Key Highlights:
• Record Rise in Homeschooling
• Family-centered Approach
• Notable shift in Educational Attitudes
As back-to-school preparations intensify, it seems that there are more and more students in Australia who would not be heading back to classrooms. According to the country’s homeschooling estimate, about 45,000 students were homeschooled last year. While the system seems to be less expensive, experts consider it is the attitude towards education and parenting that would make it the reason for this trend.
In the regional city of Queensland, in Bundaberg, Lumby readies herself for another homeschooling year with her four children-four, six, nine, and 13 years old. The house is more than enough space for all of them. Desks, workbooks, and overflowing stationery shine everywhere, waiting for the new school year.
“That’s becoming more mainstream now,” said Leon Lumby, one of the dads, as he made part of a homeschooling network in the Bundaberg region. This set of parents organizes lots of activities such as sports, dancing, and nature explorations so that the children learn interacting with other kids. Leon teaches health and fitness classes to nurture both education and social bonds for the kids.
Aggressive growth in registrations for homeschooled students has been recorded in Queensland over the last four years. In 2020, the record was 4,300, but in 2023, the number had reached 11,300. The primary school registration increased by 122% while their secondary school counterparts increased by 221% between the years.
Parents began to home-school essentially as a consequence of this alteration in the thinking pertaining to education and childcare Rebecca English, who is a lecturer in Education at Queensland University of Technology said that, “Attitudes have changed about our approach toward institutional schooling. She continued more that an increased number of family units got used to elastic scheduling regarding children’s modes and schedules of learning.
Kelly Lumby is another home-schooled who says, her children often complained that, they wish that this traditional class system had some extra time that focuses on an individual child. And she could just not do it. “I love that we have a big family homeschooling together always in each other’s space, noting closeness encouraging in homeschooling.”.
