A Study of Parents' Conceptions of their Roles as Home Educators of their Children

Terrence John Arthur Harding
BA, DipEd, DipCDP, MEd (QUT)

In March 2011 Terry Harding completed his Doctoral thesis, a study of the roles of parents who home educate their children. The work was examined and approved by the Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia, as meeting the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD).

Terry was "encouraged by what the data revealed about home educating parents. It demonstrates that parents see themselves in many educational roles (86 broadly defined roles and identities). These were reduced to the broader categories of:

1. Learner,
2. Partner (in an educational endeavour),
3. Teacher and
4. Pioneer."

The results pointed to a phenomenon within home educating parents which Terry calls the Parental Educational Dynamic (PED). He believes that the PED is the relationship between a parent and child which makes the parent a teacher of their child and that it is inherent in all parent-child relationships, and that it is God-ordained.

According to Terry, "home educators... access this educational relational educational phenomenon in a way that is unique in Western culture and thus are able to achieve significant developmental gains in their children's upbringing."

Like Terry, I am encouraged by the findings of his study as they reflect my own observations of home education over the past twenty-five years. I agree with him that his work helps to fill a gap in the literature surrounding home education, particularly as it focuses on the parents who are the key to the enterprise of home education.

Terry believes that this "study in particular will assist to inform home educators, about themselves, specifically. However, as intimated in the thesis, the study also provides a platform from which to examine various aspects of parents and parenting in general. Further, as one looks at the 86 roles and identities derived from the data, the study has the possibility to provoke exploration of what a teacher actually does and is."

You can download the study here:

• A Study of Parents' Conceptions of their Roles as Home Educators of their Children