You’re Not Alone: Finding Support on Your Homeschooling Journey | 51

Listen to this episode on

Apple Podcasts

Watch this episode on

YouTube

Listen to this episode on

Spotify

About this episode

If you are considering homeschooling, have just started and are feeling overwhelmed, or have been at it a while and hit something unexpected, this episode is about finding support and navigating the questions and challenges that may arise.

Most families come to Euka for the thing that sits at the centre of homeschooling: the curriculum. As Australia’s largest online K-12 homeschooling provider, we cover the full range of grades, and our team is where families bring their questions about lessons, progression, reporting and getting registered.

Alongside that sits a different kind of help. The Home Education Association is an independent, volunteer-run member body offering advocacy with state authorities, local community connections, member resources and work experience insurance. Many Euka families are also HEA members.

This episode covers both. How to choose between a structured program and building your own, and what to do if your school resists letting your child go. It also covers how children rebuild their confidence socially, which is often what brings experienced families looking for answers.

Ellen Brown talks it through with Tina Smith, who homeschooled six of her own children and now helps other families through the same problems as Treasurer of the Home Education Association. Her sixth child is now at university.

Meet Tina Smith

Tina is Treasurer of the Home Education Association, a volunteer-run member organisation that supports homeschooling families across Australia.

She is answering from both sides. She has been the parent working it out across six children, and through HEA she has helped other families through the same problems: getting a family registered, working through the options with a parent who had been told homeschooling was her only remaining choice, and helping a family rebuild their child’s social confidence after they left school.

In the full episode, she gets specific about the practical parts. Which office to contact when a school will not release your child, what a structured program is genuinely good for, and the work experience insurance most families do not know is available.

Key Points

Key discussion points:

  • Tina recommends Euka to families who want structure. Asked what she tells a family looking for a structured program, her answer is direct: go to Euka.
  • Schools vary. Some actively recommend homeschooling. Others resist releasing a child at all.
  • If a school resists, you have another avenue. State education departments and their home education units have become more open to helping families register.
  • A structured program does a specific job. It is often what families use while a child settles; it is also helpful if you’re considering putting your child back into mainstream school down the line.
  • Bullying is often a symptom. Underneath it, there is frequently a diagnosis or an unmet need the school setting could not accommodate.
  • Social confidence can be rebuilt. Interest-based groups place a child among people who have chosen to be there, across a range of ages.
  • Work experience insurance starts earlier than most families expect. Insurance is usually a key obstacle, and HEA covers members from age 12.

Where families can find homeschooling support

The questions Tina hears open in much the same way. Where do I find information? How do I start? I am overwhelmed because there is so much out there.

And underneath them, the one that carries the most weight: I am a parent, and I have no idea what I am doing.

Her approach with a new family is to hand over two or three things to look at rather than sending them off to survey everything. That matters because there are no guarantees. Every child is different, every family dynamic is different, and what works well for one child may not suit yours.

Ellen’s own start was much the same, with everyone she met certain their way was the right one. What she took from it is that there are many great ways to do this, and that in the end, you are the only one who will know the right fit for your child.

Tina names the comparison trap directly.

“You look at a family and go, oh, I wish I could do that. But that’s not your family. So you have to work out your own rhythm, and the resources that work for you.”
— Tina Smith, Treasurer, Home Education Association

Finding a homeschooling community

Tina points new families towards other homeschoolers, as connecting with other families is how you start to see the breadth of what is out there, and what works and what does not.

Local support groups are the usual route in, and the Home Education Association runs homeschool community groups by area. Our guide to forming a community with other homeschoolers covers how families do it in practice.

What if the school pushes back when you withdraw your child?

Tina has seen it go both ways. She describes one family in which the school and the education department worked through the alternatives, found none viable, and told the parent directly that homeschooling was the right path.

She also sees the opposite happen. Some schools do not accept homeschooling as a legitimate option, and some see releasing a child as a matter of authority rather than a family’s decision. In her experience, it can get quite heated.

Who to contact when the school says no

The school is not your only avenue. State education departments and the home education units within them have become more open to helping families who are being obstructed, and they can intervene.

As Tina puts it, it comes down to knowing who to talk to. HEA publishes state-by-state registration information, and its advocacy work is currently focused on making registration a smoother experience with each state authority.

Ellen adds the reframe worth holding onto. Choosing homeschooling is in the same category as choosing a public school, a private school, or distance education. It is a choice you are entitled to make as a parent.

If the difference between those pathways is still unclear, our episode on homeschooling versus distance education sets them side by side, and our guide to whether homeschooling is legal in Australia covers the registration requirement.

Structured program, or build your own?

Some families arrive certain they could never write their own program, and a structured one removes that worry. If that sounds familiar, our episode with a teacher trainer on what actually makes a good teacher is worth a listen, since the answer has very little to do with formal qualifications.

Tina also sees families use a structured program for another reason: to help steady a child. Time to reassess, re-ground them, and settle their emotional state. In her experience, those families often return to school afterwards, which is a legitimate outcome rather than a failure.

Asked what she tells a family in that position, her answer is direct.

“If you want to use a program that is structured, go to Euka.”
— Tina Smith, Treasurer, Home Education Association

The example she gives is a family who arrived from another country, were not confident with an English curriculum, and needed something structured while they moved between states for work. She recommended them to Euka. They kept using it as they changed states, and when they eventually moved back overseas, they did so knowing their children’s education had been properly covered.

That continuity is the point. A complete K-12 curriculum means a family can move house, change states, or travel without the program restarting, and Ellen notes that families use it either way: some take the full program, others take a subject or two as their foundation and build the rest themselves.

Cover the base, then add your own

Tina built her own program at first. By the time her children reached the middle years, she was less confident, so she bought a program that covered the foundation skills and added her own material on top.

This option worked well for her family, as they layered in what her children were actually interested in, which, for her family, was the part that mattered most.

She is clear that this depends entirely on the child. Her children were academically inclined, and she knows families with very creative children for whom that same core-work approach did not work.

A prescribed curriculum is useful. Being able to flex it is better, because it opens up everything else: nature, museums, libraries, the internet, and the history and geography a family picks up while travelling. Ellen adds that the curriculum is the base, not everything.

Why more families are homeschooling for bullying and neurodivergence

Ellen asks about bullying, noting a significant increase in students coming in because of it. Tina confirms she is seeing the same and then adds more context.

Bullying happens for many reasons. As Tina puts it, it could be racism, health, disability, or just because you exist. Our guide to the signs your child may be struggling at school covers what this can look like before it becomes obvious.

She describes bullying as a big proportion of the calls. Still, she says an even bigger one now comes from families whose children are managing a diagnosis such as autism or ADHD. Our tips for homeschooling with ADHD go further into the practical side of this.

What those parents describe is the social side of school becoming overwhelming, in ways the setting could not accommodate.

Ellen draws out the consequences of how this gets reported. Bullying and school refusal are the labels the media reaches for, but they are frequently the visible end of something else. A child managing anxiety or autism inside a system that cannot flex will often find that school becomes very difficult.

Read that way, school refusal describes a setting that is not a good fit for that child, at that time.

Withdrawal, in Tina’s account, buys back what was missing: time to stop, regroup, and learn to manage emotions and triggers in a safe place.

Two episodes cover this from the family’s side. Episode 43 follows a mother who left school-based bullying behind, and Episode 45 specifically addresses school refusal. Episode 23 is one mother’s account of homeschooling with dyslexia, ASD and ADHD.

How homeschooled children build social confidence

The worry that stops families here is that leaving school means leaving socialising behind. The episode answers it with a worked example.

Tina describes a family whose child was not fitting in socially at school. They withdrew, then rebuilt from what the child actually liked: art and board games. The child joined a board games group and an art class, and the parent enrolled in the art class alongside them.

That produced an environment the classroom rarely does. The child was learning alongside adults, so they practised interacting with older people. In the board games group, they were among children of different ages, so they learned to build relationships with peers of different ages.

The parent went along too, joining the art classes, which meant the child was building these skills somewhere they already felt safe.

Tina’s point is that these skills travel. A child who has learned to interact with people of different ages carries that into a workplace or a course, along with the ability to recognise a trigger and step away from it.

Ellen adds the observation that reframes the whole concern.

“When you’re in school, your friends are only your friends because they happen to be the same age. That’s why you’re in that group.”
— Ellen Brown

Adult life does not work that way. You find people through shared interest, and you choose them. For a child who has been struggling, being good at something in front of people who care about it can be a platform they have not had before.

Ellen also names something she saw as a teacher. In a classroom, the child who disrupts an activity is often the one with no interest in it, and the cost falls on the interested child.

More on this in our guides to homeschool socialisation and special needs homeschooling.

Other support available to homeschooling families

There is more homeschooling support out there than most families realise, including free resources. It helps to know who handles what.

Euka covers the curriculum and everything attached to it, with lots of free resources available for families: choosing a program, the lessons themselves, tracking progression, reporting, enrolment and your account. Our Help Centre answers the day-to-day questions, and the support team is there for anything it does not. If registration paperwork is the sticking point, our Registration Service prepares the learning plan and documents your state requires, ready for you to submit.

HEA is a great complementary resource: independent advocacy with state authorities, local community connections, member resources and work experience insurance. Tina notes that HEA has been working alongside Euka and other organisations to make registration a smoother experience with the state bodies.

The Home Education Association runs a free national helpline on 1300 72 99 91, weekdays 9 am to 5 pm. Callers speak with experienced homeschoolers, and the call covers registration, re-registration, and issues with the state department you are registered with. That is worth knowing about whether or not you ever join anything.

Membership adds a set of teaching and learning resources on top of that, including software and reading materials for younger children. The current list is on HEA’s member benefits page.

Some of their resources will add additional value for Euka families. Ellen picks out one example on air: Story Box Library, HEA’s reading resource for younger children, works well with Euka’s bring-your-own-novel option, where a family swaps the term’s set novel for a different book while keeping the same skills work.

One item is worth calling out because so few families know it exists. Work experience placements usually stall on insurance, since an unpaid student is not covered by an employer’s policy.

Some state education departments offer their own coverage, though Tina notes that in certain states it only starts at age 14. HEA covers members from age 12, across all states, with an agreement signed by the parent and the supervising employer. Details are on their insurance page.

Ellen’s point is that this opens up something school-rationed. She had one week of work experience in Grade 10. A homeschooled student who wants to try several different workplaces during their senior years can, and our episode on when to do work experience covers how to time it well.

Questions answered in this episode

You register with the education authority in your state or territory, then choose how your child will learn: a structured program, your own plan, or a mix. Requirements differ by state, so check yours first. Our guide to homeschooling in Australia covers registration, and our episode on registration and reporting goes through it in detail.

Start with whoever provides your curriculum, since most day-to-day questions are really program questions. Euka families have the support team, the Help Centre and our free homeschooling course, which walks through registering, structuring a program and building a daily rhythm.

For the things that sit outside a curriculum, the Home Education Association runs a free national helpline on 1300 72 99 91, staffed by experienced homeschoolers, covering advocacy, re-registration and disputes with the state department you are registered with.

Local homeschool community groups and support groups are the usual starting point, and they are worth joining early. Tina’s point is that meeting other homeschooling families shows the range of what actually works, rather than assuming the first approach you saw is the only one.

Some resist. If that happens, the school is not your only avenue: contact your state education department or its home education unit, both of which have become more willing to step in. HEA can tell you which office to approach.

Both work, and the choice depends on your child. A structured program suits families who want the core covered without having to write it themselves, and Tina’s approach was to buy a program for the foundation skills and add her children’s interests on top.

Not necessarily. School groups children by age, whereas interest-based activities group them by their choices across a range of ages. The catch is that it does not happen on its own, so you will need to put one or two regular activities in place.

It is one of the biggest reasons families are now calling HEA. The value is the ability to adjust the pace and social load in ways a classroom cannot, and to spend the first stretch on regulation rather than academics.

It removes the immediate problem, which is sometimes exactly what a child needs. Tina’s caution is to look at what sat underneath the bullying as well, because an unmet need travels with the child if it goes unaddressed.

Yes, and often earlier than in school. Insurance is the usual obstacle since employers do not cover unpaid students, and HEA covers its members from age 12 across all states with a signed work experience agreement.

Why this episode matters

This episode is for the practical questions that arrive when you’re considering or starting out homeschooling: what to do when a school will not let your child go, whether to use a structured program or build your own, and how a child who struggled socially at school starts to rebuild.

The answers are specific. Which office to contact when the school digs in, what a structured program is genuinely good for, and why a board games group did more for one child’s confidence than the classroom did.

It maps out how to find support and build confidence in your homeschooling decisions.

More support for getting started

If you want to go further on the questions this episode raises, these are the places to start.

The free course. Our Complete Guide to Confident Homeschooling covers registering legally in your state, choosing and structuring a curriculum, building a daily rhythm, supporting a child who learns differently, and knowing your child is progressing. It is a set of nine short video modules, hosted by Brett and Ellen, free and self-paced. Start the free course.

If you enrol with Euka. Our Registration Service prepares the learning plan and registration documents your state requires, ready for you to download and submit. It is an optional add-on for enrolled families, not a general registration service.

Reach HEA directly. The free helpline is 1300 72 99 91, weekdays 9 am to 5 pm. Membership plans are on the pricing page, and a set of free resources is available to everyone.

Related reading. Our guides to exploring your homeschooling options in Australia and when bullying makes homeschooling the right move.

Related episodes. The Ultimate Getting Started Guide, and what you need to know about registration and reporting.

Episode credits

Hosted by Ellen Brown. Featuring Tina Smith, Treasurer of the Home Education Association. Future Learners is the podcast for parents and students learning to thrive with homeschooling in Australia.

Future Learners Podcast

Transcript

Ellen:

Hey, and today we’ve got a really exciting podcast because we’re talking to Tina Smith, who is from HEA. As you know, HEA is a huge organisation supporting many families. I’ll let you, Tina, tell us a little bit about who HEA is and what you do and why.

Tina:

Okay, okay. Well, hi everyone. My name’s Tina. I’m currently the treasurer at HEA and at HEA we like to support homeschoolers on their journey in homeschooling. We like we have a helpline where people can call and talk to experienced homeschoolers that is for all over Australia. And our experienced homeschoolers on that helpline can listen to you, listen to your needs, listen to your angst while you’re on your journey to start, or even some people who are along the way who need help with re-registration and issues that any issues that they might be having with the government departments that they’registered with. We like to advocate for people as we are currently doing in a number of the different states that we have. And we like to support you with member benefits that we have as well as discounts to resources that you find in our membershop. And we like to be able to assist you to create plans if you’re wanting to do something of your own choosing and not following a prescribed curriculum from someone like you could.

Ellen:

Fantastic. Thank you so much for telling us a little bit about so let’s get down to the nitty gritty like when families, you know, obviously we have a lot of families that come straight to the Euka team and asking a lot of questions. It’ll be interesting to see how aligned we are there about when families reach out to you, what kind of support are they looking for? What kind of questions are the main ones that you seem to find a lot of?

Tina:

What do I do? How do I start? Where do I find information? I’m overwhelmed. There’so much out there.

Ellen:

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Tina:

How do I know what program is going to work best for my child? My child is not responding to educational or academic work. My child is not doing well emotionally, socially, and I’m a parent and I’ve got no idea what I’m doing. That’s where you know, that’s

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

A lot of the questions we get.

Ellen:

Yes and I often, you know, having homeschooled myself and I didn’t ask you whether you’ve come from a homeschooling background. Did you homeschool your own children Tina or is something you’ve moved into?

Tina:

I homeschooled six of my children. My

Ellen:

Okay.

Tina:

And my sixth child just is in her honours year at university. So

Ellen:

Fantastic. Okay, so I was going to say when I began the homeschool journey myself, it felt a little bit like when you’re having your first baby, where everyone who is from homeschooling had their own way of doing it. And it’s the only way you should do it. And they’re very passionate about it, because they wouldn’t be doing it if they weren’t. And so that’s what I feel for myself. That’s where that overwhelm came from, you know, that whole everybody was so sure theirs was the only way to do something. I suppose that’s probably one of the things that I always want to share with homeschooling parents is there’s a lot of great ways to do something and to

Tina:

Correct.

Ellen:

Feel that at the end of the day, just like when you first have your child, you’re the only one who will know the right fit for your child. And so I think it sounds like you get that same kind of thing that where do we start and what do we do and interestingly, I’ve even found that when parents expect that education is in one sphere, so if they go to the school and talk about the fact that they’re going to be homeschooling, that the principal will say, what a great idea, because school isn’t working, so off you go and do that. That’s not always the case. I’m guessing you probably hear that a fair bit too.

Tina:

I do, I do. Some schools are very supportive. I’ve just been helping somebody who has tried all sorts of different ways and discussed with the education department as well as their school, what other possibilities could they try? And going down the schoolroom track, whether it be online in distance education or being in a school just was not going to work. And that actually said, You really have no choice, you need to do homeschooling. And then yeah, so this lady contacted us and we’ve been in discussion with her about the different options that she can choose and go and have a look at a few things. And if you feel that’s not enough options, then we’ll give you some other ones to look at. But instead of throwing her in the deep end and saying, go and have a look, look at this, this, this, this, this, this, we just gave her a few things to look at first, find out what how that suits their child. If it doesn’t suit their child, like don’t go spending money before you know whether your child’s gonna respond. And it’s no guarantee either that that’s gonna be the case. And every child is different, every family dynamics is different. Some people some people will be you know headlong into they’re academic children, this is the way I’m gonna do it and you can’t change them. And you don’t know the child, so you can’t say that’s not gonna work.

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

But they but they have to go on a journey. Then and we try to make sure that they connect with other people who are homeschoolers, because it’s once they connect to other homeschoolers that they start to see the breadth of what’s out there of what can work and what doesn’t work. You know, you look at a family and go, I wish I could do that, but that’s

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

Not your family.

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

So you have to work out your own rhythm and the own and the resources that work for you.

Ellen:

It’s really nice to hear what you said about the fact that you’re helping a family where the school said homeschooling is going to be the best choice for you. And I have to say that over the last 15 years, there has been a shift from the school’s perspective as to what homeschooling is, because I found even just five years ago, say pre-COVID, schools were still very anti-homeschooling because they didn’t understand an excellent education was possible outside of the school system. But I feel like since COVID and since people have had to school at home and people have had a bit more insight into what that process feels like, it seems to me that schools have got more of an open mind and I think they’re more educated themselves about what options. There are and that homeschooling is a wonderful option for some children. Would you say that you’ve seen that shift and what would you say to families if they come up against negative response when they say that’s going to happen, you know, when they go to see the school principal?

Tina:

Yes, well there are many cases where families have been have been given a very negative outcome and they haven’t been treated very fairly. Some school some schools just don’t understand that homeschooling is an option or they see their role as being authoritarian view of over the children and so they don’t want to let the children go. And so when that happens, you know, you contact HEA, sometimes you can actually contact the education department because they’re becoming a lot more open to helping out this people who are trying to register. And we’ve come across that a lot lately. So they’re becoming the education department themselves, especially their home education units within the states are becoming much more attuned to these negativities. Unfortunately it’sometimes it’s the administration staff to the vice principal and the principal at some schools, I’ll tell you that has happened, they won’t let the children go. They won’t let the child go or leave the school grounds. It can get quite feisty. It’s just a matter of knowing who to talk to and who to discuss with. So HEA can help in that instance and talking to the education department whether you’re where you’re trying to register is also useful. ‘Cause they can intervene as well. They are getting friendlier between ourselves and number other organisations as well as Euka. We’ve been having discussions with different state bodies trying to help them to understand the trials that homeschoolers do have when they are trying to register for homeschooling. So yeah.

Ellen:

Yeah, I think that that’s a really important one, especially for people who are watching this podcast or listening to this podcast who haven’t yet stepped into homeschooling and may feel a bit nervous about, you know, how that reaction will go. And it’s good to know that that HEA is there just as we often will have families come to us and say, this has happened, and what are our rights, and that kind of thing. And obviously happy to support families as they walk through that journey. But it’s really good to know the HEA is there also to say, look, we’ve had a lot of experience with this. As long as you understand the process as a parent, and then you know that you have the same right to choose homeschooling as you do about public school or private school or distance education. Is this another choice that you have the right to make? And the negative will nearly always come from a place of not understanding that choice and what homeschooling can look like. It doesn’t mean you’re disengaging from anything at all. In fact, you probably say the same. We find our homeschoolers at Euka are more engaged in friendships and society and community and all of the things that happen around that homeschooling community. Than those that are actually quite isolated in school sometimes. So it’s an

Tina:

Yes.

Ellen:

Interesting situation to be in. So you also talked about the fact, and we did talk about the fact that there’s a whole heap of different ways to go when it comes to homeschooling. So when I first started homeschooling long, long ago, I was really looking for something that gave me a bit of a structured plan, not because I wanted to follow the structured plan all the time. But I just wanted to make sure that I knew what I could be covering because I didn’t know what the future held. And so I would say that a lot of the families that come to Euka being a structure program, people that might be coming to homeschooling because their child might be out of school for a specific amount of time due to illness or some sort of crisis in the family, and they may be planning to move back into school. Or they might be families, or I guess a bit like me, who say, you know, it’s like, if you’ve got a bit of a plan, you can go off wherever you like and come back to a plan. So it’s that stability feeling for me as a parent and my kids responded really well to that. So we find at Euka, we’ve got people who are free ranging and maybe only doing a subject or two with Euka and doing other things outside of Euka, but using that as a base. And then we have families that do each subject, each lesson, each, you know, just the way that works best for them. So I was going to say, what would you say, like, who do you see that mainly go to a structured versus an unstructured kind of do it yourself model of homeschooling?

Tina:

So I find that there are people out there who got who are really quite scared of preparing their own program. And so they want a structured program. And they also see that they also see that homeschooling is a a means to re-regulate their child, just get them over the line, just to re-assess them, re and re-ground them in their values and they’re in emotional state. And a lot of the time what I see is that they end up do going back to school when they use a very structured program. I helped one family who were travelling to different states, but they’d come from another country. And so we got them registered and that was okay. They were not comfortable with an English curriculum because their English wasn’t great. So I actually sent them off to Euka and said, well, if you want to use a program that is structured, go to Euka. And so then they actually did use that. And then they were able to then move states when they had to change jobs. And whilst they were here in Australia, they were using Euka. But then when they went back home, back overseas, they at least knew that they’d been educated properly and were able to then enter back into school where they were going to. So A structured program has a lot of good benefits. Some people use it all the way through. I know that the program that I used, the

Ellen:

Yes, let’see now. Yeah.

Tina:

I know the program I used, I made my own program and then when I got to year seven or eight, I kind of went, I’m I’m not confident with this. And I ended

Ellen:

Yes, yes.

Tina:

Up purchasing a program which covered the foundation skills and then we could just add on top of it so that I knew the children were going to have a good foundation and my children were quite academically inclined as well as being quite creative musically. So I used a foundation knowing that I could cover all their core skills.

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

And then we added in their things that they were interested in over the top on as as extra things, which were really their main things. And then

Ellen:

Yes, yes.

Tina:

We knew then we knew that they were all covered. But that worked for our family. That worked for our family.

Ellen:

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Tina:

Because they were, that’s the style of child they were. That was the style of learner that they were very academic.

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

And I do know of families that are very super creative and doing core work like that just did not work. So it’s all

Ellen:

Yes, yes.

Tina:

About understanding how your child works to what you

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

Use and a prescribed a prescribed curriculum can be useful and but also being able to be flexible is even better. ’cause then you’ve got access to so many different resources that are out there that you can pull from science or maths or

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

Or from the internet or from out in nature and using museums and libraries and going away on trips and learning all sorts of different things about culture and history and geography and all those things from travelling. So there’so many other things to do.

Ellen:

Yes, I absolutely love that. I think that that is the key. I feel that what we see through Euka is that families will come and they’ve come out of the school system so they feel comfortable that they’ve got some things that they need to do each day and that helps them. And as the years go by, they become more confident and they do add other things or they, like I said before, they might say, oh, well, you know what? We can see here they’re doing Australian history here in term one. We’re actually just going to go on a family trip and we’re going to spend every Wednesday, you know, going to do a new historic site in our town or our area, that kind of thing. And so I think that’s part of, well, it’s definitely part of the joy of homeschooling is to be able to put your flavour onto whatever it is that you’re using in homeschooling to cover the curriculum. That’s the base, not the everything. And so knowing that you’ve got your base covered, but saying to yourself, know, if your child’s a musical person, then, you know, and they’re having music lessons or they’re spending time learning music, well, then you can tick off creative arts and say, you know, we don’t need to do any more in that department. And I think the freedom comes with the confidence of time. It’s like, you know, when you have that first baby, it’s like, it’s… You know, it’s only eaten this much or it’s only done this, you know. And then by the third or fourth child, you’re like, oh, when did I feed that child? You’re more confident. You know that the child will let you know when they’re hungry and so you’re not feeling stressed out. So I feel that homeschooling, you know, when we see families come, sometimes they do feel that overwhelm or that nervousness and the structure helps them feel comfortable and confident that they. They’re still moving forward in their education. And then just knowing that with time, that confidence will allow a lot more freedom and comfort in being able to, you know, add all the things that make it wonderful to homeschool. I think that’s it. Yes.

Tina:

Yeah, that’s correct. Yeah. Yeah.

Ellen:

Look, what I’d love to ask you some of the big questions. How you see the number of students coming into homeschooling from bullying. I’m guessing you see the same as us. We have a big rise in bullying and students coming from that. What’s your take on what you’re seeing there?

Tina:

We do we do have a lot of parents on the helpline who ring us up and talk about my kids are being bullied and we just don’t want them to be in that environment, should we homeschool and the bullying comes from lots of different different reasons. You know, it could be racism, it could be health, it could be disability, it could be just because you exist.

Ellen:

With.

Tina:

So the bullying is there and that is a big, big proportion of it. But I think the even bigger proportion at the moment is people with severe disabilities and particularly people who have Asperger’s or a bit of autism, some ADHD and all those other different diagnoses that are out there. So parents are struggling with understanding how to help their children in those areas. And we certainly have had a number of emails over the last couple of weeks about children who have been struggling with the social aspects of at of being at school and it’s become overwhelming because of some of these diagnoses. And the best way that they cope with that is to pull them out. To stop the bullying from that, to stop the anxiety from that, and give the children time out to kind of reground themselves, re-evaluate, and start to learn how to manage their emotions and regulate things in triggering situations. So the

Ellen:

Hmm.

Tina:

Bullying is big and things to do with neurodivergence is also very big as well.

Ellen:

Yeah, interesting actually. As you were talking, it really hit home to me that the things that the media generally likes to jump on is bullying and school refusal. But those things are often the result of exactly what you’re talking about. That it isn’t really just about bullying or school refusal. That underneath it that it’s often because you know, the child has got some challenges that are going on there or they’re managing something like ADHD or they’re managing anxiety or autism or any of those things. And, and as part of that managing that and walking through that journey, you know, school can become very, very difficult. And so then they, the media will put that into all that school refusal when really it’s, it’s that school is not a good fit. For that particular child and maybe at that time. And I guess one of the things that I really would love to wave the flag about here is the success that we see in the homeschooling realm for kids that have come out of the mainstream school. Because when you said, know, sometimes they’removed because the social aspects of school. Now that is really important that people don’think that means they’re homeschooling. So now they don’t, there’s no socialising. You know what I mean?

Tina:

No

Ellen:

We see kids

Tina:

Yes.

Ellen:

Who would have really struggled in school as young teens and teenagers walking off into university or going off into the workplace very confident because the dynamics are different once they leave school. Is that the same for you that you’re seeing that?

Tina:

Yes, so it the school setting is just not is just not a good fit for them. They come out of that. I recently worked with a family who had this very issue where they took their child out of school, they weren’t socially fitting in at school, the social aspects of it just were not working for them. But what they did do was they slowly introduced things that the child was interested in, the child was interested in art the child was interested in doing a lot of board games and so they found a group that did a lot of board games and they went and did art classes so they mixed with not just children of their own age but they also mixed with adults and the parent also went along and joined in the art classes so they

Ellen:

Yes. Yeah.

Tina:

They were learning a skill together they were learning to interact with older people

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

And then when they went to play board games, they were interacting with different age children. And that allowed them to be able to build relationships with different ages. So you’re understanding

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

How different ages interact, how they talk. And then that became the avenue of I can actually do more in the social side. You’ve got things that are in common, build confidence. And then when you go to do something new, you’ve got skills that can actually allow you to propel yourself in a new environment by because you’ve learned these skills of how to interact with people of different ages. And when you go into the workforce or if you’re trying something new, you’ve got the skills and the ability to regulate yourself and recognise triggers and step away from them or use different words to be able to. Build an interaction in a new environment. So it can be very

Ellen:

Yeah,

Tina:

Beneficial.

Ellen:

It’s very, very powerful. There’s a few things that you spoke about there. One is a child that has really struggled in school. They have lost their confidence a lot of the time. They may have been bullied as a result of the fact that they’d lost their confidence in those social skills. And when they come into the homeschooling world and they choose an activity that the child is naturally drawn to, all of a sudden, they are with like-minded children who all like this particular activity. One of the things, I was a teacher for many, many years, and one of the things that you notice in the classroom is, it’s the child who’s not at all interested in the activity that causes all the problem, for the poor child that is interested in the activity and hasn’t got the opportunity to really focus on it.

Tina:

Mm.

Ellen:

And so… Taking them out, having an activity or a class or something that they love doing, like say it was board games or it was music or I know we used to go to like Thursday sport and we had a drama club, all those things. When your child’s in that atmosphere and as you mentioned, the parent comes along, that’s really helpful too because they’re in a safe space. They know they’ve got an advocate there for them. So in those early years when they’re… When redeveloping or even developing for the first time those social skills, they’ve had a tricky time in school and it is transferable from the club or the group or the music or the drum, whatever they were doing to the next thing, it’s transferable. And that’s where you see those successful young adults, you know, walking into the workforce or walking into university with real confidence and ability. Because, you know, one of the things I always think is interesting when people sort of talk about the worry of lack of socialisation for homeschooling is that when you’re in school, your friends just are only your friends because they happen to be the same age. That’s why you’re in that group. You’re all the same age. When you get out into the world, you certainly don’t go and only find friends who are the same age. You find friends with people who we’ve got things in common together. You know, we like the same things. We enjoy each other’s company and there’s choice involved. And I think that’s where the socialisation in homeschooling is very, very powerful. Because there’s choice, there’s commonality in the activities that you’re doing with other kids. And all of a sudden, if you ask somebody who really loves board games and you’re good at it, all of a sudden you’ve got a platform to be good at something. And they may never have felt that before when they were in the mainstream schools. So exciting. All right, well, let’s talk about what HEA members, some of the things that you think that the Euka students, would find beneficial about HEA. I know a lot of our Euka students are already members of HEA but I know you’ve got a couple of resources or things that might be helpful for our families.

Tina:

Okay, so one of the things that we do for members when they when new members join is we issue a Microsoft Office 365 faculty education suite for the parents. So they end up with a Microsoft EDU email and access to the full Microsoft education suite that we have. It is web based, and they also have the option of ordering for their students the student version of the Microsoft Office 365. It’s not an EDU because we’re not officially a school, we can’t hand those out. But we do give out an email that’s HEA specific. And whilst they’re members, they will have access to all that and the actual education information that is within the suite and it’s lots of fun and you can do create and

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

Use the AI on there and you can help draw pictures and assign lessons or classes, you know, exercises for the children through their Microsoft as well. And our older members have a Google EDU, but they can also have the option of the Microsoft. And then so while you’re a member, you can have access to all of those, but we also have some great resources that we have. So one of them is called Story Box Library, which is a suite of books. And within those, am I allowed to share on here? Okay. That’s right. Yeah.

Ellen:

I don’think it’ll share here on this one, but you can certainly let us know and we can give that out to families so they can contact you anyway.

Tina:

Yeah, sorry, sure. So Story Box Library is a great it’s it’s a library of books and it’s targeting younger younger children from, you know, kindergarten through till about I think age of eight or nine. But you know, it doesn’t mean older kids can’t read the younger stories because you sometimes you learn a lot from them. But I also

Ellen:

Yes? Yes?

Tina:

Come with ideas of what you can do with the story. And about helping your child to think a little bit more. It’s got activities, it’s got units of work, and of course it’s cross-curricular so that you can use it in different subject settings. You know, if you’re looking for a particular theme, whether it’s to do with early part of the year, whether she was Mother’s Day or Father’s Day, or a particular festival in the year, you’ll often find a storybook that’s in there with activity sheets. And that’s part that’s yeah.

Ellen:

Well, I’ll just interrupt for a second because that’ll be really helpful for families who want to do a choose your own novel or it’s called bring your own novel BYON, which means that, you know, the Euka program, it’ll have a novel per term that your children will be reading from grade two upwards. But sometimes that novel doesn’t click with your child. So if you are using the BYON novel and you want to have a talk to HEA about this particular resource, that might be a way of choosing a book that you want to do instead. So that would be helpful.

Tina:

And that’s a member benefit. So that’s just all included in purchasing a membership. And then we have another one called Newsademics. It’s kind of like a newspaper, and it covers a lot of current affairs, things that are happening. Our current one, the issue is 540, and it covers things like Peru’s newest president, Mediterranean Invaders, Chocolate Day. Record breaking trees, world map, and it comes with activities and that are geared towards two different levels. So you’ve got one that’s geared towards an upper primary and one that’s targeting a lower high school. So you give you got two different sets of activities that go with it and it covers things like word finds and crosswords. It’s also cross curricula. It does you know fill in the words for a sentence. And you can also have access to an archive of the older newsletters as well and all the activity sheets. So there’s heaps there to look at and it is lots of fun.

Ellen:

Great. The other thing that I think will be really helpful and I know it’something that we get asked about a lot is we have a lot of students from year nine all the way up, grade nine up, that do work experience and I believe that you offer some support as far as insurance and things like that with work experience. I know sometimes if you’re doing work experience it happens to be know Uncle Frank, that’s not a problem but A lot of the time when students want to go in and do a week here and there, and we really encourage that. We find our Euka students really love to be able to get out there and try new things out in the world. And sometimes you’ll approach an employer and they’ll say, I’m not sure our insurance will cover that because you’re not being paid. So I believe that HEA does offer the opportunity for their members to be able to get some insurance for their work experience.

Tina:

Yes, we certainly do. There are some states that have their own insurance that you can get from the education departments, but not all states do that. And

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

They also have an age limitation. So a lot of state registration bodies that do offer, I think it’s Tasmania and Queensland. It’s from the age of 14 and up.

Ellen:

Mm-hmm.

Tina:

At HEA, we can actually help you from the age of 12 to have work experience insurance. And we do cover all the states. It’s just a matter of being a member, filling in the registration form, and we have what’s called a work agreement form, work experience agreement form, that you and the supervising employer will fill in. And so

Ellen:

Yeah. Yes.

Tina:

It’s like it’s your contract, but it goes on record. So if something happens, the insurer has the information, and you know, and so do the parent and the employer.

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

Safety for everyone, and that’something

Ellen:

Yes.

Tina:

That. We like to encourage and yeah, it’s very helpful.

Ellen:

Yes, yeah very, very helpful. It’s one of those things that you know, know one of the disappointing things when I went to school is you got one week of work experience in year 10 and that was it. And so we find that the Euka students, know, right through high school will say, you know, I’m interested in this and they’ll go off and give it a go. And there isn’t anybody who is doing a work experience week that doesn’t end up with the, oh, when you’re looking for work because young people seem to be so driven and self-motivated and they’re always wanted in the workforce aren’they? That’s awesome. Well look Tina thank

Tina:

Yes, they are. Yes.

Ellen:

You so much for your time today it’s been really insightful to hear how you’re supporting homeschoolers. We’re so grateful that there’s an organisation like HEA that are there to support everybody homeschooling and certainly our Euka families as well. So thank you so much for your time. Thank you.

Tina:

Thank you.

Other episodes

Episode 051

You’re Not Alone: Finding Support on Your Homeschooling Journey

Episode 050

Do I need to be a teacher to homeschool?

Episode 049

The Real Benefits of Homeschooling: A Euka Graduate’s Honest Answer

Episode 048

Is Homeschooling Worth It? David’s Story of Homeschooling 3 Kids Over 8 Years

Episode 047

Preparing Your Children for the Real World: 6 Life Skills Homeschooling Can Teach

Episode 046

Starting Homeschooling Mid-Year in Grade 11 or 12: Senior Pathways Available at Euka

Episode 045

School Refusal in 2026: What It Really Is, and How to Help Your Child

Episode 044

Can I Start Homeschooling in the Middle of the School Year?

Episode 043

From School Bullying to Homeschooling Across 40 Countries as a Single Mum with 3 Daughters

Episode 042

How Young Athletes Train Full-Time Without Falling Behind in School
meet-the-upgraded-euka-learning-experience-episode-41

Episode 041

Meet the Upgraded Euka Learning Experience

Episode 040

The World Is Your Classroom: Travel Schooling with The Slow Road

Episode 039

Inside the NSW Homeschooling Audit: What It Means for Families

Episode 038

He earns 30K a year and homeschools

Episode 037

What you need to know about homeschooling in 2025

Episode 036

Is School Going “WOKE”?

Episode 035

The “True” Reasons families homeschool?

Episode 034

What you need to know about Registration and Reporting when Homeschooling

Episode 033

Travel Schooling: Everything you need to know

Episode 032

Raising young boys

Episode 031

Sleep! Are you and your kids getting enough?

Episode 030

Setting your pre-schooler up for success

Episode 029

Should children under 16 be banned from using social media?

Episode 028

Should children learn handwriting in this digital world?

Episode 027

The #1 Skill for children to learn

Episode 026

When should your child do work experience?

Episode 025

How to build a strong family unit

Episode 024

How to retain 90% of everything you learn!

Episode 023

Homeschooling with Dyslexia, ASD, and ADHD: A Mother’s Inspirational Journey

Episode 022

Unlock funding for homeschooling

Episode 021

Moving from School to Homeschooling in term 2

Episode 020

Homeschooling on a budget

Episode 019

The Importance of Raising Risk Takers

Episode 018

Empowering Girls: Building Confidence and Self-Esteem

Episode 017

3 Major Obstacles Parents Face when Homeschooling

Episode 016

The most important skill a child can learn
Browse all episodes

Follow Euka on social platforms

Meet our hosts

Brett Campbell, CEO Euka Future Learning

Brett Campbell is a leader in education, serving as the CEO of Euka, an innovative company building the future of education. He’s a successful entrepreneur and author with a passion for lifelong learning. Beyond his professional achievements, Brett is a devoted family man and the host of the Future Learners Podcast, where he shares his ideas about education’s potential to empower people and create a brighter future.

Follow Brett on:

Ellen Brown, Founder Euka Future Learning

Ellen Brown is the founder and driving force behind Euka’s educational philosophy. With over 25 years of teaching experience, she designed Euka’s curriculum for grades 1-12, emphasizing individualized and practical learning. Her expertise is recognized by major media outlets, and she is frequently sought after for her insights on the future of education.