Advice for Home Educators

School Can’t – HEN and the Senate Inquiry

By Pavlina McMaster A note about the language used: we believe that children who struggle with school attendance are genuinely unable to attend school without outward difficulties, rather than it being a willful choice. For this reason, the term ‘School Can’t’ is used in place of ‘School Refusal’ throughout this article. Going to school is an expectation that society puts on children and parents.

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2022 HEN Survey Results

HEN surveys provide the best Australian data on the Who, How and Why of home education. Since 2015, this data has proven enormously useful in accurately representing our community both to government and in the media e.g. by exploding a myth of widespread non-registration.

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Advice for Home Educators

School Can’t

If your child has School Can’t, and you are looking at other options, then you are in the right place. HEN is here to support parents, to help you meet the needs of your individual child, and to help you find community. Nobody would suggest that home education alone will magically make everything better, but recent HEN surveys of School Can’t families showed that

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HEN News

Victorian Home Education Up 66%

Figures tabled in parliament this week show a huge growth in home education. (Up by a massive 66% from last year) We’ve graphed the rise over time using figures from VRQA Annual Reports going back to 2008. These figures come as no surprise to HEN,  as they reflect the rise in enquiries that we have seen this year. Our support team has been busy

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HEN News

The Rise and Rise of Home Education

Nationally, the number of students registered for Home Education has more than doubled in the last ten years. HEN’s Kirsty James was interviewed on ABC radio about the rise on 2 February.  The annual reports of state regulatory bodies provide registration figures as at 30 June each year, and strong growth can be seen across each jurisdiction:   Students Registered for Home Education Date

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HEN News

Home Ed Survey Results 2021

HEN surveys provide the best Australian data on the Who, How and Why of home education. Since 2015, this data has proven enormously useful in accurately representing our community both to government and in the media e.g. by exploding a myth of widespread non-registration. One of the most interesting of this year’s results was that home educators become less structured over time. There has

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Research

2020 Survey Results

HEN surveys the home education community to help shape our future work. While we operate mainly in Victoria, our stats can be useful to home educators anywhere in Australia. HEN works hard for the home ed community. If you’re not yet a member, please consider joining. Membership is only $25 per year including digital Otherways Magazine (or $45 with printed copies). With 1339 responses,

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Home Ed Styles

Unschooling Works, Says the Emerging Evidence

By Arthur Grant We often notice how little prompting kids require to learn outside the classroom. Simply setting them free in nature does wonders for their curious spirits, as each overturned rock and never-before-seen leaf piques new interest and inquiries. Their instinct is to explore and learn, and structure isn’t always needed for learning to be meaningful and beneficial. The term “unschooling” puts a

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HEN News

2019 HEN Survey

HEN surveys the home education community to help shape our future work. While we operate mainly in Victoria, our stats can be useful to home educators anywhere in Australia. HEN works hard for the home ed community. If you’re not yet a member, please consider joining. Membership is only $25 per year including digital Otherways Magazine (or $45 with printed copies). 2019 results: and

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Home Ed Alumni

The Effectiveness of Home Education

By Sue Wight Whether we home educate from the start or as a result of school problems, we observe our kids learning firsthand. Most of the time, that’s all the evidence we need. But many of us have occasional doubts and have relatives who want to know if we are limiting the children’s future. Governments and media also want solid data on home education

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Research

Home Education Outcomes

The following information is available about the academic outcomes of home education in Australia: The education departments of three states are known to have examined educational outcomes of home educated students through NAPLAN testing etc. Those studies have only been released via freedom of Information requests. NSW BOSTES study on NSW NAPLAN, Year 10 and Year 12 results students being home educated plus those

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HEN 2018 Survey of Vic Home Ed

The Home Education Network (HEN) seeks to inspire, inform and support home educators. We also advocate politically and represent home education in the media when required. HEN surveys the home education community to help shape our future work. HEN works hard for the home ed community. If you’re not yet a member, please consider joining. Membership is only $25 per year including digital Otherways

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Home Ed Alumni

Handbook of Home Educated Alumni

Home education began in Victoria with half a dozen parents in the 1970s With the first generation of home educated students now adults, we set out to find out where they are and what they are doing. Some have entered school, some have gone straight to further education or careers. They have taken a variety of pathways and are living proof that home education

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Education Commentary

Socialisation: The Hidden Agenda

By John Barratt-Peacock It is the most boring of all the objections to home education and seemingly the most stupid since, on all the evidence, home educated children are the best socialised. So why do they do it and why do we buy into it? Within 30 minutes of my taking my daughter out of school the usual ignorant bully from the education department,

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Research

Homeschooling Works

The past twenty years has seen a phenomenal rise in home education across the world and the general public’s familiarity with it has moved from almost complete ignorance to one of widespread, if largely uninformed, awareness. This change has been stimulated by, and reflected in, heightened media interest with feature articles on home education appearing in national magazines, newspapers and on television and radio.

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A Summary of Australian Research

There has always been a percentage of Australian children educated at home. This was quite common in the nineteenth century with one historian stating that 19% of children were being taught at home in 1871. Summary of Australian and New Zealand Research on Home Education. maintained by Glenda Jackson B.Ed, MEdSt and PhD. Here we take a look at some of the major studies.  

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Home Education and Children with Disabilities and Diverse Learning Needs

By Susan Wight The research on home educating children with disabilities is very positive, showing advantages both academically and socially. An American study by Stephen Duvall is one of the most thorough to date. It concluded that home education offers more of the kind of education that children with disabilities need most and that they benefit greatly from the individualised attention that home education

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Education Commentary

Children educated at home don’t learn like they do in school

Ockam’s Razor, 1996 Robyn Williams: Bertrand Russell never went to school; it didn’t appear to do him much harm either, as he still got to Trinity College Cambridge, revolutionised 20th century mathematics, won the Nobel Prize for Literature and did quite a bit for philosophy and politics as well. Avoiding school was commonplace for the British aristocracy. But does it have a place in

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Education Commentary

Informal Learning

by Alan Thomas Infants start learning informally from (or before?) birth, mainly through interaction with the mother or other caregivers. Part of this is learning how to behave in culturally appropriate ways, e.g., how to deal with emotions, how to interact with others in the family and wider community, and the acquisition of cultural values and attitudes. This alone requires a vast amount of

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