Facilitating Life Learners : April 2018

Books about children who don't go to school

So, this article appeared in the Guardian today entitled

Why don't children's books talk about Home Schooling?

Except they do. My friend Mel has a comprehensive list here (but you'll need a password to read it)

I was certain I'd seen a more contemporary list recently but maybe it was a list of authors who didn't go to school I was confusing it with - Agatha Christie, Beatrix Potter, the author of the Eragon series Christopher Paolini' that's a very good list for discussion too.

#HomeEdHour on Twitter often lands up with a book focus, sharing tales of overspend on paperbacks and "shelifies" but after googling and asking and not finding the contemporary list I was after I decided to start a new one.

I'll list out the books S (which are pretty much all written this century) has read, a few I've read with O then add those contributions by others from Twitter at the end - hopefully fleshing them out with one sentence type reviews in time.

Saff (10) likes YA contemporary fiction and settings of home ed she can relate to so again that's modern contemporary fiction - it's the technology that does it I think. As a background these are the books she read in 2014

On holiday last year we read "Wonder" by R J Palacio which is the story of a home schooled boy transitioning into school in America. It's a really wonderful book about a boy called August and was published in 2012

S says

"It was good for August to go to school. It showed him that people would accept him once they got to know him. For August it was hard but worth it."

S (10) mentioned Cathy Cassidy's "Scarlett" to me recently as the main character in the story is briefly Home Schooled when other things in her life change. S really likes Cathy Cassidy books as they are again very modern and this one is published in 2012.

S says

"I liked Scarlett because although I didn't relate to her character much before I did when she was home schooled. Now I am a bit older I know kids are overloaded with homework and when she said "Yes. No homework." I got that."

S also tells me that Artemis Fowl pulls himself out of school since his Mum goes nuts and his Dad is dead. She read the whole of the this series last year and they were published from 2011 to the present.

~~~

The characters in Roof Toppers, (written in 2013) a book we read for our book club last year, don't attend school. We also read Pippi Longstocking with our book club and Pippi is educated otherwise.

In the historical fiction series the "Roman Mysteries" Flavia, Nubia, Lupus and Jonathan don't go to school. That was another book club read.

It's not all about books though, there are movies too (some of which are the books above!) and this list from Joyce is ace. And also famous YouTubers S likes the Kittiesmama channel about a home schooling family.

Orin is six so a different kind of book appeals to him

O (6) and I have read the beautiful "The Boy who climbed into the Moon" by David Almond several times and it features a great line about not feeling like going to school. I mentioned on the blog last year that David Almond is known for Mina who is home educated

O and I also reviewed "Who's not in School?" recently and that is a book written specifically about a child not going to school rather than an aside to the main plot. It is aimed at much younger children. There are other books like this egThe Day Amala Didn't Start School and Freya and Heath are Home Educated but they are more about home education specifically rather than a featuring a character who is home educated.

These books have been contributed by twitter but are not necessarily ones we have ourselves read - reviews of these titles welcome. An blog carnival? Or in the comments is fine.

@Keris "My Name is Mina" David J Almond

@liveotherwise Kingdom of Silk (Tiskin Silk) , One by Sarah Crossan

@mamacrow Many of the Enid Blyton books are set in the school hols, Tracy Beaker (Jacqueline Wilson) Rosemary Sutcliffe, Biggles, Jungle Books, Kim (also Kipling) Secret Garden, Silver Sword

If you add to this article and are on twitter the following people have expressed an interest in this subject area

@liveotherwise @keris @playbythebook @mamacrow @miriamhcraig @janelevicki @rmountney @davidjalmond @cathycassidyxx @louiestowell @rossmountney7 @birdsnestbooks

21 comments:

Zoe Toft said...: Thanks for this and for including me in the discussion. My 10 year old suggests the two Ottoline books (by Chris Riddell) which are not Ottoline goes to School. Ottoline's parents are away and send her experiments to work on.; 12 August 2015 at 14:39
Taryn @ Hayes Happenings said...: Great article. I also saw the Guardian article. It echoed my thoughts from a couple of years ago, which is why I chose then to write a contemporary fiction novel about few homeschooled kids. It's an adventure that has them delve into a bit of history. All as a result of finding an intriguing message in a bottle. You can see it here: tarynhayes dot com. You're welcome to add it to your growing list.; 12 August 2015 at 15:23
Katie Pybus said...: Cheers Zoe. I asked Saff about Goth Girl as she really likes Chris Riddell too but I forgot Ottoline.

Thanks Taryn - I have just checked your website and I think that ties in with the "I know there is a South African one" tweet I received! http://tarynhayes.com/

Also from Elizabeth Foss on Twitter The Precious One http://www.amazon.co.uk/Precious-One-Marisa-los-Santos/dp/0061670898/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1439394626&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=The+Precious+One+by+marisadlsantos; 12 August 2015 at 16:51
Katie Pybus said...: NB One by Sarah Crossan which has come highly recommended from several YA contemporary fiction tweeters does not seem to be released for general sale http://www.amazon.co.uk/books/dp/1408863111/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1439394839&sr=8-1&keywords=one+sarah+crossan; 12 August 2015 at 16:56
Jax Blunt said...: One is out on 27th August - there's a review on my blog too.

The list behind the password stretches the not going to school point rather, it includes things like Harry Potter. I think the point made in the original article and one that I would agree with, is that home education is either a plot point or a passing fad, it's rarely presented just as a normal thing, and that is what we are missing.; 12 August 2015 at 17:38
Keris Stainton said...: I think the only YA book mentioned is One by Sarah Crossan. Definitely need more home ed in YA.; 12 August 2015 at 17:49
Katie Pybus said...: I remember feeling similar about children's books that normalised breastfeeding way back in 2--5/6 Jax - We had a few that were specifically about breastfeeding eg We Like To Nurse but just to see an illustration of a breast rather than a bottle in a book about a new sibling say was very unusual.

Saff has said many times that she will never go to school but if a Hogwarts letter was to turn up she would consider it (she is 11 in November)

One has had lots of positive reviews already Keris - I hope this post has boosted it's preorders I know we have!

The volume of books purchased by home educators often comes up on #homeedhour as a topic and I would imagine it larger than the numbers of home educated children might suggest!

I have 2 book fans and one who is much keener on movies which is why I included the movie list too.

It might also be handy to split into secular and religious

Thank-You so much to everyone who has taken the time to comment and share; 12 August 2015 at 20:46
Katie Pybus said...: Although not YA more middle school age another book in the pipeline has been shared with me https://m.facebook.com/nellienovabook; 12 August 2015 at 22:14
Katie Pybus said...: Although not YA more middle school age another book in the pipeline has been shared with me https://m.facebook.com/nellienovabook; 12 August 2015 at 22:16
Katie Pybus said...: Homeednetwork on Twitter shared this list from goodreads. There's a couple of overlapping titles but several books on here I'd never heard of https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/32276418-susan-wight?shelf=home-education-fiction; 12 August 2015 at 23:15
Katie Pybus said...: Homeednetwork on Twitter shared this list from goodreads. There's a couple of overlapping titles but several books on here I'd never heard of https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/32276418-susan-wight?shelf=home-education-fiction; 12 August 2015 at 23:21
Katie Pybus said...: Homeednetwork on Twitter shared this list from goodreads. There's a couple of overlapping titles but several books on here I'd never heard of https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/32276418-susan-wight?shelf=home-education-fiction; 12 August 2015 at 23:21
Katie Pybus said...: http://www.sparklestories.com/brand/view/martinsylvia

Another add this time an audio book aimed at younger children

The Railway Children (E Nesbit) and Little Women have both been mentioned a few times - they are also in the Books Without School link that you need a password to read; 13 August 2015 at 09:13
jo said...: HEIDI by Joanna Spyri is wonderful! Being raised by her Grandad up the mountain, they just naturally do home education without naming it. He tells her the names of flowers as they come upon them on the mountains and she puts them in a book and labels them. She watches him do his carving and woodwork and copies him. Loads of love and conversation, etc.. Then when she is in Hamburg, the hired tutor tries to teach her to read in a traditional way, but it doesn't work. When the kind Granny comes, she shows Heidi a special book about plants and mountains, inspires her to want to read, and hey presto, she reads very quickly!
Its very in tune with home-ed, or indeed just the natural way that we have raised our children for 1000s of years!; 13 August 2015 at 21:07
Katie Pybus said...: Since writing this post S (10) has read a couple of the Emily Strange books mentioned in the good reads list but doesn't think Emily is #homeed she just bunks off alot.

She also has 50 pages left of One which arrived (and was released) yesterday I'll link to her review and Jax's when I update this post.; 28 August 2015 at 08:29
Katie Pybus said...: Saff has read One since I published this post and her review is on Amazon.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/books/dp/1408863111/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1442071156&sr=1-1&keywords=one+sarah+crossan
She has also read more Emily the Strange books and discovered that Emily is now Home Schooled and has lots of other angles http://emilystrange.com/; 12 September 2015 at 16:20
Stephenie said...: I happened to stumble upon this blogpost and saw that my book, "Nellie Nova Takes Flight" was mentioned in the comments. Thanks for the mention! The book actually came out recently.

http://www.amazon.com/Nellie-Flight-Stephenie-Wilson-Peterson/dp/0692617701/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1452834604&sr=8-1&keywords=nellie+nova

Thanks again for the mention and happy reading! :); 15 January 2016 at 05:10
Katie Pybus said...: Harriet has a home tutor in picture perfect by Holly Smale. S finished the Geek Girl series after I'd published this post; 2 January 2017 at 12:49
Ronnie said...: Surviving the Applewhites - The Applewhites are unschoolers so this one is my absolute favorite.

Stargirl - although she gives school a try in the book; 3 January 2017 at 00:29
Lisa Cottrell-Bentley said...: You've missed all the www.DoLifeRightInc.com books which include the Wright on Time books, My Solar-Powered History series, Bubbles and Puddles, Cody Greene and the Rainbow Mystery, The Howling Vowels books, and more!; 3 January 2017 at 02:09
Katie Pybus said...: Thanks so much; 3 January 2017 at 15:53