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15 Comments

  1. I have loved reading all of your homeschooling posts! I am a newer mom (with littles under three and under in age) and am leaning heavily towards homeschooling. I taught in a public school system for years before becoming a mom and honestly can’t imagine sending my little ones into all of what I saw happening in and out of the classroom setting, but I am also very anxious about my children making deep friendships if they don’t attend a brick and mortar school. I read on one of your other posts that this was something your boys experienced and was just curious how you felt about that now and if you had any suggestions on ways to help form those needed friendships.

    1. Hi Britni! Thank you for commenting and I love your heart on all of this! I wouldn’t worry for a second about friendships. First of all, if you have more than one child, the best friendships you can foster are their sibling relationships (and that’s hard to do when they’re apart all day at a traditional school!) Also, when you homeschool YOU get to help them choose who to hang out with and for how long. We make a lot of friends through our church, through sports, through the neighborhood or other activities. Yes, it takes some effort to get kids together, but I’m honestly not a fan of kids spending extensive time with other kids when they are young. They need the influence of parents, grandparents (or other adults who are good models to them) and their siblings. This stuff all sorts out. It is NOT a negative though, I promise you that! My book (Boy Mom) has a chapter on Influence and that probably goes deepest into it. My college boys are very happy with a full social life now and do not regret a thing about being homeschooled. They plan to homeschool their own kids one day and they thank us for protecting them from the influences they at one point thought were cool or more fun. Yay. Keep it up — it all pays off! ❤️

  2. Monica, after I read our school district’s information on how school will proceed this year I have decided to homeschool my youngest two boys! The quarantine schooling at home last spring and your podcast are the two main things that empowered and encouraged me to make this change. I have been listening to you on my morning walk the last year and have been a bit jealous of you and your guests‘ descriptions of your homeschooling and your relationships with your kids and their learning! Then last Spring we were forced to do the school packets at home for the quarantine and I just loved getting to see how and what the boys learn, getting to feel the feeling of teaching them something new, seeing how learning doesn’t have to take 7 hours a day and felt a tug from God that this may be an option for our family. As soon as I decided to do this I hopped on your blog to see what curriculum you used when your boys were young and bought that without looking into others because I knew I could trust you and I didn’t want to be overwhelmed with all the choices! My mom is going to help me while I go to work one day a week, so she and I listened to your podcast with Jenn Bryant and it so helped us set the stage for how we want to approach this new adventure. I’m so thankful for you and your guests and praying that myself, my mom and my kids will be open to what God has in store for us through homeschooling!

    1. Oh this makes me so happy!! What a blessing. I always say that homeschooling may not be for everyone but I think a lot of people would be surprised by how much they liked it if they tried it! I wish you allll the best! 🙂 Blessings and stay in touch!

  3. Penny King says:

    Dear Monica,
    I so enjoyed reading about your homeschooling life. Although it has been many years since our last homeschooler graduated from high school & went on to graduate from college (as 3 of our 4 kids did), I’m still a homeschooler at heart & I think you did a great job of communicating the ups, downs, pros, cons, joy & struggles of homeschooling. Keep up the good work, please.

    1. Oh thank you so much Penny! (Great to see you here. ;)) I always treasure encouragement for women who have gone before me in this journey! Blessings (and hope to see you around soon. I will wave as I drive by! haha)

  4. Thank you, Monica, for recommending my book! That means so much!

    1. Hey Debbie– My pleasure. Your book is excellent! I hope lots of people buy it. I think you touched on a few points that are often overlooked…I especially appreciated how you mentioned how homeschooling should not be jumped into half-heartedly but should be considered a true lifestyle shift and a true commitment…(those are my words, but I think you know what I mean! ;)) Thank you again for sharing it with me (and for the delicious coffee!) Blessings and Aloha!

  5. So much wisdom here! We homeschooled our three boys in the early years and I think all of your information is reliable, solid, and will stand homeschoolers in good stead. Well done (and ditto on the photo albums . . . still haven’t finished ours. What to do?)

    1. Thank you Deb!! Appreciate that so much, especially coming from someone who has gone before me (and probably could teach me a thing or two!) Hugs to you and Aloha! 😉

  6. Wow this came at such great timing. We just decided to homeschool next year ( 4th & 7 th grade). I’m so sorry excited but also nervous. Picking curriculums makes me nervous the most. Your post is so helpful, thank you!!

  7. Thanks for this…I’m encouraged to keep homeschool simple and intentional. I’d like to hear more about the program you use for transcripts! But we could talk about that over coffee 😄.

    1. Thanks Sally! You’re such a natural, this is going to be a great journey! And yes I’ll get you all hooked up with CEI 😊👍🏼 Coffee anytime. (Or beach more likely 😉)

  8. Wow Monica, Fantastic. Not a bit too much at all. I have passed this on to a young Mother with all very young boys who homeschools. She has replied to me that she has just signed up & loved this post. So nice the way the Lord is using you. Be Blessed because you are Blessing others.

    1. Thank you so much, Kerri! 🙂 such an encouragement. Much aloha-