How to Homeschool at a Cheap Price?

My 17 yr old son is just about to graduate a year early. We used the Penn Foster program. It was affordable AND accredited. www.pennfoster.com

I don't know anything about it, but I have seen K-12 Free Online Homeschool recommended on a few homeschool message boards. Their website is www.k-12freehomeschool.org.

There are tons of resources in this area. I would check into some of your larger local churches because many of them run home school "enrichment classes" once a week as a co-op.

The people that would know the most about what is going on in the local home school community is any local home school store. Some of the Christian book stores have home school resources in them or you could try a larger store like Home Educators Resource in Lewisville: http://www.homeeducatorsresource.com/
These stores may help you find a local home school co-op as well.

Also look into Home school associations in your area. I belong to the Denton County Home School Association and it is a HUGE online resource of active home schoolers emailing back and forth questions, suggestions and get-togethers (there is also a lot of curriculum swapping or reduced-price selling within the community). The Denton County's website is here: www.mydchsa.org/

There are also a LOT of online resources and forums. One that I joined is a social network for home schooling moms. You can ask any questions and search through discussions that might apply to you. It is here: http://thehomeschoollounge.ning.com/ and is called The Home School Lounge.

Good luck! It is difficult at first, but once you get into a schedule it will be fun.

We are homeschooling 6 on a budget. What I have discovered is that you don't have to spend a lot of money. It is easy to spend. There are a lot of great resources available. Most of materials come from the library or online. When it's time to buy, I buy used. Ebay is great. Here are a couple of sites to check out:

www.thehomeschoolmom.com
www.homeschoolfreebieoftheday.com

Homeschool groups are a great resource.
You, or I should say "he", needs to determine what his goals are. Is he college-bound? If not, what does he want to do? My very good friend's daughter was struggling with college. She hated it. She dropped out. She felt sick when she thought about going back. Finally, she enrolled in beauty school. She is happy and her job can't be outsourced.

How does FREE sound? That's how much it costs us to homeschool. Go to AmblesideOnline.org and check out the free curriculum--"year" does not necessarily mean "grade", you will probably want year 8 or 9...

Then make friends with your local library and learn how to use interlibrary loan, if necessary. Also, halfprice books and amazon.com for ones you'll want to keep.

Have him start a blog to tell the world what he's reading and learning (it will cement it in his mind). Have him write creatively, and have him tell you about what he reads. Find a free math curriculum online--they are there--my husband finds them all the time. Keep each "subject" under 30 min, and don't let him "glut" on his books, but "chew on them" to let them sink in over time. Have him go outside and explore nature and write about/draw/research what he discovers and have him write a paper on it every so often.

You will have a lovely time together, and his mind will thrive and grow. Email me for encouragement. Join a Support Group. Have him take a Science class from another parent locally, if it's not your thing, like ThinkingReeds.

Good good good luck, and God bless,
~A.

P.S. There is a moms bookclub/homeschool support that meets at La Madeline on 15th in Plano on Tuesdays (or is it second tuesdays?) from 7pm to 9 or 10, with a lovely knowledgable lady named Ginger--you can't miss her!

Math is going to be your hardest subject to do without buying some curriculum. Mardel's has a 20% off on hs curriculum sale every July. You'd have to call them for the exact date. I got my 7th graders Saxon math book for $70 instead of $88 with the discount. All other subjects you could probably just use online materials and the internet.

I was going to mention Ambleside Online. I love it's ideas. Also the Blogging idea was great.

We keep nature journals and research to add details (scientific names, habitats, food, etc.).

Also look at Home Educator's Resource in Lewisville. It sells used curriculum. There are similar stores in North Richland Hills and Duncanville, but I forget their names as I live in Lewisville.

edhelper.com is supposed to have high school curriculum. Edhelper's cost is about $20 to $25 a year.

Also the Plano Home School Curriculum fair is coming up at the end of the summer. There are also loads of used curriculum fairs that happen around town. For $360 you can get a curriculum in a box from Switched on Schoolhouse. We use SOS and a few other curriculum to round it all out.

J., congrats on your decision! There are tons of ways that you can homeschool on a budget AND your child can get a wonderful education!

A dear friend of mine is the homeschool resource person in our area for a few different state and national homeschool organizations. If you shoot me an email I can introduce you to her and I know she can give you lots of ideas. She is the queen of saving money and she is a great homeschooling mom. Her kids have a fantastic education.

I also wanted to add my 2cents in on k-12, the texas virtual school. We tried that when I first brought my daughter home and I would highly NOT recommend it. It is a one shoe fits everyone program and my daughter struggled because the curriculum they supplied in some subjects did not fit her learning style. They have a lot of requirements on you and you have no freedom to help your child beyond what they tell you to do.

Please feel free to let me help in any way that I can! :) ____@____.com

When I finished homeschooling my children. I took all of the books and lesson plan guides up to half price books.

I use to work at a private school and wrote quite a bit of the curriculum. One thing I found that works great from an education perspective and student's enjoyment is take a historical novel (fiction and non-fiction), let's use Treasure Island as an example (You can find curriculum units online for quite a few books). History and Literature - You and your son watch the movie, then read the book (helps with comprehension) talk about parts of the book that are not in the movie and vice versa, write a book report, do an author study about Robert Louis Stevenson and write a biography. Science with experiments - Find information online or at the library, about the sea, ships, England, islands. Geography - Map the route the ship took. Then find another novel in the same time period and do the same.

Also, look into dual credits at your local community college, yes, you pay for the college class, but it counts for high school and you get a college credit.

Feel free to send me a message if you have more questions.

Amblesideonline.org is a free curriculum using Charlotte Mason's Philosophy you just need to add math and foreign language to it. It is definitely challenging and will keep your kid learning.

J.,

Congrats on "hearing" your son! There are many ways to do it inexpensively and still have a great education. One option for dual credit is some of the community colleges are FREE for highschoolers doing dual credit. Denton's NCTC is not free, but Dallas is. That is a great way to get upper level math and teaching w/o the cost. Good luck!

It depends on what kind of curriculum you are looking for. The cheapest would be a workbook style. I don't know if you are comfortable with a Christian based curriculum or not but I'm using Christian Light Education. No bells or whistles, just a great workbook program. You might want to check out some reviews: http://www.homeschoolreviews.com/reviews/default.aspx Some of the reviews have a link to their website and you can check out the prices.
Best Regards,
C.

Kudos for helping your son. However, this is such a critical time for college preparation.....I urge you to not go cheap on his education. This is not a place to cut corners.

He needs a good foundation to be ready for college. Maybe there are some online options for you.

I know a lot of moms here homeschool and maybe you can get some good leads.

Best wishes.

Mardel's (Irving and Arlington) and Cc Homeschool Resource (Duncanville) are the best places to find materials-very reasonable in price and great content.

I would think you could check out a book from the library on homeschooling requirements for Texas. I know you can get cheap textbooks at Half Price Books and they probably have them in the library too.
I know there are a lot of resources online as well. Spend some time looking around.
Good luck!

Hi J.
I just posted on your other question about video games & TV. If you choose to homeschool your son, then he will have even MORE time to just watch TV and play video games. Also, if you work full time, when will you homeschool him? Do you work second shift or do you work during the day? Just a thought - if you are working full time, it may be a bit too much to take on to also homeschool him full time.

I know there are homeschool co-ops that do programs where you come once or twice a week for classes and then stay home the rest of the week. But, again, if your son is showing addictive behaviors for TV or video games, it might be safer to keep him in a structured environment.

Hi J.,

First, just a couple of comments on what some other folks said. Although Texas Virtual Academy is a public school, it only goes through 8th grade. :(

With the exception of math, he could probably learn everything he needed to know "for free" between using the library and what you could find on the Internet. BUT, you would have to keep meticulous notes (and a portfolio of his work) and make your own transcript. Some people find this method liberating, some find it stressful. We have a several local online homeschooling support groups that are excellent resources! Post a message asking a question (like here) and you get a flurry of responses.

THIS IS NOT A SOLICITATION. IT'S MEANT TO OFFER MUTUAL ASSISTANCE TO BOTH OUR FAMILIES.

For the fall, I found a fantastic secular (non-religious) K-12 distance education program (TOTALLY ONLINE), which offers all the courses that you will need to issue your own high school diploma.* This software company also offers GED test prep and AP courses. I want my kids to use this program, but in order for me to be able to contract with the company, I must have a minimum of 10 students (I've already got 5!). Although I could make a profit offering these other 8 spots, I just want to fill these spots so that my kids can use this program. If your son wishes to join us, you will only pay COST for the curriculum 12 months! ($1,200).

We are currently using this program, contracted through an online school. Although we really love the curriculum, we aren't that pleased with their customer service. So, we decided that if we could find 8 other friends to go in on the deal with us, we'd be able to manage it ourselves.

If you would like more information on the program, please feel free to contact me offlist and I will give you all the details.

Best wishes!
W.
____@____.com

*We are working toward accreditation.

I'm from california and my highschool had a program that allowed kids to be homeschooled, but they had to check in with their teachers once a week on campus. they took their tests, got homework help and new assignments. they also had daily tutoring if you needed/wanted it and it was free! it was called independant study. i don't know if texas schools have that so it is something you could look into. i did it my junior year and was able to graduate a semester early! i didn't need my parents to stay home and teach me, so they didn't have to quit their jobs. they actually made me go get a job since i had alot more free time. i loved it. sure hope you could find something like that here!

Dont know if this has already been mentioned, but we love Half Price Books for our supplies. Look for their Education & Homeschooling shelves. Try different locations 'cause the supplies are always changing. You can get a discount card there as well (ten percent off).

Also, there are loads of free resources online. Search keywords like free tenth grade worksheets, etc.

Good luck & good for you! :)

Texas Virtual Academy is the only one that I know of. It is a Texas Public School, so they are free to you if you live in Texas. Hope this helps..

Hi J., I was homeschool my sophomore-senior year because I didn't want to deal with the social aspect of high school and thought it would be a great way around it! Now that it's all said and done, we all wish I had just done regular school. The amount of time you are alone is too much, and it's not healthy. It doesn't seem like anything would happen, but it takes its toll on you. I would just really think about it