What Will My Homeschooler Remember?

Memory is an interesting thing.

When people told me I wouldn’t remember any of the pain from childbirth I thought surely that couldn’t be true. Guess what? They were right - I honestly don’t recall the pain of childbirth. What I do recall, however, is they way those sweet babies felt when I held them for the first time.

One of the most rewarding parts of being a homeschooling parent is having a child graduate from your homeschool, have some life experience, and then come back to you with their memories. I can’t quite describe the sweetness of hearing my child recall a favorite book or activity. To know that we were so intimately involved TOGETHER in their education is a feeling like no other.

Yes, I know hindsight is 20/20. I know current homeschool struggles are important. That math curriculum decision seems SO important at the time.

Please allow me to play the homeschool mentor mom - let me share with you what your children will REALLY remember from their homeschooling days.

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Your Homeschooler Will Remember The Books You Read

Literature comes up so often in daily life!. (We are big Jeopardy! fans and you wouldn’t believe how many questions are about literature!)

Make reading with your children a top priority. Read aloud to them. Read silently alongside of them. Encourage individual quiet reading times. Read, read, read!

Not only do books create shared memories and closeness, they also impart so much knowledge. I also found that if we associated activities with our books (which is why I loved the Five in a Row curriculum so much) the memories were even more vivid.

I could list pages and pages of books my children remember reading, but one stands out vividly! A Prairie Dog for the President holds a special place in our hearts because it reminds us of a couple of weeks when we pretended we were Lewis & Clark explorers. We read all the books we could find, made paper bag nature journals, and trekked around a local lake as if we were Lewis & Clark, too.

Epic read-alouds like The Hobbit, Robin Hood, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory also hold memories for my children.

THIS is what your children will remember.

I guarantee you they won’t remember the time you almost lost your marbles trying to teach them long division, or how it took them a few months longer than their peers to read. They won’t remember the failed science experiment or the trouble they had narrating a specific passage to you.

They will remember the stories of adventure, beauty, love, and greatness you shared with them.

So, when all else fails - sit down and read a book with your children.

Your Homeschooler Will Remember The Field Trips!

The great thing about this is that you can plan the field trips and search for books to go along with them!

As we talk with our adult children now they will tell us they are so thankful that we traveled with them - it wasn’t always extravagant (many times it was just a local field trip) - but field trips create so many memories and they remember what they learned on them!

Some of our favorite travels:

• The Oregon Trail/Fort Laramie

• Washington, DC

• The Erie Canal/Niagara Falls

• Exploring the West

• Muir Woods and Alcatraz

• Volcanoes National Park/Hawaii

• Homosassa Springs Wildlife Refuge

• California Academy of Arts & Sciences

• The Home of Carl Sandburg

• The Home of Thomas Edison

• The Beginning of The Trail of Tears

We often took LARGE chunks of time to pick up and travel - and guess what? My kids never got “behind” in math or reading. We just spent time catching up on lessons when we would get home or took our learning on the road with us.

The people our children met, the diverse experiences they had, and the bravery it instilled in them are things I wouldn’t trade for anything in the world!

Favorite Local Field Trips:

• Dissecting Owl Pellets at the Nature Center

• Fernbank Museum of Natural History

• The Zoo (I would let them choose an animal to research and let them get a stuffed animal of it from the gift shop!)

• Nature walks

• Fall Festivals

• Taking school to a beautiful lake - changing scenery makes a big difference

• The governor’s mansion

• Georgia Tech Robotics Day

• The Atlanta Symphony

• The Fox Theater

Sometimes we get so caught up in checking off all the academic boxes that we forget to just LIVE with our children. Take those fieldtrips. Learn on the road.

Your kids will remember the change of scenery, and chances are they will remember lots of details from the field trips, too. Once again, my own children thank me often for the experiences their dad and I were able to give them.

Your Homeschooler Will Remember The Times YOU Had Fun!

Do you let your children know you ENJOY homeschooling them? (Do you enjoy homeschooling them?)

When I could relax and have fun with my kids and not be quite the “disciplinarian” and “teacher” we made great memories and learned a lot.

Once we made magnetic slime and I think I had more fun than the kids blowing huge magnetic slime bubbles! Then, there was the day I called off formal school and declared it Angry Birds Day! My children also loved when I would participate in homeschool co-op classes with them - teaching a class for each of my children meant the world to them.

What about the time it was SO hot in September and we went to the pool to do all of our memory work from the diving board and pool, and then went to “Happy Hour” for slushies afterward?

You have a unique opportunity to ENJOY your children - and trust me they are only little for a very brief period of time. They will remember (and cherish!) those times that you had fun with them!

Your Homeschooler Will Remember Morning Time

Morning Time is near and dear to my heart. It is what I will miss the most next year when my tenure as a homeschooling parent is complete.

(And yes, we’ve even kept up Morning Time with our last high schooler!)

Morning Time changed with each stage my children were in, but a few things were always consistent:

• Devotions

• Art/Music study

• Memory Work Review

• Read Aloud

I believe my children have many memories from Morning Time because it was a CONSTANT - mom never let morning time slide, and if she did, you knew she was either sick or just plain old exhausted. And, because our Morning Time consisted of things that were true, beautiful, and good, they remained in our hearts and minds.

For many years we used the Charlotte Mason Bible verse memory box - that’s a keeper.

You can probably also guess that Super Quiet UnInterrupted Listening Time was a constant - my son still listens to the listening calendar selections!

Here is an example of our simple morning basket.

Keeping a consistent Morning Time means you WILL accomplish something each homeschool day. It also instills a habit of routine and attention to beauty in our children.

I’m actually wondering if my husband and I can keep up with morning time once my son graduates - I’m not kidding! We can have our devotions together and maybe I can convince him to read aloud with me! (My kids think I’m a little nuts on this one, but I think it just might happen.)

Launching Our Children into Adulthood

As we launch our children into adulthood let’s keep in mind the big picture. We all want to have young adults who are responsible, adventurous, caring, attentive to detail, and who have had a wide range of world experiences.

THESE are the things they will remember. THESE are the things that will help them succeed in life.

I promise - you can always study to fill those “gaps” they might have in certain subjects (although I didn’t find my kids too bad!), or outsource that Chemistry credit that seems so overwhelming for you to teach. You cannot, however, outsource the other things mentioned above. You cannot outsource relationships and a soft place to land.

When it’s all said and done, you will look at your children and feel an overwhelming sense of gratitude and joy because you created memories - with the added bonus of learning thrown into the mix. Aren’t we fortunate to be able to homeschool our children?

What is something you think your children will remember most from homeschooling?

Share it in the comments below!

Don't Let Money Stand in the Way of Homeschooling!

There are many reasons why you might think you cannot homeschool your children.

In addition to wondering if you’re qualified (which you, by the way, most certainly ARE), there also comes the financial worries that go along with homeschooling. How can your family survive on one income? Doesn’t it cost MONEY to actually homeschool? Curriculum and extra classes get expensive, right?

These are all VALID questions. You probably have envisioned your life progressing along a particular financial path, and homeschooling might change that path.

Let me encourage you. Money does not have to stand in the way of homeschooling your children!

Homeschooling has been a tremendous blessing for our family. It changed not only the way we educated our children, but also the way we looked at our lives.

We no longer view ourselves as cogs in a wheel that we simply must roll with - we are able to chart our own course, and that all began with stepping out of the public schools. Once you take that step, you will find that taking other big steps isn’t as scary. In fact, it is quite liberating!

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5 Suggestions to Help Alleviate Money/Homeschool Worries:

Look To The Future and Have Faith

The situation you are in today will NOT be the situation you are in three years from now or even a year from now.

I remember when we were buying our current home - my father advised us to stretch ourselves just a bit because generally a financial situation improves as we get older. That little bit of extra home we purchased fit us very well down the line and I’m so glad we had the space and extra land it provided.

The primary breadwinner in your house will most likely be making more money as the years go on and/or you will discover other ways to earn money as well.

As believers, we also knew that if God was calling us to homeschool that He would provide for us to do just that. Yes, homeschooling is a leap of faith in many ways, and financially is no exception!

That leads us to the next reason…

You Have the Ability to HUSTLE

Once we stepped outside of the traditional school box we began to look at many things quite differently. One of those was the ways we are able to earn money.

In the beginning, I was giving piano lessons at home to earn some money to supplement my husband’s income. Then, I began blogging and writing curricula to sell.

Having a side hustle can take on many different forms. Maybe you work a job in the evenings or on the weekends. Or, maybe you find some type of work online. We always have the ability to HUSTLE and can do so much more than we think we can!

Believe me - I get it. I thought when my kids were both in school I would go back to work and then we could achieve our financial goals. I was SO wrong. Homeschooling (and giving up what I thought was future income) actually provided MORE for our family and we have achieved and exceeded our financial goals!

Slash & Burn

My husband is an expert at this, and I’ve learned to become one as well. Take a look at your family expenses and see what you can slash and burn.

Once we began homeschooling I found that our homeschool friends were a great network for a lot of ways to save money. We had aligned ourselves with a new group of friends and because of that we were living our lives differently.

And you must stop trying to keep up with the Joneses - and in many cases, guess what? The Joneses are living in debt, anyway!

A few ideas:

• Ditch your cable (we had NO television when my kids were little and we first started homeschooling.

• Shop second hand

• Health Insurance (We participate in Samaritan Health Sharing Ministries which greatly reduced our healthcare costs!)

• Constantly evaluate your car insurance to make sure you are getting the best rate.

• Evaluate your cell phone plan to make sure you are getting the best rate.

• Drive older, paid for cars

• Get rid of STUFF - constantly purge and sell things - you can live quite simply and make some money by selling what you don’t need

• Don’t eat out and shop wisely (We frequent Sam’s Club and Aldi for good deals.)

• Watch the “click traps” (don’t shop on Amazon - that’s a direct contribution from my husband!)

The Power of a Budget

There is great power in a budget.

Contrary to popular belief, a budget does not restrict you - instead it gives you FREEDOM to spend money on the things that matter most but decreasing and eliminating spending on things that are NOT of value.

My husband was a credit counselor for a nonprofit for many years, so he has counseled people through budgeting. He has also utilized different ways of budgeting within our family.

I, on the other hand, am not a budgeter. To be completely honest, I could care less about budgeting, but I realize its importance and know it is something I MUST do.

Here is the truth about budgeting: Before you spend it is necessary to have a plan in place. This is true for both a saver (my husband) and a spender (me). It has actually improved our communication about money and eliminated the tension we used to have surrounding the subject.

(Get budget coaching from him at Your Profit Pro!)

Curriculum Doesn’t Have to Be Expensive

Finally, homeschool curriculum doesn’t have to break the bank. (But it CAN if you let it.)

A couple of suggestions:

• Easy Peasy All-in-One Homeschool

• Ambleside Online

Additionally, when your children are very young they will thrive on good books, play, and a solid math program. You can use your local library to find MANY resources! Check for local homeschool curriculum sales and join your local homeschool group on Facebook to see if there is a curriculum marketplace.

With some research and thriftiness, you can definitely homeschool on a shoestring.

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If you need more homeschool encouragement, that’s what I like to do.

At the end of your homeschool journey, you will look back with thankfulness on the relationships and lifestyle you have developed. Those worries that you’ve had will melt away and you will see that it has been WORTH IT.

Leave me a comment below if you have thoughts about money and homeschooling - or if there is a question we can help you with!

Between my husband’s financial counseling background and our years of homeschooling experience, our heart is to help you succeed in your homeschooling - without money being a barrier!