The homeschooling journey explored

Concluding part of an interview with homeschooler Anna Dusseau

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Richard House [RH]: In part 1 (issue 32), you referred to a ‘silly incident’ that led you to withdraw your daughter from school - can you say more?

Anna Dusseau [AD]: The incident was that she was bullied – pushed around and harassed – at school for an entire day. I say ‘silly’ because it took me less than 48 hours to withdraw her. Looking back, for months before this incident I’d been making my mind up about what I saw going on at the school and how school was negatively impacting our family. I’d seen the bullies targeting one child after another for some time, and though I flagged it up, it was never properly dealt with. So realising that absolutely nothing would happen provoked my reaction. Modern schooling fails to recognise the glaring parallels the schoolhouse shares with the penal system; and if you’re going to incarcerate people in these conditions, of course you need stricter control of behaviour and safety.

RH: You also intriguingly referred to mainstream schooling ‘teaching us not to think’ – can you say more about that?