Karen Adams

It’s estimated that 10 million households, with school aged children, have had the responsibility for the child’s education suddenly thrust upon them, albeit for a temporary, unspecified duration.

Almost as suddenly, a host of resources, tips and advice have sprung up as Government, schools and businesses rush to support. Never has there been such a wealth of support, nor the lime-lighting of homeschool life.

Homeschooling is not new. In fact, HM the Queen was herself homeschooled by private tutors, her offspring being the first in the Royal line to attend school.

Jane Austen, the famous English novelist, was home educated. In her day, formal education was the prerogative of male children, and female children were largely taught at home, if at all, with special ‘finishing schools’ available for older girls, providing the skills and knowledge deemed to be requirements of successful home-making.

But this pandemic, and the temporary homeschooling that the nation has been thrust into, is not that. And so, I’d like to find the common threads from the various routes into homeschooling, in order to share some tips.