Welcome, panicked parents.
This is my quick start homeschooling guide. Relax. The simplicity is going to be startling. And I hope pleasantly eye-opening and inspiring.
Step 1: Breathe.
Then: Decide if you are going to:
A) Do school at home with a safety net via umbilical cord to an online all-inclusive educational program.
or…
B) Cut the cord and homeschool for real. i.e. Gather your own supplies and set out on an independent family path and schedule toward your children’s personal life goals.
If you choose A… I wish your family all the best and pray your journey is filled with joy and learning. Seriously, no judgement. But I don’t consider online school to be true parent-led homeschooling and it isn’t covered in this how-to.
If you choose B… keep reading. Also, air high-fives, and keep breathing.
Step 2: Run
Run to educational freedom.
It is simple to educate your own children.
I didn’t say effortless, or easy. But outside of an engorged over-hyped machine covered in parasitic self-aggrandizing bureaucracies and interest groups, learning is pretty straight forward.
And so is homeschooling. People have been doing it for millennia. Check out this historical list!
Like most of the population, you’ve been brainwashed to think that a 6-year-old cannot learn to read Dick and Jane without the help of an unrelated certified teacher, a clueless group of peers, and those cute alphabet pictures hanging around a sterile classroom.
You probably are having a hard time letting go of the idea that socialization and citizenship are learned only in an institutional setting, walking single file down a hall, asking permission to pee, and conflict resolution needs to be learned in the principal’s office.
And you likely have been led to believe that constant testing and comparison are the only measures of a child’s future and ability to function in the outside world.
All these ideas are set up to satisfy and enrich the architects of a system driven by standardized tests. Those who will never meet your amazingly unique child, or hear them proudly read aloud and find out what happened to “Dick and Jane” after they ran.
So run, Dick and Jane! Run!
Run to freedom. It will take determination, hard work, worry, lots of coffee, and all the love you have for your kids (and then some) to keep going, but it is simple to start homeschooling.
Step 3: Know your state and its requirements.
How?
HSLDA —The Homeschool Legal Defense Association has your back and has fought for your freedom to homeschool for decades before you decided to embrace it. From their site you can find your state’s homeschool laws and requirement, locate local homeschool groups, co-ops (parent led group classes that meets once a week), conventions, clubs, sports, etc., in case you ever need to reach out to someone like-minded close by.
Joining HSLDA gets your family personal homeschool related legal advice and representation if ever needed, discounts on their academic courses, high school transcript apps/templates, and helps in the fight for continued and increased educational freedom for American families.
Step 4: Question Everything
Where do I start and do I need chickens?
When I started, I didn’t know a thing about homeschooling, except that only weird people did it and I’d need a laminator. (Turns out that was only half true.)
But I didn’t know where to start? What to tell the kids? How to schedule? What the heck is a co-op? Should I get a set of encyclopedias and a goat?
I know what worries and questions are running through your brains, Dick and Jane. I know what you want to ask but feel silly. Because I’ve been there! Keep running with me, the answers are out there and simpler than the system wants you to know.
Questions you probably want to ask:
How do I know what to teach?
How do I know if they are learning anything?
Who keeps up with their files/grades/behavior charts/attendance/lice checks?
How do I set up our daily/weekly/monthly/coffee break schedules?
When do we change grade levels?
Do we do P.E.? Ring a bell?
How do I know if they have done enough to change grade levels?
Should we take attendance, recite the pledge, get dressed?
What about prom? Shhhhh…Just no.
Some Basic Answers about setting up your homeschool year:
To answer some of your other burning questions and make things as clear as mud possible, know this:
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- A typical school year is 36 weeks.
- Curriculum is largely divided up into 36 weeks of study.
- 36 weeks of instructions & materials for teaching, practicing, grading,
and extra fluff to skipare usually included. - The basic subjects of math, language arts (reading/writing), science, and history are available in 36 week courses from 100s of publishers under 1000s of titles, both secular and religious-based curriculum, in boxed sets or to pick individually
if you’re a control freak like me. - Pick a start date. You’re in control. Count out 36 weeks from there, excluding any and all holidays, allowing for a few sick days and ‘anything goes’ days, and vacations you’d like to take, and then you’ll find the date your kid will level up! Technically you could school year-round, or buckle down during quarantine and finish two grade levels in one year.
- Start with a lesson per day for each subject. Or a different subject each day for a few hours at a time. Follow the teacher’s guides, make up your own schedule. Mess-up. Try again.
Burn it andpick something new if it isn’t working out. - You will know if your kid grasps a subject by discussion, grading their work and tests, and gauging their level of frustration, boredom, or contentment. And like many homeschoolers, they will be A students because a lesson isn’t complete until it is mastered.
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- Add electives based on your child’s interests or requirements for their college/career/skill of choice. You can even make your own study plan, gathering your own resources. Cooking is learning, fixing cars is learning, hiking every trail in 3 counties is learning, and all can be counted on a transcript.
- Transcripts are for high school. Templates are available online, as well as paid sites that will record, store, print, and send them out to colleges for you.
- For all other grades record what subjects/electives you studied, curriculum you used, books read, activities, clubs, sports, awards. Hang on to some writing, art, and keepsake items (more or less is required depending on the state where you live).
Step 5: Go shopping.
You know what calmed my fears? What eased my confusion? What made me wonder why I’d waited so long to take control? Why I had let my family get so stressed and depressed before taking action?
Shopping.
I mean, obviously. Retail therapy, duh.
Shopping for curriculum threw me over the cliff of indecision and right into homeschooling.
I don’t know what I expected to find. Probably some bible school paraphernalia and a soap making kit. Which is why I was unsure how I’d begin, or continue, or even complete the first month of homeschooling, much less till college do us part.
What I found was my confidence. The school system I was fed up with had offered little instruction or GPS route to what they were teaching my kids every day. Naturally, I felt handicapped and in the dark before stumbling onto a plethora, nay smorgasbord, no treasure trove of freedom tools for teaching my own children!
I giggled and smiled down each digital aisle in awe of what I didn’t know existed. It was like the first time I set foot in a Tuesday Morning. Ahhh… throw pillows and half priced Belgium chocolates all under one roof.
But this was even better! So many great tools and options, for all types of learners, every grade level and ability, with teacher’s guides, and hands on fun stuff! As I began to see what was available to homeschoolers, I said to myself…
“I so got this!”
Frankly, I find it amazing anyone is able to make the decision to homeschool before checking out the merchandise and available resources. I wasn’t so bold. But these days parents must be gutsy, because you’re not daring to jump off the homeschool cliff, you’re being shoved.
Before the next person emails me to ask… “What curriculum should I use?”, please know that this and the questions up above are mostly only answerable by you as a homeschool parent.
Why? Because I don’t know your kids’ ages, interests, learning styles, where you live, or your budget. You just need to do a bit of research. It’s hard to explain if you don’t look for yourself. And it’s empowering when you do. And then you likely won’t want much of my input, because you’ll see that…
You got this!
However to get to that point, here is my advice to any mom or dad wanting to homeschool, but not sure where to begin…
Step 6: Know your audience.
i.e. Who you are teaching? Kids are all unique, which is why so many fall behind or get lost in a one-size-fits-all school system.
Some kids learn better by listening, others by looking, or touching, or doing, or writing, or any combination. Discovering your child’s learning style may take some time and trial and error. Likely, you already know your kid better than the school did or cared to accommodate. You can choose curriculum and scheduling based on what works best for each of your kids.
As you search for resources and books, walk like an Egyptian think like your kid. When you think you’ve fallen in love with a curriculum, stop and remember your own hardheaded learners. Think about little jumping Johnny trying to learn literature based science. Think of math-a-phobic Martha crying over that accelerated self-guided program to MIT that looks so promising.
Pssst… Need help motivating your middle school writer?
Remember that what others love and swear by, may not work for get-er-done Gregory.
Look at lots of options, and flip through it if you can, just don’t buy too much right away. You’re finding your groove and don’t want to regret impulse buys like a laminator. Start with the basic subjects: math, reading, writing. Then check out the most rewarding and hands-on homeschool subjects: history and science!
Here are some of my favorite sites for curriculum searches, descriptions, browsing options, looking inside books, and reading reviews of secular and religious-based homeschool curriculum:
Rainbow Resource Center
ChristianBook.com
Home Science Tools
Cathy Duffy Reviews
But remember… shop for your kids, not the kids in the brochures who are always smiling, always cuddled with mom and dad by a sunny window while learning about adverbs. That’s bull-fiction photography. Learn to just drool over and scroll past the things you’d only use with your Stepford children, and buy what your real kids will use because reality is…
The curriculum that gets done is the best curriculum.
Go for some items you will use over and over like a globe, stapler, math manipulatives, pencils… GET EXCITED! Homeschool shopping is fun! Especially before 6th grade. Back to school grab bags are fun. Nothing says I love you & welcome to 7th grade quite like a glow-in-the-dark protractor.
Step 7: Embrace Freedom
Fear today, freedom tomorrow.
Understand that with true homeschooling you and your children are in control of their education. This won’t always seem as scary as it sounds right now. Sure, you will make mistakes, but like we teach our kids, that’s where the learning happens. And we can change things up and find a better way.
Schools make mistakes all the time, and many go uncorrected at the expense of students. So don’t let fear and worry keep you from enjoying homeschooling.
The crux of homeschooling is freedom and family.
The chaotic, overreaching, underwhelming, impersonal and disheveled system you are fleeing should not be turned around and leaned upon when things get tough.
Already the school system is in a panic to keep its funding. We must keep its tendrils out of homeschooling as it searches for justification and not welcome them in to feed off your new found freedom. Assistance offered by the government is never given without strings (oversight, regulations, and restrictions) attached. Which means less educational options and more agenda driven mandates.
When you need help, information, advice, opinions, or resources there is an abundance to be had within the homeschool community. Reach out to those of us on your side. We’re still learning everyday right along with our kids, and we can show you how to do the same.
Step 8: Talk Like a Homeschooler
Homeschool terms, they’re the lingo of the educationally liberated. Can you talk like a homeschooler?
Whether you are new to homeschooling or just nosy, I’ve put together this list for you to laugh over or print out and memorize before co-ops start back up. Don’t know what a co-op is?
There’s a dictionary’s worth of homeschool lingo and vocabulary to share. It includes the things we say to our kids and terms we use that most outside of the homeschool bubble wouldn’t understand and the titles and nicknames we give each other.
Step 9: Socialize Like a Homeschooler
The general public has been brainwashed through public schools to think socialization is learning to interact within an institutionalized peer group for 6-8hrs/day, 5 days/week, 9 months/yr., for 12-13 years, in order to adopt the groups behaviors and ideological norms.
So as not to be weird. Cause that’s really what it’s all about, right? Will our kids be awkward around their peers or fall in line with mainstream think and have good fashion sense?
Socialization is a false flag on homeschooling. And it is the only weapon left for naysayers to wield against parents who feel a pressing urge to homeschool.
Most homeschool critics won’t let it go until our kids are squared away in a classroom 8 hours a day, five days a week, 9 months a year… So, homeschooling will always be wrong about socialization.
Duh, that’s sort of the point.
So…Drop the myth of the “cool kids.” We don’t have to follow the masses, their group think, or educational choices.
Homeschooling allows for the most natural learning of socialization skills.
Socialize like a homeschooler!
To socialize like a homeschooler is to meaningfully interact, individually or as a family, within your community. Not forced, despite your personal values, beliefs, and goals, but naturally because of them.
Step 10: Be Awesome
You will never have a perfect homeschool, or be a perfect homeschool parent. So, get that out your head right now.You don’t have to be perfect to be awesome.
Homeschooling is an ever-changing life’s work. Hopefully we will work ourselves out of a job. We don’t get paid, and we don’t even get to keep the finished products. And yet it’s so worth it.
“We wagered a second income on the notion that we could educate our children more effectively than the public-school system. We wagered the need to fit into the world’s expectations on the belief that our children should look to us for social and moral guidance. We wagered the ease and comfort of kid free time on the belief that kids need family more than peers, love more than affirmation, and encouragement more than conformity.”
And it is the best investment we have made for our family. And I hope it will be for your family as well.
