Hello everybody. Our family is new to homeschooling. We have 3 kids, 4 1/2 , 2 ½ , and a 1 month old. We will be starting our journey this fall with our 4 ½ year old. We’re both excited and hopeful for this journey that we’re about to start. I wanted to ask all you veteran homeschoolers about some of the things that you would have wished you would have known before you started the journey?
That schedules and structure are important things for our family to have, but there also needs to be room for flexibility. We were really structured the first year with times for every subject, which caused me more stress if we ran over our time limit on any given subject. Now we have a weekly schedule and if we get everything done in 5 days, great, if not there is always the weekend to finish or next week.
That I would change my mind 1000 times about curriculum and scheduling and EVERYTHING else that goes along with homeschooling ... and that's ok. Do what works in the moment, and if it's not working, don't be afraid to toss it all out the window and start from scratch.
That it really is easier then you think, and the exact curricula isn't life and death... children will learn pretty much no matter what you do... it's their nature to learn.
That there is a difference between "homeschool" and "school at home". We don't have to duplicate what they do at school. And I don't have to worry about "failing" my kids!
This thread is several months old but still a good question. -I wish I would have started sooner. -Keep a handle on computer games because it's hard to go back to life without them.
I have not been here in a very long time...years, I suppose. Nice to see everything still flowing here. I tend to never look back and say I wish I had done something different, I just end to take a look at where I am and decide where to go from that point. Ironically, that would be my first advice to homeschooling parent. Your expectations should start from where you are at this moment, not where you hope to be in the next and not looking back from where you were and hoped to be. Simplified: Make plans (in pencil) but not expectations. However, there was one thing that I learned from that almost made me wish I did it differently (but I just used the above advice and moved on). My daughter, in her younger years, learned math very randomly and I am a sequential, so I naturally wanted to follow what I considered the natural order to math every math text: addition, subtraction, multiplication, division. My daughter naturally went from addition to just not getting just the concept of subtraction for six months, but at the same time learning multiplication on her own without me. Which leads me to the next piece of advice: Be open to letting the child teach you how to teach him or her. Another for instance, I used to struggle with my daughter's time use, especially when she looked out the window in the van instead of using that time productively by reading history, until I realized that she gets carsick otherwise, so I adjusted to what worked for her by listening to audio books on history in the van. After reading Amada's post, I would add that my daughter and I have this in common: we are both highly creative, so I stay very strict on all tech use. She uses her computer mostly for writing. She prefers writing fictional stories and books, but I found an opportunity to stretch her writing abilities and she had her first nonfiction article published at 14yo. However, if I had a techie kind of child, I might have challenged the child in the same way using technology. I am sure that there are others with more children that would have greater insight into homeschooling multiple ages at the same time.
I think I would be a little more child led and relaxed than I was in the beginning. This year is so much different than previous years. I'm having them do their choice of mom approved assignments. For example, with language arts, they can do a language assignment from curriculum, or write me a report on an agreed upon subject, or complete some other agreed upon assignment. Today, my son wrote a report on his latest passion (you tube) and my daughter wrote a paragraph in the book she is writing (a mystery novel!) and read a chapter in her latest book. They are so much more relaxed and happy having choice and input on their assignments.
What do I wish I knew.... Thing is, I've been at this so long that I can't really remember a "before"....
That's a great question! Be confident and trust yourself. You are the best educator that your children could have. Try, test, don't be afraid, and enjoy learning along with them. And YES, play a lot! Learning can be fun! These are some blogs and resources you might find useful: - http://blog.educents.com/what-to-know-before-your-first-day-of-homeschool-teaching/ - http://www.homeschool.com/articles/mostimportant/#