One of the amazing benefits of homeschooling is that learning can happen anytime, anywhere. There is nothing saying that you can't homeschool your child on weekends, or after supper. Breaking down this typical thought about what school needs to be allows much more awareness of how much time you need to homeschool. First off I figured out how much time my child would spend learning at a typical school in our area. I worked it out that they have 182 school days in a year. Each day they have 5 hours of time that they are with their class (not including lunch and recess). Since homeschooling can be done year-round I figured I will school at least 360 days a year. Since there is nothing saying a child can't read on Christmas or journal on their birthday I will probably "school" 365 days a year. But anyway, I worked out that typical school hours equal 910 hours a year. Using my 360 days my child would only need to spend 2.5 hours a day learning. The next point is that the 910 hours a year for a typical school includes everything a child does in the school other than lunch and recess. This means it includes things like gym, library, computers, art, sports days, assemblies,transition times, etc. When I broke the 5 hours a day down it really only equals about 3 hours of actual learning time. This means for my child they only need to spend 1.5 hours a day learning to equal a typical school year. The next thing we have to be aware of is what learning truly is. Students in schools learn from things such as silent reading. This is included in the 3 hours of learning a day. For my child they only need 1.5 hours a day which could easily equal 30 minutes of silent reading, 20 minutes writing in a journal, 30 minutes learning about a history event, and 10 minutes of looking at a map. Add in an hour at the park and 30 minutes doing art and we are OVER the 2.5 hours a day to reach the 5 hours of "in class" time that a child attending a traditional school has. Homeschooling has many approaches that I will probably get into later but for now I just wanted to show how easy it is to fit a homeschooling "schedule" in while working full-time. It doesn't take much "learning" time to end up being the same as a child that attends a traditional school. Some parents might argue that their children are learning outside of school too and that's valid but that doesn't mean homeschooling kids aren't learning the same amount of hours as a child attending traditional school just because they are learning at home. In the video below I explain further some of my homeschooling plans.
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About Me
I am 31, single, and been on my journey to becoming a single mother since 2013. I have struggled with infertility and I am now on the path to international adoption of a little girl with Down syndrome. Come join me on my journey to becoming a mother! Categories
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