thegreenparent May 2, 2024 4 minutes read

I’m a Teacher, but my Children Won’t be Going to School!

I want my sons to be able to climb, run, move and play as much as they need to rather than be forced to sit still and write before they are developmentally able to.

Tags: alternative education, home education, writing competition

Photograph of a young child on a beach, playing in the sand and looking pensive — We want to preserve our children’s childhoods, letting them be young, free and playful for as long as possible.

Sian Kirwan is a teacher but doesn't want a mainstream education system for her children. Here she explains why she's chosen to home educate

It is September again and I have a new cohort of children to inspire, teach and connect with. I am feeling full of new school year energy and enthusiasm as I imagine being the ‘Miss Honey’ of these children’s lives, getting to know each of their individual needs, ideas and personalities, enamoured with the idea of being a nurturing and inspiring teacher.

Then the first set of assignments begin, the children in my mind begin to get grouped into low, middle and high achievers and I sit down in the pupil progress meetings where a few children are selected to be my ‘focus’ children because they are not where they ‘need’ to be and we ‘need’ to hit a certain percentage as a school to keep the school afloat.

And so it begins… the yearly cycle, of pressure, stress and throwing every possible resource and intervention at focused children who just become data and numbers. Sigh. I am in the system, and that’s exactly why I don’t want my children to be in the system.