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These are show notes for the Home School Support Network podcast episode number 4.

How To Homeschool Basics “Basic Training”

• Need to create a foundation before (successful) homeschooling can begin.
• Need to frequently reevaluate/retrain these

We referred to some great material from Todd Wilson from Family Man Ministries and also referred to an HSLDA Home School Court Report article from the Sep/Oct issued by Michael Farris titled 10 Lessons I Learned from 30 Years of Home Schooling.

Keep your expectations in check
HSLDA Article point #4 from Michael Farris

• Learn your husband’s non-negotiable for house cleanliness
• How long do you expect them to sit while receiving instruction/teaching? still vs fidget?
• What will school look like? Do you think mom needs to be standing at an easel or everyone around a table, etc.

HSDLA Article Point #5 Strive for mastery in just two areas (i.e., language and math)

Husbands Need to Help

• Farris talks about this in the article point #7. Protect your wife from over commitment
  –  give your wife permission to throw you under the bus when people ask for help. (i.e. Wife can say, “I’ll have to check with my husband)
  – Don’t be quilted into putting ministry support in front of the needs of your family.
• Make sure your wife gets a break. Mom is also a wife and has friends. Refer to http://daddylife.net/session7 title Mommy is a Wife.
• Dads need to off-load homeschooling academics and/or household upkeep. Do it yourself or hire a house keeper or tutor if you can afford it.
• Husbands need to learn wife’s hot button issues and take care of those first.
• From http://DaddyLife.net/firstthings“I will paraphrase what our good friend Gary Ezzo says in the Preparation for Parentingseries, “You will only be as good of a parent as you are a spouse.”  Dads cannot forget how important their commitment is to the marriage relationship. Mr. Ezzo says in the Fathers Mandate from Chapter 4 of Growing Kids God’s Way by Gary and Anne Marie Ezzo, “If you really love your children, if you really love your children then give them the gift of confidence and security. Show them how much you love their mom.”  Parents need to teach their kids what healthy relationships look like and there is no better place to begin than by demonstrating an unconditional love for each other.”There are many ways to demonstrate love towards your wife.  You can certainly tell your wife that you love her, but little kids in particular tend to understand better by seeing than by hearing. So husbands should not wait until the kids are in bed to demonstrate your love toward their wife. Check of DaddyLife.net/session13 for more specific tips for dads in this area.

From the article point #6 we are reminded that Moms need to remember that your marriage is more important than your curriculum

 

• Mom needs some energy left at the end of the day. Review the time and energy it takes to implement your curriculum.

How well do your children Submit to your authority?

First Time Obedience- Immediately, completely, without challenge or complaint

• An example of us obeying God. We are His representatives. Why is the important in homeschooling specifically?
• Not all learning will be “fun” or “easy”-cant spend hours fighting to get things done or you will burn out and put your kid into school

Self Control Training

Purpose: (1) Self control is a base virtue, (2) Helps a child sit, focus, and concentrate longer.

Howto: Practice self control by what we call “sit time” as learned in our parent training. The child sits for a few minutes. (Practicing what you would love to have them do in a bank or doctor’s office) Start with as many minutes as your child can handle and work up from there by increasing the length of time they sit each day to practice.

Training children to do chores

Why: Time with mom learning to do things that will eventually free mom up to do other things. It trains responsibility and they invest into the family and acquire a sense of ownership of the family unit.

How: Have them work along side you until they show enough understanding to be allowed to do the task on their own. Then use a timer to help them stay on task. What Every Child Should Know Along the Way will help parents understand what chores are appropriate for a particular age of child. The book is available in the GFI.org Store.

Structure and routine

All of the above is much more likely to be accomplished if you have established structure and routine.

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We are going to touch on two areas.

• The Myths about Home School
• Reasons commonly given for NOT homeschooling

Myths about Homeschooling?

1. Socialization – The more traditional meaning is that kids need to mingle and learn with other kids so that they are better prepared to go out into the world. Who will do a better job? Your kids along with a group of their peers who are just as inexperienced as your kids? Do your kid’s teachers have time to train in how to deal with the world?

Per Dictionary.com:
so·cial·i·za·tion
[soh-shuh-luh-zey-shuhn] Show IPA
noun
1. a continuing process whereby an individual acquires a personal identity and learns the norms, values, behavior,and social skills appropriate to his or her social position.

The question that all parents should be asking is, “Whose values and behavior standards are they using?”

2. No Degree or parents thinking they are not smart enough or trained well enough

   • degree taught Sherry classroom management & exposed her to resources/books more than anything. Utopia!

3. Costly – We consider this one to be a myth because cost is relative. If you are homeschooling in place of a $4,000 per year private school then home schooling is not costly. There are other factors that com into play depending on what curriculum(s) you choose and how often you switch. You can also increase home school if you get involved in co-ops that charge a fee to participate or if you frequently take expensive field trips.

Why NOT home school?

We want to acknowledge that some people simply could not home school there children even if they wanted to because of circumstances out of their control.

Single Parents
Financial Situations
An unsupportive spouse

Even with that said don’t give up if you believe God is calling you to homeschool. He will not give you a task that He is not willing to equip you to accomplish.

Can sacrifices be made?

Our past financial mistakes here with NOT adjusting lifestyle. Don’t forget the cost of daycare and children’s programs that you will be saving money on by having mom at home.

Creative scheduling? If you can’t do without Mom’s extra income for now then how about alternate or flex schedules. Don forget that homeschool is not required to be an exact replica of a public school classroom. You can school on the weekends or in the evenings for a season.

Curriculum choices can be as hands on OR as hands off as you desire. We will get to this in future episodes, but your choice of curriculum can aid you in dealing with scheduling issues because many programs are self paced and require less supervision.