Latest / The BIG Home Ed Conversations | Home Education / Changing Perspectives in Home Education — Diversity, Belonging & Real Voices

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Changing Perspectives in Home Education — Diversity, Belonging & Real Voices · The BIG Home Ed Conversations | Home Education

• 0:11
  Hello everybody, welcome to season 4 of the big Home Ed
• 0:14
  conversations. As always, you are here with
• 0:17
  myself, Kelly Rick. I'm a home Ed mum of two, the
• 0:19
  founder of Off Roading Motherhood and a qualified
• 0:21
  mindset coach. I am really passionate about
• 0:24
  supporting parents and their divergent families as they
• 0:26
  navigate the transition from mainstream schooling into home
• 0:29
  education. I am here together with my Co
• 0:32
  host Ashley Venerio. So she's also a fellow home
• 0:34
  educating mum of three and a former primary teacher.
• 0:37
  So we created the big Homework Conversations podcast together
• 0:41
  with what kind of began as just us just chatting around the
• 0:44
  coffee table, feeling very, very deeply into lots of different
• 0:47
  subjects. And it's grown into a space now
• 0:49
  where hundreds of listeners now tune in for real, unfiltered
• 0:53
  conversations about mindset, behaviour, challenges,
• 0:56
  educational philosophies and the often emotional journey of
• 1:00
  alternative education. So we are cutting through the
• 1:02
  noise and we're focusing on what really matters to home educating
• 1:05
  families and hopefully offering you some clarity, confidence and
• 1:08
  community in every episode. So this episode also comes with
• 1:12
  our last comments on Out School. So we were given an opportunity
• 1:16
  over the summer from outschool.com to go and use
• 1:19
  their platform to review it, to comment on it honestly about our
• 1:23
  experience and actually what they've basically done is get
• 1:25
  themselves two more customers. I think what's quite funny about
• 1:29
  it really is that initially I started out looking at it
• 1:32
  thinking that would we use it a lot?
• 1:34
  I'm not sure. And actually what we have found
• 1:38
  is through trialling some classes for a little while to
• 1:40
  make sure that we had some feedback and thoughts for you,
• 1:43
  that we have actually found ourselves with a couple that are
• 1:46
  really starting to help form our weeks.
• 1:48
  My son is a real reluctant writer and is someone who I have
• 1:53
  spent an awful lot of hours trying to support with his
• 1:55
  writing. And I'm really excited to see
• 1:58
  him starting to engage with essentially this Percy Jackson
• 2:01
  class we've been doing. It's creative writing class.
• 2:05
  And the woman is just incredible.
• 2:06
  She spends half an hour supporting him with his learning
• 2:10
  and giving him ideas and prompts and supporting him with that.
• 2:13
  And one week we missed it actually.
• 2:17
  And when I reached out to her to say, is there a recording, like
• 2:20
  we just need to catch up, like it was just a bad day went a bit
• 2:23
  awry. She even offered, I mean,
• 2:24
  obviously most teachers obviously absolutely do not need
• 2:27
  to be offering this, but she even offered to actually do a 1
• 2:30
  to 1 private class with him to help him catch up because she
• 2:32
  knew that obviously the one to one engagement would really
• 2:34
  help. I declined.
• 2:36
  Obviously I said to her, please don't worry.
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  Like like it's not your fault. You shouldn't have to give up
• 2:40
  your time to help us. But ultimately she's great and
• 2:44
  she's really inspiring him and her enthusiasm for the subject
• 2:48
  is really helping him to come out of his shell.
• 2:50
  And I'm seeing such a lot of confidence week on week as he
• 2:53
  participates in that. And we've, we've tried a few
• 2:56
  others as well, just to enjoy some different subjects.
• 2:59
  And he's started actually going, oh, is there a class about this
• 3:01
  on there or whatever? And so it's helping me out.
• 3:04
  I don't feel like I've got to be as responsible for every single
• 3:07
  bit of his learning right now. And that is, that is a bit of a
• 3:11
  relief. It has definitely lightened my
• 3:13
  load a little bit. And I think the kind of people
• 3:15
  you're going to find on there are just just fascinating
• 3:17
  subjects wise. You're just going to find
• 3:19
  something they love. If if you need something around
• 3:22
  a specific subject, you are definitely going to find it.
• 3:25
  But I think you've had some, some good experience as well.
• 3:27
  You had quite a busy kind of couple of months and you've had
• 3:30
  to to pause a few. And I think you've had a really
• 3:32
  good experience with that as well, haven't you, Ashley?
• 3:34
  Yeah, we have definitely had I would say like a full spectrum
• 3:39
  introduction and use of out school.
• 3:42
  So it's been great and it was great years ago when we used it.
• 3:46
  We're at a different stage now and it's been great this time
• 3:49
  around too. We definitely took some
• 3:52
  different courses throughout the summer break, which was
• 3:54
  fantastic because we were able to have the capacity for a
• 3:58
  little bit more. But now that we're back into
• 4:01
  term time here, we have all the activities that have started
• 4:05
  back up again. And so we don't have the same
• 4:08
  amount of time available for some extra courses, but we have
• 4:12
  found a couple that really work for my girls and that they're
• 4:17
  really excited about and that's been great.
• 4:20
  The teachers themselves are really positive, helpful,
• 4:25
  encouraging. They just all have this presence
• 4:29
  that is really approachable and the kids just sort of gravitate
• 4:33
  to. And I found this to be
• 4:34
  consistent across all, all of out school courses that we've
• 4:37
  taken. I haven't found one where my
• 4:39
  kids have said I don't like that teacher.
• 4:42
  They might not love the content, but they've loved the people and
• 4:46
  the content just a personal thing, whether they're into it
• 4:48
  right now or not. So we definitely are going to
• 4:50
  continue on. We definitely are going to keep
• 4:53
  the subscription that we have, which we actually do even
• 4:57
  supplement. And right now my parents are
• 5:00
  visiting, they're here for three weeks.
• 5:02
  One of the courses is a sort of ad hoc.
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  It's a it's a course that we take just my two daughters and
• 5:08
  the teacher. So it's like a specialized
• 5:11
  sibling course. They call it all around Canva
• 5:15
  and designing things in Canva. And so that course was easy to
• 5:19
  pause because there it's not like we would be missing
• 5:22
  something. Where is my one daughter is
• 5:24
  doing a reading class and it's very phonic space.
• 5:28
  And so if she were to miss three classes, I feel like we would
• 5:31
  have a gap in her learning. And so anyway, all this to say,
• 5:35
  we paused one of the classes, but we didn't pause the other.
• 5:38
  And it's worked out great and we're excited to start back up
• 5:42
  next week on the one that we paused.
• 5:43
  So I definitely think it's really workable for probably
• 5:49
  most, if not all home educating families.
• 5:53
  Yeah. I think the flexibility and that
• 5:54
  ability to just which as long as you get to it before the Sunday
• 5:58
  before the class, so like you get to it like the weekend
• 6:00
  before you do. Have to plan.
• 6:02
  Just just just pause it and and skip a week.
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  It's no big deal. If you sign up for a class and
• 6:07
  then you immediately change your mind.
• 6:08
  I think you've got like a day to be able to pull out of it.
• 6:10
  So you've got, you have got a short window to be like, oh,
• 6:12
  actually, no, we won't do that one.
• 6:15
  The memberships and the credits mean that things work out that
• 6:17
  little bit cheaper. I think it definitely works out
• 6:20
  really well as a system that is really flexible, allows you to
• 6:23
  be in control of what you use and what you don't use.
• 6:26
  And you've got obviously the great opportunity to like really
• 6:28
  review the, the teachers that are on there and, and to really
• 6:30
  know who's going to be talking to your kids.
• 6:32
  Like I haven't had any pushback with any of them being funny
• 6:35
  about it. Me sitting in next to him.
• 6:37
  Like most of the time I will sit with him whilst he's doing it to
• 6:40
  keep him accountable more than anything.
• 6:42
  Thank God. I'll end up just like running
• 6:43
  around the room doing something else.
• 6:45
  But he, but none of them have like had an issue with me
• 6:48
  sitting with him. And they certainly like a super,
• 6:51
  super aware of his needs in terms of the autism and ADHD as
• 6:54
  well and are really receptive to that.
• 6:56
  And I've found it's really built his confidence and his like his
• 6:59
  ability to kind of chime into a conversation and to interject
• 7:02
  and to offer like his own thoughts, but also to understand
• 7:05
  what his limits are. Like he didn't like a class that
• 7:07
  we did because it was too busy and he felt like he didn't get a
• 7:10
  chance to interact with the teacher enough.
• 7:12
  And that's just because it's a super popular class.
• 7:14
  And obviously the guy runs like 20 of the same Class A week and
• 7:18
  it's just like fully booked every time.
• 7:20
  It's incredible. So clearly it's a very popular
• 7:22
  subject. He can only run so many, right?
• 7:25
  But he was really good at managing the room and like
• 7:27
  getting the kids to, to not like interject over each other and
• 7:30
  gave people a chance to speak and it's encouraging and
• 7:33
  respectful communication. But he just finally just, he
• 7:35
  wants to have a lot of interaction.
• 7:36
  He quite likes that constant back and forth.
• 7:38
  So the smaller classes work better for him.
• 7:40
  But this is the thing you can choose whatever you want.
• 7:42
  So we won't keep whispering on about it any longer.
• 7:44
  You know that we like it. This is our genuine honest
• 7:48
  experience. And ultimately our school have
• 7:50
  given us a discount to share with you whilst this is going
• 7:53
  on. So if you would like to get $35
• 7:56
  off of your first month of membership, essentially if you
• 7:59
  go to outschool.com/home Ed and then you pop in the code Home
• 8:04
  ED-35 when you sign up, essentially you will get money
• 8:07
  off of your first month of your membership.
• 8:09
  So getting the membership, as I say, gives you credits, the
• 8:12
  credits roll over like it's one of those things you try it for a
• 8:15
  month, if you don't like it, you stop it.
• 8:17
  You don't have to keep going forever.
• 8:19
  It's a really great system and I think ultimately it allows you
• 8:21
  that lovely flexibility to give something a whirl, see if you
• 8:23
  like it and if you don't, you don't.
• 8:26
  But it's just a great opportunity to to try something.
• 8:29
  Might as well just go and give it a whirl and see what it does
• 8:31
  for you. So let us know if you have tried
• 8:33
  it and if you like it. But for now we will move on.
• 8:36
  So this series is like, we have actually spent a lot of our
• 8:41
  summer planning it, haven't we? Actually, this has been a lot of
• 8:43
  conversation, a lot of emailing, a lot of researching and we're
• 8:47
  really excited about it. Essentially, it's it's all to do
• 8:51
  with the concept of changing perspectives.
• 8:54
  So this idea that as home educators, we actually work
• 8:58
  quite hard to ensure our children are given a really good
• 9:01
  understanding of the world around them.
• 9:03
  Our children out in the real world, they're meeting real
• 9:05
  people, they're interacting with stuff all the time.
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  But I do still think that and I, this is just talking from my own
• 9:12
  perspective and I appreciate not everybody is going to have
• 9:14
  exactly the same experience, but ultimately I am a white British
• 9:20
  heterosexual family. He's currently still sort of
• 9:24
  like mum and dad and two kids. I've got a boy and a girl.
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  Like we couldn't honestly be any more quintessentially British if
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  we tried. I just need myself a little
• 9:31
  white picket fence. And essentially I know that in
• 9:35
  our little community of home educations that I spend a lot of
• 9:37
  time with that whilst we do have Muslims and we have people who
• 9:42
  are of different ethnic backgrounds and we have got
• 9:45
  people from white people, but they are from various different
• 9:48
  parts of Europe and like all over the place, right.
• 9:51
  So we do meet and talk to an awful lot of individuals that
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  the truth is that digging down deep into the understanding, the
• 9:58
  belief systems, the foods they eat, the experiences they had
• 10:01
  growing up, the socio economic differences, a family that that
• 10:06
  has a mum or has two mums or has a dad or whatever, right.
• 10:11
  People who have experienced lost people who are currently
• 10:13
  experiencing prejudice with their local authority or we
• 10:17
  might be having a lot of issues on that side of things that the
• 10:20
  kids are just not going to know an awful lot about that.
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  And I really found myself worrying about this and thinking
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  that actually this is something that I really want to cover in a
• 10:29
  lot more depth with them and to build and expand on their
• 10:32
  compassion because they're already incredibly lovely,
• 10:35
  compassionate children. But I just want them to actually
• 10:37
  understand a little bit more, to be able to put their feet into
• 10:41
  somebody else's shoes just that little bit more, to ask some
• 10:44
  really good, intelligent questions and to start to really
• 10:46
  wonder why we have such a narrow view of how things should be in
• 10:51
  our socio normative kind of constructs that we have in our
• 10:54
  life. And I just want them to question
• 10:56
  it a little bit more. And I think this is actually
• 10:59
  just really vital in just about every family, to be honest.
• 11:02
  Like most people are not going to be experiencing the level of
• 11:05
  diversity that would allow their children to truly understand
• 11:09
  what some of these experiences must be like.
• 11:13
  So I think this is something which feels very close to home
• 11:15
  for me. And I think as we were
• 11:16
  discussing, Ashley, you were feeling that actually this is
• 11:19
  important to you too. Yeah.
• 11:21
  I mean, I think we just have to acknowledge that we often are in
• 11:25
  a bubble and we grew up and then we continue to move in circles
• 11:31
  that reflect our own experiences, beliefs, cultures
• 11:36
  and worldviews, right? And the home Ed community can,
• 11:40
  can become that way, or I mean, anyone can become that way, But
• 11:44
  it's not, it's not that it's purposely excluding.
• 11:48
  It's just about what you're familiar with and you kind of
• 11:51
  naturally gravitate towards that.
• 11:55
  So I think what what I want to do and just be really conscious
• 12:00
  of the effort is expanding that understanding, creating
• 12:06
  belonging and having my kids really look at like, OK, who is
• 12:12
  in our circle and who isn't and what can we do to change that?
• 12:19
  Yeah, and to open our arms and to make sure that people feel
• 12:21
  welcome as well. Yeah.
• 12:23
  Yeah, because I think there's also there is this big kind of
• 12:26
  like elephant in the room with this subject, which is that
• 12:28
  obviously there are a lot of people who experience prejudice
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  already in our in our communities, in our society, who
• 12:37
  are going to feel like putting themselves out there as a home
• 12:40
  educator and actually putting themselves more at risk of
• 12:43
  judgement or critique or comment from the local authority,
• 12:46
  putting them on maybe more on the radar or social services or
• 12:49
  whatever it might be that they maybe won't want to do that.
• 12:52
  They won't want to put themselves in that volatile
• 12:53
  position. But actually then they are
• 12:55
  losing out on an opportunity to be empowered in their education
• 12:58
  of their children. And maybe this is something they
• 12:59
  would really love to do. But maybe do look at our
• 13:02
  community and think, well, it seems like a bit of a a bit of a
• 13:06
  club really. And I'm not sure if I
• 13:07
  necessarily fit in with that. And we do get comments about how
• 13:10
  all home educators are privileged white British people.
• 13:14
  And actually that's not true. And it's something which I do
• 13:17
  get upset about a little bit sometimes because we, a lot of
• 13:21
  people make a lot of sacrifices to choose to home educate.
• 13:24
  And an awful lot of people will be going on one income or will
• 13:27
  be desperately trying to make ends meet because they are
• 13:30
  trying to meet the needs of their children and ensure that
• 13:32
  they get a good education and get support with their
• 13:35
  education. Because let's face it, the
• 13:37
  school system is not supporting people as it should be in a lot
• 13:40
  of different situations. And that it isn't always true
• 13:44
  that we are kind of all just sitting there pretty with our
• 13:48
  plenty of money in the bank. But actually I can understand
• 13:54
  how when people look at our community that that is maybe
• 13:57
  what they would think. Because it does seem like a huge
• 13:59
  privilege to get to choose stay home with your children and to
• 14:02
  raise them as a home educating family.
• 14:05
  It is a huge privilege. And for a lot it would feel very
• 14:09
  inaccessible. And I think the conversations
• 14:11
  that we're planning on having are not just about kind of how
• 14:15
  difficult it can be for people to enter the home educating
• 14:18
  community. We want to touch on all sorts.
• 14:21
  We, we, we want to talk about the prejudice within the home
• 14:23
  education community. We want to talk about the kind
• 14:26
  of like the, the home schooling versus home education and the,
• 14:30
  the issue we'd face with that terminology and language and how
• 14:35
  we treat each other when we perceive that somebody is doing
• 14:37
  it differently. Yeah, we want to talk about
• 14:40
  whitewashing and education, banned books, things that
• 14:43
  children are not allowed to see in schools and conversations
• 14:47
  that people struggle to have with their children.
• 14:50
  The issues around gender and sexual orientation are things
• 14:53
  when people don't want to talk about it with their kids.
• 14:54
  So they don't want to, I don't know, accidentally groom them
• 14:57
  into becoming anything other than a heterosexual person and
• 15:02
  are fearful of having these conversations.
• 15:04
  And that ultimately, when we guard our children from certain
• 15:07
  subjects, potentially we also stop them from having the
• 15:11
  ability to make up their own minds and to have some critical
• 15:13
  thought about it and to also see what they relate to, see what
• 15:16
  actually feels right for them. Things like ableism sends the
• 15:22
  concept of how education is not serving some children in a very,
• 15:26
  very big way and also being disabled and being a parent and,
• 15:31
  and the judgement that people can face if if that is the case
• 15:34
  too. Yeah, all sorts, ethnic
• 15:38
  stereotyping, othering refugees, ageism.
• 15:42
  There's so many different conversations that we can be
• 15:45
  having and we'll be having throughout the course of this
• 15:47
  series. And we have got some amazing
• 15:50
  guests. We've got a couple of authors,
• 15:52
  we've got home education consultant that works out in
• 15:56
  America working with Black families to try and help them to
• 16:01
  embrace home education and to empower them in making the
• 16:04
  decisions that they're making and educate others on some of
• 16:09
  the barriers that they're facing as well.
• 16:11
  Yeah, we have got some incredible conversations
• 16:13
  planned. And I think this is just so
• 16:15
  vital. We, we have an awful lot of
• 16:18
  potential prejudice that we are just not even aware that we're
• 16:21
  doing on a daily basis and things that we just don't even
• 16:26
  cast our minds into thinking about.
• 16:29
  I mean, I, I say, I don't want to, I don't want to put myself
• 16:32
  in kind of an ignorant pair of shoes.
• 16:36
  But we've all only got so much capacity for understanding what
• 16:41
  is going on around us, right? Like neurodivergence, autism,
• 16:45
  ADHDI had almost zero understanding of what that was
• 16:50
  and what it meant. And how beautiful it is and how
• 16:53
  incredible it is, as well as all the challenges that people face
• 16:56
  with it. Before finding out that my
• 16:58
  children were and that I was and that hang on most of my
• 17:01
  community is like, suddenly we're motivated to understand
• 17:05
  it. And the truth is that it's not a
• 17:08
  failing that we don't necessarily understand what it's
• 17:12
  like to be a refugee coming into this country and trying to
• 17:15
  receive education and the experiences they might be having
• 17:18
  in school. It's not a failing for us to not
• 17:20
  understand what that's like. Like that's not something that
• 17:22
  we have experienced and it's not something that we know about.
• 17:25
  But taking a minute to read, read a book with our kids about
• 17:29
  it or to consider the perspectives of somebody like
• 17:33
  that, even just one YouTube video, even just like 1
• 17:35
  documentary or having, as I say, just reading one book with them.
• 17:39
  There's some great books we're going to be recommending through
• 17:41
  this series. I think they're just great
• 17:43
  opportunities for conversation, aren't they?
• 17:45
  They're they're just an opportunity to to dive in to
• 17:48
  what they are experiencing. We want everyone to come out of
• 17:54
  this with some great conversation and hopefully some
• 17:58
  practical ways to break out of your comfort zone.
• 18:01
  And hopefully you'll feel like these different topics that we
• 18:05
  cover and the conversations that we have really just emphasizes
• 18:10
  the diversity and how that can bring strength and perspective
• 18:17
  and frankly, learning opportunities for everyone.
• 18:20
  And you mentioned the the books we're going to be recommending.
• 18:23
  Our goal is to have one to kind of read with your children
• 18:27
  alongside, not not like they will listen necessarily to the
• 18:30
  podcast. You get to decide if that's
• 18:32
  appropriate. But alongside the topic of the
• 18:35
  podcast, there will be a book recommendation that you can
• 18:38
  share with your kids, and that's hopefully something that will
• 18:43
  just help to really underline and build that experience and
• 18:47
  exposure. Yeah.
• 18:49
  And just sort of try and encourage a bit of conversation
• 18:51
  in your house about these things.
• 18:53
  And I think when you sort of touch on the kind of the wisdom
• 18:56
  and the ideas, like when you look at kind of like who
• 19:00
  invented certain things around the world, I think growing up in
• 19:04
  a British culture, obviously this in itself is terrible
• 19:07
  really. But he kind of you, you do
• 19:09
  always get like 0 understanding of who came up with our number
• 19:13
  system, who invented time, Like who actually has done all the
• 19:17
  thinking or the inventions behind, I don't know, the
• 19:20
  vaccines that we use or the like the healthcare methods that we
• 19:24
  have now. Like who came up with the cures,
• 19:26
  who, who invented antibiotics? Like we don't know.
• 19:29
  Like, I mean, there's only so much we only sort of know.
• 19:32
  Like there's only so much we can take in, but ultimately there's
• 19:34
  an awful lot of when when you look at how essential
• 19:39
  immigration has been in keeping this country afloat and taking
• 19:44
  care of like coming up with ideas like inventing types of
• 19:47
  bridges, like, Oh my goodness, the the millions of things that
• 19:51
  have massively benefited us as a community and as a group of
• 19:54
  people and how humans listening to humans and the experiences
• 19:59
  say, for example, of somebody in a wheelchair are that.
• 20:03
  If we don't know what it's like to be treated a certain way or
• 20:06
  to have somebody speaking to the person who's pushing a
• 20:08
  wheelchair every time you go into a room or not having step
• 20:12
  free access into important places like banks or libraries.
• 20:15
  And like all of these different things that potentially have
• 20:18
  created a barrier to them accessing the same things that
• 20:22
  we have been able to get and to be treated in the same way is
• 20:27
  just shocking and, and sad and, and very, very frustrating.
• 20:31
  And without understanding what they've been through, we, we
• 20:35
  have no way of being able to help these problems get solved.
• 20:41
  And so listening to people's experiences and understanding
• 20:44
  that they are just as important and valid as ours helps us to,
• 20:48
  to innovate and to come up with ideas and to progress things.
• 20:52
  And ultimately, I know that I am hoping to raise raise a couple
• 20:56
  of critical thinkers and people who will innovate and come up
• 21:00
  with ideas and be ready to listen and be open to people's
• 21:04
  experiences. My goodness, just I really hope
• 21:07
  that that's the kind of people I'm raising.
• 21:10
  I feel like that's our goal, right?
• 21:11
  Every home school mom, that's probably one of the goals.
• 21:15
  So he. Is like, we want them feeling so
• 21:17
  empowered, don't need to make good decisions and to come up
• 21:20
  with their own ideas in this this world that tries to sort of
• 21:23
  funnel us all down the same routes.
• 21:25
  And I think that's that's where this stuff can become incredibly
• 21:29
  interesting and something which helps them to be like, it's not
• 21:33
  all about kind of like we should be noticing where we're not
• 21:36
  being very nice people. It is definitely a lot of it.
• 21:38
  It's about empowerment. It's about thinking this is
• 21:40
  actually like everybody has a voice and every single person
• 21:44
  matters, no matter anything that's happened in their lives
• 21:49
  or they are experiencing, like everybody's voice matters.
• 21:53
  And I think the more we can help our children to understand that
• 21:56
  and ourselves, like, let's be honest, we need it too.
• 21:59
  Like it's not just about them. So anyway, so this this
• 22:03
  conversation hopefully will be really impactful.
• 22:05
  We hope it's going to be as hard hitting as we are obviously
• 22:09
  angling for it to be. Some of these conversations are
• 22:12
  going to be uncomfortable for us, for you guys, but hopefully
• 22:15
  in a good way. That's that's the idea.
• 22:17
  We want to stretch and expand and to open up our minds and to
• 22:22
  challenge some of the things which have been stuck as what we
• 22:26
  basically, it's that kind of concept of fixed, factual
• 22:29
  information in our heads that sometimes it can feel very
• 22:32
  jarring to talk about some things.
• 22:34
  And actually that's kind of the point.
• 22:35
  We need to try and break some of these cycles and to interrupt
• 22:38
  those automatic thoughts that that ultimately are often racism
• 22:45
  or prejudice or just cruelty or nastiness or hate.
• 22:49
  And they're things which are stopping us from expanding and
• 22:52
  growing as people. So we hope that this series is
• 22:56
  going to be really impactful for you guys.
• 22:58
  As I say, we'll have a book recommendation hopefully every
• 23:00
  week. We have got some incredible
• 23:02
  authors and guests coming on to join us to talk about some of
• 23:04
  these things. So you haven't just got our
• 23:05
  perspective on them, which obviously would not be very
• 23:08
  diverse at all, would it? That would be kind of pointless.
• 23:11
  So we're hoping to get some really great people on to talk
• 23:13
  to you guys. And so the last thing we want to
• 23:15
  ask you guys, we want lived experiences to talk about during
• 23:20
  these episodes. And obviously for a lot of the
• 23:22
  cases, we are not going to have experienced them.
• 23:25
  So what we are desperately asking you to do as our loyal
• 23:28
  followers, people who care about this podcast, you want to see it
• 23:31
  grow, We really want you to send us a message.
• 23:35
  We're going to do a blog that'll be on the operating
• 23:37
  motherhood.co.co.uk. Sorry, forward slash blog, but
• 23:42
  go and have a look there, find the post.
• 23:44
  And essentially we're going to put on there the list of topics
• 23:46
  that we're planning on covering. If you see one that's missing,
• 23:49
  let us know if you have a personal experience that you
• 23:52
  want to share with us, send us a letter that we can read out on
• 23:54
  the podcast. And we'd really love to be doing
• 23:56
  that over the course of this season to, to give lived
• 23:58
  experiences, whether you're educator or not, someone who has
• 24:01
  experienced that kind of prejudice in our society who
• 24:04
  wants to add something. Maybe you've got an idea or a
• 24:06
  thought that it's very important that we need to be hearing and
• 24:09
  sharing with our community a question, a comment, whatever.
• 24:13
  We can read them after the fact. We can read them on the episode
• 24:16
  that it's relevant to whichever is relevant to the message you
• 24:18
  send us. But we want to hear from you and
• 24:21
  we want to know what your thoughts are around this.
• 24:24
  And we'll read as many of them as we can.
• 24:26
  And yeah, just keep in touch with us, really.
• 24:29
  This is an exciting one for us. It's really kind of, we've put a
• 24:32
  lot of work into this. So we're hoping that that will
• 24:33
  end up showing as the week's go on.
• 24:36
  But for now, welcome back. I hope you guys haven't missed
• 24:38
  us too much. And we've tried to keep some
• 24:40
  little bonus episodes going for you.
• 24:44
  But yeah, and anything, any last thoughts, Ashley, before we sign
• 24:46
  off for today? It's going to be good.
• 24:49
  We're going to have some amazing episodes coming.
• 24:51
  So thanks for listening to this one and we look forward to
• 24:56
  hearing your thoughts on the ones upcoming.
• 24:59
  Cool guys, right? See you again next week.
• 25:01
  Bye bye. You've been listening to the Big
• 25:07
  Home Ed Conversations podcast. Thanks for tuning in.
• 25:11
  Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share with a
• 25:14
  friend. Follow us on Instagram and
• 25:17
  TikTok at Big Home Ed Podcast for updates.
• 25:21
  We'll be back again next week for another episode, but don't
• 25:24
  forget to send us your questions, comments, and
• 25:26
  personal experiences on the topics we'll be covering this
• 25:29
  season. Visit our blog, LinkedIn, the
• 25:32
  Show Notes for a reminder of the topics, or just message us
• 25:35
  directly on Instagram or TikTok. Take care.