Are you new to homeschooling or ready to start but a little nervous or overwhelmed? Do you need some help in learning about and choosing a curriculum that best fits your family?
I’m Nikki, and I remember how overwhelmed I felt right before we started homeschooling.
I only knew a few families at the time who homeschooled, and I remember meeting with one friend and asking somewhere close to 152 questions (ok, a bit of an exaggeration but probably felt like that to her). It was before the days of amazing instagram accounts of curriculum and ideas for every subject. We were about to move to Hawaii, and I knew the Lord had put homeschooling on my heart. I was so very excited and also felt a bit nervous.
Initially, my husband and I weren’t on the same page with homeschool. We weren’t even in the same chapter of the education book, if you know what I mean. I felt that God had given me the desire before our kids were school-aged, but that desire wasn’t realized until our kids were in a public school in 2nd grade and Kindergarten. The thing that gave me a bit of (perhaps false) confidence at the time was that I had a teaching degree. Ironically, I never enjoyed teaching and didn’t like the mainstream educational environment in general, which made my life as a teacher not the most fulfilling, but that dissatisfaction made sense later. I seemed to “buck the system” a bit and wondered why it couldn’t be a different way. I loved being with my kids and remember sharing with my husband, “If I CAN do it and WANT to be with our kids, why wouldn’t I homeschool?” That statement began the shift in his heart toward believing in homeschool. I was so thankful for his full support to move forward. I say all of that to say this…
If you have the desire to homeschool, then you CAN homeschool!
I remember walking around our neighborhood in Tennessee just praying and sharing my heart with the Lord in having a desire to move to an island for some reason. Amazingly, maybe around 8 months later, we moved to Hawaii for a season in 2011 and began our homeschool journey when our kids were 8 and 5. It felt overwhelming, but more than that, it felt RIGHT for us! I was so excited to start our “school” that we arrived on Maui on a Friday, and we started homeschooling 3 days later on a Monday!
Although we aren’t in the homeschooling season anymore as a family, I am still very involved in the homeschool world through researching and reviewing curricula, teaching and writing Christian lessons, and writing articles and activities for a creation science ministry. I homeschooled our two kids for nine and a half years and have continued to teach other homeschooled kids in Tennessee since ours moved out of the homeschool season. I passionately believe in homeschool and the power of a loving home to shape and teach children.
If any one of the following statements resonates with you, I would love to help!
- You are a Christian parent and have a child in k-8 and aren’t sure how and where to start homeschooling.
- You feel stuck to the typical mainstream school style or system, but you want to have freedom from it.
- You don’t know what style of homeschool you want to pursue.
- You’d like help with selecting a curriculum or piecing together your own curriculum.
- You’d like to have a variety of useful accounts and websites to follow.
- You’d like direction on meeting state requirements
If you’d like to chat about getting started in your homeschool journey, let’s have a conversation to learn if I might be able to help you! Shoot me an email and let’s connect!
