Since we began homeschooling at the beginning of the year, I get lots of questions come through. I thought it would be a great idea to write a blog all about 7 FAQ about our homeschool life in Australia.
For reference, I currently have a 6 year old, 4 year old and 22 month old. Our homeschool year has been incredible and we feel so fortunate for the homeschool community we have been welcomed into.
We sent our eldest daughter to kindergarten last year, and although she loved school, I felt like I was being robbed of my time with her. I felt like I barely saw her throughout the week and had very little idea of what she was learning at school. We had back and forth conversations about starting homeschool the following year and without locking ourselves in, we agreed to take it year by year.
It has truly exceeded my expectations in the best way. The reason being that I have learnt to let go and not be as regimented as I thought I needed to be.
If you are on the fence about homeschooling your child, then I encourage you to keep reading. As a homeschooling mother in Australia, I can only speak from an Australian perspective of homeschooling.
What questions I will answer in this post
- How can you sign up to homeschool in NSW?
- How do you choose a curriculum that’s right for you?
- How can you cater to different ages at once?
- What are the social opportunities you give your children?
- How do you get your partner on board about homeschooling?
- How do you respond to negative reactions from friends and family about your decision to homeschool?
- How do you find time for yourself during the week?
How can you sign up to homeschool in NSW, Australia?
The process looks similar in all states of Australia, so you just go to your state’s education website and there will be a homeschool department you can access. Here is the link to Homeschooling NSW.
Someone from the homeschool department will contact you via email and proceed to set up an interview with you regarding your reasons and preparations for homeschooling. It is best to have your curriculum ready (if you choose to follow a curriculum) and a planner outlined before this interview.
How do you choose a curriculum that is right for you?
Compared to when I was homeschooled for some of my childhood, there is a huge range of curriculums available today. Some people choose the alternative and source free lessons online, which you can do too.
If you are just starting out, I would recommend following a curriculum for ease and assurance. I love that the preparation work is done for you and you just teach the lesson.
It is best to do your research online, speak with other homeschooling parents for their advice (especially those whose values align with yours), listen to podcasts and read blogs to understand which curriculum or education philosophy to choose.
I really like Charlotte Mason based curriculums because of her education philosophy, so at this stage, we will always choose to follow a Charlotte Mason inspired curriculum.
How can you cater to different ages at once?
If you have children of various ages and you are just starting to homeschool, then my advice would be to take the pressure off yourself and experiment with the kind of routine that works for your family.
A few months ago, my youngest was really needy with me in the mornings and instead of doing a lot of our homeschooling work in the morning, we would wait until his nap time to complete the work. Now that he is more independent, we complete most of our work in the mornings and more focus time like Maths during his nap time.
With my preschooler, we don’t have any regimented work, but I cater to her interests. If she wants to practice cutting with scissors, that’s what she does. If she wants to read a book, that’s what we do together. In the preschool/foundation years, there is so much flexibility and freedom in what you do in your homeschool day.
My older daughter is in year one, so even though there is still a lot of freedom in her day, we do more regimented work in the mornings, like writing, reading and Maths. Any other work like Art, Science and History, we do in the early afternoons.
Your day will be more successful the less you stress about getting all the work done. It may take some experimenting depending on the season of life you are in, but it is worth taking the time to make it work for everyone.
What are the social opportunities you give your children?
Let’s debunk the myth that homeschooled children are socially awkward. It’s not true one bit, unless the family is socially awkward.
In Australia, there are plenty of social opportunities for homeschooled children. To start with, you can join a homeschool co-op, which is a group of like-minded homeschool families who work together to create a parent-run ‘school’.
Homeschooled children have the same amount, if not more, opportunities to play sports, meet with other homeschool families and do extra-curricular activities.
Currently we are a part of a homeschool co-op and both my girls do extra-curricular activities like dance and swimming. We also go to church weekly and meet up with other families every week. Clearly, there is ample time for socialisation!
How do you get your partner on board with homeschooling?
This is a question I get often, which means, there is often one parent (most commonly the mother), who wants to homeschool and the other (most commonly the father) who is hesitant about it.
I will share what I did with my husband, as he was hesitant at first about homeschooling.
I did some research about homeschooling in Australia: the social opportunities, available curriculums and requirements. Secondly, I presented him with a pros and cons list about homeschooling. Thirdly, I asked him to do some research on his own and see if his fears are valid or just hypothetical. I also recommended he listen to some homeschool podcasts that would help give him some more perspective.
We had various conversations before we decided to homeschool together. One thing that helped us meet in the middle was that we decided to take it year by year and not make the concrete decision that homeschooling would be the only way until our kids graduate from high school. This seemed to help.
You can follow the steps I took in giving perspective to my husband or tweak your case as you see fit. But at the end of the day, the decision has to be mutual, otherwise it won’t work.
How do you respond to negative reactions from friends and family about your decision to homeschool?
Thankfully I haven’t received many negative reactions, if any. However, I have received many curious responses, as if people think it might be odd that we homeschool and want to know more.
However, this is why I believe it is important to know your why behind your decision to homeschool. If you know your why, you will be able to give a short answer to any response, whether positive or negative.
If someone is curious to know more or negatively responds to our decision to homeschool (I find that people in the medical field like Doctors or Nurses have given me more of a negative response than any friends and family have), then I would just respond to say that we chose to homeschool to give our children more freedom to learn what they want to and to spend more time with them. If you give a response like that, then who can argue with that?
How do you find time for yourself during the week?
This is where setting up a good routine for your family makes all the difference to how I am filling up my cup.
When you have a good routine or rhythms in place, then you and your children know when it is ‘mama’s time’. For me, this is when my youngest is having a nap and my girls have some quiet time to play by themselves.
I either work on my business, rest or read a book for at least an hour and a half.
If you don’t have a solid routine in place, then by the end of the week you will be disheveled and in desperate need of some alone time.
There are of course some weeks where my kids are sick or we have a particularly busy week and I don’t get this time every day, but I try to make it a priority most weeks.
I hope you found this post helpful and you now have a little more perspective on what homeschool life could be like for you! Feel free to ask a question in the comments below.
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