Homeschool Preschool
You Don’t Have to If You Don’t Want to
When I talk about the preschool years I am specifically referring to children who are 3 and 4 years old. And, obviously, this is because a 5 year old would typically go into kindergarten and not preschool. With that said, let’s move on.
This may be a little controversial, but the first thing I want to point out is that you do not have to homeschool your children during these 2 years if you do not want to, and, depending on your state, you may not have to school them at all until they are 5 or 6 years old. Every state has compulsory attendance laws, and the specific laws in your state will tell you when you are required to have your child in school.
For example, here is Florida, I believe children are not required to be enrolled in school until they are 6 years old, so technically, parents in Florida are not required to put their children in school or provide any formal education until they are 6.
I also looked up a few other states while I was on the Homeschool Legal Defense website. Most seemed to have 6 years old as the requirement for school, but there were several, like Louisiana, that have it set at 5 years old. Although I didn’t look at every state, it seemed 5 or 6 was the norm. However, I did notice Alaska has it set at 7 years of age which surprised me. So if you do not know the homeschool laws in your state, you can go to HSLDA.Org and look them up.
So, again, my point in telling you all this is so you understand if you don’t have the capacity or are not ready to teach your preschool aged children, you don’t have to. You can simply wait until they are older.
Is it going to hurt them? Is it going to affect them and cause them to be behind for the rest of their school years? I’m don’t have a PHD, and I don’t have any scientific studies to show you, but I do not see how it could hurt them in any way if you are going to continue to homeschool them for several years. I think in school settings it may matter since everyone is taught at the same level and at the same pace. If a child comes on the scene at 6 years old never having been taught their letters or numbers, of course they are going to be behind everyone in the classroom who has already been taught these things. Also, the curriculum probably starts out with lessons that assume the child has already had previous education on certain topics.
However, when it comes to your child in your home, it is a totally different situation. If you didn’t start teaching them letters at 4 years old, you teach them at 5 years old. No big deal. Your child is not trying to keep up with other children.
In my opinion, having educated my own 4 children all the way through and knowing many other homeschooling families, It’s not going to hurt your child to delay any formal education until they reach the compulsory attendance age in your state or until they are 5 and ready to start kindergarten. Again, this is just my personal opinion formed out of my personal experiences and knowledge.
Why Wouldn’t You Homeschool Your Preschooler
So now that I talked about the reasons you don’t need to do preschool with your children, let’s just talk about some reasons why you wouldn’t. Maybe you have your hands full already. If you have some older children and you are just starting to homeschool, maybe you don’t need the extra stress of trying to keep up with a preschool curricula on top of everything else you are doing.
Maybe you just don’t have the extra funds to purchase materials this year. Maybe you just don’t feel that your child is ready for it or even needs it.
So, if this not something on your radar to do this year with your 3 or 4 year old, there is no need to stress about it.
You don’t have to put it off for a whole year either. Maybe you just need another 3 months or 6 months to prepare and get other things in order first.
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What if You are Ready to Homeschool Your Preschooler?
Now let’s look at the other side of this. Maybe you are ready to do some preschool work with your child. I think a lot of times when those little ones see their older siblings doing school work they want to do some as well.
Did you know that you could do preschool activities that only take a few minutes a day and cost very little or nothing at all if you have some simple materials at home?
Of course you could also purchase a preschool curriculum that has everything laid out for you. They often provide lesson plans, workbooks, and learning aids such as flash cards and charts, etc. The Abeka curriculum is one example of this. They offer 2, 3 and 4 year old preschool preschool materials. If you go to their website, just make sure you are looking at the homeschool versions of the materials and not the classroom versions. They are different.
Here are some other publishers that offer homeschool preschool curriculum programs:
You can also go to christianbook.com, and look through all the preschool curricula they offer on their website. I made it very easy for you too.
Just type “preschool homeschool” in the search box below. This will take you to the christianbook.com page and show you all the preschool options there. You could also search for any of the curricula I mentioned above.
The other thing I highly recommend is reading to your child regularly, maybe even every day. Get a library card, and go check out lots of children’s books. Don’t just read them from your tablet or phone. It’s so different when your child is sitting on your lap and turning the pages rather then swiping left on your tablet or phone and having notifications pop up every minute. Make sure to get great stories and lots of children’s poems and rhymes such as Mother Goose etc. Also, don’t forget to sing with your kids. I think most parents do this naturally anyway, but don’t forget the alphabet song and The Itsy Bitsy Spider and Jesus Loves Me etc. Children can learn a lot just from singing songs. My children still remember the song that helped them learn the 50 states.
Now I know reading all this might sound like a lot, but in reality it can take just a few minutes a day.
If your oldest child is the preschooler or you don’t have any other children you are homeschooling, then teaching preschool may be a great way to ease into homeschooling in general. You could do it every day for a few minutes or only 2 or 3 days per week.
If you can, I would recommend every day in the morning for a few minutes. It will help you and your child get into a routine of having a regular school time.
So that’s really all there is to it. You can go all in on a preschool curriculum that guides you with lesson plans etc., or you can just get some simple supplies and do it on your own. Or if you choose, you don’t have to do either of these. You can simply wait to start school until they are older.
And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men.
~Colossians 3:23
Let me know your thoughts and if you have any questions.
Email me at Mary@whatabouthomeschooling.com
“…And the sweetness of the lips increaseth learning.”
~Proverbs 16:31