The rise of flexi-schooling

supersized with elementary schools, overcrowded classrooms and the pressure on places in primary schools, some parents choose to educate their children at home for the hand of the week

It's Friday morning Arzu Tahsin

terraced house in east London and her daughter and three other classmates will train at the bottom line of the stairs Before going to a studio on the first floor, where to find ILS table served with a sheet of thick paper. When children have scrambled to the flesh, Tahsin Supports the lesson: "Today we will do something called step book."

displays

One That She Made Her Daughter Previously, a book of colored cards to the course of this year sequence biographical detail on each page - likes, dislikes, favorite foods - and the chirp with children enthusiastically. "One day, my room was so messy that no one could it tidy," said Bea, five, referring to one of the "do not like" - toy storage.

"I Love Sushi," his classmate, Nick aussi five, report and Bea said one of his favorite foods is "beans with oil and vinegar," before they get to work with cards, scissors and glue.

It's like running a school

Tahsin micro-home. This purpose one day a week Happens. Other For the oven, all children have their formal courses at the local school, Shacklewell Primary. Theys, with two other families in school Sami, are involved in an experiment called "flexi-schooling", so to get out of school for students from this week. It has existed for years is the goal difficult to know how common it is normal do not have the government maintains the numbers of Ofsted. Purpose of the request for flexible working from employees increases - and as a baby boom puts increasing pressure on schools primary - it is likely that more parents are starting to think about it.

Shacklewell parents withdraw their children from school on the same day each week on Friday to minimize disruption. Theys sometimes collaborate on a target price often spend more time tutoring their children one-on-one before taking them on a trip with an educational purpose.

For Matt Anstee, a lawyer, he is to give the history of STIs, Satch, five years, the time to pursue a passion. "We spend the first couple of hours at home, make a single reading and math, which is similar to what the school is able to be more focused and responsive to," said Anstee. "Then we go to something like the Natural History Museum, ET interests you up. It is interested in.. Things like evolution or the body, so it is possible to develop this."

Tahsin, editorial director for fiction editor at Weidenfeld & Nicolson, spent Friday taking his daughter Esme to see the Gerhard Richter exhibition at the Tate Modern, a piano recital and even - for half-term - the 9 / 11 Memorial Museum in New York. Everything in New York aside, much like how the middle class most parents in large cities spend their Saturday. Purpose of the flexi-grandchildren say the goal is to teach.

Anstee said. "It's not just hanging out my feelings about this course is that it is" learning to learn "- You can not just learn in school, we learn from various sources, not not just your parents. "he does not believe the lack of children lose one day a week while they are still in year 1. That accepts the goal Familiar HE will work hard to ensure they are at the speed with the program in later years.

More controversial

is proof that it is a very middle-class group of children waiting for parents whose diverse and difficult inner-city, school. Shacklewell, which is classified as "satisfactory" by Ofsted, is greater than the average primary school children where many speak French as a second language. The majority of the 392 pupils on roll ICT are of Turkish origin, African or Caribbean heritage, accuracy accurate reflection of the ethnic mix in the area of ??ICT. Above Average On A proportion of children eligible for free school meals, while about 10% of students of refugees or asylum seekers are families.

An inspection

largely positive earlier this year, noted that - while there are many out-of-hours school activities and travel -. "Dealt only with basic skills" of the recovery is

The six families

Shacklewell They say the value for the sense of community diversity and instill in their children, and ICT education. Purpose of partners Anstee, Ally Scott, the school social and agrees that racial mixing is a factor in the education of their children's decision was at home Friday. "If education is valuable found extremely flexible in our local school where the demographics offer a particularly diverse range of challenging needs and abilities of a class of a teacher of great ... How does the child's particular needs is each time one of 30 very different - linguistically, culturally, emotionally -? other children '

None of the parents wants

engage in home schooling full-time and in any case, fans of They Are comprehensive education.

Laura Gray, Nick's mother and a professor of history at the University of London, said: "I really want Nick to be part of a historic community of his peers, learn to s' hearing because he is an only child. , Is especially important. And I love the area here, the love of the fantastic mix of kids in school get ET. I could not really recreate. "

The advantage of flexi-schooling of children is of interest that can be encouraged beyond the curriculum that focused on literacy and numeracy, parents argued. Believe Theys Feare the school they tried to set up alternative years - an effort to tighten their children one day a week - when their approach is intended to supplement IS.

"One of the things we have done is to have to focus on individual countries," Gray said. "Last week we focused on France, we made pancakes, French, Some Talk visiting a French friend who happened to be, looked up some facts about France, last week my partner has not fire, one thing about Japan -. They looked at the Japanese words, some have writing brush, then made sushi for lunch. "

Activities for

money should not be an obstacle goal Some parents need courage to negotiate an agreement with the school and a family income of one parent is enough to be able to take Fridays off.

Gray said: "We are very fortunate to have at least one parent works part-time form makes it quite different from the week because we got it Friday means that we can approach the weekend .. differently. Everyone is tired, but much less pressure Delivers. "

• In a large urban elementary school, flexi-schooling allows parents believe their children are not only swallowed up in a crowd. But it has also proved successful in a small town HAD oz primary While few students has almost disappeared. Hollinsclough is a Church of England primary school in a village in the Peak District pretty name of Sami, south of Buxton about thousands oven. A few years ago, he just had the students on the five reels STIs. Then, at the beginning of the last school year, flexi-schooling and Introduced experienced a surge in pent-up demand of parents to educate their children at home who were wanted to reinforce this view with one or two school days.
• For
• Many new student, the school year and had been an unhappy experience their parents had begun to teach at home because they refused to go.

The head teacher, Janette Mountford-Lees, said: "For many people it is flexi-school as a last resort if their children with such a bad experience at school - they were emotionally bruised by themselves. educational experience. Theys, such as small school ethos. They want to educate at home, drinking just want a little help if their children have not missed something. '

If a government-commissioned review of home education in 2009 urged local authorities to "extend and make available the chances of flexi-schooling," Many parents find it difficult to convince headteachers Let 'Em do, Mountford-Lees said.

Children from a radius of cam line - was one shuttle Sutton Coldfield, a suburb of Birmingham, because they can not find local leaders who are willing to Flexi-school.

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