Requirements For Homeschooling

I remember when my first child was very young (he is soon to be 11 now) and his education became a  dominant discussion for my wife and I. We knew homeschooling was the best choice but had many concerns about how to start. Thanks to a very intelligent wife we began our quest of home educating our children and began to understand the states requirements for homeschooling, the various curricula that was available and soon we were on our way to starting our first real class. Living in the state of Florida, we are only required to send a letter of intent, have a certified teacher evaluate our child's progress and finally send in that evaluation. Nothing more was required.

We will be teaching 3 of our 4 children this year and I must say, we have come a long way. So far Florida's requirements for homeschooling has not changed and seemingly have not failed to cross our t's and dot our i's. Homeschooling is becoming super exciting (most of the time) and I am becoming increasingly amazed at how smart children truly are. My six year old little girl will be starting Piano class for the first time in only a few weeks, while my boys will continue their amazing playing.

Although homeschooling is not the easiest thing I've ever done, I must say that I am truly blessed to be able to do so. I am also thankful to be living in Florida where the requirements for homeschooling is relatively easy.

Sometimes just watching my kiddos play, I am reminded how far they have come and how far they need to go. Homeschooling is fun.

Does Homeschooling Work?

Does homeschooling work is a question that I get asked all of the time. The second most popular question I get asked is, "Are you a certified teacher?" I have four children, 10, 9, 6, and 3, each of them are currently involved with some form of home education. My youngest is learning to recognize her letters and numbers with various online apps, while my other children are involved with a full scale curriculum. Living in Florida affords my family a simple letter of intent be sent to the state advising that we will be homeschooling our children. I am not certified in the sense of studying and taking a test for a teaching certification, but I am a father that loves his children. At the end of each year our children take an achievement test and are then evaluated by a certified teacher. There have been no concerns on her part, nor ours. Aside from keeping our children motivated and keeping ourselves organized, we can emphatically answer the question "does homeschooling work" with a yes.

Does public education work? Our children have never been in the public school system, but I have. It did not work for me. I do have a 4 year degree as proof that I went to college, but even that did not seem to benefit me in the sense that I feel like a better person after college. Because I believe in the idea that my children should be taught about God and feel safe while obtaining an education, my wife and I decided to teach our children from home. We have learned a great deal about ourselves as a family and as individuals because of our homeschool experience, but the question still remains, "Does homeschooling work?" I suppose we will never truly know until our children face the real world and its challenges and come out victorious. If our children can enter adulthood having their faith in Christ in tact, then I will know that homeschooling indeed does work.

How to Start Homeschooling

There are a number of reasons why many parents are considering how to start homeschooling. Many parents believe the school system is failing their child as they watch a steady decline in grades. Parents these days have also become more aware of bullying at school and want to provide a safe environment for their child to learn. Oftentimes parents just want to take a more proactive approach to their child's education. Whatever the reason why they are looking search for how to start homeschooling, any reason is a valid one.

If you watch the news, it does not appear a public school environment is a good place for our children. School violence has certainly been on the rise. Even more apparent than school violence is the attack on a child's free speech. A friend of mine witnessed this first hand. Her little boy's kindergarten class was told to bring in their favorite book and he wanted to bring in a Veggietales book that said "God Made You Special, " and the teacher would not allow him in the classroom. His mother went to the teacher to discuss the reason why and the teacher simply said this book was not appropriate. Why would a book about God telling a child they were special be a problem? Freedom of speech even for your children is the reason why.

Being bullied has also become a serious problem for young children and teens. Teen suicide is on the rise in large part because of bullying. I remember growing up and witnessing this unfortunate thing and it was certainly not fun.

If you want to know how to start homeschooling, then there are a number of resources online today to help you in your endeavors.

Preparing For Homeschool 2017

While our homeschool curriculum is almost set for August 2017, there are always things left undone. We have the curriculum we want to use, currently we are working on getting the scheduling done. Sometimes having 4 children in school makes planning a bit difficult, I believe we are up for the challenge. Part of me can't wait to see them learning new concepts, the other part of me is already concerned about keeping them motivated. We have vacations for the year already in the works and know how easy it is to get off track. Thankfully with homeschooling, if we need to readjust, it is often easy to do.
Tonight, my wife and I will sit down and get a schedule planned out, even though we have an idea how things should go, we want to be sure it will work efficiently. This year, I want to start with the parts of our curricula requiring technology; Virtual Piano, Online Portuguese, and Typing. Then we will likely take care of Language Arts and Math. Possibly Science will be last, but not sure if I want to put reading last since it is a bit more relaxing for the children. Excited to begin the year, only 2 more weeks.