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If you have the resources to get babysitting during work hours (I know that’s a big if), it might not be out of the realm of possibility. Many homeschoolers follow this rule of thumb when it comes to time actively teaching per day.

K - 30 min
1st - 1 hour
2nd - 2 hours
3rd - 3 hours
4th - 4 hours

After that it seems to vary a lot more, depending on the type of pedagogy and materials used.

So, for the next year or two you could complete sit down teaching in the time it takes most kids to do their homework, after you or your husband come home. You could select open and go curriculum that requires little prep to make it easier. As the kid gets closer to seven or eight, there are virtual classes they could take that are high quality and don’t require much from you (though for the love of god, not K12). If there are co op classes near you, a babysitter could take your child to those where they often teach science, language, art, etc. for a modest fee.

The only problem might be paying for babysitting. Small problem, right? And mustering up the energy to tackle school work when you just want to relax after a long day!

I sought out a public magnet school for my son with a specialized program. I was surprised at what is out there, and that is what sets this school apart from the ones in my home district. We could do private school, but I have to wonder if we would really be getting something other than small class sizes and content that the public schools couldn't deliver for $45k a year (yes, that's what private non-religious schools cost in my area).

It's clear that I would be doing my son a disservice if I tried to homeschool him. I have a masters degree, so it's not a matter of the content, it's a matter of the method. I see it with the home learning that we do for just 20 minutes every night. I don't have the background to be able to identify his learning style and to give him the methodology to learn. Not to mention, the school system has access to so many programs that I wouldn't be able to afford if I had to piecemeal them together.

@Becky: as a parent you still play a big role in your childs education. Their evenings and weekends are spent with you so you can still work on reshaping any aspect of the education that you dont feel is individualized enough

I did want to add that even though I'd like to homeschool, I think it's very difficult to do well. It would be important to me to match the content of the public school curriculum even if we learned in a project based way. I would also want to seek out lots of learning opportunities in the community and extra classes for science as he got older. It sounds like a good idea, but it would be a lot of work.

@Becky: Maybe you could strat by casually starting a relaxed homeschool curriculum and your husband and in-laws can see how much she thrives with it?

A Year if Playing Skillfully is a fun, projects based program that follows the seasons. I think it’s for ages 4-7. It’s mostly secular, aside from a single bible verse hey include for each month. It’s like someone gathered a bunch of Pinterest projects and organized them for you, complete with items you need and suggestions about how to pick and choose and tie it all together.

Or you could do something more formally academic, like a reading or math program. All About Reading uses a hand puppet and lots of games. Right Start math uses lots games and manipulatives. There are a lot of options!

@Chuckles: this exactly.

I think just like public school, homeschooling can have a HUGE variety of quality. I know some homeschooling families and their kids have an amazing breadth and depth of knowledge, then I have some others whose parents are just "playing" school and leading to huge gaps in their knowledge. Anecdotal, but I had a home-schooled friend in high school that ended up moving into public school and being two grade levels behind where she was supposed to be / thought she was.

Oh- and even at kindergarten level, managing the schedule and staying on top of stuff is a lot of work. It was important to me that she attend outside classes with other kids, but it’s a lot of schedule juggling especially with two younge kids at home. And it requires tremendous self discipline on my part, to hold the rhythm and routine. And my daughter really has a hard time with not knowing things/not being perfect, which is a total trigger for me and we butt heads about it.
I’m really grateful for this extra year with her, truly. But it is a lot and I’m barely doing any actual schooling!!

@Becky: If you currently WOHM, what kind of care do you use for your child? Isn't school just in a way an extension of that freedom?

Like, I'm a WOHM. I have some guilt and questions about "leaving" my kid in someone else's care. But, rationally, I know that they are getting a better education and a more well-rounded life with other caregivers involved than if it was just me 24/7.

For what it's worth, my sister and I went to a pretty bad public high school because we lived in a rural area. My sister went to Harvard for grad school (she got a PhD in theoretical physics) and I went to UCSF School of Pharmacy, which is one of the best in the nation. Prior to that I went to UC Berkeley, and my sister went to UC Davis. However, I do understand the need for good schools. We moved into a neighborhood with mediocre public schools and amazing charter schools (3 for elementary age) but they are based on a lottery system, so I'm not sure how long it will take to get into one of those. The amazing public schools in our city require you to live in very high income housing ($750,000+), unfortunately. There are two cities near us with amazing public schools, but it would add 30 more minutes to my husband's commute to work, so he would spend 1 hour one-way driving to his job. Elementary school isn't going to make or break my child's academic career, so we are hoping she gets into one of the charter schools. She's only 22 months now, so we have some time before she gets to high school. At that point we may move just so she attends a really great school. I have a friend who gives her daughter math homework as a supplement to public school (daughter is 8) and she's at the top of her class. Might be something else to consider.

@Becky: it’s really hard to make these decisions. I really think with love and support at home kids will be okay. ️

@2littlepumpkins: This is highly offensive to homeschooling families. You do not need a degree in education to teach your child well. Statistically, most homeschooling moms do not have a degree at all and yet their children outperform both their public and private schooled peers. This soundly debunks the notion that homeschooling is impossible for anyone who doesn’t have a background in education.

@Hypatia: I’m neutral on homeschooling - think it works well for some and not for others but in the research on performance isn’t it sort of self selecting because testing isnt required/mandatory? Ie if parents are allowing their kids to be tested they will probably do well.

To the original question: I think that you have to decide how important it is to home school and if you really want to do it, you figure out how to make it happen. I don’t think it is easy for anyone. Every family gives up something to do it, whether it’s an income or loads of time. The range of solutions will inevitably look radical, because HS is a radical choice.

Regarding caregivers, I think that you have to make sure that everybody you have help is on board with HS and with your particular approach to it. I imagine that it could be fine to have caregivers during the workday and then do academic work in the evening/weekends, especially for early elementary, but you’d need caregivers who will at least not do stuff that actively undermines your efforts. Not every adult likes reading children’s books or supervising children in the park, for example, so if a caregiver is going to resort to TV over reading aloud or outdoor time, you probably need to find someone else.

One thing I would caution against is doing what is referred to as “afterschooling,” which is trying to do a HS-type curriculum after your child comes back from a day at public (or private) school. I feel like this approach, even if you’re using a play-based curriculum, means you get the worst of both worlds without many of the benefits of each. Children need time off.

I would also be very careful to resist the temptation to do an outsourcing-heavy version of HS, especially to start. I know these types of programs are attractive to parents because they reduce their workload and potentially give the parents some time "off," but I think there are plenty of not-great offerings out there and it requires a lot of effort to find the really good ones that are also suited to your child. There's little point in my view in going from a sub-optimal school situation to sub-optimal outsourced HS classes.

To the point made by several commenters: I think the idea that being a former classroom teacher gives you an edge in being good at home schooling is largely mistaken. In my observation, it is often more of a hindrance because former classroom teachers tend to feel like there’s a “right” way to do things and get stuck doing things that might work okay in school but don’t really make sense in a HS environment. It’s not universally true, but it happens quite a lot. Having been a classroom teacher might mean you’re more current on some topics, which is helpful. Still, no one teaches every grade and every subject, so the advantage there is limited, and quite possibly no greater than someone who has worked in or studied a particular field.

The fact is that if you’re going to HS, you’ll have to (re-)educate yourself too, whatever your previous or current occupation. I think it’s best to look at that project as an ongoing one, but it is definitely time consuming. You could opt to have someone else teach the things you’re not thrilled about, but like I said above, I think that you need to be thoughtful about outsourcing and I wouldn't start with a mostly-outsourced approach.

I think HS is a great way to educate a child, but you should know that it is time-consuming (I said this already, but it bears repeating!) and tiring. I think it could work with some employment situations, but I don’t think you would have time for anything else. That’s something you’d really want to consider.

I am an educator and I attempted to homeschool my daughter at one point but found it did not work because (1) she did not care that mom has an Ed.D, (2) Mom knows "nothing" as far as she is concerned in comparison to any other educator she comes across, (3) Our personalities don't always "mesh" in an educational environment, (4) she CRAVES peer socialization and finally, (5) DD is not a self-motivated learner. Unfortunately, we may be revisiting the idea of homeschooling her next year (while I homeschool her Kindergarten-aged brother) due to the fact that our upper-class area is zoned for an intercity lower-achiving middle school. We have the option to opt out and apply to the nearby middle school, but, if DD is not accepted, I will be homeschooling her once again. While I may be well equipt, I just do not believe it to be a great fit for DD and I the way it is for DS and I. All-in-all, I'm really feeling quite a bit of stress atm ... not to mention that I teach 3 days a week at a university and I'm a certified personal trainer. Part of me wishes to embrace fulltime homeschooling and the other part hopes (for her sake) they accept her. I'm certain I'm the minority here as for one child, I see where homeschooling is beneficial; however, for the other, I see where in regards to both her erudition and our relationship, it is detrimental.

To answer OP question, get involved and make it your ideal school as much as possible. Support your teachers, plan and prepare to give enrichment during break & an hour or two on weekends, and participate in parent boards. Do whatever you can to help your child grow at home. I enroll my child in gymnastics and a language class upon her request and she also loves school. Test scores are not everything if that is why you think it is less than ideal. Homeschooled kids, whose parents give up after a few years, are often harmed by having to transition back to regular school and teachers not having enough time to fill in the gaps of thousands of hours they missed. So I guess if someone commits to homeschooling it needs to be an all-in thing. Getting involved to improve public schools for all kids is the answer in almost all cases.

4H sounds really interesting. Also a a big fan of outdoors, art and play as learning to enrich at home beyond classroom walls.

That’s great, @looch. When I was co-chairing the preschool PTA, we wanted to include parents who couldn’t make the meetings in other ways and aimed to help them bring their ideas/questions to life.