We are hoping to do so starting in the next couple of years when we finally figure out where in italy we want to move and GET there, but I have a lofty long term vision of finding other English speaking mothers who plan on homeschooling and connecting with them over the years to create a little sub-community of (English speaking) homeschoolers within the Italian community. It's a long shot but I thought I'd check and see if anyone on this forum is already doing this kind of alternative family life!

ok - so 2 little finnished blood boys are gonna move to Italy and be homeschooled in English??

I do know people who attempted something like this - it was 2 german parents that moved to Italy and only spoke English to the children -
the parents spoke in german with eachother they were homeschooled for a few years and then went to regular school.

10 years down the road - the children only speak Italian with a very strong local accent and dialect.

Of course that is an extreme case!

The biggest problem that I have seen with creating a homeschooling group is that unless you live in a city center , it can be difficult to get the kids together. I live in a very rural area (where there are quite a few "alternative" expats) - some friends of mine did a homeschooling group for a year but they stopped becasue it was too much of a hassle taxing the kids between houses .... at least a 20 minute drive each way (not because the houses are far - only because from one house to the other consisted of a few kilometers of windy curvy hilly dirt roads and the rest of the kilometers were paved but still windy curvy and hilly!)

Actually, I'm not sure if home schooling is legal in Italy. There was another thread on this where some of the Italian members said that it isnt. You should look into the relevant Italian laws on this.

Leila,

You can google "Homeschooling Families in Italy" for an idea of who's doing what where.

We are an American family and just arrived outside of Milan at the end of May. We have homeschooled from the very beginning of our children's education, and we are in a unique situation. We move every year, all over the world, with my husband's work, and that can happen either after the school year has started or before it is finished.

I can tell you from experience that our best years have been when we have had other homeschoolers in the area. I think it will be challenging to find other English-speaking expats in Italy who are next door and homeschooling. What happens if they move away? Or, as kellytree pointed out, what if it's just too much of a bother to ensure your kids have friends?

It's hard to juggle priorities--moving to the country you love, or taking charge of your children's education. You have to ask what's in it for them, your moving to Italy. Are they going to have an artificial, not to mention lonely, existence, never really experiencing the culture in which they now (would)live? Moving permanently to another country seems to demand certain obligations, and for your children that means learning the language and culture of their adopted home.

I am a strong advocate of homeschooling, but not at the expense of the children. There is a small group of Italian homeschooling families. Again, google "scuolafamiliare" for the link. If homeschooling is the goal, why not homeschool in the language of your new home?

Good luck!

Judith

rtpm, Leila, and everyone else:

ART. III-D.L.VO 16 APRILE 1994, N. 297
MODALITÀ DI ADEMPIMENTO DELL'OBBLIGO SCOLASTICO
All'obbligo scolastico si adempie frequentando le scuole elementari e medie statali o le scuole non statali abilitate al rilascio di titoli di studio riconosciuti dallo Stato anche privatamente, secondo le norme del presente Testo Unico.
I genitori dell'obbligo o chi fa le veci che intendano provvedere privatamente o direttamente all'istruzione dell'obbligo devono dimostrare di averne la capacità technica od economica e darne comunicazione anno per anno alla competente autorità.


So it's on the books that Italians have the right to homeschool.

Just an aside: we've been very upfront to all the townsfolk in Abbiategrasso about our homeschooling the children for the year that we're here. I can honestly say that not a single Italian out of at least twenty (including the priest and the sindaco) has questioned the wisdom of our choice, nor have they in any way suggested or stated that it's illegal. So it seems fine with both the church and the state, and that's quite all right for us.

Judith

Thanks Judith. In that other thread on homeschooling there was some confusion about whether it is allowed or not in Italy (I think the confusion arose because of the need to follow the compulsory Italian state curriculum if you are resident in Italy). Good to know that there are more options out there.

Well we will be homeschooling in Italy,but as of this moment we will not be living there permanently,so not exactly what you are looking for.We have a different agenda and will be traveling around the world slowly for a while.We love Italy ( I lived there for a year when I was young) so will definately be spending a good amount of time there.

Even if you don't run into a group there exactly as you want,you can still find ways of creating community.Online is one way,both for you and the kids.I know people all over the world who are homeschooling and kids that connect with others via skype or internet etc. and imagine that will just continue to grow.Kids can connect thru a virtual school or class or just for fun.Moms & dads can connect for support and ideas.

I know a mom who has been doing it for years in an isolated place in China with her 2 boys ( American dad,UK mum), I know a UK family that travels & lives between places in Spain and France ( & to Italy soon) & homeschools ( they live in a large RV full time).There is a family from France that just spent the last 4 years traveling the world with thier 2 children and homeschooled as they went.I know many families in the US that move between Mex,Canada & US and homeschool for years with their children.I know people who have homeschooled on boats as they travel the world.So there are as many ways to homeschool and find community as there are people.

There is no reason why you can not also have connection with the Italian community and schooled kids.Most places have sports and lessons,scouts,clubs,summer camps etc for kids,so your kids can connect that way plus with neighborhood kids.

It is harder to maintain a language that is not dominant in a culture,but it can be done.There is a great book about a family in Austrailia where the parents were monolingual and raised bilingual kids in German/English without other German speakers around.Its possible ,just harder ( and they did take trips to Germany,the father always spoke German to the kids and they listened to german radio etc).

Raising a bilingual child is harder than one might imagine.Kids can learn languages quickly ,but they can also lose them just as quickly.I read about a family that moved yearly around the world & the kids would learn the language quickly,but as soon as they moved and were not around the language they lost them all.One must continue to speak a language regularly to keep up with it. I know people who live in this country who now speak their mother tongue like a foreigner.

If you are living in Italy your children will need to know Italian too ofcourse & you will have to work harder to keep up the English.I know many UK parents in Spain who are distressed that their UK kids have lost thier English or do not have a grasp on their native tongue like a native after years of Spanish immersion.So you will need to stay conscious and work hard at maintaining a language that is not dominant in a country.

We started out raising our child as a trilingual ,but decided to go to bilingualism.Its a lot of work to keep up a second language that is not dominant in a culture.We have gotten together with other families who are raising Spanish bilinguals since birth and that has been helpful.

If you can find other Italian/English bilingual families that will be a help for you.Or if you can spend sometime ( hopefully yearly like summers and grandmas in English speaking country or whatever)in an English dominant country that will be very helpful.

I think you can definately do what you want to do ,but it will take a concentrated effort and work on your part.

Heres a good link for books on bilingualism that can be very helpful understanding how to support that:

http://learninfreedom.org/languagebooks.html

I didn't mean to be so cryptic with my plans.... What I'm looking for is just some other English speakers who are homeschooling their kids in Italy that we would be able to, at least occasionally, meet up with for planned activities. We are homeschooling them in English here now in Finland, so why not in Italy? I figure it might actually be easier to find native English expats in Italy than in Finland to homeschool alongside, my area in Finland ain't so packed with non-Finns. Anyway, thanks for all the suggestions. I did manage to find, through the ScuolaFamilia yahoo group, a Finnish family and an American family homeschooling at Lago di Maggiorio (spelling?) and another family near Milan, but I have little interest in moving so far up North. I'm focusing my hopes on Tuscanny or Umbria, but so far haven't found too many (homeschooling) folks in central Italy. I shouldn't even say 'homeschooling' --we are an unschooling family, but most people don't know what that means! Anyway, I'm following the boards closely....

quote:

I shouldn't even say 'homeschooling' --we are an unschooling family, but most people don't know what that means!

Leila, I'm one of those people who doesn't know what unschooling is so could you explain? Thanks!

I don't know what it means either. "Unschooling" sounds like you're trying to reverse what has been done in school. ??

Funny, I didnt know what unschooling was either until last week when I read this article...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15029646/

It probably should be called "nonschooling" to make it clear, the prefix "un" implies that they are undoing previous schooling.

It's a difficult concept to articulate, so I imagine naming it was no easy exercise either.

I (inspired by this thread) read on Wikipedia that the term was coined by American educator John Holt, so maybe he explains the etymology somewhere in his books.

Or perhaps Leila can help?

I think rather than trying to explain, I'll recommend an excellent book, "The Natural Child: Parenting from the Heart" by Jan Hunt. It's a short easy read, a collection of essays, that describes natural parenting practices, including unschooling, in a way that just really opens your eyes. Also a very inspiring read: "The Continuum Concept" by Jean Leidloff (there's an email discussion list as well as a discussion thread at mothering.com for parents interested in the ideas from this book) which is a complementary read.
In my own quick words, I would describe unschooling as a positive, relaxed way of life with your children, where parents are constant 'guides' to this earth and all there is to learn on it, planting rich & varied opportunities for learning all around a child, for them to discover and devour on their own terms and fueled by their own desire to learn. I wouldn't use the term school at all, I would just call it a natural upbringing or childhood. The traditional school system is based on the supposition thata child has to be forced to learn academic subjects, or peer social skills. Unschoolers believe that is actually ridiculous given that children are walking, breathing learning machines, if given a natural environment to explore and feel secure. When I had my boys, it started to make more sense to let them just continue on the same self-motivated path they are on when they are born and learn to walk and talk and understand the social system they are working within. I think formal education does more to quelch a child's excitement for learning, rather than to enhance it, and my own experiences, (although I graduated from a high school in Tennessee #1 out of about 250 students and enjoyed and thrived at a prestigious college in Massachusetts afterwards), also left me less than impressed with traditional K-12 education. The parents have to be present, and they have to be committed to this concept and of creating the right environment and community for their child to receive a rich upbringing ('homeschooling experience,' whatever) but we are working hard for that already, getting a group of families committed to these values together here in Finland, and we are going to build houses in the countryside next to each other (6-10 families to start with, more later I'm sure) next year, so we always have a base at least in my husband's home country where our kids will have a healthy, thriving tribe of kids to unschool alongside (and 'socialize' with if you need to hear that word also). I just want to take our 'show on the road' and move to Italy for half the year or more, but hope to meet other likeminded families as soon as possible, and maybe in a few years after we've found an area we love to spend the colder half of the year in, we'll have a small group of kids for our children to spend lots of time here and there doing group activities with. Maybe one day we'll also be building a little cluster of homes in a countryside so the kids can really have some freedom and a social life, from a very young age, also. But we plan on having more than 6 kids ourselves, so our own tribe even in-house is going to be considerable. To start with, I just wondered if this website would give me any leads on finding a few homeschooling, english speaking families in Italy who also have small children. I believe God will have a part in leading us to meeting other families with similar values once we find a home in the area of our choice, and learn the language and become part of the community. I'm in no rush, as like I said, we will continue, for quite some time, to spend part of the year in the little homeschooling village we're putting together now here in Finland. But I'd like to do something like half & half our time in Finland and Italy, as the summers are really lovely and not so terribly hot, but the other 9 months are kind of a bust so I'm eager to find a home-away-from-home as soon as possible in Tuscany or Umbria that doesn't get freezing in winters!
Ok now I'm really rambling-sorry!!!!!

Ok, I'll admit it: I really have a problem with this whole idea. SURE, your boys are not even 3 years old yet! YES it's too early for them to go to school. But....

From the article Jennifer linked to:

quote:

Kenzie, who was surrounded by books and stories from birth, began reading at 4 without any prompting or effort from his parents, says Hickman. Through his own recent exploration and the help of his parents he knows about a range of subjects, including mythology and the Great Depression.

Absolutely. I learned to read at 3½ years of age, and I have read thousands of books. Between the age of 7 and 17 I probably read 5 books a week. Fiction, non fiction... you name it.

But there are soooooo many things I would never have chosen to learn. There are so many things I never would have known if I hadn't gone to school.

I don't think homeschooling is allowed in Sweden, and to me it is a really strange concept and sounds very much like going back to the old days, to how it was before modern school, before school was mandatory.

I have a son who is six years old, who has just started in school. He loves every minute of it, and is already learning so much. He has developed a burning interest in learning to read and write, and don't think for a second that I haven't encouraged him to learn before! Before starting school he knew most of the capital letters, but he wasn't really interested.

You learn so much else in school. School is not just about teaching, school is also a way to learn how to interact, how to manage on your own, how to handle setbacks... how to become independent. Something you can't learn if you spend every minute of the day with mom.

School is cool. Parents are very un-cool, and the older the child the more un-cool the parents. I'm not so old that I don't remember that

In some ways I can understand your point - if nothing else, because your kids are still so young. But do you really want to have the sole responsibility for their education? It puts a whole lot of pressure on you as a parent.

Stepping down. I know this wasn't what you asked about, but... well, this is me.

quote:

Originally posted by Annika:
School is cool. Parents are very un-cool, and the older the child the more un-cool the parents. I'm not so old that I don't remember that

I agree that you'd have to be one very cool (and very unusual) parent for your kids to spend that much time with you on a daily basis and have you as his or her main influence in life.

While I love my parents, they are crazy in that typical parent way and I'm very glad that I had the influence of non-parent adults (mostly teachers and babysitters) in my life from an early age. As much as parents think they can be the main influence on their children as they grow up, they simply can't (as anyone who can remember their adolescence can attest). I would have ended up one neurotic kid if I had to spent the majority of my day with my parents. But to each their own!

As usual I'm in the middle. I think that unschooling and homeschooling should absolutely be choices for parents, and that the decision should be made on a per-child basis. I'm in the law, so the "best interests of the child" standard comes to mind; this is always case-by-case.

I had a similar school experience to Leila (except that my university was in NC), and looking back on my time, I could've done a MUCH better job of learning on my own K-12--and, in particular, narrowing down what I wanted to do in life faster. Sure I would've had to take organized classes to learn that because my parents aren't experts, but I was always motivated, so unschooling probably would've worked for me.

Would it have worked with my brother? Who knows? He did well in school with little effort but really lost interest somewhere around 8th grade b/c he was much smarter than what was going on around him. I was bored, too, but went and read, learned, traveled on my own--he played sports instead, so who knows if he would've ever learned Punnett squares or read Jane Eyre (gasp!)?

It's also important to remember that, as one article (I think the msnbc one) says, it's not an all-or-nothing deal. Some parents do send their kids to school intermittently for various reasons. It also very much depends on the parents, their commitment, their knowledge base, their ability to present stimulating, comprehensive experiences when the child wants them, etc. There are many factors to consider.

Btw, Leila, I think you did an excellent job of describing unschooling despite your initial unwillingness to do so. I don't have kids yet, I'll be getting that book, so for your input!

Interesting discussion

I think it sounds wonderful. Too many parents hand over responsibility for their child's education over to schools without a second thought.
And since there are other families involved they wont miss out on the social interaction and they wont spend every minute of the day with their parents.
I only wish I had the confidence in myself to do this. In the UK I would have seriously considered it, the school system is so hit and miss there - I don't think I'd have trusted them to educate my child. But here in Italy it's impossible for me since I dont know the language /culture well enough to educate Lila in it. I also think the education system here is better in many ways so I am more confident that she will do well. Also I dont think I'm strong enough to stand up to the backlash from the in-laws who already think my attachment parenting style is a bit wacko.

Good for you Leila, sounds like you know what you're doing and I think it's great that you care so much about your kids education.

Hi! I'm Italian and a teacher and I might be of some help on this issue. It is nearly impossible to homeschool a child under the age of 15 in this country.If you do not enroll them in a legally recognized school you might even serve some jail time. Once they are 16 you can, but in order to have a valid currculum they must pass an exam each year.

Ok, my 11year old is in a prep-school in the UK. When he is 13 he will go to boarding school. This is where it starts to get weird - because we are moving to Italy in 2 weeks (come what may!) from September 2006 I have been homeschooling him and will continue to do so until Easter 2007. His eventual Senior school thinks this is a brilliant idea because of the life-experience it will give him. This is to the extent that they have said he only has to pass their exam (not Common Entrance) in Maths, English and Sciences. I know many of you are going to be against the idea of boarding school but my son has tried it at his Prep a few times and is really looking forward to it, but he is also loving being at home and is looking forward to his time in Italy. For me it is a challenge as I am having to re-learn the subjects, make them interesting and keep them at the right level. His Prep school haven't been too helpful and only agreed after checking with his proposed Senior school. I do feel the whole thing is a bit of a gamble with his education but that is because I expected him to be in a formal education until he was 18. I am enjoying it and don't really want him to go away but the school he will hopefully go to is one of the best in the UK (my husband says the world!) so it would be a hard decision to keep him at home permanently. I hope it all works out and will let anyone who is interested know how we get on Other than to say I am trying a bit of everything everyone has been talking about, I'm not really sure what my point is - maybe wish me luck?!

In bocca al lupo, alyson! And also to your son on his new adventure!

alert! Parents can never really know whether they are doing the "right" thing for their children. Heck, parents or not, how can we know if we're doing the "right" thing for ourselves?! You have put a lot of thought, care, and love into this decision, and, IMHO, that's exactly "right."

Your son is very lucky and blessed on many levels, and I wish you and your family tante belle cose