Anxiety is the most common reason why parents choose to take pupils out of school
Steve Bladon has been a headteacher for a decade. Yet when he found himself temporarily home educating his 11-year-old daughter, who had such severe anxiety that she couldn’t leave the house, he admits he felt “absolutely lost”.
“Initially we had no idea what to do,” he said. “All we knew was that she needed time and space, so we weren’t compounding her anxiety.”
Continue reading...Review of serious safeguarding failures finds young people from abusive environments ‘less visible’ to agencies
Children who grow up in neglectful or abusive environments are safer attending school than being educated at home, according to a review of serious safeguarding failures in England in which six children died and 35 were harmed in one year.
The report, by the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel, emphasised that while home education was not a safeguarding risk, it found that vulnerable children were “less visible” to safeguarding agencies than those regularly in school.
Continue reading...Fears over ‘forced exclusion’ of vulnerable pupils whose families will be too scared to send them to school
The lifting of Covid restrictions in England will lead to a further rise in home schooling and the “forced exclusion” of immunosuppressed pupils whose families will be too scared to send them to school, an academy trust leader has warned.
Steve Chalke, the founder of the Oasis academy trust of 52 schools, said the scrapping of twice-weekly testing in school communities and the legal requirement to self-isolate after a positive test was “a huge gamble”.
Continue reading...Worldwide shift to flexible and home working in pandemic has led to rise of new kind of backpacker
Samantha Scott does not miss her daily commutes in London, particularly “the dread of having to wake up and get on the tube, and heading into work sweaty and flustered. I’m still waking up at 6 or 7am, but I’m able to go for a walk on the beach before I start work.”
When she and her partner Chris Cerra arrive with their luggage in a new city, they can easily be mistaken for tourists. But they are part of a new generation of “digital nomads” who hop from country to country to live and work.
Continue reading...The pandemic exposed gender inequality, shattering the fragile jigsaw of support that allowed women with children to work. Radical action is necessary to prevent women’s rights backsliding a generation
“It is so hard, I cannot describe it.”
“I burned out, completely.”
Continue reading...After nearly a year of disrupted learning, primary school children in the UK have missed key milestones - as well as their friends. What will be the long term cost?
• In pictures: pets, plants and cuddly toys: a child’s eye view of home schooling
It is fair to say that Wells, eight, does not enjoy remote learning. “It’s horrible,” he tells a group of fellow year 4 children over a video call. “I can see my friends, but I can’t talk to them.” Emily, nine, finds home schooling tough, too: “It’s really, really boring. I’m sad. But I like being able to play with my guinea pigs.” Flora, also nine, agrees lockdown learning isn’t all bad: “It’s fun solving maths problems with my granny on Skype, and I get to have yummy snacks, like chocolate biscuits, all day.”
But they would all prefer to be at school. “There’s less distraction,” says Betty, who has two younger siblings and is expected to work independently in the afternoons. “When you’re in class, you can talk to your teacher and ask for help,” Ainhoa says. “Privately,” Wells adds. “You get their individual attention.” The children talk about feeling frustrated, stressed and even exhausted at the end of the school day. “Sometimes I just want to scrunch up the paper into pieces,” Ainhoa admits. “I really miss playing with my friends in the playground,” Flora says.
Continue reading...