Hi I’m Crystal! ! I have a 5, 3 and 1 year old, this is our “2nd year” of homeschooling. I never in a million years thought that I would be homeschooling and already I love it!! We are a small business family and I love that my kids can go to work with Dad and even over night trips without the worry of school. We really began to homeschool because we were not liking the government involvement and God being pushed out the door. I am so thankful we have chosen this path. I would say that right now we are an eclectic style! !
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I will be starting my homeschool journey next school year. I have four kids (12, 10, 7 & 5). Homeschooling was always on my radar, but last year I feel the Lord really was laying it on my heart. It was a constant thought for me. But, my husband was not on board. I started praying that is this was really God’s plan for us that He would soften my husbands heart toward it. Well, New Years Eve my husband turned to me and said if this is what I want, and if this will make me happy…he is for it! What an answer to prayer! I have been reading your site for several years now. We too live in CO (Parker). I am taking this time to get all ready to kick things off next school year. We will lean toward traditional/eclectic. Using different curriculum to best fit our family.
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Hi, I’m Susan!
My husband and I have three great kids who are 7, 5, and 4-years old. We are VERY new to homeschooling, as my husband and I just decided over the Christmas holidays that we would start homeschooling our children starting this fall. Right now, the two oldest are in kindergarten (my oldest is doing kindergarten for the second year due to him having special needs) and we are reading everything we can get our hands on and researching curriculum like crazy people.I have no idea which teaching style will fit us best but I imagine we’ll probably be a pretty good mix of everything by the time we settle into what works for us!
We decided to home school mostly because we just felt this overwhelming need to keep our kids close - I can’t explain it at all but it just feels like something we need to do. My oldest was having problems keeping up. My middle is having problems with being bullied. And my youngest just misses the age cutoff for kindergarten so she would have to be in preschool this fall and she is already doing kindergarten work. Also, with our oldest being special needs (autism, spd, seizures), we can provide more accommodations at home for him and teach to his learning style. Also, we don’t have to worry about juggling his many doctors’ and therapy appointments around school.
Right now, we’re just kind of a jumble of emotions - impatient, because I am sooo ready to just get started already, nervous, excited, and defensive because we’re already getting judgement from a few of the friends we are telling. So I am so glad that I have found Erica’s website and this community! P.S. Erica - my little girl (4) is LOVING the Letter of the Week curriculum!
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Hi Crystal,
Welcome to the forum, I’m so glad you could join us! I hope you enjoy it!
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Hi Susan,
Welcome to the forum! I know getting started can be overwhelming! I wrote a book called Homeschooling 101 that will help answer all of your questions on how to get started homeschooling, choosing curriculum, creating lesson plans, etc.
And I have a getting started series that I started in August 2014 that might help as well:
http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/blog/category/homeschooling-101
Don’t worry, we’ve all been through it all before, feel free to email me, or post questions here to help you get started!
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Hello!
My name is Jason. I am Erica’s husband. As most of you already know we have 4 children. All boys and 3 girls. 
Turbo and I hold our own though.
I am really excited about this community and hope it is a place where everyone can come and talk about homeschooling and all that it entails. We love it and so do our kids!
If you have any questions or issues about the community please post a topic to the Meta category. You can also mention me directly by using @jason in your post.
Be sure to read about the trust levels. Also, once you are done seeing the Getting Started banner post on the top you can click the X in the top right corner to close it. You can always go back and read the post later. Finally, be sure to use the search feature at the top if you are looking for something in particular. If you don’t find it…create a new topic! 
I am excited for everyone to get to know each other…to share ideas…and see what a cool place this can become as our community grows!
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Hello, My name is Adrianne. I have four beautiful children, three boys ages 14, 5, and 3. My youngest is our only girl who is 18 months. We are in our 4th year of homeschooling. I started off more Eclectic style picking and piecing different curriculum. We now are more Charlotte Mason utilizing My Father’s World, which we simply love! With the desire to be with our children more and in control of their education, we felt lead by the Lord to homeschool. It’s not always easy but I wouldn’t change these precious memories for anything!
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Hi! I’m Tiffany! I’ve been homeschooling for 7 years. I have 4 beautiful children. My oldest is a boy who is 12 years old and in 6th grade. The next in line is my 6 year old daughter who is in 1st grade. Next is my son Gabe who just turned 5. He’s doing preschool things and my youngest and is my boy Job who is 2.
I’m more of a traditional/eclectic style. I like having a curriculum to follow, but add my own fun things, too.
I started homeschooling because there really was no other option. Public school was not an option, and private school was too expensive. I always said I would never homeschool - LOL. Not all days are sunny and roses, but God gives strength for each day. I truly love homeschooling and I know that this is what God has for my family right now.
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I have four kids ( ages 8, 7, 5, and 2), and this is our second year homeschooling. You blog has been instrumental to my success as a homeschooler, and I am so excited about this forum! I have been looking to something just like this for awhile.
Frankly, I brought my kids home because I didn’t like how the public school was handling their education. My oldest is extremely gifted and wasn’t being challenged. My daughter was a struggling reader, and wasn’t getting the extra help she needed. Then the common core nonsense started. Taking charge of my kids’ education has been the best decision I’ve made!
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Hello! My name is Angela. We have 3 kids, We currently homeschool our 2 boys ages 10 and 9. We have been homeschooling for 5 years now. We also have a 4 year old daughter, we will start her in K. We enjoy it. It is nice to be able to go at our own pace!
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Hi!
I’m Rebecca and we have been homeschooling for, I guess, 3 years… we have one son, age 7 and he is in second grade.
I guess we are classical in homeschool style, we follow classical conversations… but kiddo loves workbooks - so I guess classically traditionally with a bit of unschooled, thrown in for good measure.
To homeschool was my husband’s idea… he was involved in a multi-level marketing group with other families who happen to homeschool. He loved that their families were to tightly connected and he asked me to consider it. I was a bit on the fence until kiddo pretty much taught himself to read at age 4 and I didn’t want him to have to “slow” down on learning when we hit public school, so we just kept going where ever the wind took him… 
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Hi! I’m Trisha. I have one kiddo who is 8. This is our second year homeschooling. We love it! Our reasons for homeschooling are being able to teach the love of Jesus everyday in a nurturing environment where our child can learn and grow comfortably. Nice to meet everyone!
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Hi, I’m Jacq, we have 4 children and another one arriving in May. Ages 11, 9,5,and 3. I homeschool the 11 year old and the 5 year old. The 9 year old goes to public school. I started Homeschooling last January (14’). I made it through the first year and I am enjoying it more and more as time is going on. I felt a whisper to Homeschool for years, but never had the support or confidence in myself to take the step. I knew God was asking this of me and he showed affirmation after affirmation of opening the door. since I have taken the step of obiedience life as Peaced out! Woohoo! I too question the choice and possibly school occasionally and for the same reasons as you Erica - But there is always a blatant encouragement that occurs that sets me straight in what is right for my family right now. I have found Erica’s post to be a helpful at all the right times and I enjoy everything I have ever purchased from her shop. (Thank you)
I think our style is eclectic/ traditional. I really like unit studies and lap books. I am not sure how this site/ group works but excited to be involved.
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Hi everyone! My name is Ryan and I am a mom to 3. Daughter 7, Son 5, Daughter 3.
We have been homeschooling for 3 years and my style is very eclectic. I am a former public school teacher turned homeschooler and I will never go back! After having my first child I knew I didn’t want my kids in public school. Since then, I have grown in my faith and in my homeschooling journey. This is what God has called me to do. Oh, and we live in the Houston area. 
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I want to add that when I first started homeschooling 3 years ago COAH was one of my first homeschooling blogs that I followed and it helped me along my new journey! Thanks Erica!
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Hi,
My name is Stacy and I have 3 young children. This is my 5th year homeschooling but I still feel like such a newby! I consider myself an eclectic but this year have found myself drawn to more of a CM approach. Niether my husband nor I were homeschooled… It never even crossed my mind to homeschool but when we started talking about having children my husband suggested it. After years of research I decided that this was something I might be able to do. The first year was rough and I almost gave up but I powered through the second year and then never looked back. I’m excitd to join this forum and get advice from like minded people. 
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Hi, I’m Dana! I have 6 amazing boys! We are a blended family but my husband and I have known each other since we were 12 years old (that’s a huge awesome long story of it’s own). Our boys are ages 12, 11, 10, 10, 8, and 7. Our oldest has Autism. We are in our first 4 months of homeschooling. We decided to start this journey because of the issues we were having in our public middle school with our two oldest boys. Both with some really bad safety issues with a special needs child, and also the “dropping” of the ball with our other son, who was just not getting what he needed even though we were doing everything we could to make sure that he was. Most of our boys have some sort of learning delay and in school were just being pushed along and everyone was just “hoping” at one point they would pick it up and make leaps and bounds of progress, especially at the middle school level. Though our elementary school is one that we love with people we love more, we knew it just wasn’t giving our boys all that they needed, not to mention the constant push of common core. We know it was time for a change to give our boys the best and what the school was offering just wasn’t the best or the safest anymore. I also felt it was the huge push I needed to go in this direction. I saw homeschooling as something that wasn’t for me or us, or something I couldn’t even do. It terrified me and still does some days, but I think God showed up in a big way for me, with a huge door and a big light saying this is the only way to go, so go. I’m pretty hard headed so that’s definitely what I needed to make the jump. So we prayed and made the jump, as scary as it was, into something totally foreign to us. We have such great friends who home school and they came along side us to get us started and help us weave through everything to get ready to start teaching our guys. It’s been so amazing to see our guys bloom, achieve confidence and enjoy learning and actually hold on to and converse about the things they are learning (which has never really happened when they were in public school). Even our son with Autism has grown more than we thought possible and is blowing us out of the water with all that he is doing on a daily basis and how much joy he has learning (we are really starting to see that in school, they had no expectations for him, so he didn’t excel, which is sad and they missed out on how awesome he is an how great his brain is, and now all of our boys are excelling and we are seeing their strengths and pinpointing weakness to work on). I think we’ve accomplished more in these last few months than they have in school since they started. We that’s how is seems anyway. Since we are a blended family two of our boys are still in public school as of right now, but hoping they will join their brothers at home next year, that’s been the saddest, hardest part, not having everyone at home. We are loving it so far, and I’m getting the hang of it. 
I have no idea what teaching style I like best, since I don’t really know what they all are. I just know I’m super ocd and right brained so I teach and schedule in that capacity, but I’m learning to not be super rigid and lay back a little, go with the flow, and just enjoy the time together with my little men as we learn even though we run on a pretty set schedule (my husband is helping me let go, and use big x’s on our schedule, reminding me we don’t have to do it all). It’s so good to teach and not reteach, which is how I was feeling when they were in school. They would come home and we would have an hour + of crazed, stressful homework time, and everyone started our family evenings off angry, tired and frustrated. It’s been a refreshing change for sure. My husband also is a pastor so it’s freed up our family for week day family time, since our weekends are pretty booked up, and it’s allowed my guys to help their dad in ministry which he and they love so much. We are excited to continue in this journey and I’m excited to keep learning and teaching, and I’m super excited about this forum, because there’s so much I don’t know, and I love reading, getting to know people, and learn from the wisdom of others who are so much more skilled!
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Hello,
I am Sarah. I am going to take my kids out of public school and homeschool in the fall. Right now, I am finishing up my AA degree and will be done with all but one class this semester. Then in the fall, the girls will stay home. We have 3 girls. Lex is 11 and in 6th grade. Sam is 9 and 4th grade. K is 7 and in 1st grade. I am still trying to figure out what we will use. I am leaning towards the eclectic teaching. I am here looking to see what others use and like and what I think will work for my girls. I am starting to homeschool for a lot of reasons. Lex is in all pre-AP classes and it is still to easy on her. I want to see how far she can go. We are working together to plan her classes and come up with a plan for her High school. Sam is a great reader, but struggling with Math and Spelling. The school is doing nothing to help her. K has a lot of challenges and I think her being at home will let me be able to help her more than she is getting in public school.
Sarah
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Hi! My name is Jillian and I have 2 beautiful girls ages 5 and 2. We just started homeschooling in October, so we are still learning what we like and what works best. My 5 year old loves dinosaurs and has a very active imagination. My 2 year old likes to do everything her big sister does, so we make sure to include her in our learning. We started homeschooling for various reasons, but mostly because we feel that its whats best for our girls.
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Hello. My name is Sonja A., and I’ve been homeschooling for about 6 years now to our 2 kids, 1 girl, 1 boy. I started homeschooling for many reasons, and a few are: We love the Lord and wanted a Christian-based atmosphere and education. As well, since my hubby is in the military, it’s just easier to stop and start at our own pace than public or private school’s & the kids are able to have a better relationship with their Dad–and vice versa–than they would normally have (not saying it can’t be done, but it’s what works for us.) One of our more pressing reasons was because our daughter has medical issues and a developmental delay that would be complicated in a public or private school setting; and in her 2 years in public school, she was sooo very behind in Math, she couldn’t tell me what 0+0= at the end of Kindergarten, and they wanted to pass her on. We were not happy with that, and with an upcoming move, we prayerfully took her out.
We have varied the way I have taught a lot along the way. It was first all textbook, all the time, lol. That was really hard. Now we have some textbook, some Classical Conversations, some notebooking, and some serious independent work (since they’re both in middle school/or will start middle school soon). I try to sorta work their schoolwork around what they enjoy/need. Ex: Our daughter needs a lot of repetition in Math, as she has an issue with multi-step instructions; so she gets a lot of worksheets, book work, etc…to repeat the information a lot. Our son, however, excels in that, so once his Math is done, he is pretty much done. He needs help in Spelling, so he gets extra Spelling on the computer, through worksheets, or help from his Dad or myself.
This is super exciting, as I’ve been a COAH follower for I don’t know how long now. And it’s great to see your husband on here, Erica, since he’s normally a behind-the-scenes kinda person.
Thanks for having me!
Sonja
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