Meet the parents who let their daughters ‘take charge’ at home, explaining they ‘almost always say yes’ to them.
Amanda and Paul Conway, both 47, say they’ve always been ‘different’, so when their eldest daughter, Hannah, struggled to fit in at school, they decided to take an alternative approach.
They pulled their daughter out of school, allowing her instead to ‘take charge’ at home.
Hannah, 11, is allowed to do whatever they want as long as she completes chores – and Amanda and Paul say that she’s happier than ever.
Younger sister Beth, 10, is also allowed the same freedoms – although isn’t quite as wild.
Amanda, a finance manager from East Preston, East Sussex, said: ‘Hannah doesn’t just get what she wants.
‘She has to do her chores and home education, to show that she doesn’t just get things for free in life.
‘But now she’s excelling. She left school broken, and now it’s let her bloom into something wonderful. She’s expressing herself.’
Amanda and Paul, an account manager, say they let both daughters do what makes them happy – within reason.
For example, Hannah was allowed to get her ears pierced aged seven, and she’s recently been allowed to cut off her long blonde her and dye the rest purple.
Amanda said: ‘She’s always been different so we thought, lets do things differently for her.
‘It was a bit difficult for me when she asked to cut off her gorgeous hair but it’s her choice.’
Since dying her hair purple, Hannah bleached it back to a blonde colour but has now decided she wants it to be blue.
Amanda says she realised she needed to ‘do things differently’ for her daughter, who didn’t enjoy school.
She says: [Hannah] was always happy but said she would fake it. Now she is confident.
‘She was silent and hardly spoke.
‘She was so unhappy and I realised what I was doing wasn’t working. I asked her what she wanted and she said she wanted to be at home.
‘She’s not stifled at school anymore. We said to her, “You’re in charge.” Now she’s just excelling.’
Amanda and Paul now approach their parenting as ‘child led’ and let Hannah and Beth learn in the style that works for them.
Amanda said: ‘Hannah is now doing her learning through audio and that works for her.
‘Children are put into boxes and told what to do. I believe as soon as a child can think for themselves they should be able to do it.
‘If she can prove why she wants to do something I’ll back her. We have a very different approach to parenting.’
But Amanda and Paul have had to deal with some criticism.
She explained: ‘I get a lot of comments for people saying, “Why am I harming my child?” or “She won’t learn anything at home.”
‘We even had an older lady say, “Why are your kids not at school?” when she saw us in the village.
‘Beth turned around and said, “We are learning – we are home educated”.
‘Hannah’s gone up a whole school year since learning at home. She’s allowed to be free and explore things herself.
‘I don’t like conforming to what society says we should do.’
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