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Homeschooling as a family business
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My husband and I have been wanting to have him stay home and work on the farm (we don’t have a farm yet, but it’s in the near future), and also be a big part of our girls’ education. We have six girls, ages 1-9. We also have been wondering for years how we can actually do something about the problem of Christians sending their kids to public schools. We go to a Calvary Chapel in Idaho, and many of our friends there want to homeschool, but they just don’t for one reason or another.
So we got to brainstorming and thought of the idea of homeschooling other people’s kids. I guess it would basically be a one-room schoolhouse type of thing, with all the ages learning alongside each other.
We wouldn’t want to change the family dynamic and real life of homeschooling – we would not want to just make it a little classroom. They would learn real life skills associated with home and farm life. My husband would be a huge part of this also. He would take them outside and teach them various things each day.
We are hoping to maybe get started next fall in 2015. We still have a lot of praying and researching to do, but I am wondering if any of you have any experience or information/advice? I’m looking for some kind of trail to follow. I don’t even know what to google. LOL.
I appreciate all the kind and helpful words I always find on this forum. Thank you!
Micheala
Michaela – too bad we’re not closer – we have FIVE girls – between your family and mine we could have a pretty sizeable all girl school. LOL! Don’t have any advice, except that my hubby thinks there’s a big market for co-op style paid classes for homeschoolers. We have one in our area that is not what you are describing, but it is an income earning business for a friend of ours and it grows signifcantly every year. Google Omaha Homeschool Learning Center.
Thanks! That’s a great idea about paid co-op style classes for homeschoolers. Will add that to the list of things to consider.
It would be so fun if we lived close enough to hang out with all of our girls!
I suppose one of the first things I’d wonder about is what happens when you, your husband, or one (or more) of you daughters gets sick, or requires unusual needs to be met. When it’s only your family, you can handle things differently than when you have other families’ children involved. The only reason I’m bringing this up is that our co-op has had to handle this situation over the last couple of months. There are three teachers in our co-op. I teach the 10-15 yo students. The other two teach the under 10 yo children. My class is two hours. The other teachers each teach for an hour.
One of them had to deal with family illnesses most of the fall semester and part of this one. My husband and I were in an auto accident mid-November. We are both still going to frequent PT because of it. We’ve had a mom wililng to substitute for the other mom, but no one took my place. We didn’t have scheduled classes in December which helped. Because the other mom had to cancel one of the January days, I cancelled and was able to send out assignments via e-mail. A few weeks later, we are now going to recycle that lesson tomorrow as none of the families completed it without me teaching it in person. That saved me some time/work, but I’ve felt bad about having to be off so much due to these unforseen circumstances.
I’d seriously consider how to structure a back up plan for the out of the ordinary times. We have huge gardens and many animals to feed/milk, etc. This all takes an enormous amount of time on top of homeschooling our children. Co-op adds and adventurous element into the mix, but it includes quite a bit of stress when I can’t follow through on all that I planned to do.
It can work well. But, I wouldn’t want you to be caught off guard by this situation if you haven’t considered it, yet. If you are considering teaching core subjects (with, or without the extras) please consider teaching the parents along the way, too. That way they can keep up with lessons when necessary. If they don’t pick up the slack in this unplanned type situation, you need to have some sort of agreement in place as to how it will be handled.
I think it’s doable, it just needs careful planning ahead of time.
We had wondered about what we might do in that type of sistuation. I really appreciate your thoughts! It gives me something more concrete to think about. Thank you 🙂
And give yourself time to get your legs under you on the farm. (Did I understand you aren’t farming yet? I may be assuming wrongly that you’ve never done it.) Farming requires a HUGE learning curve. I tell people that when we got our first Jersey milk cow, Lynette, the biggest animal I had been around was a German Shepherd. 🙂 I felt my brain was in constant overdrive for two years. But we had NO (ZILCH, NADA) experience which may not be the case for your family.
And you’re in Idaho? Sigh… Still considering it but way back on the burner.
Blessings on your venture. You will be a huge blessing in your community. (Now if you could just start a living books library as part of your little school…) 😉 Sorry, I promote that shamelessly.
I would love to have a living books library!
We have never farmed, but my husbands parents have had sheep, chickens, and pigs and we are going to buy some land with them. My father-in-law is almost retired and they have the same desire we do: to be as self-sufficient as we can be by growing our own food and raising our own meat. Our goal is to make enough money somehow at home so that my husband could stay home and help with the farming the homeschooling. It sounds like we might need a couple of years to get oriented first, though. 🙂
What a neat idea! I don’t have much to add, just that I would check out the legalities of homeschooling other kids in your state. If it’s just co-op classes there’s probably not much to be concerned about, but if you’re taking over responsibility for the full education of another person’s child I’d check w/HSLDA.
Also, I don’t know if you’re looking for healthcare, but we’ve been impressed with: http://samaritanministries.org/. It’s only about $370 per month for our family. You do have to pay for Dr.’s appt.’s on your own, but any expense over $300 is covered.
Best wishes, sounds exciting!!!
If I were to do it, I would first check into the legalities as far as the state regs – in our state there are requirements for certain subjects being taught for a certain number of hours in our home by the parent, although it allows me to have lots of variety in the other required hours.
If you are planning to charge for this and make money off it, you need to see if there are other state laws that require you to be registered as a type of school, any building requirements (safety doors, good access like sidewalks, etc) and check to see about the insurance requirements and costs, etc. The red tape of this will have to be dealt with first, and the reality is that you might not be able to afford it right away. I know that you are invisioning a small co-op thing, but if you are using it as a business, the government will want to stick their noses in it.
I would also prepare to have a serious learning curve for something like this if it were not a skill that I already had mastered. I agree with Robin that often takes a solid chunk of time.
If you can handle those things, then go for it. It sounds delightful. =)
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