Be encouraged in that minor path

Here, have the day's home ed, if you are worried, when you choose an alternative path to conventional schools, that you kiss goodbye to your opportunities to meet other people or have your child see anyone else, ever.

Today, Shark, Squirrel and Tiger wake up with their regular weekly sleepover chum, so notch that one up to the benefit of running a routine.

Next, we're all out to Cineworld with a home ed tribe to see the schools film about Pompeii and Heraculaneum live from the British Museum (required only the purchase of tickets, so no form-filling, permission slips, payment for hired coach, risk assessment or feedback forms).

Then it's to the local woodland with the teen group to reenact the Hunger Games, involving red ribbons on the chest, 30-minute timings to report back to bases for water and food, and the brilliant spectacle of watching the kids we have all grown up with negotiate alliances, articulate trusts, form co-operations, and discuss tactics to deal with suspicion, insincerity, and betrayal.

From there, the drama/youth club for Tiger and chum, while Shark and Squirrel variously go about reading and screens.

See? Be encouraged. The home educated gritlets sit socially isolated, academically failed and spiritually impoverished staring resentfully at mama only some of the time.