Tips for new homeschoolers

/ Holly Stoner

With the current situation here in the United States and questions surrounding children going back to school, I wanted to take some time to post about some options for parents. If you’ve been here before you know that I currently homeschool in the state of Pennsylvania. Homeschool laws vary by state with mine being one of the most regulated. The first place I would send a new family interested in homeschooling in any state is the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA). Visit their website and learn the laws in your state. Much information provided there is free but there are members only information sections and it’s not a bad idea to consider joining. They are like an insurance policy and can help you should you need it in dealing with anything related to your homeschool and school district. They have helped many families. When you are a member, their legal consult is free to you in regard to homeschooling in your state. 

Once you are familiar with your state laws and you know how to report to your school district, if that is required in your state, you can then start thinking about curriculum and how you might make it all work for your family. Not every family will have the same situation, such as a parent who can stay home during the day and provide the supervision for the homeschool program. Some households will only have one parent. In this difficult time of lost income and jobs shut down, it can make the idea feel even more impossible. Don’t despair. I can offer only a few tips for you, but I’m going to be honest and tell you that I have been blessed to be able to be home with my children, but even that has been up in the air over the course of this season. Even with the uncertainty, I decided I would make it work somehow if I needed to get a job. I would work at night or do school work at night. It’s not impossible, just more tiring. There are other options like cyber school as well. My children are teenagers now and mostly can work indepentently. It can be more difficult if nobody can be home with them but doesn’t mean impossible. 

Financially families may think the buying curriculum option is too costly. I can tell you that there are many affordable options and there are plenty of free resources online. I buy strictly from a Christian worldview, but there are secular curriculums out there as well. I’m going to list here some places for you to browse. Keep in mind with the large amount of interest this school year, and shut downs across the nation, it has affected availablilty of some items from a variety of publishers. If you can’t find what you want right now, don’t worry, I’ll post some free resources for you to check out also to at least get you started. By the way, public cyber schools are also free (I can only refer to PA schools) and provide the materials that your child needs. The following will just be lists, not endorsements. I may have used some of these but not all and I have no affiliations and get no money from you clicking on the links.

Affordable Curriculum Choices

The above is by no means an exhaustive list. If you’re looking to save money but you love the ABeka curriculum, check out Christian Liberty. They often use ABeka and Bob Jones books but don’t require all the items that buying from Abeka and BJU require. What they do is they make their own teacher book and lesson plan and it is a lot less expensive but still a great program. Also search for your books used on sites like ThriftBooks or HalfPriceBooks. Don’t forget Amazon or even other retaliers like Barnes and Noble. Ebay might also be a place to look for books. And if your local library is open that can be very helpful and if not, many are lending ebooks and all you need is a library card and an app like OverDrive or Libby. You can also look at Hoopla (an app) to borrow books for free. So below I’ll list a few more free choices for those who really can’t afford anything right now. I won’t be making a list of cyberschools but you can certainly check those out. There are also private distance learning schools but when I explored that option it was more costly and you lose the freedom you have with homeschool.

Free resources

  • CyberSchool – there are many, do a search
  • EasyPeasy All in one homeschool
  • Your local school district – in PA, if you request materials from your local public schools, by law they need to supply it. It will likely only be core subjects and no lesson plan and I don’t know about answer guides either.
  • Ambleside
  • Discovery K12
  • Plain and not so Plain
  • Khan Academy – does not have all subjects
  • Project Gutenberg – free books where th copywrite has expired, completely legal
  • LibriVox – free, legal, audiobooks
  • Art For Kids Hub – also on youtube
  • IXL – math
  • CoolMath
  • Math Antics – also on YouTube
  • YouTube – There are many free school channels on youtube. there is one called Free School to check out. Also Crash Course and Over Simplified (for older students)
  • Worksheets – there are countless places online to find and print out free worksheets.

Again, the above list isn’t exhaustive. There are countless resources for you to either use entirely or to supplement your homeschool program. If you have a computer and an internet connection or a phone with just unlimted data and a good cell signal, your options are many.

Now that we covered the curriclum and that it doesn’t have to break the bank and can be done within a small budget, let’s breifly discuss some other top questions I’ve seen.

What counts as a school day? Some of this may depend on your state laws about homeschool. In PA you are required to count 180 days of instruction time. (or 900/990 hours) What the school day looks like is up to you. Learning doesn’t have to take place at a desk, table or from a book. Different ages will require differing amounts of instruction time. Kindergarten isn’t going to look like 6th or 12th grade. For reference, my children do 5 – 5 1/2 hours of instruction time 5 days a week, however they are in 8th and 10th grades now. Instruction time doesn’t always mean workbooks or lectures.

What should my school room look like? You will see a lot of pictures online with desks set up and bookshelves and very organized rooms. You can do this, or your school can look like books stacked up on the kitchen table or kids sitting on the living room floor or even sitting outside on your deck or in your yard. You don’t need any kind of organized fancy school room. You can quite literaly school anywhere and it can be organized or chaos. What works for you is the right choice.

Can I teach my kids together? Yes. Why not? Many curriculums allow for this and if they don’t specifically say it, anything can be customized. If you have a 1st grader and a 10th grader, obviously thats not going to work very well. Your 10th grader needs highschool credit work and your 1st grader is likely not going to understand that level of work. However, if your children are within a few grade levels, there is no reason you can’t. My own children do all subjects except Math and some Electives together.

Do I need to grade and keep track of grades? This may also depend on your state homeschool laws. In PA, it’s not a requirement. I do suggest grading and tracking grades at the secondary level, that’s 7th-12th in PA. You definetly want to strongly consider this for highschool and keep good records if your child plans to go off to college. While there is no requirement in PA to keep grades, if your child intends to participate in school sports they will most likely require some sort of report card. (again, this may depend on your state)

These are just a few questions and suggestions. Look through my blog for more information on homeschooling in Pennsylvania. I also have several reviews as well as sharing what my children and myself have done over the past 3 years of homeschooling. Whether you’re planning on a temporary solution during a very troubling time in our history or plan to continue, I hope that I’ve been able to help you and encourage you that you can successfully homeschool your children. It doesn’t matter if your day looks different than mine. It also does not matter if you school in the daytime or have to school in the evenings because you have to work. You can also do school on weekends if your schedule needs you to so that you can get all 180 days complete (again, the number of days is a PA requirement).

I know this year will bring its own challenges. Have fun. Enjoy your children. Love the journey. Don’t expect everything to be perfect, it won’t be. Don’t compare yourself and your kids to someone else’s. If you’re a believer in the one true and Holy God, have faith. He’s got you. Train your children. You will learn right along with them. You may learn things about your children you didn’t know or about yourself. You are capable. You can do it. Have a great year. Come back here from time to time or subscribe. I try to post as much as I can.

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