Take field trips with other homeschooling families. This will give your child valuable social interaction with others. You can also get group discounts at some venues.
Older children should have one on one time set aside. Keep an area dedicated to arts and crafts. If possible, allow your student to interact with and ‘teach' the younger ones. This will help them both to learn, and the older kids will appreciate your confidence in their ability to teach.
There is more to learning than textbooks. Be certain that your child reads lots of different things like comic books and newspapers. Current news stories can lead to amazing discussions, so make sure they stay abreast of current affairs. This will help them learn skills that can last forever.
Understand the laws that your state imposes on homeschooling. The HSLDA website can inform you of all the important regulations for your area. If you are a member of a homeschooling organization, this may help if you are questioned by CPS, or your local Board of Education. The support such an organization will be able to give you should more than make up for any annual membership fees you are charged.
Write a list of good things and bad things about both homeschooling and public schools. Go back to this list and create lesson plans that address the cons you came up with and focus on the advantages of the method you chose. Use it as a checklist of things you need to do or avoid. Keep the list to use when you need it.
Learning how to live in the world is just vital for life, just as book skills are, too. Therefore, try to incorporate both life skills and academic studies in your lesson plan. Everyone understands academics, but life skills like balancing a budget or cooking a meal are also important. By incorporating both, you can give your child both sets of skills simultaneously. For example, if your child is learning about gardening, teach about plant growth cycles and the effects of the environment.
There are great resources available to those who are interested in homeschooling their children. Do not let your new role as a teacher overwhelm you. Make sure that you attend classes and seminars to maximize your skills. This will help your child's education as they will gain a better teacher.
Are you going to homeschool more than one child? Prior to starting, you should think about the way you discipline your children at present. If rules and boundaries aren't clear, it will be impossible to keep everyone on track during class. By finding out what area you are weak in, you can work on that and make sure you and your children know exactly what to expect.
Don't allow the homeschool process to isolate you. There are many local networks worth joining, and they can all prove quite valuable. You can build a network of fellow homeschooling families by seeking out a support group. This will provide you with someone to talk to, a diverse array of opinions on various subjects and general homeschooling support.
There will always be challenges in homeschooling but it can be quite enjoyable and rewarding. Expect that you'll need a lot of patience to enforce the rules when the kids don't want to focus on their school books. Memorizing facts on a subject a child is not interested in won't be fun for you or the child. You may consider using a reward system to keep you and your child on track.
Give the kids your housework, or hire someone. This will take off some of the pressure while homeschooling. Cleaning, caring for your kids, shopping, cooking, and homeschooling will wear you out quickly. Take every piece of help you can get, and don't feel bad about it.