You should check with your local Board of Education to find out the laws in your state.  They will have the most recent compliance guidelines, and laws can change from time to time.  You need to be sure you’re up to date on the most recent laws.  Remember, ignorance of the law is no excuse.

There are many resources available on the internet that will give you the basic guidelines of homeschool laws by state.  Personally I recommend making sure you get your information directly from your state’s website if that information is available online.  It’s better to get it straight from the source, where you know it should be up-to-date.

Don’t forget that many states have record-keeping and testing requirements that you need to comply with, in addition to their registration requirements.

Failure to comply usually just results in a warning, but you could be charged a fine for each child.  Some parents (mostly in countries outside the U.S.) have even faced jail time over child neglect charges, so you must keep appropriate records at all times!  I wouldn’t risk facing any kind of legal issues simply because you failed to keep adequate records and comply thoroughly with the law.

Homeschooling is often chosen by Christian parents who want to keep their children from being tainted by the children of parents who have a very different set of morals than they do.  It is indeed very difficult to send your child off to socialize with the children of parents who regularly swear, drink heavily, or let their children watch objectionable material that causes those children to learn unacceptable behavior.  And let’s face it, many parents today just don’t spend time teaching their children civilized values.  They let their children watch violent movies, and television shows where children regularly disrespect their parents and elders and laugh about it.

Even many athiest and agnostic parents are fed up with this!  Responsible parents of all types know that today’s school environment is not a healthy one.  Violence and shootings are becoming regular events, and drugs and teenage sex run rampant.

Making the choice to teach your children at home is rarely easy.  You may have to juggle things like work, church, errands, and other daily tasks around to make time to educate your children properly.  But as a Christian parent, you may feel you have no choice if you hope to keep your child from learning these unacceptable behaviors.

It’s important to remember to strike a balance between education and religion.  Many Christian homeschoolers are taught far more religion than other subjects, and their education ends up skewed or distorted.  While teaching the Bible is very important to Christian homeschoolers, you have to remember that your child still needs to be well-versed in all of the other subjects, as well.

You’ll also have to decide which subjects you want to teach as they are presented in traditional schools, and which ones you’d prefer to gear toward Christian values.  Will you teach creationism or evolution?  Will you give your children any type of sex eduation, or would you prefer to leave this out of the curriculum.  Fortunately you have the power to make these choices yourself as a homeschooling parent.  If you sent your child to a public or private school, your children would have to follow the curriculum they set.

It is your responsibility to provide your child with an adequate and thorough education.  Just remember to provide the right mix between religious and other subjects and you will be giving your child and excellent Christian foundation on which to base their lives.

Well, the good news is you can make learning science fun for your children AND for you!  You can learn together, and learning together makes it easier and more enjoyable.

While it’s important to concentrate on firm lesson plans and homework-style lessons sometimes, it’s also very important to get some hands-on experience.  This is what makes learning science easy and fun.  Trying to teach science without any hands-on work will not only be potentially boring, but it will be harder to grasp many of the concepts, too.

Here are some ways you can experience science hands-on:

• Visit a pond and take water samples.  View them under a microscope and describe on paper what you see.
• Visit the beach and take notes about the ecosystem.  What types of plants live on the beach?  Which creatures live in the tide pools?  What types of animals live in the ocean near the beach?
• Cook something like bread.  Explain how the yeast works to make the bread rise, what the various ingredients do for the bread, and what would happen if each ingredient were left out.
• Grow a garden.  Children can learn about botany, food supply, pest control, organic gardening, and where their food comes from.
• Get a chemistry set and experiment.  Did you have one of these as a kid?  They’re a lot of fun and very educational!
• Get a telescope and watch the stars.  Point out the various constellations and draw maps of the ones you see.
• Go on nature walks.  Identify plant species and animal species.  Document when and where you located each species, what they were doing, what time of day they were seen, and how many times they were seen.

Teaching homeschool science can be fun and rewarding for the entire family.  It’s just important to focus part of your time and energy on the hands-on part, rather than spending all of your time memorizing binomial nomenclature and the parts of cells!

One thing that made it easier for us to choose homeschooling is the fact that we work at home.  Because we own our own business, we don’t have to be at work certain hours, we’re home all day to supervise the kids, and we have more time available because we don’t have to commute to work.

For parents who work, choosing homeschooling can be considerably harder.  When you have to deal with work and commuting, it takes away a substantial part of your day, and homeschool can certainly interfere with the time you do have left.

Still, we believe homeschool is the ONLY option for our family.  Here is a partial list of some of the reasons we chose homeschooling for our children.

• We don’t agree with some of the things that are taught in public schools.
• We wanted to teach our children our own set of moral values.
• We didn’t want our children corrupted by children who are allowed to run rampant and behave terribly.
• We didn’t want our children to be bullied or harassed.
• We didn’t want to put our children at risk from children who might harm them.
• We didn’t want them to be exposed to additional illnesses.
• We wanted to protect them from drugs and alcohol for as long as possible.
• We wanted to be able to choose who our children socialized with until they’re older.
• We wanted them to have more attention during the learning process.
• We wanted more control over what they learned.
• We wanted them to have some say in what they learn, and how.

There were SO many reasons for us to choose this, and so few for us to choose public school.  For us, this was the right choice.  This won’t be the right choice for everyone!  We certainly don’t want to push this lifestyle onto anyone who isn’t ready for it or doesn’t want it, and we don’t want anyone to feel guilty if they don’t choose this for their family.  You have the right to choose what you want to do for your own children!

But for those who do choose this, we wanted to offer a little help.  We know what it’s like to struggle in the beginning to create lesson plans, organize your day, fit everything in, and find good lessons without spending a fortune.

This blog is to share our experiences with homeschooling, help you plan lessons, help you organize your day, and just give you general help and advice when you need it.  If you’ve chosen to homeschool your kids, good for you!  We’re happy to have you!

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