New Delhi: Climbing trees, making lunch and choosing subjects to study, a learning day for Ravleen Kaur Three Children – one girl and two boys. These children, aged 7-10 years, have never attended a formal school.
Kaur lives in a village in Gujarat is one of a small group of parents in the country who are homeschooling or, as they prefer to call it, “unschooling” their children. According to him, the group has been growing ever since the pandemic, which led to the closure of schools and opting for online lessons.
Homeschooling or unschooling is a method of learning where children learn at home instead of being enrolled in a school for formal education. While some parents follow a set curriculum, others let the child drive the process by deciding what they want to learn next.
Another emerging trend is parents of older children opting out of regular schools for purely practical reasons. Earlier, only people who did not want to tie their children down to a formal system of learning chose to homeschool them. But The recent reduction in curriculum by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), which designs the school curriculum, has prompted parents of older children to choose this route.
While there is no data available on how many children are being homeschooled in the countrySome of the parents ThePrint spoke to said they pulled their child out of school in Class 10 to prepare for engineering (JEE) or medical entrance (NEET) exams. These children attend online coaching classes only for this purpose, spending the rest of the time in self-study.
Such children are either enrolled to take the examination at the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) or sent to ‘dummy schools’, which are traditional institutions in which attendance is not compulsory, but students are allowed to appear for the examination Will be
Take the case of Dubey, who moved to Delhi from Nashik earlier this year. Kavita Dubey, an engineer who quit her job to homeschool her 15-year-old daughter Divya, told ThePrint over phone, “When we came to know about the shortfall in NCERT syllabus, we decided not to send our daughter to school. She is in 10th standard and wants to give NEET later.
“She is enrolled in a school from where she will appear for her board exams but attendance there is not mandatory. She studies for NEET through online tutorials,
University Grants Commission (UGC), in credit structure Free This April for schools and higher education institutions, recommended That Homeschooling and Other Options learning methods accepted as formal education.
Experts in this field also recognize the benefits of homeschooling, but acknowledge that its overall impact has yet to be assessed.
Read also: Congress to BJP, Ambedkar cartoon to 2002 riots, political ax running in NCERT syllabus
‘Learning at your own pace’
Kaur said she was part of a WhatsApp group with fellow homeschooling parents, and her ranks were rising. “The number was around 60 people before the pandemic, but has gone up to 150 recently. I get a lot of questions from parents asking me how my husband and I are doing to homeschool our kids,” she said.
Some parents also see homeschooling as a good way to save money. He said that his savings, from school fees alone, range between Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh annually.
Santosh Sharma, Education Consultant based in Bhopal, Opted to homeschool her son after the pandemic. He said that he had been toying with the idea for some time but the pandemic provided an opportunity for it.
his son Jay, now at the level of a grade 7 student, has been homeschooled for the past two years. “My son learns at his own pace… If one day he feels like studying only English, he will read books and poetry and I will give him tasks like reciting poetry. Someday, if he feels like studying maths, he will do so. There is no stipulated period and time for that,” said Sharma.
“I was not satisfied with what was being taught in her school and with the pandemic and online learning, things got worse as I realized that her learning levels were going down. That’s when I decided to take matters into my own hands.”
“Both my wife (a preschool teacher) and I home-school him. Different homeschoolers have their own methods of teaching, some follow a curriculum, I don’t. My focus is on enhancing their skills and basic concepts.”
Another parent, Arpita Dutta from Gurugramwho has a five-year-old daughter, said, “The pandemic has made parents realize that they can teach their children at home with online learning tools and lots of other aids, provided they have the time”.
“I’m a college teacher And I know how schools work. I make time To teach my daughter… I don’t like the way the school teaches young children and alternative schools with experiential learning are very expensive,” she said.
What about social skills?
However, school is not just about learning to read and write. It is also about making friends, learning social skills and developing a sense of teamwork. So, how do these parents make sure their kids, Learn these skills, deprived of the social interaction that schools provide?
Sharma said that his son goes to play hockey and learns guitar. These are activity classes where he interacts with other children.
Parents who have never enrolled their children in school say co-curricular activities are the best way to learn skills they will otherwise miss out on. In fact, some parents attach great importance to what their children want to learn.
Pallavi Lotlikar from Pune Said that his family kept moving from one place to another every few years.So that our children get a chance to know more about different cultures.
“We came from Pune to Jaipur to facilitate the change for our children. Here my daughter started learning tennisSo we are staying for some more time so that he can complete his lessons… We enjoy the freedom that comes with not sending our kids to school and they enjoy it too.
Lotlikar, an architectural consultant, and her husband, who took early retirement, have not been sending their children, a 13-year-old girl and a 16-year-old boy, to school for nine years.
He said that allowing children to read at their own pace gives them confidence and enables them to make their own decisions.
“We teach our kids how to handle their finances. We give them a fixed amount of pocket money and let them use it on their own. They start saving money from a very young age.”
allowing students to ‘think for themselves’
Vivek Dutta, a researcher in the field of education at the University of Delhi, said that homeschooling as an idea works only if it is implemented properly.
“I think many parents these days want to homeschool their children but are unable to because of time constraints,” he said. “Schools have a set way of teaching kids and don’t really allow them to think for themselves, and this is where homeschooling or unschooling tries to break down the barrier.”
The flip side, however, is that “we really don’t know what these kids will be like once they go to college, where they have to attend classes”, he said. “We don’t have enough data or case studies to study this,” Dutta said.
Leena Ashar, founder of Dreamtime Learning School, an online school for pre-primary to middle-aged children, said in an email that “Homeschooling has many benefits, including personalized instruction, flexible scheduling, and greater control over a child’s learning”.
“Additionally, the central government has recently announced a new policy emphasizing the importance of personalized learning and flexible learning, which may further boost the homeschooling trend in the country,” she said.
“Children may be missing out on some of the social benefits of going to school. However, homeschooling provides unique socialization opportunities, such as participating in homeschooling groups or extracurricular activities,” she said.
“Technology (also) can help connect homeschooling students with peers around the world, offering opportunities for social interaction and collaboration.”
(Edited by Smriti Sinha)