Why we homeschool, the back story.

Louise's catapult she made during a science lesson.

 I've been homeschooling Louise for what seems like forever but it's actually been just over a year. When I met Malcolm he told me that he had been home schooled, I was Impressed his Mum had done a fantastic job with teaching him and he really academically wise was just as smart or smarter than the average guy that went through the school system. My only other experience I had of knowing someone who was home schooled, was a friend that I had when I was 9 whose mum took her out of school to home school her, I  didn't have the greatest time at school and remember asking my Mum the same evening I found out she was being home schooled if I could stay at home and be home schooled as well. She told me something along the lines that she wasn't clever enough to teach me. So,off I went back to school the next day and my friend came back to the school 6 weeks later telling us all that her Mum didn't have the time to teach her ?!

I received a letter from the  local council  for Adam in the Easter before his 4th  birthday asking me to fill out a form telling them which school I wanted him to attend in the coming September, so I filled it out with the preferred school and sent it back ( we actually moved between the Easter and that September and he ended up going to a different school).

Home economics - Making flapjacks.

Within a few weeks of him starting school we had comments from his teacher in the playground at lunchtime when I picked him up.

Why wasn't he ( a boy who just turned 4 that July) interested in writing his name ( in a book over and over again for 10 minutes or more every day), he should be?  Why is he just wanting to play and not sit down and do his worksheets?

After about 6 weeks we were called in for a parent's consultation with the head and his year teacher and found out that they had ( behind our backs) done an IQ test  and according to them the score he got meant that he would struggle ever to do anything. I burst into tears, Malcolm more level headed just sat there quietly angry at the picture they were painting of a boy who had these fantastic ideas and who was able to grab a variety of different concepts. We promptly after that moved him to a better school, which we for the majority of the part was happy with but it still took him til about 7 or 8 years old to really be ready for learning in lessons.