'A suitable education'

As a parent, I have a duty in law as follows;

(I ) shall cause him to receive efficient full-time education suitable—

1. to his age, ability and aptitude, and

2. to any special educational needs he may have,

either by regular attendance at school or otherwise.

I am interested in the wording of this law. One word in particular, in fact.

'HIM'

This law is written using a personal pronoun, with 'him' standing for 'the child' (of any gender) Why?

This law does not focus on all children, a faceless 'them'. It uses a personal pronoun very deliberately all the way through, denoting that EACH child has DIFFERENT needs and that my duty, as a parent, is to ensure that, no matter how many children I may have, the education of each one is decided by it's own personal abilities and difficulties, aptitudes and struggles.

I have two children. A creative, dreamy daughter who hates loud noises and crowds, is highly cautious physically and is so intensely visual it is often a source of amazement to me that she ever learned to talk at all let alone be the highly verbal child she is. And a loud, physically fearless son with a highly outgoing sociable personality who is drawn to sound over everything else but who at 18 months has yet to speak more that a couple of 'real' words.

There is no way that the same education that is suitable for my daughter would adequately fulfill my son's individual needs. And the kind of education my son will thrive on would be more likely to terrify my daughter than teach her.

Therefore, my intention is to attend to each one's personal needs, and I will do this easily because I know them very well as individuals. If my daughter learns best by seeing, she can learn by watching TV or watching someone else performing a task. If my son needs to hear to learn, he can talk to people, ask questions and listen to instructions. I will praise my daughter for jumping and my son for sitting still. I will leave my trustworthy daughter alone with the acrylic paint while I heavily supervise my not so trustworthy son's use of the crayons. I will hold my daughter's hand as she climbs while watching her younger brother zoom up without comment. And I will change with them, allowing crayoning alone for my son when he finally learns to neither eat them or draw on my furniture with them, letting go of my daughter's hand when she learns enough confidence in herself to climb alone. I will allow them to put aside old interests for new passions, allow them to leap ahead where they wish to without ensuring 'all previous steps have been covered' first or regress if they feel they need to with needing to 'show steady progress' because what they need is more important than what I want.

So, I will 'cause' my children 'to receive' an education that is suitable by making certain each one has their individual needs, wants and passions met. And by doing so I will fulfill my duty as laid out in the law that specifically defines the suitability of a person's education on how well it marries with their individual, personal traits.

In light of this, what sort of lunacy is the government's intention to try to define 'a suitable education'?

How do they intend to find the time to get to know every child in the country on such a personal basis that they will be able to say what will be suitable for each one at each stage of their educational journey? How will they follow each child through to adulthood and beyond in order to recognise what factors in the child's education served it well as an adult and what hindered it? How will they take this knowledge and use it to produce a method for determining the best method of educating any individual child?

How will they even recognise 'education' when they see it? After all, I often don't. I take it on trust that whatever my child is choosing to do at that moment must have some educational value to them or they would not be doing it, whether I can see it or not. I have always been proved right, but rarely at the time and never without surprise. If I can't always see the educational value of an activity, and I know how my child thinks, how will someone else fare better?

Obviously, they will do none of these things. It would be highly impractical and intrusive for a government to try it on even a minor scale. So, what are they talking about when they discuss 'defining a suitable eduation'?

It can only mean one thing. They want to set perameters based on what they think education looks like and define 'suitable' as 'that which suits the average'. Because they can't possibly define it on an individual basis without studying every child intimately every day of it's life until it dies.

And that means the government has not understood the law it perports to uphold. Because To define 'suitability' based on an average, or a majority, is to deny the personal aspect of it. The law does not confer the duty on parents to educate their child in the same way, or to the same standards, or using the same values or core subjects/knowledge as every other parent. It demands that education be something far more specific and individual, based on the child in front of you, not on statistics, studies, the lastest fads, cultural dictates or government desires.

From which I conclude that any attempt to define the meaning of 'a suitable education' in generic, countrywide terms would interfere with my ability to carry out my statutory duty to my two, very different, highly unique children and ultimately be in direct opposition to the law. And the government bods who think doing so would be a great idea and would solve a lot of problems haven't even realised it.

Assuming that 'suitable' means 'fit for purpose', what can be concluded about their education? And their ability to spot a 'suitable' one when they see it in another?