Hey friends! I hope this post finds you well!

I am attempting to do better at actually putting out content however, I always like to have some inspiration to write about. So sometimes I am waiting for that to strike because I don’t want to put things out that aren’t authentic. If you do any reading about blogs you may have come across at least one that tells you how to make money blogging, and in those, there will always be something that says it needs to be a certain length and you need to post twice a week or something of that nature. But I am here to break that mold! I don’t want to pump out something fake and I don’t want to make everything a long read. I want it to be digestible and quick to consume. With that said, there is some backstory here and if you want to skip it, hop down to the how to start heading!

THE TRUTH ABOUT HOMESCHOOLING

So to bring it back to inspiration, I had some strike a few weeks ago and I have been thinking on it since. As you may or may not know, I began homeschooling my kids two years ago. To give you some back story, I grew up going to public school but my husband was homeschooled. I had started thinking about homeschooling after our first daughter was born but I didn’t think I could leave my job. Fast forward about 8 years and we had 3 more kids making 5 total. Well I had been thinking harder on it and I had my husband on board but I didn’t think I could leave my job still. But then divine intervention happened when our daycare decided to close. She was a provider in her home and she had taken care of four of our babies from 3 months on so it was a big shock. At the time my second son was still under two and I was struggling to find a daycare that I, a) trusted and b) could make work in terms of travel time. There were very few who had the ability to take a child under two and I took a leave of absence to try to find something. I was on the leave for a couple weeks, maybe, and I found out I was pregnant again. That was a way bigger shock. We thought we were done. That cemented the idea of homeschooling becoming a reality for us. At the time, there were not enough daycares to be able to take all the newborns in our area.

I decided to quit my job and keep the younger kids home. The older two were already in a charter school and I was having our 6th baby in March so I didn’t want to pull them out unless I was completely for sure that I was happy with my decision. I was super happy but also scared out of my mind! The first year home I drove the girls to school everyday and picked them up. I had two toddlers at home all day and I was pregnant and then pretty soon, there was a newborn. My husband stayed home for two months with me after he was born. After that I was on school duty and napping two kids duty and pre-schooling one duty. We somehow made it and that summer I decided to keep them all home.

We started the fall of 2022 and I had a 2nd grader, 1st grader, two preschoolers and a baby. My oldest son is actually grown and works full time. That first year was really hard. I was nursing the baby all the time and he was taking 3 naps a day still. We had no routine except his and the kids would have disappeared when I would get back from laying him down for a nap. It was so hard to try to get them to come back and start their work again, that a lot of times I just wouldn’t. Other times it was time for lunch and I would need to get that done not to mention, I was just so TIRED. We got through about half of what I would have liked to get done. But that is the beauty of homeschool. We had that freedom to do what we needed in our lives at that time.

So in 2023, I was ready to get a schedule down but it was still a little rough. We didn’t get a good routine down until after Christmas I would say. The baby was still on two naps a day until around that time I think. We had gotten sick with COVID at Christmas and it took me a while to feel better. And as we were getting in the swing of things, almost all the kids got strep. We were definitely knocked off our game again. However, 2024 even with strep was super productive. We finished all the math and reading books that we had scheduled for the year. We doubled and tripled some lessons some days. Now we have finished our school year but we will continue to work on handwriting, spelling and reading throughout the summer.

All of this is to give you a background and a REAL life synopsis of beginning homeschool. I have seen so many curated videos of the cute little homeschool rooms all designed with neutral colors and a really pretty, perfectly done-up mom. And more power to them, but I am not that. We are a hot mess and I definitely look like it. I am always trying to do better though and if you want tips from a mom like that, I am your girl! We are often just piled in at the dining table or the first year everyone sat on the floor in our den. It is fluid for us. You CAN homeschool and it can look however you need it to.

HOW TO START

So now let’s get to it! My inspiration came from two of my oldest friends, asking about homeschooling because they are thinking about homeschooling their kids now. I decided I would try to put together a quick little guide on how to start homeschooling.

The first step for me is always to research. I did research for years, before I even knew that I was going to homeschool because I was interested in doing it. However many people may not have that amount of time to research so here are some links to get you started. Smarter learning is a great site with lots of research information to peruse.
You need to find out what the law is in your state and what is required when you homeschool. Homeschool Legal Defense Association This is a great resource to get you started, you can search your state and find out the basics of what is needed. I do not have a membership for this but it looks helpful.

Then you want to move on to your state and school district and see what is available on their site about homeschooling.

From what I have found all homeschools that meet the requirements can apply to be accredited. Each state has their own rules about it. However, it is not necessary in order to be allowed to graduate nor get into college. The only benefit touted in MN is the ability to not have to take standardized tests. But it costs money and you have to document a lot of things and send them in to be approved. It never seemed worth it in my eyes. Also accredited curriculum is a farce. Schools are accredited not curriculum.

If you want to continue after you have made it this far, you need to decide on a curriculum for your kids. There are many made for you, some even online, some public schools online and of course just textbook programs. There are also many that are religious and many that are secular so you can find what ever you like.

There are a ton of resources for you to put together a free curriculum and I will link some of them below. This is by no means an exhaustive list because that would be impossible. There is so much information out there. Pinterest is a great way to find things. I use an aspect of all of these but I never fully pieced a free curriculum because it takes so much work. I have had better luck with purchasing programs for certain subjects and putting things together myself. In this case for me, time is more valuable than the cost of the program.

Freedom Homeschooling

This is a free site with SO MANY resources. It has free resources for many, many subjects and also some curriculum. This is a hard site for me to navigate a little bit but overall a great resource to help you find and narrow down what you are looking for in homeschooling.

Easy Peasy All In One Homeschool

This was built by a father that wanted to keep all the useful things he used for his children’s curriculum and it is free as well. It is a Christian based curriculum but I find many parts are useful as a secular homeschooler. This is mainly online, though. I didn’t want another reason for my kids to be on a screen. I tend to go with hard copy programs and limit screen time.

Rainbow Resource

This is a site with textbooks and many other items for you to order. There are plenty of options to choose from and they are labeled to be religious, neutral or secular. It is almost too much to even go through. I purchased specific reading programs from them. We love All About Reading. They even have full year programs put together for you for each grade. I found that I didn’t need all the manipulative items that come with these. I have plenty of learning toys already.

Moving Beyond the Page

This is a curriculum for kids that have a reading program added. They offer one as well but I have already purchased our reading program for all my kids as we are reusing it. MBTP is based in literature and is for gifted learners but they state that gifted curriculum is beneficial for all learners. They will even tell you to make copies of the consumables for use with other children later on which I can appreciate. MBTP has a few planned schedules to choose from if you want to follow that. I had been just trying to write out my lesson plan myself based on the textbooks we were using but I am excited to try an actual plan done for me this year. They also have the full curriculum packages broken into pieces in case you don’t want math or another subject. Plus they have virtual access for 18 months included.

Bookshark

This program is another all inclusive program that provides language arts, social studies, science and math. I looked at this one extensively and I really like the books it provides. Both Bookshark and MBTP are literature based and reading is the main way to reinforce learning which I really like. Our family school motto is if you can read, you can learn anything. I love being able to show that in real life with the reading. Bookshark has a 4 day program schedule and I really like that. It is planned out which you can follow or not, you know, because this is your homeschool. Virtual is available as an add on.

FINAL THOUGHTS

These are just some of the options available. Rainbow Resource actually shows a lot of options that you can just go and buy from the company’s themselves. I am not well versed in the religious curriculum which is why I don’t mention them here, but I do know of Abeka and Christian Liberty Academy. They have online availability as well. There are many more on the Rainbow Resource site as well if that is what you prefer.

And there are so many more things available. Just searching a little will bring up so many options for you to choose from and now is the time to research!

Each year in MN, if you are not an accredited home school, you need to do standardized testing. I order my testing from Christian Liberty Academy which I find to be inexpensive. You can get the Iowa Basics if you prefer but it is more, or there are online versions that give you better understanding but they are more expensive.

I hope that this is helps a little for those that have no idea where to start about homeschooling. I really love it and having my kids home with me, being able to nurture them into the people they are meant to be even if I may go crazy some days!

Did this help you? Do you have more questions? Send them my way- I would love to see if I can help!