Alternative education: study when you want. Alternative education systems Combating the lack of socialization

About what you need to transfer your child to a family form of education

Remember Huckleberry Finn's famous line from Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer: "I won't let going to school interfere with my education"? It can be said that it illustrates the position of those parents who have decided to educate their children in the form of family education. There are more and more such parents every year, including in Tatarstan, where family education is becoming fashionable. Realnoe Vremya decided to study this phenomenon. In the first article, we will consider what family education is, according to Russian law, and how much it costs parents.

What is family education?

D Homeschooling is the oldest form of education. It existed long before the appearance of the school in the form in which we know it. For centuries, homeschooling was the only way to get an education. Wealthy families hired teachers, tutors who introduced children to various sciences, while poor families coped on their own: parents passed on household skills to children, a craft that they themselves owned. Moreover, the role of a home teacher was not limited only to the transfer of information, they were also mentors, educated their wards. For example, in ancient Greece, a teacher discussed with his students (and only with young men) questions of morality, philosophy, and religion.

In Russia, until the reign of Peter the Great, literacy was studied according to church books, and only Russian teachers could give education. Peter the Great strengthened the position of secular culture in the state, and for several centuries admiration for the Western way of life among the highest circles brought German and French tutors into fashion.

Last e revolution, the situation changed dramatically. In accordance with Part 4 of Article 43 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, basic general education is compulsory. And it should be provided to children by parents or persons replacing them. At the same time, the law provides for various forms of education, taking into account the needs and capabilities of the individual - both within the walls of the school and outside it. Outside the school, education and training is provided only in two forms: in the family form and in the form of self-education.

It should be immediately clear that in our article we are not talking about the form of home education when it comes to children in need of long-term treatment, disabled children who, for health reasons, cannot attend school. In this case, the school, with the consent of the parents, takes upon itself the organization of the educational process at home: it provides free textbooks, reference books, develops an individual curriculum, provides teachers, and conducts appraisal of the student. Parents are only creating conditions for homeschooling.

In Russia, for several centuries, admiration for the Western way of life among the highest circles has brought German and French tutors into fashion. Lithograph reproduction from cheloveche.ru

In the case of family education, the parents take full responsibility for the education of the child. As Realnoe Vremya was informed by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Tatarstan, the main points regulating the receipt of education in the family form of education are spelled out in the letter of the Russian Ministry of Education and Science dated November 15, 2013 No. NT-1139/08 and in the current legislation in the field of education. The letter says that when choosing a family form of education, parents (legal representatives) are obliged to take full responsibility for organizing the educational process of the child so that he can acquire knowledge, skills, skills, gain experience in activities, develop his abilities, learn to apply knowledge in everyday life. life, and was also motivated to receive education throughout his life. Parents must ensure that the child receives a volume of knowledge that is not lower than the norm established by the federal standard (FGOS).

What needs to be done to switch to family education?

You can switch to the form of family education at any time - from the 1st to the 11th grade. At the same time, by the decision of the parents and taking into account the opinion of the child, it is possible to change the form of education at any stage of education - for example, to return to school.

If you decide to transfer your child to family education, then you need to submit an appropriate application to the local government of the municipal district or city district in whose territory you live. You can choose the school where the child will pass the intermediate or state final certification, or ask to be assigned to some place. At the request of the parents, such an educational organization can be determined for the entire period of general education, for the period of passing a specific attestation, or for the period of one academic year. If your child is already enrolled in a school, you can apply to the Principal to transfer to family education.

At the same time, you can organize your child's education in part-time or completely part-time form, that is, you can agree with the school that you will attend some lessons at your discretion.

Children in family education can pass the intermediate and state final certification at the selected school for free. An educational organization must independently develop and approve the certification procedure, and this regulation must be posted in the public domain on the school website. And the procedure for passing certification should take into account the opinion of parents, based on the pace and sequence of studying the educational material by the child.

Parents and students do not have the right to demand from the school when and in what form it will conduct certification, but you can choose the school, the timing and form of certification in which you are satisfied. However, it is important to note that passing an intermediate certification by a child who receives education in the form of family education is his right, not an obligation. That is, he is not required to pass an intermediate certification up to the 9th grade, when he can pass the final certification and receive a certificate of basic general and secondary general education.

The school must provide children receiving family education with textbooks and teaching aids. Photo bibliokniga115.blogspot.ru

The school where you take your final assessment is not responsible for the quality of education. She is responsible only for organizing and conducting intermediate and final certification, as well as for ensuring the appropriate academic rights of the student.

Children in family education have all academic rights. They, along with other students, have the right to develop their creative abilities and interests, including participation in competitions, olympiads, including the All-Russian Olympiad for schoolchildren, exhibitions, reviews, including official sports competitions, and other public events. In addition, children in family education can count on receiving socio-pedagogical and psychological assistance, free psychological, medical and pedagogical correction.

The school must provide children receiving family education with textbooks and teaching aids. If a child experiences difficulties in mastering the general education program, local authorities must provide him with psychological, pedagogical, medical and social assistance.

Figures: Tatarstan

Accounting for children who receive family education is not carried out by schools, but by local self-government bodies of municipal districts and urban districts. “Due to the fact that the number of such children is constantly changing, statistics on children receiving general education in a family form are kept only at the level of educational authorities of municipal districts and urban districts,” said Alsu Mukhametova, head of the press service of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Tatarstan. However, she noted two main trends. Firstly, the number of children receiving general education in the family form is constantly growing in Tatarstan. Secondly, the maximum number of such children is observed in large cities, namely in Kazan and Naberezhnye Chelny. So, in Chelny, 23 children study at family education, in Kazan - 148. At the same time, she notes, the reasons that determine the choice of this form of mastering the educational program are very diverse.

The Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Tatarstan did not inform us about the progress of such students, however, they noted that “not all parents (legal representatives) can provide high quality education when it is received in a family form.”

The number of children receiving general education in a family form is constantly growing in Tatarstan. Photo aktanysh.tatarstan.ru

“You can’t do without the help of tutors at home education”

Natalya Resnyanskaya, Candidate of Pedagogical Sciences, director of the private educational institution "Egoza" Psychological and Pedagogical Center for Early Childhood Development, noted that most often parents decide to transfer their child to family education when they realize that teaching methods in a mass school today do not allow the child get the required level of education. We will not dwell in detail on the shortcomings of modern general education schools, which are noted by parents. In short, this is the low professionalism of teachers, the compulsory system of homework, the depressing system of assessments, the not always friendly atmosphere among classmates, where children adopt bad habits from each other, etc. And plus, he gets an individual approach, which the school now, unfortunately, only manages to position, but not implement in any way,” Resnyanskaya told Realnoe Vremya.

As a rule, at the elementary school level, parents take care of their children themselves. Most often, this is done by a mother who does not work anywhere and can devote time to children.

“Units of parents have a broad outlook. At the initial stage, they cope, but then physics, chemistry go on, and the parent is not always an expert in this field. Therefore, home education is indispensable without the help of tutors. I know cases when two or three families unite and take a tutor together - for example, in physics, ”says Resnyanskaya.

Thus, the resources that parents who transfer children to family education should have at their disposal are not limited only by time.

“An hour of a tutor costs from 500 to 1,000 rubles. In the early years, you can hire one teacher in mathematics, reading and Russian - it will cost 15 thousand per month. If you take senior classes, you need at least 20 thousand rubles to get a home education. But this is only taking into account the fact that the parent takes on part of the program - that is, history, social science and other humanitarian disciplines. To help parents - the Internet, and if a parent has critical thinking, he will be able to give the child information so that he passes the exams, ”says Resnyanskaya.

However, full-time education in a comprehensive school is not cheap. According to parents, if we count all the costs for repairs, security, additional needs, food, as well as for the same tutors that most of the children even attending school resort to, then the amount is about the same.

Children need not only to gain knowledge, but also to socialize in the children's team, Guzel Udachina believes. Photo by Roman Khasaev

“I wouldn’t choose this form of education for my children”

The Commissioner for Children's Rights in the Republic of Tatarstan Guzel Udachina, in an interview with Realnoe Vremya, noted that the family form of education is now provided for by federal law because it leaves the parent the right to decide what is good and what is bad for their children - the state provides parents with different opportunities and methods: “Today we stand on the position of the presumption of conscientiousness in the performance of parental duties by parents, that a parent cannot a priori act contrary to the interests of his child, that he knows better how best to organize his education.”

“However, I do not support this practice, although it is perfectly legal. I would not choose such a form of education for my children, - says Udachina. - Parents need to think about the fact that children need not only to gain knowledge, but also to socialize in the children's team. After all, then they will have to live in society and build relationships with the guys, you need to be able to make friends. From the point of view of the interests of the child, it is better to organize his normal full-time education on a common basis. I am against, first of all, because socialization, immersion in society, communication with peers is violated.

Supporters of family education notice that the issue of socialization is solved by the fact that children study in studios, circles, and sections in their free time. “He does not find himself in a domestic vicious circle. He has a wide social circle. As a rule, such parents travel a lot, and the child does not just learn about the world around him from textbooks, but on the contrary, they give him the opportunity to see the world with his own eyes, touch it, look at it. I know several such families. And from the point of view of the usefulness of life, such children are not deprived of anything. Because the quality of the knowledge gained does not depend on the amount of time spent at school,” says Resnyanskaya. In her opinion, even 20 years ago it was possible to argue and say that “the school gives something different that family education cannot give”: “But now the school, unfortunately, has lost the educational function that it used to have. If I had free time, I would certainly take my children to family education. Now my children go to a private school. And although there are small classes, the crisis of teaching staff is evident today.”

However, supporters of family education agree that it is far from being for everyone. And it's not just the financial costs. Not all parents are able to organize the education of their children themselves, moreover, most parents treat the school as a “luggage office”, where they “surrender” the child for a certain period and where they come only when he has done something bad. “Thinking parents who are interested not only in education, but also in general in the mental and emotional health of the child, go to family education. They are interested in education in its original sense - so that the child retains the desire to explore the world, learn and develop throughout his life. And I can say by the example of my friends: their children easily pass exams, they have a fairly broad outlook, and they can easily cope with the curriculum, ”Resnyanskaya believes.

“This is the normal form. This is when parents are not satisfied with schools in general or their own specifically and begin to teach the child themselves. This is especially good for small children. I know a family with seven children, and the parents themselves educate the children at the elementary school level. And later, children come to our school normal - cheerful, happy, not clogged with an ordinary school. Family education is a flexible form that allows parents to participate in their child's education if they disagree in any way with the concept of a particular school that is close to home, or with teachers. You know, we have a lot of problems in our schools - the salaries of teachers are low, the competition is small, not all good students of pedagogical institutes will go to school, ”a Russian and Finnish teacher, founder and director of the school“ Specialized Olympiad and Scientific center "(Sun) Pavel Shmakov.

Family education is a flexible form that allows parents to participate in the education of their child, notes Pavel Shmakov. Photo shraibikus.com

Shmakov noted that a form of family education exists in many countries of the world: “Just a few years ago, there was no such form in Germany. German teachers came to one of the international conferences with an appeal to help in order for this to appear in their country. Because they still have Hitler's law on education. He is normal, but he does not allow children to stay at home - the children were required to go to school. The teacher says that so far in our country, officials are wary of the family form of education: “If a child studies at home, then the school has another type of accountability. And in our country it is already quite tight with papers, teachers are inundated with various forms of reports. And there is such a sad joke among teachers: school is the place where children interfere with the teacher to fill out reports.

“Family education is a progressive form of education. Of course, it would be better if the schools were good and varied, then the need for such a form would disappear. But, since our schools are far from all good, the need for such a form is growing today, ”Shmakov sums up.

Read more about what motivates parents who transfer their children to family-based education, as well as about the experience of families, including those in Kazan, in the following articles by Realnoe Vremya dedicated to this topic.

Natalia Fedorova

Going to school only for your favorite lessons is possible! Did you know about it? You can come to the second or third period, or attend school only three times a week instead of five, or not go to school at all, and still master the program perfectly.

Svetlana Marzeeva, the author of the Alternative Education in Russia portal and the founder of the Family Schools Club public organization, told the correspondent of MIR 24 about the wide opportunities the Law on Education provides for parents and children.

Three years ago, Svetlana called on parents and teachers to jointly educate their children in small groups, uniting on a territorial basis. Since then, there have been more than forty such groups in Moscow, and their number is constantly growing. For some, such a group is an alternative to a regular school, but for someone it is a real salvation. Here is what Svetlana had to say:

Now the law provides parents with literally unlimited opportunities in choosing an educational trajectory for their child. Many simply do not believe that it is possible not to attend the lessons of teachers who do not like, or simply unloved subjects, you can sleep in the morning if the child is a “night owl”, or attend lessons in several subjects at one school, but, say, in mathematics or chemistry - in another, where they teach more interestingly. It is only necessary to competently build relations with the school, somewhere to exercise their right, and somewhere to agree.

What does "agree" mean? Parents are used to being obliged to comply with all the requirements of the school. In what part can we negotiate with her?

In the part where the school itself makes decisions within the law. The fact is that the school is also given great rights and opportunities by the state. Any public school can choose not only educational programs, but also textbooks, can make attendance free, can allow its students to study in several schools at once (in the law this is called "network learning"), can afford small classes, unusual subjects and the most modern techniques. I know it sounds fantastic, but it is completely in line with Russian law. Moreover, such schools existed before. For example, school No. 200 (humane pedagogy according to the system of academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences Sh.A. Amonashvili), school No. 734 (school of self-determination of Alexander Tubelsky).

- Let's first talk in more detail about what is required by law, about which it is not necessary to agree.

Most importantly, parents have priority rights in the field of upbringing and education over other persons: see the Family Code and FZ-273. This means that you, as a parent who knows the inclinations and needs of the child, know better if he needs to do homework and go to school every day. You have the right to write a statement that you are asking to transfer your student "to study according to an individual curriculum" (Article 34 Part 1 of Federal Law 273-FZ), and then choose those subjects that you decide to attend at school. And the rest study at home and pass certification on them (that is, write one final control or take a test, or submit an essay). That's all, nothing more is needed for this - no arguments, no medical and other certificates, a statement from the parents is enough.

Exactly the same opportunities are given by a statement with the wording "I ask you to transfer my child to full-time part-time education." But which of these two options to choose is already a subject of negotiations with the school. Previously, it was very difficult to get permission from the school not to attend certain lessons, because there were no such precedents, and they were perceived as some kind of eccentric trick.

But after some representatives of the administration of educational institutions lost their positions, they realized that this was not a joke and that parents really had good arguments and serious reasons. So, there are more and more students who attend classes at school only partially, and not only in the capital, but also in the regions.

What reasons do parents have to achieve such conditions, I would say special? After all, it has not yet become a mass phenomenon.

Over the years that I have been involved in my project, I have studied well the reasons why people turn to alternative education. The first is the health of the children. Second, the quality of their education.

The fact is that the school curriculum is based on memorization and at the same time is heavily overloaded with unnecessary and outdated information.

Many well-known teachers say that it is impossible to complete the amount of tasks that are required from children, starting from high school. "School program is not feasible!" - These words belong to Alexei Bitner, a former Novosibirsk teacher and director, who today helps students get rid of school, graduating from it as an external student.

Children who honestly try to remember everything experience constant stress. Therefore, the body is simply forced to turn on defense mechanisms - that is, diseases, and sometimes they are very serious, even incurable.

Those who have a more stable psyche have to turn on indifference, lie, pretend, skip or simply ignore all this constant violent information intoxication. Against this background, the lack of time for walks, reduced sleep, rest, the need to sit still for 8 hours a day - these are already “little things”.

It's about health. Now about education. Such a life kills interest not only in knowledge, but in general deprives one of energy and joy. That is, even important skills and information are not acquired by children. In addition, a lot of important things remain outside the school, which children are not taught.

They don’t teach conflict-free communication, they don’t teach to find a common language with other people, they don’t teach financial literacy. Career guidance, psychology, the basics of economics and business - all this has to be acquired outside of school. But when? If you go to school, then there is simply no time for it.

I remember when I was at school, we were asked to learn the ballad "Heather Honey" for the summer. My daughter was asked to do the same, but in three days. This is a very significant difference: everything is the same, only much faster. Because more modern literature has been added over the past years, but nothing has been reduced, they simply reduced the study time.

In the public school system, parents don't delve as deeply into educational issues, but they do see the tip of the iceberg—children in high school lose interest in learning. And in order to maintain motivation, and at the same time health and joy, they also come to the conclusion that it is necessary to reduce the time that the child spends on school. That is why in recent years we have seen such a surge of interest in alternative forms of education.

But what if the parents work and cannot take the child to school or are not ready to take responsibility for his education?

If we are talking about secondary school, then the responsibility for their own education is already within the power of teenagers. They no longer have such a passion for learning, like kids, but the motivation is still there. For example, they themselves consider a difficult or boring subject important. Or they want to test their strength. Or they need this knowledge for their future profession.

And if we are talking about elementary school, then everything is simpler there. To succeed in elementary school, it will be enough for someone to have a good teacher. After all, it is not by chance that everyone repeats: look not for a school, look for a teacher. And if someone wants more, then you can transfer the child to family or distance learning, find a few like-minded people in the neighborhood and pool the money to hire a teacher to teach your children.

By the way, this is exactly what we did with several parents. This was in 2012, before the last law on education was passed. I did not come up with this scheme, the first such family school was invented and implemented on the basis of a circle for difficult teenagers by psychologist Boris Grechukhin - a bright, extraordinary and internally very free person.

And who would have come at that time with the seditious thought that "free mass education is the confiscation of children from their parents." But big words are easy to say. And what was it like to create your own school in the USSR? Moreover, stating: “No professional school teachers. Students and parents take care of children.

By that time, parents who opened the first class on the basis of their own private kindergarten had a similar experience, and we did. I conditionally called these groups of parents and teachers family schools, but this not very successful name stuck. Literally in four years of such non-schools more than fifty in Moscow and the Moscow region. And now there are such associations in St. Petersburg, and in Samara, and in Kaliningrad, and in many other cities of Russia.

Now in the capital and in St. Petersburg even the tiny experience of creating school-parks by Miloslav Balaban has appeared. These are schools of free attendance, where students themselves choose which classes (studios) they attend. Once upon a time, such an experiment was first staged at school No. 734.

Literally over the past two years, another option for alternative education in the beginning has appeared: these are the Zhokhov classes. Vladimir Ivanovich Zhokhov - Honored Teacher of the Russian Federation, author of school textbooks, developed a methodology for teaching in elementary school. Oddly enough, many public school principals have taken on the responsibility of opening such classes. That is, some alternative methods already have support in the form of state schools.

- What other opportunities, not noticed by the broad masses, has the law on education given us?

The Federal Law on Education includes full-time, part-time, family and distance learning. And there is also a network form that allows you to study in several schools at once. And if the first four are used in one way or another, then the last one is just beginning to be mastered by parents and schools. All schools (both private and public) can enter into networking agreements with each other. This means that a student can study in different school subjects at different schools if they have entered into an appropriate agreement among themselves.

For example, the private International School of Tomorrow (MShZD) forms distance classes that learn Russian remotely according to the methodology of Olga Soboleva and under her methodological guidance. So far, only this Russian school has such an opportunity, but children from any corner of Russia can study in it.

With this form of education, students may not attend Russian classes at their primary school: the grades they receive at the MSHS are counted there. They also appear in the report cards and the personal file of the student.

It is a pity that such promising forms of education are still little used. But it's so great that they exist, that our state has legally taken care of this.

Well, well, if a child studies at home in some subjects, then how and who controls his knowledge, and will such free treatment of the school curriculum lead to a decrease in the quality of knowledge? After all, parents can rarely objectively assess the level of knowledge of their children.

For those subjects that the child attends partially, control, surveys and other numerous so-called. slices of knowledge. And for those subjects that the child does not attend, schools control the level of knowledge through assessments. They can be one, two, three times a year, at the discretion of the parent and wherever he wants - even in a public school, even in a private school.

If you are guided by the law, then de jure only the GIA and the Unified State Examination are obligatory. But de facto, our parents and their children still prefer to pass certifications every year or every six months in those subjects that the child does not attend. Firstly, to be sure that he is successfully mastering the program, and secondly, to have documents confirming this on hand.

- Why do many schools hardly agree to such experiments?

Many, probably, would not agree, but they are obliged by law. I think that parents are not ready for this first of all. For example, theoretically, a school has the right to start teaching not at 8.30, which, in my opinion, is unhealthy, but at 9.30 or 10.00.

I remember how we told the director of a cool lyceum about the success of the children, from where we took the children to teach them on our own. And she told us: “Of course, because they get enough sleep!”. She herself understands the benefits of this, but she cannot make the start time later, because every morning at 8.00 and even earlier, children are brought to the door of a closed school, whose parents have nowhere to go. That is, educational institutions simply respond to parental requests. If the principal of my daughter's school allows free attendance for everyone, his parents will eat him alive!

The deputy director of one of the schools in Tsaritsyno recently told me that it was the parents who opposed free school attendance when they wanted to introduce it in this school. Then this wonderful teacher himself, a candidate of historical sciences, introduced free attendance only at his lessons.

For the first two weeks, no one came to him at all! Children simply could not believe in such a "laugh". And then they began to look, more and more often. And then history became a favorite subject for many. Children will not drop out of school if they are no longer forced to go there. They will simply do it for their own benefit.

Tatyana Rubleva

ON THE FORCE OF HABIT

Participants in a survey conducted by the Rambler analytical service commissioned by MIR 24 told what form of secondary education they consider the most appropriate for a child.

The majority of respondents (70%) support the existing school system in Russia. They answered that the most correct form of secondary education is "standard - like everyone else."

20% of respondents voted for the option “alternative education with an individual approach”. 1168 respondents took part in the voting.

In third place in popularity (8%) was the option that suggests that some of the lessons can be studied at school, and some at home. Least of all respondents (2%) considered it right to study at home without going to school.

The composition of the speakers of the event should inspire those who are interested in how children can be taught “in a different way”. Alexander Lobok, Doctor of Psychology, creator of the probabilistic learning methodology, teacher Dima Zitser, founder of Epischool Mikhail Epshtein, director of the IT school Alexander Ezdov will speak here. Participants will be told about the Montessori school, about multicellular mathematics, about blended learning, about the InterUrok.ru project, which allows studying the entire school curriculum via the Internet.

One of the organizers of the conference, Aleksey Semenychev, is a family education consultant. In general, the initiative to hold such a meeting arose from the desire of parents who decided to teach their children outside of school, exchange experiences with each other and somehow structure the ideas of modern alternative education for themselves.

Aleksey believes that the search for alternative ways will never be widespread, but modern education, if it is directed to the future, should be different: family, traditional, school, mixed - whatever.

Alexey Semenychev
When we started to engage in alternative education, we discovered that in our country there are a lot of good pedagogical systems, experiments, methods, and so on. Suffice it to recall that Shalva Amonashvili's collaboration pedagogy dates back to the 1960s. But the problem is that there is almost no dialogue between the mass school and these finds. The education system is one of the most conservative.

There is a dramatic conflict in the very idea of organizing mass general education: on the one hand, it is called upon to become basic for as many children as possible. On the other hand, all children are so different that it is simply impossible to teach them equally. At least it's not efficient.

When an adult does not like a job, he can find another one, taking into account all the wishes from the schedule to the salary. He can change jobs simply because the team does not suit him. Or the motivation for development has disappeared. Or because they offered a more suitable place.

What if the school is not suitable for the child?

Naturally, some adults who are used to choosing sooner or later ask themselves the question: why does my child have no choice and should go to a school that does not motivate him to learn? Or to a school that is bad for his health? If adults realize that they, the parents, and not the Minister of Education, are primarily interested in the good education of children, they will find that in fact there is a choice.

Alternative education is a search for an alternative, first of all, to the average format of the system of mass general education.

Five myths about alternative education

If the child does not go to school, he will have problems with socialization.

Indeed, with home schooling, organizing communication with peers and other people is a separate task. It is solved with the help of various sections, circles, interest clubs. For this, parents can also unite in so-called “family schools” (although it would be more correct to consider them clubs, since they do not have an educational license): on the one hand, by uniting, it is easier to resolve issues with tutors, on the other parties, it is possible to conduct joint extracurricular activities.

Alexey Semenychev
family education consultant
Awareness of oneself as a person, awareness of oneself in society in the conditions of family education occurs even earlier than at school. Compared to our adult life, it's like a full-time job and freelancing. So you go to work, where the salary is stable, and then you decide to become a freelancer. On the one hand, freedom comes - I do what I want, I don’t go to school. On the other hand, you understand that now everything depends only on you. Our children come to the idea earlier that you are responsible for your own destiny.

Proponents of alternative education pamper their children by making learning fun.

Agree, there are thousands of ways to pamper children in a traditional school. What is worth a good study for gifts or doing homework for a child. So this is not a problem of the education system, but only the approach of parents. However, many recognize that balancing between “learning should be fun” and “child should learn to overcome difficulties” is very difficult when you combine the role of parent and teacher. In fact, such a balance is not easy for professional teachers, no matter what system they work with.

Alternative education is always a traditional school "inside out".

It seems that if we are looking for an alternative to the class-lesson system, the main thing is to cancel lessons of 40 minutes, abandon the subject schedule, and grades - and the new system is ready. This is not true. Still, the main goal of alternative education is to find an individual approach to a particular child, taking into account the peculiarities of his development, and not to abolish the usual things from the principle.

Anna Nine
Both the 40-minute classes and the subject schedule are just a way to structure educational activities and stick to a schedule. Even if the child receives an alternative education, this method may suit him. Subject education allows you to focus on the main disciplines at his age, for example, Russian and mathematics, and stay in parallel with his classmates in terms of knowledge. This is especially important if, for health reasons, it is difficult for a child to master all subject areas. As for grades, the assessment of an adult is important for a child, healthy narcissistic nourishment of his skills and abilities, it is important to show his knowledge in front of peers - all this is called healthy competition. Problems begin when, along with grades in the journal, the child receives a social assessment, which becomes a stigma and begins to determine his position in the class.

Parents cannot know better than teachers how and what to teach children, so alternative education outside of school always loses in quality.

Of course, in the case of choosing education outside of school, parents must spend a lot of time and attention in order for the result to be of high quality. But they should not take on all the functions of teachers. Their task is to organize the educational process and find resources from which the child will receive knowledge. It can be tutors, textbooks, websites. If the elementary school program can be mastered with the help of mom and dad, then in middle and high school this will not be enough. In terms of developing an educational strategy, professional tutors can help.

If my child goes to school safely, I don't need to know about alternative education.

You need to know about alternative education, if only because it allows you to take a fresh look at the usual school - as one of the ways to teach, with its pluses and minuses, but not the only true one. And if a child suddenly has difficulties at school, perhaps even a temporary recourse to alternative education will correct the situation.

Anna Nine
family psychologist, gestalt therapist
If the child is in a low position in the class and does not study well, alternative education can come to the rescue. A change of environment, an individual approach to building motivation save from negative feedback in the form of ratings and peer opinions. Thanks to alternative education, it becomes possible to raise the level of knowledge, increase self-esteem and self-esteem.

According to Article 43 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, basic general education is obligatory, and its receipt by children must be provided by parents or persons replacing them. That is, every child, a citizen of Russia, must receive a certificate after the 9th grade. The Russian Federation supports various forms of education and self-education, but at the same time sets federal state educational standards.

The law determines the parents (legal representatives) responsible for the education of the child, gives them the right to choose how to give this education, and determines the standards that the result must meet.

What can parents do if they do not want to send their child to a public school?

There are several options: find a school with an alternative teaching method (author's schools, Montessori schools, Waldorf schools, park schools, and others), switch to a part-time (or part-time) form of education in a traditional comprehensive school, or switch to family education.

Schools with alternative teaching methods

In these schools, the class-lesson system is opposed to its own approach: instead of dividing into classes by age, there can be classes in groups of different ages, instead of academic subjects - interdisciplinary projects and individual educational routes, instead of lessons from bell to bell - free disposal of one's time.

Among the schools that work according to methods that have long been recognized in many countries (such as Waldorf schools), there are state schools. As for copyright schools that work according to independently developed methods, almost all of them are private and require financial investments from parents.

Author's schools appeared in Russia in the early 1990s. Among the brightest are Mikhail Epshtein's "Epischool" in St. Petersburg and the author's school of Alexander Lobk with the embodied idea of probabilistic education in Yekaterinburg.

From the point of view of parents, studying in such schools does not differ much from traditional ones: the child goes to school under the supervision of teachers, and the organization still bears responsibility for the quality of education. It is quite another matter if parents choose a correspondence or family education for their child.

Distance learning according to an individual curriculum

This option is chosen by those who are satisfied with the school program, but are not satisfied with the need to attend school. The child is enrolled in a general education institution for part-time education. The school itself draws up an individual curriculum and provides educational materials. Part of the subjects can be mastered at school full-time (then it will be part-time).

The child will be assessed in the same way as other students of the school. The main task of parents in this form of education is to ensure that the child masters the school curriculum. How this will happen - with the help of tutors, video lessons and online resources, self-study in the textbook - parents decide.

family education

This is where parents go on a completely free voyage along alternative educational trends. With only one condition: the child must pass the state certification after grade 9 to receive a certificate of basic general education and pass the exam after grade 11 to receive a certificate of secondary general education. As for intermediate certifications, they are optional until grade 9. But parents who choose family education are still recommended to go through them every year to be sure that different currents did not take the ship far away from the Federal State Educational Standard.

Everyone comes to this form of education in different ways: someone because of beliefs, someone because of circumstances. But all parents who have taken on the responsibility of teaching their children outside of school face similar difficulties: how to find a school for certification, how to solve discipline problems, what program to choose, what methods to use. Adults come together in online and offline communities and discuss effective ways to teach children.

In Russia, the question of the methodology of family education is acute. On the one hand, this is a good free market for alternative learning systems. If you come up with a method that makes it easy to teach children math, parents will be happy to try it, while in a comprehensive school it is extremely difficult to prove the need for a new tool. On the other hand, developers of educational products do not have enough channels through which they could express themselves to parents. And parents, in turn, do not have enough pedagogical knowledge to independently choose methods. It is not surprising that it is those who are faced with the issues of family education who initiate a wide conversation about alternative education at the all-Russian level.

It turns out an interesting picture: if before the tone for alternative education was set by innovative teachers, attracting both enthusiastic and skeptical views, now it seems that the initiative has passed to the parents. From passive consumers of educational services, they have become active participants in the process that influence the market.

Conferences like the one that will be held at the ZIL cultural center should become a platform where parents, developers of educational tools (from methodologies to specific products - textbooks, web services, and so on) and professional teachers meet, who teach “differently than at school” and are ready to share their experience and understanding of what education can be.

"Once upon a time, those who did not go to school were uneducated. And now it is just the opposite ... "(French novelist Paul Gu).

Many women, when they become mothers, decide that they will give their child the most important thing - childhood. In other words, they will not break his nature. They won’t force you to stand when you want to run, they won’t make you sit down if you want to stand, they won’t drive you home when you want to play outside. They will not brush aside his desire to receive answers to their questions. Nevertheless, setting priorities in favor of educating a free personality in a child in fact often leads to a serious conflict with the entire school education system. It is interesting, by the way, that the very word "school", which is often associated with sleepless nights, poor health, dubious knowledge, is actually translated as "leisure".

School education - solid cons?

For centuries, children have been taught at home. Parents either educated themselves or hired special teachers and a tutor for this purpose. The situation changes only with the onset of the nineteenth century, when schools in the form familiar to us replace the then home schooling. By the way, the modern look of these schools is not criticized, probably only by the lazy. First of all, the school system is accused of discouraging children from learning. The material is presented very monotonously in an extremely tedious manner. In lessons where there are 30 people at the same time, the teacher, with all his desire, cannot see an individual student. As a result, the child gets tired, loses all interest in the educational process.

Learning is natural for a child. Any preschooler is ready to torture his parents half to death with eternal "why" and "why". Parents are ready to buy all the children's toys in Moscow for a curious baby, only to stop the flow of his questions. However, sitting down at a desk, curiosity, interest and thirst for answers disappear somewhere. Why? Because of the same erroneous system. The schoolboy is extremely overburdened with all sorts of bureaucratic burdens. But seriously, we, for example, do not observe a direct connection between the counting of cells between completed tasks and the development of the Pythagorean theorem. One thing is obvious: Leonardo da Vinci would be branded by modern educators as an absolutely mediocre person, unable even to write from left to right, as all normal people do.

In addition, a system where one adult (not always with excellent moral abilities) for many years becomes the Lord God for a little man leads to numerous discrimination and humiliation of that child who dared to be different from others, or simply did not like the class teacher ... Nervous breakdowns, broken psyches, suicides are side effects of today's education.

Another sign of our time is the broken health of the younger generation. Forced imprisonment in one place, carrying heavy backpacks, homework until dawn, mental overload, ideological hours do their job. Here is a list of the inevitable companions of our children: respiratory diseases, digestive disorders, diseases of the skeletal system, diseases of the circulatory system. So is schooling only causing harm? A lot of people will agree with this.

Homeschooling as an alternative to school

So what is the way out here? Unless you take your child to school. Some parents do just that. Moreover, the popularity of homeschooling is gaining momentum. The leaders in this area are Canada and the United States. Thus, in Canada in 1980 only about 3,000 children were homeschooled. In 2003, there were already 77,523 such children, or 3.8% of the total number of registered students.

In the United States in 1985, only 50,000 children were homeschooled. In 1993 there were already 300,000 of them. In 2008, several million. Today, 4.4 to 7.4% of all US students are homeschooled. In 2006, a special survey was conducted among North American parents who spoke in favor of transferring their children to home schooling in order to identify their motivation. So, they chose this form of training because:

It makes it possible for the child to lay his own system of values;
building tight and strong bonds between parents and children;
Gives the opportunity for the child to communicate with adults and children at the highest level;
Allows you to get rid of Guarantees the best academic performance;
Makes it possible to avoid negative influences (drugs, alcohol, early sex) through controlled positive contacts with peers;
Provides a physically more favorable learning environment.

In Russia, the home education system is not yet widespread. However, to say that it does not exist is not necessary. Parents who decide not to send their child to school take advantage of the fact that the general educational institutions of our country can provide "external certification for persons who receive general basic and secondary education on their own." Permission for home education in Russia was secured as early as 1992 by decree of the then President of the Russian Federation. At the same time, Russian schools are obliged to contribute to the desire of parents to educate their children at home. At the moment, there are numerous websites and associations in our country aimed at helping families who choose to receive education at home for their children. In addition, according to Russian law, such parents are even entitled to payments from the state.

What to do if you are not satisfied with school education? You are not satisfied with the quality of teaching, the environment, against school "equalization", strive to reveal the individual qualities of your child. There can be many reasons. And there are only a few alternatives to school:

Find a school with an alternative teaching method (author's schools, Montessori schools, park schools, and others).
Switch to a part-time (or part-time) form of education in a traditional comprehensive school.
Go to family education.

Today we will talk about the latter option. Family education is often confused with home schooling and external studies. Homeschooling is organized by the school for children who are unable to attend an educational organization for any reason of a medical nature. Teachers come to the home of the students, respectively, academic performance is the responsibility of the educational institution.

With family education, the child's academic performance, passing the necessary intermediate and final certifications is the responsibility of the parents.

Externship is an independent, often accelerated form of education, in which the child is not a student of a particular school. With a family form of education, the child is enrolled in a particular school, using all the privileges - free textbooks, the opportunity to use the school library.

Homeschooling in Russia is a young phenomenon. In Soviet times, it was believed that any education outside the walls of the school is not education. Since the 1990s, the situation has changed, but family education has not become widespread. Today, interest in homeschooling is growing.

pros

The main advantage is an individual approach. Family education is like a coat tailored to the figure of a child.

Parents can independently set the schedule, select teaching methods. All the individual characteristics of the child, his biological clock are taken into account.

There is an opportunity to focus on the study of those subjects that are bypassed or do not pay so much attention at school: languages, architecture, art, etc. Such training is aimed at the natural cognitive interest of the child, and not at getting high marks.

Another significant plus is a comfortable society. Pressure from teachers or classmates is excluded, the child is not in a routine, which makes life freer and more natural. By the way, practice shows that the crisis of adolescence is much easier for children who study at home.

Minuses

Parents who choose family education for their children should be prepared for the fact that this will require a lot of their own time and effort.

And the organization of such training will require from them a high degree of organization, a solid understanding of the goals and objectives, pedagogical skills, and education.

The child may manifest (or may not, it all depends on how the family education system is built) the following "side effects": reduced communication skills, the image of a "white crow", lack or partial violation of discipline, selfishness, a sense of being chosen, infantilism .

What parents need to be prepared for

Almost all parents, one way or another, face similar difficulties in this area. Here are some of them:

search for a suitable school for certification;
the problem of choosing an educational program and methods;
difficulties in dialogue with the school administration, which wants to avoid unnecessary problems associated with transferring a child to another form of education;
parents should be ready to work with normative documents (for example, with educational standards), with subject programs, with teaching aids, in order to most effectively implement training;
homeschooling eats up all (or almost all) of a parent's time.

How to transfer to a family form of education

To transfer a child to home schooling, you need to do only 2 things:

1. Write an application for the transition to the family form of education (in 2 copies).

If you wish, you can hear from such phrases as: "There is no such form of education at all", "You are not allowed to have a pedagogical education", "We do not have a charter, go to another school", etc. But as soon as you get a written statement and ask him to accept, the situation is likely to change.

In order to maintain a warm relationship with the school management, say that you fully trust the director, but you need a written refusal for reasoned communication with the RONO and the education committee so that they do not send back to a school where it is impossible to study on a family form.

2. Inform the local self-government body of the municipal district or city district at the place of residence about the transition of the child to the family form of education.