Why Ben Fogle Inspires My Homeschool

To be clear, I have no idea what Ben Fogle thinks about homeschooling. But this astounding adventurer, explorer, and broadcaster is an inspiration to all who tread an unconventional path – and particularly those of us who take the brave step of teaching our children at home.

NB Why Ben Fogle Inspires My Homeschool is based on the admiration I have for Ben after I saw him speak as part of his Wilderness Tour series.

Why Ben Fogle?

When you homeschool, you take a step into the unknown. Lots of family and friends are going to question you and feel threatened by your decision. It’s not a comfortable place to be.

The conventional wisdom is that school is the best place for your child and you will ruin your child’s future – either academically or by producing a social loner who will forever be an oddball.

Deciding to ignore all this wealth of perceived truth takes a tremendous amount of courage and an ability to see alternative priorities in life.

Ben Fogle has these qualities in spades. Only someone with great courage could row across the Atlantic in a tiny boat, thrown overboard in the darkness as the boat pitchpoles under the weight of crashing waves – and then carry on to win the race. Only someone with infinite determination could take up the challenge of climbing the highest mountain in the world only to have his oxygen bottle explode meters before the summit – and still carry on to reach his goal.

As homeschoolers, we have our own Everest to climb and our own Atlantic to cross. Deciding NOT to send your child to school and to give yourself full responsibility for your child’s education takes tremendous courage and determination. Homeschooling strikes to our very heart because the absolute first priority of any parent is the wish to do everything we can for this amazing tiny bundle we have somehow been blessed to hold in our arms – and we don’t want to mess everything up.

Believe in Yourself

Ben Fogle’s experience teaches us both about courage and also about insecurity. Because he opens up to reveal the struggles that all homeschoolers face – the daily battle with lack of confidence in our abilities, the way in which our path could have been so very different and, ultimately, how much richer and more fulfilling it has been to take risks and follow our dreams.

Amusingly, Ben Fogle has an absolutely terrible academic record. Lots of schools, lots of failures at school – always the child with the sick note at games, lack of confidence all round, trouble making friends – and came out with three pathetic qualifications at age 18 including the magic grade ‘N’ (lower even than a grade E ) for – ironically! – geography.

He makes no reference to whether or not he thinks the current school system is to blame, and certainly no mention as to whether he might ever have considered homeschooling his own children.

But what his experience shows yet again is that:

Conventional education does not work for all – many extremely talented, able and intelligent children get completely written off by the system
Coming out of that system can leave you completely adrift – you have failed and you think of yourself as a failure

Ben’s Book Up! My Life’s Journey To The Top Of Everest

If you would like to find out more about Ben’s path through life, I strongly recommend his book:

Up: My Life’s Journey to the Top of Everest

Please note that the book links on this page are affiliate links so if you buy I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.

Take Risks

To build his terribly flagging confidence and low self-esteem, Ben chose to take risks. He decided to sign up for madcap schemes like crossing the Sahara desert on a back-to-back six-day ultra-marathon, giving himself only one month to fit in all the training required.

This is hardly what most people would advise. It flies against all conventional wisdom and is bound to lead to failure.

But taking those risks has made his life worthwhile.

Homeschooling is a big risk – perhaps the biggest you can take. It’s also one many people would say is bound to fail.

Except once you take the risk you suddenly find you are on a path which actually others can prove works.

I was taught at home by my Mum and Dad, who were some of the earliest home education pioneers in the UK. Having themselves reached the top of the academic apple tree by the conventional route (including being taught by CS Lewis and JRR Tolkein), they both felt school was not the answer.

I loved being homeschooled so much it was an obvious choice to teach my children at home. Why would I want to stop all the fantastic learning, fun and excitement that was so clearly happening before my eyes and send them away to a place which would impose artificial markers of success and confine that ‘learning’ to what was considered by experts to be what my children ‘should’ learn?

“It’s not that I feel that school is a good idea gone wrong, but a wrong idea from the word go. It’s a nutty notion that we can have a place where nothing but learning happens, cut off from the rest of life.” ~ John Holt

My homeschool son William is now at one of the top Universities in the world – Oxford; my daughter is a gifted artist. And there’s the rub – who would have thought that just by encouraging what your child loves to do at home they will learn far more than any conventional education could possibly teach. Our days were full of the wonder of discovering the human body, building dinosaur robots and exploring the rainforest. No set curriculum, no set workbooks, no set marks.

Unschooling is not the only way to homeschool and many parents (including myself) use a method that mixes both traditional and interest-led learning. But the important thing is that homeschooling does ‘succeed’ because you can give your child the individual love and attention they deserve.

Follow Your Dreams

Ben’s big message is that you are only in this life once and you need to follow your dreams.

In his case, this was brought home through tragedy. His third child Willem was still-born at nine months and he cradled a perfectly formed baby in his arms which would never wake up.

He wants us to find our own Everest to climb. In my case, this has been making the decision to teach both my children at home.

Ben’s life path is full of seizing challenges and finding fulfillment in ways that are far beyond the nine-to-five.

Homeschooling is a dream. At one stroke, you are changing the entire future of yourself and your family.

Like all dreams, it has its downsides.

And perhaps the biggest reality-check is the toll it takes on you. Finding the fulfillment and confidence you deserve when what you are doing is at best not valued by society – and at worst actively criticized – is very tough.

That’s why this blog is full of ways to increase your confidence through the Happiness Challenge, which helps you value yourself by celebrating all you are achieving every day, thinking positive thoughts and taking strength from inspirational thoughts that show you are on the right path.

Most importantly, if we follow Ben’s advice and think of the big picture you become immensely grateful that you have chosen to follow an alternative path – and that gives you a sense of fulfillment beyond words.