Homeschooling in South Africa:
the Better Choice
Homeschooling, or Home education, is legal in South Africa and is a fast growing market at about 20% per year.
According to many media reports (see below), the education system in South Africa is not improving. Therefore parents in SA will have to face the fact that their decision to keep or to put their children in schools will have long-term consequences.
It is important that parents realize that they do have a choice in the matter of their children’s education.
Homeschooling in SA is the same concept as internationally and therefore all the information provided on this website can be read as applicable in SA.
A number of articles appeared in the media confirming the fact that South Africa’s education system is questionable:
- Beeld newspaper – School Shock, Children cannot read or count
- Rapport newspaper – Qualifications create a false image of literacy
- Cape Times newspaper – Matric not good enough for varsities
- Rapport newspaper – Stop the schoollaw, Quality teaching are endangered)
- Rapport newspaper – Exam papers full of mistakes is no joke
There were also a number of articles explaining and encouraging homeschooling:
- Taalgenoot magazine - Education options for you children, whereby research is cited done by Dr Esther de Waal and Dierdre Bester indicating that people who choose to home educate their children in SA do so for smiliar reasons as in the USA. It is also stated that there are a number of advantages to homeschooling, but that it requires a firm commitment from parents.
- Beeld newspaper – Tuisleerling vaar baie beter (Homeschoolers do better) had an article summarizing the fact that Home students do much better in language and number skills than their school counterparts.
- The Pretoria News newspaper – The pros and cons of homeschooling, where home schooling is discussed as a new trend in education as more South African parents choose to teach their children at home.
Although homeschooling in South Africa is legal there may still be some confusion and concerns for parents who are interested in homeschooling their children.
The Pestalozzi Trust is the national legal defence fund for home education and provide specific information regarding the law in South Africa with regards to home education. They are doing continuous research and it is very beneficial to attend at least one of their information days they have on a regular basis.
They can also be invited for an information session to your area. It is valuable to read the following articles/booklets available on their website, or just download it here:
They can be contacted in Pretoria on tel. 012 3301337 - Bouwe van der Eems and Karin van Oostrum.
A useful website on South African homeschooling with general information is South African Association for homeschoolers.
Since we recommend following an eclectic curriculum, some providers of high quality resources, here in South Africa are:
Other books can be bought from any Book suppliers such as Loot, TakeALot, CNA, PNA, ChristianBookDistributors etc.
P.S. I have personally used Math-U-See (Oikos), Apologia Science books (available from Creation Ministries) and English LLATL (Learning Language Arts Through Literature) from primary years to highschool.
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