Why should you have goals?

Targets to hit, Measures success, Get ahead of tough choices. Validate your tough choices against your goals.

How should you come up with goals?

Start at the end -- what skills and values do you want your kids to have when they leave the house? What kind of human do you want to produce?

Embrace the things that make Home School special:

- Tailored to their needs - go fast/slow

- Unique Experiences - Internships, Travel

- Different approaches - classical, unschool, etc

Pick your educational philosophy. Book: Homeschooling Methods by Paul and Gena Suarez

Write down your goals. Make sure the adults involved agree with them.

 Goals are allowed to change and should change as you discover new things. The odds that you get the goals 100% "right" the first time are very low.

Examples of our goals over the years:

Kindergarten

- Learn to Read. This is always a good one.

Elementary school 

- Move as fast as they could through the material

- We chose Classical style philosophy originally

- Read to them, lots of memory work

Middle school (5-8th)

- Moved to a blend of Classical and Charlotte Mason philosophy - not willing to fight for Latin

- History taught well, global history - better than we got

- Kept "move as fast as they could" for Math

- Embrace opportunity on the road

- Survive.

High school, What are our goals now?

- Baseline level of knowledge

- Thinking skills

- Wisdom to interpret the world

- Curiosity and Good Readers

- Character -- Honesty, Integrity, Self-Control, and Self-Motivation

- Culture -- religion, language, music, arts, family, traditions

- Prepared for Work / Independence