I am new to HS this year, and trying to battle self-doubt, (...I know I can do this ) It would be helpful to see others who successfully HS.

I'm in IL, I have 5 children, 3 school aged -dd 6th, ds-4th, and dd-1st. I have a 2.5yo and a 4mo as well and would love hints on how to HS with little ones in tow. Worried about working that out.
DH is giving me 6 mos to prove this will work. We pulled them out of Catholic school to do this. Many, many reasons.
I have alot of books and curricula for the 1st grader and the 4th grader , their school gives the text books away at the end of the year- what a waste of $$$ - but worked out great for me, I'm set 1st-5th now. For my 6th grader I've bought a package curriculum from covenant home. I'm sure next year I'll know enough to be more selective/pick and choose for best fit.

So...here are some questions if you would so kindly reply :)


Tell me about your family:

How long have you been homeschooling?

Is your DH fully supportive?

What are some tips you would give a newbie?


Thanks mamas!

Tell me about your family:
There are 4 of us. Dh, myself, and 2 kids ages 7 & 5.
DH woh ft, I woh pt when he is at home.

How long have you been homeschooling?
Since ds was 6mo :lol: ok that was went we decided that we would hs.

Is your DH fully supportive?
YES. Thankfully. DS would not have thrived in a traditional school setting and DH can relate to some of what makes ds click and wants a better educational experience for his child that he was given.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
You are comming from such a different place that I did that I'm not sure I have any advice to give. :( Sorry.

Tell me about your family:
i am a sahm to 3 daughters (máire - 9.5, lylly - almost 4, sarah - 11 months)
i do some wah stuff thru seasonoriginals
my husband works a 9-5 job for right now but is working on getting to be at home within the next 2 years.

How long have you been homeschooling?
since birth :) but officially for 4 years. we have been unschooling for over a year now.

Is your DH fully supportive?
yes, we were both homeschooled at various times (my mom pulled out of school when i was 13 and my husband was homeschooled when it was still illegal to do so and then until he was about 12)

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
the only thing i can recommend is relaxing, homeschool burnout is a b!tch. lol

Tell me about your family:
I have two children. Max is 5 1/2 and Maizy is almost 3. My SO gets work here and there after losing his ft job 3 years ago. I go to school ft and work very pt (about 9 hours a week)

How long have you been homeschooling?
I have been been planning on hsing since the kids were born. Max does go to a very small Waldof K 2 mornings a week, he will attend a hs program one day a week starting in the first grade.

Is your DH fully supportive?
Not exactly. I think he sometimes would just be cool with taking the "easy" route, public school. He has the "it was good enough for me" syndrome. Which isn't even true since he had learning disabilities and struggled and hated school. He barely graduated from high school and b/c of his educational experience will never ever go on to higher education. But he knows I usually get what I want when it comes to things like this, mostly b/c I am the one that does all the research and educates myself on the possibilties, so he is just along for the ride.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
Well, I am a newbie myself. I will say to find a communtiy, talk to hsing families, surround yourself with the hs culture. Ask lots of questions, and don't doubt yourself.

Tell me about your family:

We have 2 boys, 7 year old and a 4 1/2 month old. We have a dog, 8 fish and 2 newts.

How long have you been homeschooling?

This is our first year of homeschooling. I have been really wanting to forever. I wanted to be homeschooled very badly growing up. And really think that hs is the best way. Now a series of events has led us to choose this path for ds.

Is your DH fully supportive?
He is somewhat supportive. To get his complete support, I know that I will have to "prove it" to him. Although he would never admit that, it is so.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?

Being a newbie myself, I don't know, but I think that standing firm with your choices, once you make them would be good. Also chilling out with the curriculum would be good for me to do. :)

Can I ask where you are in IL? I'm also in IL and I don't know another soul here who homeschools. I keep meaning to check out the support groups, but I haven't yet.

Tell me about your family:
I'm a married SAHM. We have three girls, Sydney-6, Emily-6 and Bella-4 months. We have a couple of critters running around here too named Willow (dog) and Sage (cat).

How long have you been homeschooling?
This is our first year.

Is your DH fully supportive?
Yes....of homeschooling. I lean more toward unschooling, though, and he's not quite getting that yet. He keeps asking Sydney (DD) if she "had school today". :rolleyes: I have to keep telling him, "We have school everyday!".
To him homeschooling is sitting down and doing lessons from a workbook or something.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
I'm a newbie too, but I've already learned that I have to be flexible. We technically started last Monday with unit studies.....HA....they didn't go over well with DD. It was a continuous argument all day. Tuesday I switched to a more relaxed unschooling approach, and it worked wonderfully! I just feel that flexibility is important to make sure you and your children are happy and learning.

I'll PM you!

Tell me about your family:
I am a sahm mom of 4; 12 yo ds, 9 yo dd, 5 yo ds, and 2 yo ds. My dh works ft about 2 minutes from home.

How long have you been homeschooling?
Well I have always thought about homeschooling. Just wasn't sure I would succeed. Due to long story made short this is our first official start with dd who will be starting 4th grade and ds who will be doing kindergarten. (Oldest ds who will be going into 6th will still be in private school where we attend church.) Also, I guess some will not consider us truely homeschooling due to the fact we will be using an online public charter school. Although we did get to choose the curriculum that best supported each child and we will be suplimenting w/other lessons/plans ourselves. But for our first year I kinda need to see what I am doing if that makes sense. Kinda be guided and then probably go to the more traditional hs approach.

Is your DH fully supportive?
Yes :couple:

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
I am right there in the newbie boat with you lol. Maybe just try to relax, find support, post questions here (the mamas are great and offer lots of advice ;) ), and enjoy teaching/learning with your child :)

[QUOTE]Tell me about your family:
I'm a SAHM. Ethan is 5, Noah is 9 1/2 months.

How long have you been homeschooling?
Ethan was pretty little when I began to realize that our path was most likely going to be as a homeschooling family. This will be our first "official" year though.

Is your DH fully supportive?
Yes ... he agrees that right now, homeschooling will best meet E's needs. We've both agreed to be open to other possibilities as our family's needs and our children's individual needs evolve.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
As mentioned above, I'm pretty new to this too, but I'd echo the other replies that suggest relaxing. It's so easy to get so overwhelmed with all the philosophies and all the curriculae. There have been times that I've been on total information overload! My personal motto will be to approach this as a journey, not a destination. I'm hoping that will help me keep some perspective :)

i am jen, a sahm to tucker, who will be four in september, and griffin, who will be two in september :heart:
i actually started using an official "curriculum" with tucker in may, when he began to read and write (on his own). since he has a late b-day, he wouldn't be eligible for ps for two more years, and i really felt that we needed to get something started with him. he is eating it up, and is now halfway through sonlight's pre-k curriculum.
my dh is very supportive. we had discussed hs'ing from the time i found out i was pg with my first ;). i think he is shocked at how much tucker has learned in the past 18 weeks. when he hears him read or talk about something we did/read/learned that day, he always thanks me for hs'ing.
tips? don't purchase a curriculum until you are certain it's a good fit for you and the kids. ;) relax. enjoy it. have fun.

Tell me about your family:

We're a family of 4 living in sunny So Cal. DH works within walking distance of our home, and I am a SAHM. We have 2 boys who are 14 months apart in age. We also have a dog.

How long have you been homeschooling?

I believe that learning happens all of the time, and made the decision to homeschool nearly 5 years ago. However, last year was our first year of using a curriculum. We also leave plenty of time for unschooling in our days.

Is your DH fully supportive?

I would say that he is, although I don't think he would really mind if I changed my mind and wanted them to go to school. But he never makes comments about sending them to school or doubts my ability to homeschool them.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?

I would say to trust your instincts about what style of homeschooling works for you, and to not spend too much money at the outset. I was interested in Waldorf-inspired/holistic learning, but allowed myself to get pulled into using The Well Trained Mind as a resource, as so many people online were raving about it. We all burned out within 2 months and then I had to scramble to find a program that would work for the rest of the year. We used an older version of Oak Meadow kindergarten, and now will be going with Enki. I feel confident spending the money on Enki this year because I researched it thoroughly and believe it is a good fit for our family.

Kimberly

Tell me about your family:

How long have you been homeschooling?
Formally since 1992, when our oldest reached K age. The oldest 6 have always been hs'd, the youngest starts preK this year. Our eldest is a senior in HS this year, and last year he decided to take advantage of a free-tuition-to-local-college program, so I only homeschool him history and lit. He made the transition to college seamlessly, and has done well there, ie, he gets in major trouble here when he gets a "B".

Is your DH fully supportive?
Supportive, yes, but involved, not particularly.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
You asked about little ones. My biggest tip for that is not to expect to look like a school. I do a LOT of teaching sitting on the floor, so that my littles feel that I'm still with them. The schoolchildren can come and find me with questions.

Stay flexible. You *will* change some curriculum.

There is no perfect curriculum, don't waste time trying to find it. There is not even a perfect curriculum for your family. Start with what you have . . . you will learn in the first few months alot about how each of your dc learn, where their weaknesses lie, how they need to be approached. You will also learn that you can't STAND to teach in certain ways. Once you find out more about your family's learning needs, you can find curricula that meets your needs, not someone else's.

Even then, needs may shift from year to year.

Don't be nervous . . . has one of your dc ever had a teacher you don't like for a year? You may have said, "I just can't stand Ms. X, what a waste of a year". When I started hs'ing, I asked myself, "what's the worst thing that can happen in just one year? It'd be just like getting a bad teacher in ps, and one year of that doesn't ruin anyone's education for life".

PS . . . wonder what your DH means - 6 months to prove it will work? What does "working" mean exactly? I think I'd want mine to write down what he felt "working" would look like, how he'd evaluate that.

Tell me about your family: Dh and I and Hannah 6.5, Tyler 4, and Logan 14m

How long have you been homeschooling? Since Christmas Break January 2005

Is your DH fully supportive? 100%..he was pretty insistant about hsing!

What are some tips you would give a newbie? OMG...none right now but I may have some when I feel better!

Tell me about your family: It's me, DH, Justin, age 4 1/2, and Rebecca, age 27 months.

How long have you been homeschooling? Well, we decided to homeschool when Justin was an infant.

Is your DH fully supportive? Absolutely.

What are some tips you would give a newbie? I don't know, I guess I'm still a "newbie" LOL

Tell me about your family:

DH, Me the two kiddos ages 7 and 4 and Oscar the Pug.

How long have you been homeschooling?

Since birth :) We have always known that homeschooling was the right thing for our family.

Is your DH fully supportive?
Absolutely.

What are some tips you would give a newbie? Ask questions! Sometimes I feel like a fool for asking so many questions, but now I am thankful I did. Also if you could find a support group IRL, that can be helpful as well.

Tell me about your family:
We're a family of four with two daughters, ages 4 and 6 months.

How long have you been homeschooling?
Officially since April. LOL We've thought we would homeschool since I was pregnant with my oldest.

Is your DH fully supportive?
He is 250% supportive. I think he'd be very disappointed if I decided I wanted to put the girls into school. (so he'd better treat me special, ha ha j/k)

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
I am not sure I am eligible to be giving out advice. :) But if you wanna listen to me, I'd say to remember that you can get so much more done at home in less time so try not to over-schedule. Ask questions, find a homeschool group, relax and realize that you as a parent know your children the best. :)

With kindergarten coming up in a year for my daughter, all my friends are just buzzing about it right now. I keep having to talk myself up into knowing I CAN do this! I think doubt is part of homeschooling unfortunately, but know that it will get better once I have some experience.

Tell me about your family: I am a SAHM to dd 9, dd7, ds 6 and dd 2 1/2. DH is a manager for Family Christian Stores

How long have you been homeschooling? We have never given thought to sending our kids to school. We decided when dd#1 was a couple of years old.

Is your DH fully supportive? Absolutely

What are some tips you would give a newbie? Try to relax and be calm. You will soon enough learn that when kids are not in a large classroom setting, they will want to learn and be able to easier and quicker. Listen to your children. Learn what they like and dislike. Learn how they prefer to learn and then run with it. They can learn their fractions by baking with you in the kitchen. When we cook, I will give my kids the 1/8th cup instead of a full cup. They have to figure out how many 1/8 th cups are in one cup. Teach them inches by challenging them to clean the most inches of baseboards in the house. They clean then measure with a ruler and then add it all up. They learn to measure and add, you get clean baseboards. LOL Let them learn how to tell time by using a stopwatch to measure how long it takes them to do a certain chore, or how long it takes to get ready in the morning. The possibilities are endless. Teaching your children should be a reward to both them and you.

Wow... thankyou all!!
Anji I am ROTFLMBO...my kids would totally LOVE to do the "measuring" lesson and would not even realize they were cleaning! :hahaha:

Thanks for all the tips! I was so impressed by The Well Trained Mind, ummm... I think I'll relax a little bit on that one.
My DH wants them tested (??) after 6 mos. :rolleyes: I asked him why he wasn't so overprotective over their learning when a stranger was letting DS fall further and further behind. I'm their mother I feel I am the only one with a vested interest in their entire future. Not just 178 days out of the year. ;)

After posting this...I finally had the HS talk with my Mom (we've both been avoiding the subject- she's a public school teacher) and she said "Why not? You're one of the smartest people I know...if anyone can do it, you can!"
Stunned silence. I think I can, I think I can, I know I can!

Thank you all! :heart:

Tell me about your family:
one mom, one dad, one kid
I'm a SAHM, my husband is a WAHD, and our son is 5.5 years old.

How long have you been homeschooling?
5.5 years. :)

Is your DH fully supportive?
Yes, we decided jointly when Sam was around 2 that we would homeschool all the way through. We are all equally enthusiastic.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
Don't get too caught up in all the options for boxed curricula. You can start out with nothing more than a library card and do a great job. We are fairly relaxed and definitely follow a child-led approach to learning. I don't buy boxed curricula and we do/buy things based on Sam's current and evolving interests.

You can do this! It's incredibly fun.

Tara

Don't get too caught up in all the options for boxed curricula. You can start out with nothing more than a library card and do a great job.

Tara

Tara...thankyou for that, dh is expecting worksheets, p-encil pushing, etc. I look around our community and see learning possibilities everywhere. The more I relax, the more I see this. I'm a bit uptight, worried about failing. I am going to take everyone's advice and work on the word r-e-l-a-x. ;)

Tell me about your family: Erik is 3 1/2 (4 in November), Anders is a busy 16 months :)

How long have you been homeschooling? We started with Sonlight PreK in February, finished it in 4 months, repeated it in 2 more months, and are currently awaiting our box with Sonlight K. We LOVE Sonlight, it has been such a good fit for my family. When my box came with the PreK, it had a catalog (I had ordered online), and I almost cried reading through it, it was just what I was picturing in my head for our homeschool, and didn't really know it existed.

Is your DH fully supportive? Yes, he is coming around. He's fully supportive of me homeschooling now, but he doesn't completely count out school in a few years. I can't see it fitting Erik at all, though, so I hope we'll be on the same page by then! Erik could start K in 2006 at almost-5, but I can't see doing that at all.

What are some tips you would give a newbie? Do your research, then trust yourself, because you know your family and what will work for you.


Your mom's reaction is beautiful. I'm so glad you'll have her support, it really helps!

I'm new to hsing too and will be starting with my 6 yr old in 1st grade this year after he attended part time K last year in public school.
I also have an almost 4 yr old I'm doing some preschool with and a 9 mos old to keep things interesting! ;)

My DH has not been on board until recently when we sat down and had a long talk about DS's best interest and learning at his own pace to instill a positive feeling about learning vs one of resentment. Dh is still leary since this is all new to him but he's willing to give it a go which is all I wanted. I know he will be happy in the long run.

What I've learned after just starting this journey last year is to find a local support group (on-line ones are great too!) and read all you can!
Good luck
Ann

Tell me about your family:
I stay at home with our 5 yo ds. Dh is a freelance video guy and is able to a lot of his editing work from home so we are together a good portion of the time. :)

How long have you been homeschooling?
"Officially" we are just starting, but I have been planning on hs'ing since ds was a baby and he has been learning ever since.

Is your DH fully supportive?
Absolutely! He is my biggest supporter. I lean more towards an unschooling/relaxed approach, but dh does not! So we are compromising and doing some more structured things for phonics and math, and learning science and history in more interesting ways than textbooks ~ I like the living books idea for those.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
Not much real experience here yet, but my advice is to keep things simple. Find out what your kids are interested in and go with it. You can make up whole unit studies on what your child shows interest in and they will learn so much beacuse it is something they are excited about.

Good luck!!

Tell me about your family:

I'm Kelly, we live in Sothern Cali. I have Bryce 9, 4rd grade and Blake, 6 1st grade. Marlie is 3.5

How long have you been homeschooling?
We started homeschooling when Bryce was in K, so this will be my 5th year.

Is your DH fully supportive?
He's 110% supportive. He hasn't ruled out traditional school for them in high school though..But I'm amiable to that.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?

Relax, relax, oh and relax. And don't overschedule. Make it fun. Trust yourself to make good choices and feel free to toss things out if they don't work.

Tell me about your family:We homeschool through a charter school, I pick the curriculum, they pay for it...I meet with a teacher to review what we've done for the month at the end of each month, she (and the school) are VERY supportive of EVERY learning/teaching style, waldorf, Charlotte Mason, Unschooling, Classical, Ecclectic..you name it.

My son is 6, starting first grade this year, (we will be doing 1st in some subjects, 2nd in others)...my daughter is 4, and we are doing K with her just because she is beyond 'pre-k' stuff and wants more. She is *not* enrolled in school though, because of her age.

How long have you been homeschooling? For 6 years? LOL..."officially" this will be our 2nd year.

Is your DH fully supportive? Yes! He was apprehensive at first, but overall was supportive, now he is completely on board with me...he even has good things to say when others are asking about HSing...especially those considering it!!

What are some tips you would give a newbie? the first year for me (and I've been told by others they had the same experience) is more of a 'getting situated' year...we were successful, they learned much that first year, but it took trial and error to find what was 'right' for us...
Don't take yourself too seriously...or it becomes more of a 'chore' than an 'experience'...don't be afraid to take a day to step back and relax.
Let your children guide you...they know what they are able to absorb...if it's a TON sometimes and just a bit others, work with them, not against them!

HAVE FUN :D

Tell me about your family: There are 5 of us.
WE have two boys and a girl.
Justin is 7 Nick is 4 Savannah will be two in November.

How long have you been homeschooling? 3 years. We have planned to homeschool since justin was a baby.

Is your DH fully supportive? Absolutly. He would be upset if I decided to stick the kids in school.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
Read lots of catalogs. PLan ahead. Dont worry. It will fall together.
Join a homeschool group and go to the activities.

Tell me about your family:Me, DH and two kids. Ryan is 7 and alyssa 16mo (almost)

How long have you been homeschooling? This will be our first year!!!

Is your DH fully supportive? Well hes getting there ;)

What are some tips you would give a newbie? well being a newbie myself i really dont have much advice to give but the one thing i would say is dont over do it. I have already found this out. Just go with the flow and things will fall into place.

Tell me about your family:

I am a sahm with 2 children that are currently homeschooling. They are ages soon to be 11 and soon to be 8. Neither one has ever set foot in a public school. Dh works for the County and I volunteer in the community about 70 hrs per month.

How long have you been homeschooling?

We have been unschooling since day one from Pre-5th this yr.

Is your DH fully supportive?

At first he wasn't and was dead set against homeschooling mostly because he had a fear of what other people would think and most of his family members are Teachers and Professors. After seeing the results of their assesment tests yr after yr he now says they will not go to School as long as he can help it. They are both well above grade average even though we have no particular method, schedule or style of learning. We just do what comes naturally for our family and what works best for us.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?

Don't stress to much over whether or not they are learning enough. It is amazing how much they learn with or without books.

Have fun!!

Enjoy your time with your kids!!

Follow their lead in the subjects they are interested in.

Tell me about your family:
I am a SAHM to 6 children age almost 10 and under. dh works for a bank. 3 of my children will be schooled this year. they have done some public school.

How long have you been homeschooling?
this is our 2nd year.

Is your DH fully supportive?
totally-he saw how bad the public school was

What are some tips you would give a newbie
don't try to do public school at home. get rid of schedules. have fun. if you try to schedule every day and make it too much, you will burn out. kids dont' have to learn by sitting at a table all day.

Tell me about your family:

there are 3 of us (SO, me & DD who's almost 5) and several pets
SO works full time for the cable company but controls his own schedule so we have lots of free time to do family stuff when ever we want. I sponsor a local chapter of API and used to work as a private tutor for kids up to soph. year in high school and do private tutoring for ACT exams.

How long have you been homeschooling?

we technically aren't homeschooling yet as in WI we don't file paperwork until the kid is 6yrs old. We have ben unofficially homeschooling for 3 years, although we knew before DD was born that we would be a homeschooling family

Is your DH fully supportive?

SO goes back and forth. He worries about me getting burned out being with DD all the time, sometimes feels that if she went to school she would be happier and have more friends. But he also has a lot of problems with the public school system. He disagrees with basic ideas like homework. He says, "lets try just for this year and reevaluate next year". I know him well enough to know that next year he will say the same thing. I don't think it's a bad idea to reevaulate every year but I also don't think that DD will be ready or want to go to school until she's in Jr. High and then it will be a break more than an education experience.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?

Not sure since we follow a different schooling path than most. We are unschoolers and don't do curricula or lesson plans. I would say to relax, don't fall into the trap of schooling at home. make sure to get out and see the learning experiences in daily life too. Also find a local homeschool group. it's great to hang out with other homeschoolers where you know that they won't start up with the negitive opinions about homeschooling.

Chole

I'm here! I'm a sahm, to Ethan, 6 yo, and Bella, 1 1/2 yo. Dh works about an hour away, but goes in early and is off at 3, so we have a lot of family time in the evening. E will be doing first grade type work this year. He reads, and has pretty solid math skills, it'll be interesting to see how fast we go through materials.

I started doing some preschool workbooks with E the summer he was 4, and he was so bored. I was pg with B, it was hot, and he just wasn't ready to do practice writing and things like that, so I dropped it. Last year we did a couple of kindy workbooks daily, plus a castle unit that we made up as we went along. It went really well, and proved that we can do it.

Dh is pretty supportive, as long as E is learning something and not just sitting around watching TV or playing games on the computer (although the educational games are okay with him). The local schools suck, and we got that from our neighbor, who taught there, so that helped dh with the decision to keep E home.

I'd tell a newbie to take it easy, and be flexible. If something doesn't work, drop it and try something else. If your kids get hooked on something but you have something else planned, scrap your lesson plan and go with what's happening, you can always get back to your lesson later.

This is going to be our second year homeschooling.

We have decided to let our boys (ages 13 & 9) go back to ps, I wasn't cut out to hs them... they missed their friends, and I missed my sanity.

DD1 (7) is being hs'ed this year, she is doing Abeka 2/kits
DD2 (2½) is going to also do Abeka, nursery books

Tell me about your family:Me, DH, DD (10), DS (3), DD (1)

How long have you been homeschooling? This will be our first year through the Charter School.

Is your DH fully supportive? Yep.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
Not sure, but I hear relax is good! ;)

Tell me about your family:

We have a dd who is almost 7; twin boys who are almost 4; a ds who is 8 mos.; a dog; and a cat. We live in Ohio. I'm a sahm and my dh drives truck cross country for my father.

How long have you been homeschooling?

This will be our second year. We started with a charter school last year; and while it was good, it's not what I want to do. I really want to do unit studies and am considering switching to konos at some point this year.

Is your DH fully supportive?

He is not yet fully supportive. He's still questioning whether I can do it and get everything else done as well. He has definitely improved because of the progress dd made this past year.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?

I still consider myself a newbie!!! So I guess I don't really have any tips, yet.

Tell me about your family:

dh and myself, we have been married 15 years, three boys G-almost 6, E- 3 1/2 and J-almost 2

How long have you been homeschooling? we did k part time last year and are doing K full time this year

Is your DH fully supportive? yes

What are some tips you would give a newbie? well I am a newbie and I am just trying to take it one day/week at a time.

Tell me about your family:

I'm Nama. My hubby is Mike. Our kids are Jahnu (age 8), Chakra (age 7), Vikram (age 5), Tarani (age 3) and Karika (newbie). Mike owns his own freelance computer software company and I'm a birthing coach.

How long have you been homeschooling?

I started schooling my kids at home when Jahnu was 2. Once they turned five, they would go to a private school that has now closed. I started homeschooling them full time this year.

Is your DH fully supportive?

Oh yeah! He teaches too!

What are some tips you would give a newbie?

I'll second the "toss the schedule" comment. Relax ;-) Always make sure you give lots and lots of positive reinforcement. Make sure you get out of the house every now and then too.

--NB

Tell me about your family:
We have 5 children - ages 6, (almost)5, 3 and 18 month old twins.
Melissa (6) will be 1st grade, Michael (5 in Sept) will be K.

How long have you been homeschooling?
This is our 2nd year but the first one where we have actually registered. Last year we did K unofficially.

Is your DH fully supportive?
Supportive - yes. He wants me to homeschool. I am the one who is wondering if it's going to work or not! I've promised to at least try it this year. :)

Is he actually helpful with the actual homeschooling - no.

What are some tips you would give a newbie?
umm - I don't think I'm in a position to give tips yet! We try and do school during naptime. It's getting harder as the babies are napping less and less!