Concern about 'draconian' home education laws

Nov 26 2009 By Michael Russell, Ealing Gazette

Rhea Anderson and her eight-year-old son, Damian, at a play session for home educated children at the Log Cabin, Northfield Avenue, Ealing

FOR many people the idea of home education conjures up images of a child alone at a desk, isolated from friends and normal life.

But Rhea Anderson says this could not be further from the truth and both her sons and their friends are the proof.

The 49-year-old, of East Acton Lane, East Acton, turned to the alternative method of learning after her eldest son, Rory Parsons, was badly bullied when he was 13.

Now 25, he has made a successful career out of computer game-testing and it is all thanks to home education.

Ms Anderson said: "I had to take him out of school. I felt it was a matter of life and death the bullying was so bad at the time. It was scary pulling him out, but I believed if he stayed in the school system he would've become withdrawn. I wanted to make sure he was emotionally supported even if the academic side came later.

"I used a mixture of the formal curriculum and other activities and he thrived and worked towards getting a job in the computer games industry. He organised his own projects and work experience and his employers were so impressed they took him on."

Rory's success persuaded Ms Anderson to home school her other son Damian Anderson, now eight.

She said: "Damian tried school but this worked better for him. The phrase 'home education' is a misnomer. We may do academic work in the morning but we're always out and about visiting museums, parks, academic lectures and other activities, most of them organised by groups in our massive network of home educators. There are so many activities going on every day you are spoilt for choice.

"Even if my son does not learn subjects when he is supposed to according to the curriculum, he'll catch up later, if and when he needs to, when he is ready to learn them. Kids are pushed at five or six, when many are not ready, but they catch up later very quickly when they are ready."

Although home educated children often do not achieve as many GCSEs as in the school system, Ms Anderson says this does not matter because home education helps develop confident children who learn how to prove themselves in interviews rather than rely on GCSE certificates.

She added: "There should not be a one-size fits all approach to education."