Has or does anyone home school their children?

Question

I am seriously considering home schooling my daughter, does anyone else teach their children at home? Any advice? Any websites that may help me?
Many thanks in advance

creative rae..... How did you start, where do you get your ideas from?

I really appreciate everyones answers they have been very helpful and informative (well except one or two usual idiots) i have decided that i will teach my daughter at home and i feel better already just having made the decsion, all the websites have been a great help
Thanks

Answer 1

I am homeschooling my daughter. Depending on the State you live in the rules can be a little different but it is legal in all 50 states. There are many books on the subject that you can checck out at the library.
Type in homeschooling and the city state where you live to find online groups in your area. There are many people that will be happy to help.
Here are a couple of websites that will help you get started
http://hslda.org
http://www.homeschoolcomplete.com/

I also wanted to mention that no two homeschooling families are the same. Everyone has a different way of going about it. From traditional to unschooling. (which when I first heard of it thought how can you get an education that way) I think most people I know fall somewhere in between. What is great is that your child can go at their own pace. If she gets it she can move on if she needs more time she can have it. If she loves a particular subject say "horses" she can study horses until she is an expert. (or whatever she likes) And for those that will tell you that she won't be normal or won't be socialized.
here is the definition of SOCIALIZE
To place under government or group ownership or control.
To make fit for companionship with others; make sociable.
To convert or adapt to the needs of society.

I don't know about you but I don't want my daughter to be "socialized"

I prefer her to have the opportunities to have friends and be around people of all ages.
People comment to me all the time how well my dd is so well adjusted and polite and how she gets along so well with others.

Answer 2

I homeschool my daughter. Check out www.hslda.org, you can find laws for any state and their requirements, if any. My husband was homeschooled so naturally it became a highly discussed topic when our daughter was born. I went to the library and checked out a ton of books, which was a BAD idea! It was to much information and it made me feel as though homeschooling was impossible! A couple of books that did help was by Lisa Whelchel, spelling on last name may be wrong but she played Blair on The Facts of Life. She homeschools her kids and has some very informative books with a ton of websites listed. I just started asking around once we were sure homeschooling was the path we wanted to take. I found an amazing homeschool group that consists of about 10 families and around 50 kids. We get together a lot and everyone is very helpful. Ask at your church, if you have one, or at the library. Homeschoolers spend so much time there that the librarians know who we are and most homeschool parents are happy to answer any questions you might have. Since I don't know exactly what you are looking for I'd say just google homeschool, everything will pop up. homeschool.com and home-school.com are a couple good ones though. Yahoo groups also has a homeschool support group you might want to check out one of the ladies on there has been doing this for over 20 years! Everyone is friendly and ready to answer any questions you might have or to at least help point you in the right direction. Good luck, you can do this and don't over complicate it. Have fun!!

Answer 3

Don't know where you live. I live in UK and homeschooled my youngest daughter. I phoned "education otherwise" who told me word for word what to do and how to go about it. They have a regular magazine, and groups for children and parents to meet up and down the country. Other countries are more used to homeschooling, ie USA. If you go on the internet and just tap homeschool in, with your area ,you will arrive at something helpful...there is loads of advice out there. Main thing is not to feel alone, or panic! When I started I expected to use a sort of "school timetable", but threw it out after a few days. I gather lots of people do that. I was advised to just let her find her own way. She did. We survived. She was secondary school age, but she's now 21, has a job, and is happy. Join a few homeschool groups. Good luck.

Answer 4

I homeschool my daughter, hmmm daughter theme going on here! lol Anyway we checked out books at the library, looked at sites on the internet, asked others if they knew of any hs groups and finally what done it was that we decided to go ahead a try public school. My daughter would come home moody and not wanting to go back, then finally she was begging to be homeschooled! She knew of hsing because during our decision period we tried it out over the summer, but now she has had a taste of public school and doesn't like it. She doesn't understand why anyone wants to go to public school, everyone should be homeschooled according to her, she has even been trying to talk others into it lately, and she's only 5!! Check out books, but don't go overboard, because like stated above there is such a thing as too much info. The sites listed above are also great places to start, if you don't know your states laws check out http://www.hslda.org first. We are lucky enough to live in a green state and all we have to do is keep attendance.
Oh! By the way I have had many public school teachers tell me that if they could do it all over again they would have hsed their kids, the one that disturbed me and helped me with my final decision to hs was a woman who is a public school teacher and mother of two that said she just couldn't handle hsing her kids that she wouldn't want that responsibility!! She won't school her kids but she wants to teach mine? Yeah right!! Good luck though and just ignore all the critics, most that knock hsing don't know a thing about it! I like what the first post's definition of socializing! Look how people are today!! Do we really want our kids to be like that?

Answer 5

I homeschool my two children, ages 6 and 12. I've been homeschooling now for about 6 years. My son was in preschool and then in school for kindergarten and first grade, but he had a very difficult time keeping up and it became more difficult as he got older. He was crying each day and having stomach aches from the stress at school each day, and wanted to homeschool so we did. He wants to homeschool until college, and his younger sister has joined in also, so we will probably be homeschooling for a while. Both children have autism spectrum as well.

One reading program that I would recommend, although it can be a little costly (about $80 and that was with an online coupon I found by googling), is www.headsprout.com, if your child isn't reading yet. It is a somewhat fun program, and is laid out fairly well, and is best probably for children that are about 5 or 6 years old. It has 80 reading lessons online you can sign up for total although we just signed up for the first 40 lessons and may just do those. I also made sure to do the 3 free trial lessons they let you do to make sure my dd liked the program and was ready/mature enough for it.

I also recommend the library/garage sales/ebay(sellers that have been selling for a long time with very high scores like 99.9)/http://www.bookcloseouts.com/default.asp?N=0 when they have sales/and I like to check amazon.com for reviews (but don't always order from them although I do once in a while.

Favorite Web sites are iknowthat.com (click on the lower right hand corner on register "maybe later" and it is free) and starfall.com and uptoten.com and http://www.learningpage.com/. Those are all free. Another great site is www.edhelper.com which is not free but is the one site I pay for, a low annual fee, but is worth it in my opinion, because it has so much on the site.

My only advice would be not to try to schedule too many activities your first year if you do homeschool as I did. I scheduled my poor son the first year for about 7 or 8 things: piano, karate, soccer, football, gymnastics, plus he had OT and speech therapy and the poor child was exhausted and so was I, and fitting in regular school work was tough, but I also tried to fit in tons of school work the first year as well because I felt pressure to teach everything the first year as well! So I think I made the first year twice as tough as it needed to be.

The next year I only scheduled a few activities, his therapies were completed, and I relaxed on the academics and didn't kill him so much with the worksheets, so the whole year was SO much better! I've heard many homeschoolers tend to do the same thing their first year of homeschooling doing too much the first year....I just felt so much responsibility not to leave out teaching him anything that I tried to teach him everything that first year, which left us both feeling a little crazy!

Answer 6

Find out if there is a homeschool suppport group in your area. I homeshcool my 3 kiddos. I would have a hard time if I didn't belong to a homeshcool group. It gives me moral support, group educational opportunities, and other homeshcool friends for my kids.
There are so many opportunities for homeshcooling families these days. It is a wonderful thing to do with your family, you will be blessed!
Every family homeschools differently. Keep searching and you will find the strategies that work best for you. Whether you choose a traditional approach, eclectic, or unschooling you will embark on a journey that will be rewarding and beneficial for you and your daughter.
Blessings to you.

Answer 7

I home schooled my 5 sons. I highly recommend finding other home-schoolers in your area so the kids can socialise. I teamed up with other home-schoolers & divided the kids into classes! I taught the 4-7 year olds, someone else had the toddlers, and another taught the 8-11 year olds. The kids learned very well.

However, due to our work, we had to move, so I had all 5 kids by myself. My favourite home school course is A-Beka. I was able to teach it to my kids. However, it was more expensive here in England, so I switched to A.C.E. (Accelerated Christian Education). One of the benefits of ACE is that it's been accredited in the UK (it's an American course). Also CLE from the Mennonites is excellent, as long as you don't mind their illustrations of ladies in old-fashioned Mennonite clothing

My sons eventually went to college or high school as I became ill & couldn't teach them. They were slightly behind in a few subjects & very advanced in others & had no trouble adjusting. The main advantage was that they had good morals & character. Now one of my sons will soon get his university degree.

Answer 8

Yes I home school my two boys in U.K. join a home ed group in your area. Good websites for uk include www.heas.co.uk and the education otherwise website. A book to read that may be useful is free range education, its a collection of stories from people who home ed and how they approach it.It also includes comments from children. As far as advice how you go about it is up to you. My children are quite young so their education revolves around play, answering their question and going for walks talking about what we see. We meet with about 20 other families every monday so the children can play together and the parents can chat.

Answer 9

No-one can possibly tell you anything without knowing whereabouts your niece is in the world (country *AND* state or territory). Different places have different rules; ergo, it's impossible for anyone to know the requirements of homeschooling without knowing where in the world she lives. Coming from a home educating family in the UK though I can tell you this much : there is nothing amiss with the situation *IF* she happens to live over here. The law here says her parents don't have to send their daughter to school, nor do anything that resembles 'school' while home educating her, nor do they have to provide her with the opportunity for social interaction with anyone else her age.

Answer 10

I started by talking to people in my church that homeschooled. Seemed we had a lot of people that homeschooled their kiddos, but I didn't know it until I started asking questions. I went to one that was a long time member of our local homeschool group and asked if I could come over for coffee and talk to her.
I scheduled it out about a week and made a list of questions. She in turn took that time to gather tons of info for me, including books she had used, examples of record keeping, portfolios, things like that. From her I had a list of different teaching approaches, so I took that and began comparing them online. I decided to go with an umbrella school for my first two years: an accredited program that kept records for me. It was like a no-brainer beginning for me. They sent placement tests for my daughter, and used them to create a curriculum for her. They kept grades and issued report cards. Having someone else do all that for me helped me get my feet under me and really consider how to continue on in our home education experience.
I would suggest you ask around. If you are involved in a church, see if you have anyone that homeschools.
If not, then go to hslda or your state homeschool coalition and find a group in your area, then talk to the Director of that group.
I ended up becoming director of that group I mentioned previously for two years and I talked to many many people that were in the same position you are in today.
It truly was the most rewarding part of my job as Director.
Hope this is at least some of the info you are looking for.