October 07, 2014

018 Five Things I Wish I’d Known Before Homeschooling

22 minutes

When my wife and I started homeschooling, it was much like when we became parents. We knew almost everything before we started. When our first child arrived, we started to get the sense that we were in trouble. Any of you who have read the hilarious blog post from stolensleep.com titled How To Get Your Baby To Sleep Through The Night (In Just TWO Years) will understand.

Homeschooling was slightly less of a shock to our systems, but still, there are some things I wish I’d known then. So, I’m going to share 5 of them with you today. Now, you’re smart, so you probably know all these, but we’re not so quick in our house. So, please indulge me. Here we go – the 5 Things I Wish I’d Known Before I Started Homeschooling.

It’s going to be messy.

We will not keep the same curriculum for all of our children. In fact, we may not even make it through one semester with one child using the same curriculum. When we started, it was like Christmas morning receiving our curriculum in a box. We ripped open the package and pulled out all these shiny, beautiful books, and we just new that we had made the right decision. Two months later, we were dialing the Homeschoolers’ Anonymous hotline begging them to buy our used curriculum so we could afford to buy a different one.

Homeschooling is expensive.

There will be tears. Lots of them.

You mean I have to learn, too?! Yes, folks, if you want to teach your children, you will have to learn.

Bonus tip: Learn to say I’m sorry. A lot. Don’t always try to fix everything. Be ready to clean at a moment’s notice. And get Chinese takeout whenever your wife needs it. It’s important. Put it in the budget. Okay, so that was like 4 bonus tips. You’re welcome.

News articles:

Right And Left Joined Forces In Fight To Legalize Home Schooling

‘From Birth to Adulthood:’ Christian Group Decries Proposal to Monitor Connecticut Homeschoolers

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