As a parent, providing your children a quality education is most likely one of your top priorities. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has made parents increasingly concerned about ensuring their children receive a quality education while remaining safe.
As the COVID-19 vaccine becomes widely available across the UK, many families are refusing to get vaccinated. Not only is this delaying herd immunity, but it’s also increasing the risk of COVID-19 contraction among school-going children.
If your child interacts with an unvaccinated child, they could potentially contract the virus. This risk has compelled parents to help their children transition from conventional schooling to online schooling. However, there are lingering doubts about moving forward with this decision.
According to research, over 1.2 billion students are attending online classes. Long after the COVID-19 pandemic dissipates across the globe, many students are expected to continue to attend online classes.
In this blog, we’ll help you understand why this transition is quickly popularising globally. Continue reading for a closer look at five signs it’s time to make the switch from conventional school to online school.
1. Your Child’s Mental Health Is Suffering
Unbeknownst to many parents, conventional schooling can take a toll on a child’s mental health. Over the years, conventional schooling has consistently stood out for its risk of bullying and/or harassment.
According to a survey, 29% of secondary school heads in the English department received reports of school bullying, both physical and non-physical.
BBC recently reported that over 8,000 incidents of school abuse were reported on a site that is known for collecting testimonies of violence. Circling back to school bullying, 65% of gay or bisexual students experience homophobic bullying in conventional school systems.
As these statistics become increasingly alarming, taking children’s mental health into consideration is imperative. Apart from being a source of continual bullying and/or harassment, conventional school is also known for making students feel insecure, demotivated, and dispirited.
Favouritism is a common issue in conventional schooling systems, including private schools. Teachers often identify their favourites, and continue to prioritise their educational experience and personal development journey over other students’. A lack of equitable, unbiased, and impartial treatment of students can result in lower grades, poor mental health, and a dislike for learning. Instead of looking forward to attending school, students may dread it.
As a parent, identifying these patterns is extremely important. If your child isn’t thriving in conventional school—both academically and personally—it’s likely that something is holding them back. Perhaps it’s how their peers treat them, the lack of attention from their teachers, or other underlying issues associated with conventional schooling.
We recommend getting a good grasp on these factors at the earliest. By switching to online schools, you can help your child receive a quality education in a healthy, interactive, engaging, and enriching online learning environment.
As one of the leading online schools in the UK, Cambridge Home School has a team of MA/PhD qualified subject specialist teachers on board. Our teachers have extensive experience in identifying signs of potential classroom bullying, racism, harassment, or discrimination of any other form. By detecting such behaviour in students, they take prompt measures to nip derogatory comments, actions, subconscious biases, and microaggressions in the bud.
As a parent, you can rest assured your child will feel safe, supported, and excited about attending their classes. If there is any threat—implicit or explicit—that puts other students at risk, it is quickly taken care of. This plays a pivotal role in protecting each student’s mental health in the long run. Consequently, they perform exceptionally well academically. Since there are no fears or hesitations holding them back, they can fully commit to their lessons and secure top grades.
Recommended Read: How Homeschooling at Online School Can Help Children With Anxiety
2. You’re Worried About Your Child’s Safety
As stated earlier, the risk of the pandemic hasn’t abated. Until we reach herd immunity, taking precautionary measures is imperative. Presently, the COVID-19 vaccination isn’t mandatory for residents of the UK. Until the vaccination becomes mandatory for children in the UK, sending them to conventional school is quite a risk.
We recommend erring on the side of caution and switching to online schooling instead. As your children safely receive a quality education from the comfort of their home, you can gain much-needed peace of mind. If you’re hesitant about the adjustment phase, your concerns are valid. Today, parents can choose from a plethora of online schools. Unfortunately, they don’t uphold the same quality of education.
In light of the pandemic, online schooling has quickly popularized across the UK. This has resulted in the establishment of dozens of new online schools in the UK and thousands across the globe. As a parent, making an informed decision is extremely important. Instead of blindly putting your trust into all online schooling systems, we recommend being hyper-vigilant and selective.
As a rule of thumb, look for online schools that have 15+ years of experience. In addition, make sure they boast an esteemed faculty, state-of-the-art online learning systems, comprehensive and updated educational resources, small classroom sizes, and an independent curriculum.
At Cambridge Home School, we cover all the bases, and then some. With over 19 years of experience, we’re committed to providing motivated English-speaking students a quality online British education. By putting quality education, resources, teaching, and online software first, we ensure a successful future for our students.
As your child interacts with their teachers and peers in an engaging online classroom, receives individualised attention from their teachers, and receives expertly curated lessons, they’ll secure top grades. Ultimately, you can put their safety first without worrying about their academic growth and personal development.
3.You Want Your Child to Perform Well Outside of Class
By enrolling your child in an esteemed online school, you can rest assured their academic performance will be top-notch. However, parents often worry if online learning enables students to perform well outside of class.
Many nuances need to be explored here. For starters, online schooling allows students to enjoy greater flexibility. Students who attend conventional school often return home tired, worn out, and ready to call it a day. As a result, they may spend the rest of their day in bed and engage in minimal outdoor activities.
Even if they manage to play sports after school, they’ll struggle to retain their focus and energy levels. In essence, conventional schooling can quickly tire out students.
As you switch to online school, your children will feel more active, energised, and refreshed. Online classes don’t demand much from students physically. Your child will not be required to shuffle in and out of classes for hours on end. Instead, they can fully commit to their lessons and save their energy for afterschool sports, activities, events, excursions, hobbies, and explorations.
Recommended Read: Homeschooling Elite Athletes With Online Schooling: How Does It Work?
Online schooling also helps students free up a lot of time. Instead of spending this time shuffling in and out of classes, they can invest in other activities they’re passionate about. This also helps students think outside the box and develop an entrepreneurial mindset.
If they’re interested in tech, they can explore their passion in depth. If they have a penchant for mathematics, they can use their free time to hone their analytical thinking skills. And if they’re fond of science, they can resume their microscopic adventures and analyses with full force.
By enjoying a healthier study-life balance, students are less likely to feel drained, demotivated, and unstimulated. In many (but not all) cases, conventional schooling wears out students to such an extent that they become withdrawn and feel less enthusiastic about hobbies and interests that they previously took a liking to. As this spark is regenerated, students can feel energised and inspired again.
As a parent of a young child, make sure you create a healthy schedule for them. Incorporate sports, leisurely activities, play dates, and other fun adventures into their routine.
Older children between the ages of 13 and 19 will march to the beat of their own drum for the most part. Ensure that they’re socialising with their friends outside of class and taking up a keen interest in afterschool activities and enjoyments.
If your child is an introvert, they may use online schooling as an excuse to spend more time indoors. While this isn’t the case for extrovert and ambivert students, it’s possible among students who appreciate their “me time” more than others.
Encourage your child to explore new passions and interests outside of the home. A motivating nudge is often enough to help introverted children reach out to their friends and put themselves out there more. At the end of the day, your children will reap the benefits of a healthier study-life balance.
Recommended Read: How to Maintain Your Child’s Social Life When Homeschooling
4.Your Child Doesn’t Frequently Engage with Their Teachers
We touched upon this earlier, but we’ll dive into it a tad more in this section. Not every child is the same, and parents know this better any anyone else. If you have multiple children, we’re sure their distinctive personality traits amaze you on a regular basis. If one of your children is a bit more shy, withdrawn, and taciturn than others, making the switch to online school is a great way to help them open up.
Conventional schools have a high teacher-student ratio. When quiet and reserved students are placed in a large classroom, they fade in the background even more. In most cases, teachers and students fail to encourage reserved students to open up and break out of their shells. On the flip side, they may resort to bullying them.
At Cambridge Home School, we keep the classroom size small by grouping together a maximum of 8 to 10 students. This helps our teachers provide one-on-one attention to each student, especially students that aren’t as communicative and need more help coming into their own.
Our teachers use a welcoming, motivational, and empathetic approach to help these students engage in healthy discussions and unhesitatingly share their two cents with the class. At Cambridge Home School, we don’t believe in immediately pushing students out of their comfort zone by putting them on the spot. Instead, we use a gentler, gradual approach to help them put forth their questions and share their input. By giving each student an equal opportunity to engage in class, our teachers help improve their aplomb and academic performance by leaps and bounds.
This approach doesn’t just help students secure top grades, but it also plays a big role in helping them excel at job interviews. By creating well-rounded individuals, we ensure that online schooling works in each student’s favour.
5.You Want to Enjoy Greater Flexibility as a Parent without Compromising on the Quality of Education Your Child Receives
The best gift you can offer your child is present parenting. While spending all day with your children may sound like an ideal situation, these hours are of little value if the parent is continually taking work calls, distracted, and zoned out.
On the contrary, spending quality time with your child can help you be more present, attentive, and completely focused on them. In the long run, your children will remember their parents being attentive, as opposed to perpetually busy and multi-tasking.
As your child attends their online classes, you can take care of work. Our teachers are adept at managing the classes and keeping children on track, so you can rest assured that parental involvement will not be required during classes. Once the classes are over and you return from work, you can spend wholesome, quality, and focused time with your children.
Recommended Read: How to Navigate the Homeschooling Adjustment Phase as a Parent
Online schooling also helps parents and children enjoy greater flexibility. You can plan mini-trips and getaways in the middle of the term, provided you make arrangements for stable Wi-Fi and a separate study room for your child in your hotel suite or Airbnb. Online schooling offers parents a lot of leeway, which can be used to provide enriching experiences to children.
If you’re looking for a reputable online school, we should be your top consideration. At Cambridge Home School, we provide a quality British virtual high school online education to motivated English-speaking students in the UK, Europe (including Western Russia), Africa, and the Middle East.
Parents can choose from four schools: Primary Prep/Key Stage 2 (ages 8 to 10), Lower School/Key Stage 3 (ages 11 to 13), Upper School/IGCSEs (ages 14 to 16), and Sixth Form/AS &A Levels (ages 17 to 19).
If you’re ready to get started, make sure you browse through our admissions process, online reviews, and term dates.
Find out more about School options for working parents here.
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FAQ Section
Is online schooling a safe alternative during the COVID-19 pandemic?
Yes, online schooling is considered a safer alternative to conventional schools, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. It allows children to receive a quality education while reducing the risk of contracting the virus, especially if there are unvaccinated individuals in the community.
How does online schooling affect my child’s mental health?
Online schooling can be beneficial for your child’s mental well-being. Traditional schools can often be a source of stress due to bullying, harassment, or even teacher favouritism. Online schools like Cambridge Home School offer a supportive environment that aims to protect each student’s mental health.
Can online schooling provide a quality education?
Absolutely. When choosing an online school, look for ones with extensive experience and a qualified teaching staff. Schools like Cambridge Home School, which has over 19 years of experience, focus on delivering quality education to English-speaking students, using state-of-the-art online systems and resources.
Will online schooling hamper my child’s social and extracurricular activities?
No, online schooling can actually offer greater flexibility, allowing your child to engage in extracurricular activities more freely. With the time saved from commuting and a more flexible schedule, students can participate in other activities they’re passionate about.
Can online schooling be a good option for shy or reserved children?
Yes, online schooling can be especially beneficial for shy or reserved children. With smaller class sizes, like those at Cambridge Home School, teachers can provide one-on-one attention, encouraging quieter students to open up at their own pace.