Will my homeschooled children succeed in life?

“The most effective and least destructive way to help a child .. is to do everything possible to help her fall in love with what she is doing , to pay less attention to how successful she was ( or likely to be ) and show more interest in the task … Encourage more , judge less , and love always “ Alfie Kohn

A few days ago , a parent asked on one of the Facebook groups whether homeschooled children are at a disadvantage for not taking SAts at year 2 and year 6 . Of course , I had to reply and give my two cents on how useless these exams are anyway and considering the fact that in some countries children start school at 7 ( U.K. equivalent year 2) , other counties like England choose to test their children at that age… But , this blog post is not about SATs , but rather on something that is often prevalent in our society and the view that homeschooled children are somehow at a disadvantage for choosing a path that is not mainstream and that they miss out on things . The thing , is though , home education is not a guarantee of success just as public/ private school is not guarantee of success. In fact there are no guarantees. Full stop. But I think it’s important to emphasise that home schooling will not put your children at disadvantage compared to other people ..

Ultimately , your children will succeed or fail to the extent they are motivated and have confidence that they will succeed . This really has to do with how your children were educated and nothing to do with where they are educated , because the atmosphere of the educational environment can make a difference . Whether your children go to school or not , I do strongly believe that motivation for success comes from the values our children learn at home and in the community , about hard work and persistence and having goals to work towards to and ultimately an overall life purpose .