First of all~WELCOME! Welcome to the world of parenting first hand. Welcome to the awesome family of homeschoolers! You are one of us; whether you have one child at home and one at a traditional school; whether you are just debating the idea of schooling at home, or unschooling at home; or if you have put both feet and all children in~you are welcomed!
Simple points to get you started:
*If pulling your children out of school during the school year, write a letter to the principal stating your children's names (whom you are pulling out of school) and state your intention to homeschool them. Sign and date the letter. Keep a copy.
*Google/Search YOUR state and homeschooling laws. For example, type in the search bar: homeschooling in (Wisconsin/your state). Read it. (The state where you have residence while you homeschool is the state that you look up.)
Some states require no further action, but list what subjects you need to teach and for how long per year. Some states want you to fill out a form via online, or print out and send, by a certain date. Some states require further action and want paper work and testing. Read. Call with questions to the number given on their website. (It is usually a government/department of education/your state website.) Don't be intimidated. The laws are actually much simpler than how they read on paper.
*Take a new notebook. Put in a copy of any forms you had to fill out with the state, if any. Write down the subjects you have to teach, according to the state's rules. Write down the amount of hours, or days, you have to teach, if stated.
*Breath. Hug your kids. Breath. Go to the park. (This is what we call "deschooling".)
*Now, unless your state specifies that you have to follow a set curriculum that is approved by the school district, (search online for your local homeschool group, or school district, to answer further questions in this case), I would do the following BEFORE you spend a ton of money on curriculum that will end up in your trash.
*Buy a math curriculum (like Saxon for Homeschoolers at saxonhomeschool.hmhco.com), or at the least, math work-books that give a variety of math lessons to the grade level that your child is at. (Saxon is often a year ahead, so you may consider buying a year back. For example, if your child is in the 6th. grade, buy 6/5. If she is in the 7th. grade, buy 7/6 for homeschoolers.) Yes, Saxon is a curriculum and pricey, but it is vital for students to keep up with math in a sequence; and it will cover all holes that you may not know you are skipping over otherwise. This is my curriculum exception and it is much cheaper than buying a whole, all-encompassing boxed set curriculum.
*Buy Language Arts work books for kids, such as the FlashKids series found in Barnes and Nobles, or online at various websites. For the 3rd grade and younger crowd, check out the dollar stores and the big box stores for workbooks. They are cheap and effective.
*Every remaining subject can be obtained IN THE LIBRARY, with online research and free sites on the computer (such as allinonehomeschool.com), from DVD's, as well as on PBS, Discovery Channel, the History Channel (beware of age in-appropriate material here-watch first before you show to your children), etc. Netflix has a wide variety and a huge list of great documentaries as well!
*To help with Science and History subjects, just choose what interests you and dig into the subject as deep as you would like. You are not trying to continue public school at home and besides, every school district learns the subjects in various orders. Catch your child when he is interested in certain subjects in History or Science. Kids learn better when they are excited and interested in a topic. Catch that excitement train before it leaves! Take out lots of books and documentaries. Remember, they don't need to learn every fact, date, and person out there. Just have fun and dig in! Don't forget about government history and current events, when they reach their jr. high/early high school years. Geography is fun to learn on free websites, such as shepardsoftware.com, or kidsgeo.com.
*Gym, Health, Home Ec, Art is learned at home naturally, thru healthy lifestyles and hands-on parenting. Just document it in your notebook under these subjects. Walking, biking, swimming; chores, helping fix the car, lawn mowing, baking; talking about hygiene and puberty; making puppets, lava lamps, holiday ornaments; these are all documented under the above subjects. I give one whole credit hour to each subject done that day.
*Music is done at home, or at lessons. Practices, or the study of music by listening and reading about the musician's life, can be documented as an hour a day that these tasks are done. Computer lessons are a vital part of this generation as well. Seek out community classes or software to help with that. Let kids have lots of time to "play", "type", and "create" on the computer. It is how they learn!
*If your YMCA gives homeschooling classes, such as Gym, Swim, or Art, sign them up and document the hours! Sports and other clubs count too! Religion also counts!
*Documenting hours your first year, is easiest in a basic spiral notebook. Date each day, write the number of hours that you work on learning. (Some parents log half-hours to shorter tasks/lessons, two hours for longer ones, such as Math, or a documentary.) Write down the total amount so far, for the year, next to that. Write down the subjects taught that day and a short explanation of what was taught. Under a separate section, giving yourself many pages, write a list of curriculum, work books, books, documentaries, movies, etc. that you used throughout the year. Be sure to include every title, author, and publishing date of every fun book, chapter book, poetry book read, as well as the hard core learning texts. Document as you go!
*Keep a Rubbermaid box for collected papers written, art work made, other various projects, etc. that you can collect and keep, just in case laws change and you need to prove your homeschooling. Some states even require this as part of a "portfolio", along with your hours documented, etc.
*Now, research "learning styles of children" and "different homeschool types" to learn all you can on the various ways your child might learn (this will take a year or two of watching your child and teaching her in different ways-visual, hands-on, auditory, etc.). Different homeschool types are the various ways in which you may want to homeschool. This is the fun part of teaching homeschool!
*Have fun this year! Your first year is just about getting your feet wet and enjoying each other! Also, please remember that young children need only 20-60 minutes of "schooling", 2-4 days a week, and more hands-on play the rest of the day! Early elementary students need just a couple of hours each day, increasing their sit-down work by 20-30 minutes each year. The high schooler may be up to 4-5 hours a day at best.
*Some of us school year round, with breaks throughout the year. Others may follow the public school calendar. The decision is up to you! Just follow your state laws and document, document, document and don't push your kids to do hard-core school and memorization. You are homeschooling for a reason. Learning should always be fun, light-hearted, child-led and teacher guided and approved :-D
- *For extra guidance and to feel like you are on-track, check out books in the library on what your child should be learning at a certain grade, as well as seeking out online homeschooling websites, or public school district websites on these topics. A place to start would be at www.home-school.com.
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