New To Homeschooling Tips: 8 Changes to Expect

hello I'm Sarah Fagan and today I want to talk to you about a big mistake that I see in new home schoolers or those considering to home-school and they don't even notice that it's a problem I'm the author of minimalist homeschooling and I homeschool my four children who are now range in age from 4 to 12 and I have ever since the beginning so over my years of working with home schoolers I've noticed that the biggest struggle with new home schoolers is the lifestyle change so let's talk about eight ways that homeschooling is going to be dramatically different than perhaps what you're used to number one homeschooling is not going to be like it was when you were doing homework with your children so a lot of parents will say to me we struggle so much with homework I'm not even sure that we can homeschool well guess what when you're homeschooling there is no homework in fact you will get your children during the best part of the day you will have a finite amount of work that will get done at specific times it won't drag on and linger on through the entire day if that's not what works well for your family so hopefully you will choose the best time to do things with your children and everyone will be at their best number two responsibilities a lot of mothers will say how will I keep the house while my children are home all day I still have to be a homemaker I still need to get the vacuuming down on the cleaning down are the meals done and the good news is is that now your children will participate in that with you so when your homeschooling children are given a lot of responsibilities around the home one they now have the time to do that to take on more responsibilities and two you're going to have less time to do it so it really works out well and lastly it's good for children to learn these life skills and to be part of the team and so it really is a win-win for everybody so start giving your children some age-appropriate responsibilities right away and add to that as they you become more mature number three is prioritized right now there's a lot of overwhelm when we start homeschooling because our minds immediately want to go all the way to them being productive members of society that's the ultimate goal right we want them to be happy and we want them to live big valuable lives but our goal when we're home school is to focus on right now what your children most need a most love right now and how do we serve that how do we guide them and how do we teach them those things and we trust them that everything will fall into place if we continue that focus throughout their lives of what they need at that stage in their education number four don't recreate school at home please don't be a drill sergeant I know I was a product of the public schools and so that's all I knew and when I started the idea was we sit down we open the book we do the work however when you're homeschooling we can shift that focus because the reality is what we imagine when we think of learning is actually what it takes to manage an education for twenty to thirty different children that is they sit down at their desk and they do an organized activity and it's a very structured day because that's what's required to manage an education for that many students who are all individualized your job now is to manage an education simply for your own children there's a lot more flexibility in that and you can individualize it a lot more so I want to repeat over and over again the goal was learning the goal is learning whether that happens on the sofa around the coffee table and a picnic table via a documentary by a deep discussion in the car the goal is always learning so it doesn't matter where when or how the learning happens so much as whether it is happening so we need to free ourselves from this idea please do not make your children sit at a table for six to eight hours and structure their entire day because that is not homeschooling and nobody will enjoy that I can nearly guarantee that will not be fun nor will it be nor will it be sustainable so don't try that instead remember your goal is learning number five is that you're going to want to routine when you homeschool and this is different from a lesson plan if you're not familiar with the idea of a routine go ahead and check out this video a lot of parents will say to me but my children will listen to their teacher they go when it's time to go they sit when it's time to sit and we don't have that same discipline in our own home and I'm afraid my children won't listen to me or I'm afraid that it will be chaos all day long well guess what your children learned how to go with that flow in school they learned what to expect and they learned what was expected of them and you can have that same sort of symbiotic relationship with your children if you have a routine so go ahead and establish a routine so that everyone knows what sort of expected and approximate times and everybody can get in on the same flow okay number six is take breaks when needed so a lot of us you know that sounds great but at the same time we are resistant to taking breaks because we think that's not the way that the world works right when they have a boss I'm not going to be able to take a break whenever they want however these are children and if the goal is learning we are going to take breaks as needed and the fact the matter is is that you will have plenty of time to take breaks it will not take six to eight hours for your child to complete a day's worth of school work it just simply does not take us long when you're homeschooling so you have time for breaks and breaks we'll help you be a better teacher and help them be a better student everybody will have a better day with more breaks and that means more learning will actually happen when we're taking breaks number seven is value free time a lot of people who start homeschooling they really struggle with this idea that their children have all this free time and they simply don't know what to do with it and that's okay free time is really valuable research is clear that unstructured time for children is incredibly valuable I won't go into all of that here but this is when they will sort of find their own passions I'm find their own interests and pursue those and take the initiative to take things a little bit further in their own time and so watch what happens during your child's free time and really learn to value that not only for them but also maybe a little free time for yourself as well number eight enjoy your kids so this will be a different relationship that you will have with your kids very different from making sure they're out the door at a certain time and in the door at a certain time and that they get everything on the checklist done and then there you repeat it the next morning right so now where you are focusing much more on having a relationship with our children then meeting that sort of checklist or rat race mentality and I'm here to you that great academics and a great relationship with your children are not mutually exclusive you can have both and in fact if you focus on having a great relationship with your children the academics become that much easier and the learning becomes that much more enjoyable so make sure you enjoy your children okay those are the eight suggestions that I have for people who are new to homeschooling and considering homeschooling and I that's you I would love to hear what other questions you have go ahead and leave me a comment give me a thumbs up share subscribe I will see more of you soon I have more resources in the comments and until then I'm wishing you all the simple things but bye guys

Channel: Zara PhD

Views: 7,571

Rating: 4.7727275 out of 5

Keywords: minimalist homeschooling, minimal homeschool, simple homeschool, homeschool planning, homeschool tips, new to homeschooling

Id: OgwSot0z8jY

Length: 7min 14sec (434 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 14 2020