Why did you choose to home educate? 

Harry, who was 7 at the time and very happy at school, starting asking for us to follow up on things he’d learned at school and it made us realise that the curriculum is so crammed that he wasn’t getting the time to really get involved in things that interested him. After discussions with the school, we decided to home educate him one day a week and after doing that for a little while – and really enjoying it – I started reading about home education. The more I read, the more I felt it would be a really positive thing for our family. More time for Harry to do what he enjoys doing (and learn what he enjoys learning) and more time together as a family.

Is it even legal?

Yep.

Do you have to follow the curriculum?

No. You can if you want to – there are various school-at-home methods of home education – but being able to learn whatever you like without following the curriculum is part of the joy of home ed.

What about exams?

Home educated children can take exams as individuals, i.e. you don’t have to attend school to take exams.

As for the wider question on why there’s so much focus and worry about exams, I’ve written a bit about that here. 

What about a job? Letting them do whatever they want doesn’t prepare them for doing a job they don’t want to do. 

Good. That’s part of the reason for doing this. I don’t want them to do jobs they don’t want to do. As Sark says in her book Prosperity Pie, ‘It is an accepted practice to have a job you hate, barely tolerate, rail against or are bored to death by’ but it doesn’t have to – shouldn’t! – be that way.

More questions to come. If you have any, feel free to ask in the comments – I’ll try to answer them all. 

There’s a fantastic, comprehensive, FAQ here.