He homeschooling In Spain it has been gaining a relative and modest strength in recent years. We have gone from not having documented cases or platforms that work for their recognition to see recurring cases in the press while associations of families that fight to practice education at home flourish with legal guarantees.
Meanwhile, there are some families who are contemplating it, to a greater or lesser extent, as a possibility to consider for the education of their child. Beyond the benefits and disadvantages that can be seen in each particular case, there are a series of basic recommendations for anyone in Spain who is considering this decision.
1. It is not legal, although there are several interpretations and it is not usually too persecuted
Article 4 of the Organic Law of Education specifies the ages of schooling, understanding it as the set of courses that a student follows in a teaching establishment.
"The basic education includes ten years of schooling and takes place regularly between six and sixteen years of age."
Javier Urra, a child psychologist and former Ombudsman for Children between 1996 and 2001, has already clarified that the legislation does not include homeschooling for these ages, and that a judgment of the Constitutional Court of 2010 endorses this thesis. In addition, he also warned us of the existence of a prosecutor's circular that warns that in cases of homeschooling the withdrawal of guardianship and guardianship, and, if it persists, of parental authority may be assessed.
In practice, it is not very common that there is a legal process against parents who decide to educate their children in this way. Although with a nuance, where we live. Something that takes us to the next point.
2. The autonomy in which we live also counts
Based on the multiple interviews conducted since Magnet to several families homeschoolers We can say that living in one autonomy is not the same as in another. There are those in which, today, it is easier to carry out the homeschooling, such as the Community of Madrid, Catalunya or Euskadi.
Andalusia is usually designated as the community that acts most to educate children that it detects as homeschoolers
By cons, in others such as in Andalusia, it is more delicate due to the administration's most hostile attitude when it detects a case, something that usually ends in the obligation of schooling the child.
In this sense, the best thing that a family that is considering this model can do is to locate and get in touch with other families that are already putting it into practice or their associations, who can better advise you about the reality of their place of residence .
In some cases of families in less receptive autonomies with this model have even said that there are those who consider moving to a single-family home away from the urban center. A decision resulting from the fear of being discovered by neighbors who see a child of school age too often and can lead to ugly situations. Laura Mascaró, mother of a family homeschooler, affirms that "if someone is going to live this with constant fear, maybe they should rethink the homeschooling".
3. The dossier
Image: Nik Macmillan - Unsplash. Another usual advice in families homeschoolers It is to have prepared a dossier in which the child's learning and evaluations are collected. Inside of the homeschooling there is a variant, that of unschoolers, which advocate an education without following an academic curriculum, completely autonomously. The latter may have something more complicated for the development of a dossier like this, especially in the aspect of evaluations, although you can always keep track of the skills and themes you learn.
This dossier aims at justify that there is no abandonment in the education of the child, but that an alternative method is being followed to traditional schooling in the event that an inspection of the Administration arrived. The aim is to collect evidence that shows that there has been a concern and active monitoring for the education of the child.
4. Raise in illegality
One of the most delicate issues of a family homeschooler towards your child's morale will be how to explain that you are educating against the legislation. In most cases interviewed in Magnet The answer is very similar: the child is explained that the laws are not always fair or that they are not always adapted to the times. Of course, this is an individual decision and argumentation for each family.
One question to ask for parents is how to face educating a child in illegality
This case has often been compared with that of homosexuals who could not marry in Spain until 2005, or who a few decades ago were directly persecuted during the Franco regime, when the Vague and Maleantes Law condemned them to prison for their sexual orientation.
On other occasions it has been explained that you simply never had the feeling of being committing any illegality, but that you were opting for an alternative model to the majority, although it is true that this happened with families in which the child is older and is Option was decided at the beginning of the last decade, when the available information was lower.
5. Socialization
Image: René Bernal - Unsplash. It is possibly the first point of debate that jumps like a spring as soon as a conversation about the homeschooling. What happens to the child's socialization? Are you deprived of surrounding yourself with equals and interacting with them?
Of all cases of homeschoolers interviewed in Magnet, all pointed out that alternatives have been sought at all times to avoid the isolation of the child: living in an urbanization, aiming at daily extracurricular activities or making weekly meetings with other families homeschoolers They are the most common answers.
Psychologists such as Silvia Álava, Alberto Soler or Javier Urra himself, all specialized in parenting and childhood, point out the need for an environment in which the child is socialized, both for his own social development and so that he can get to know the world through from different realities to yours: children of another race, other social classes, other backgrounds ...
6. And at 18, what?
Leolel Virosta, homeschooler avulense who today studies Cell Biology at the University of Manchester. It is another of the usual issues. What happens to children homeschoolers When do they grow up and meet the age of majority? They have lived their entire school life apart from a system that is designed to be based on bureaucracy and titles that, a priori, will not have.
Among families who educate at home there are differences in how to deal with this. There are those who live happily outside that system, which leaves the children the possibility of finishing with only jobs that do not require official qualification, either because they do not require training of any kind or because access is allowed through autonomous learning, without titles that support them.
On the other hand, there are those that do educate in view of leave the door of higher education open for tomorrow. How is this achieved? Based on the interviews conducted, this is the most common procedure.
- From the age of three, enroll the child in a US distance school.
- Perform exams and evaluation methods that accredit the level of learning.
- At age 18 (impossible before), take the exam to get the ESO free (there is no way to validate the ESO in Spain).
- Subsequently, begin the procedures to validate the Baccalaureate obtained in that American school.
- After that, it would be possible to do the Selectivity. And with it, enroll in any university, whether in person or not.
7. "It is a decision that conditions your whole life"
Yvonne Laborda, mother homeschooler, with her daughter Ainara. This phrase was pronounced by Yvonne Laborda, one of the respondents in Magnet. He explained that such a decision conditions absolutely everything for fathers or mothers: jobs, leisure, economics, social relations, and even the place of residence. Everything has to be adapted around education in the home of the child or children.
Before making the decision, you have to think about several issues and if you are willing to accept them in the very long term:
- Normally, one of the two parents has at least a reduced working day, when not a very flexible work from home. If not, the usual thing is that one of the two (if there are two) can quit his job, and therefore, his career and personal income.
- In the event that neither wants or can quit his job, another option is to hire a private teacher, something that involves a very high investment and not available to all families.
- For single parents where the parent has to work for income, the options are more complicated.
- Income, for one election or another, tends to be reduced from the moment education begins from home. And if the non-family leisure capacity of two parents is already diminished from the moment you have a child, this mode is reduced even more.
The choice or not of this model in a family, in any case, is linked to the individual circumstances of each one. And to assume that, although it is considered the best for the child, it has a considerable toll. Each will know if it compensates.
