10 Homeschooling Tips for New Homeschool Moms: don’t miss these!
So, you’ve decided to homeschool! Or maybe you are considering it and becoming more and more convinced by the day. Congrats, you’re about to join a world filled with learning, adventure, and… some pretty rad homeschool mom friends -if I do say so myself. If you’ve been a mother for more than 2 seconds, you know that every day is not picture-perfect. Not every day of your homeschool will be your kids reading Frog and Toad under a tree with zero sibling rivalries (though that can happen).
In this blog post, I will give you 10 homeschooling tips to start creating a good and meaningful life of learning with your kids.
1. Start Slow – You’re Not Recreating School at Home
Go ahead and get the idea out of your head right now that learning happens from 8:00- 2:55 Monday- Friday and replace it with this phrase: life is learning.
homeschooling isn’t just public school in your living room or your dining room table. You don’t need to complete six hours of rigid lessons with 20-minute recesses. Start slow. Try out different activities, see what works for your kids, and take time to find your groove. Think less “teacher standing at a chalkboard” and more “let’s learn fractions while making cookies.” (Yes, cookies count as math.)
“Measuring flour? Fractions. Timing the bake? Science. Sneaking a taste? Life skills.”
check out my youtube channel
here’s a video I created on this topic where I expanded a little bit more on the 4 tips I think are most crucial!
2. Don’t create routines, lean into RHYTHMS.
Routines have a connotation of being rigid, inflexible, and demanding. Rhythms move with the beat of our lives and seasons. Rhythms can change from day to day, moment to moment. Up beats and down beats. Flexibility is your BFF as a homeschooler. Flexibility is one of the main reasons our family has chosen a homeschool life.
For instance, when our 4th baby, Pepper, was born, our rhythm slowed way down. My children were able to see their baby sister be born in our bedroom, they saw their father care for their mama as she healed postpartum, they learned how to care for a newborn baby, learned what foods nourish a new mother, we lived in those sacred sweet days of newborn bliss together as a family.
Rhythms are our superpower.
What rhythms could you embrace that align with your current season of life?
3. Fill up your cup.
Once we realize that self-care isn’t face masques and pedicures, the second part of our life begins. Skincare and clean toes are not filling our cups, they are just taking care of our basic needs. (some seasons this is all we can do, and that’s ok too!)
We can better pour into our children’s education when we invest in ourselves in every area of our lives.
Losing yourself in motherhood and homeschooling don’t go well together.
Here is what filling my cup looks like for me during this season. I hope it encourages you to find the things that fill up your own cup.
MIND : I’m always learning something new, be it a new recipe, a new skill, or a new idea. Reading even just a couple of pages of a book every day. Here’s a personal developement podcast I’m loving right now!
PHYSICAL: donating all the clothes that I don’t wear or don’t fit, discovering my personal style so it feels fun and exciting to get dressed every day, wearing Flutterhabit eyelashes so I feel more put together, investing in good quality haircare so I feel confident.
COMMUNITY: socialize the homeschool mom. going to conferences like the Wild + Free conference, hang out with other moms, girl’s night out, inviting a friend out for coffee, having neighbors over for dinner, date nights, doing things without my kids sometimes -I don’t know who needed this permission slip but HERE IT IS. Our community will become our children’s community and our friend-making skills will become our children’s friend-making skills.
PERSONAL GROWTH: having a bigger project outside of being a homemaker and homeschool mama. for me, that’s my network marketing business, my blog, and my youtube channel.
4. Let Go of Perfection – Pinterest Is Not Real Life
We’ve all seen those Pinterest-perfect homeschool rooms, but spoiler alert: Your kitchen table, with books, crayons, and the occasional cracker crumb, works just fine. You don’t need a magazine-worthy classroom setup or perfectly curated lesson plans. Your kids will remember the fun they had learning, not whether your bulletin board matched your throw pillows.
We love to inspire and be inspired by other homeschool families. But we need to remember that 1. Comparison is the thief of joy. and 2. Social media is a highlight reel!
tip: Instead of aiming for; perfection, aim for progress—a messy, happy home is a sign of learning in action.
5. Embrace the Mess (Because It’s Gonna Happen)
turns out, we actually can’t be full-time homeschool moms, chefs, nannys, business owners, and housekeepers. We HAVE to lower our expectations when it comes to our homes. Some families spend the majority of their day outside of their homes. As homeschooled families, we often spend most of our time inside our homes.
Keeping a decluttered, minimal home will help a lot with not feeling overwhelmed in your space. Keep only what’s necessary, get rid of the rest. (A good motto for life.)
tip: Set aside 15 minutes a day for a family tidy-up—it won’t be spotless, but it will be manageable.
6. Learning Happens Everywhere – Not Just at the Table
One of the best parts about homeschooling? School can happen anywhere! Take the math lesson outside, turn a grocery trip into a real-life economics class, or teach geography with a map of your next family vacation spot. Your kids will love it, and so will you when you realize learning doesn’t have to feel like, well, school.
Where’s the most unexpected place your child has learned something new?
7. Get Plugged into a Homeschool Community
Truth is, not everyone is going to support your decision to homeschool. There might be people who are very close to you who simply don’t understand why you chose this lifestyle. That is one of the reasons it’s so important to plug yourself into a homeschool community- to have other families with similar reasons why they homeschool. You need other moms to bounce ideas off of, to socialize your kids, and to cultivate your own rich community. Your homeschool friends will become some of your closest friends because you’ll just *get* each other in ways that other people can’t.
Here’s a link to find a Wild+Free group in your area!
Read also: The reality of making friends in a new place
8. Keep the Big Picture In Mind
Not every day will be butterflies and rainbows (although, odds are many of them will be, especially if you’re a nature-forward homeschool family!) Many days will feel hard, and mundane, and we will question our decision to homeschool more often than we would like to admit. Is this even working? Was this the right choice?
On those days, remind yourself why you started. Remember, homeschooling isn’t about nailing every lesson perfectly—it’s about creating a love for learning and a family rhythm that works for you.
Try creating a Why We Homeschool note on your phone to reference on those hard days!
See also: Why We Chose The Homeschool Life
9. Figure out your homeschool style.
There are lots of different methods and styles that homeschool families tend to gravitate toward. Montessori, Charlotte Mason, Classical, Unschooling, Wild + Free, Eclectic, Unit Studies… to a brand new homeschooler this can all seem overwhelming. Don’t worry, part of the beauty of homeschooling is finding our own style based on our children, our season, and our strenghts.
I would recommend learning a little bit about each of the most common homeschool philosophies, see what resonates. Try something new, adjust when it stops working.
you’ll probably end up with a vibe so unique to you that you can’t even put a name to it. If I had to put a name to my current homeschool style it would be something like “Nature Based Charlotte Mason Candlelit Unschooling Reading Books from the Thrift Store Go Play Outside Let’s Cuddle Artistic Vibes”
10. Don’t forget to have fun.
My main goal is to enstill a love of learning in my children which means I can’t be such an anxiety ridden, uptight crazy lady that my children don’t actually enjoy their homechooling experience. As someone who can tend to be a perfectionist, a mantra that helps me to bring lightness to my days is “it’s not that serious.” Few things in life are actually that serious, and my 7 year old drawing squiggles instead of dotting his i’s is not one of them.
This homeschool life we only get to have once with our children. Let’s make it fun.
Ready to dive in? Subscribe to my blog and follow me on YouTube for more tips, encouragement, and real-life homeschool adventures.
