Home Schooling My Children - Houston,TX

This website can fill you in on all the information you need to get started homeschooling in Texas.
http://www.thsc.org/FAQ/default.asp

I highly recommend getting connected with a local support group - there's a listing on the sidebar of the THSC website, and you can also google them for your area. A yahoo group search will probably yield great results as well.

There's a lot of curricula out there so you'll have a lot to choose from - I use Ambleside Online http://www.amblesideonline.org/index.shtml

In general, homeschooling is well known and accepted in Texas. I have been homeschooling for 6 years and it has been a wonderful blessing for our family.

Have a Wonderful Day!!!
A. :~D

Go to Texas Home-school Coalition for all your questions. I Home school and love it. I use a lot of online programs and that helps. Feel free to email me at ____@____.com for more info.

You may want to check out the following site. I found it very helpful. http://www.hslda.org/hs/state/TX/default.asp
This next one was more helpful http://www.thsc.org/FAQ/default.asp

They tell you all the legalities. Hope this was helpful.

In the state of Texas there are no rules governing Home Schooling and anyone can do so. There is no testing required for progress and there is no proof for you to supply.

Having said that, many Texas municipalities have issues with home schoolers, and may attempt to harass you into sending your children to school.

I say this because I have had several Texas Home Schooling parents assure me that subscribing to HSDLA (Home School Defense League Association) would be in my best interest as once you are a member you will have not a single court cost related to fighting the State for your right to Home School and no other fees related to any information you need on same.

I pulled my oldest daughter out of a Texas School District to homeschool her at the end of last year due to severe harassment issues that she was having to endure with no help from the school district unless I intervened on her behalf. When I questioned the school thoroughly about my rights in doing so, they assured me that I would not even need to submit my child for TAKS testing as a home schooler unless I CHOSE to do so.

If I am questioned I merely have to show them that I have a schedule to follow and maybe even the coursework I have chosen, but only if they have reason to believe that I am not actually schooling her.

I highly suggest if you are going to be Home schooling you subscribe to the HSDLA as well. I have had several conversation with them already and they are a fount of information nationwide. We are getting out of the military and will be moving out of Texas. They have the most recent laws regarding Home Schooling for each state and have helped a lot in our determination of where we wish to move based on laws supporting Home Schooling.

The cost is a little expensive appearing a little over 100 dollars for one year (they have 2 year, 5 year and lifetime mebership plans as well). However, the amount of advice I have already sought has more than made up for the cost. We chose to go with a one year membership as we are not sure it will work out in our Daughter's best interest, but we want to have tried all of our options to help her out.

I would also suggest reading the book "100 Top Picks for Homeschool Curriculum" but Cathy Duffy. If you have never embarked on this plan before looking at all of the curricula available can be daunting and trying to choose what will engage your child the best is terrifying.

I loved that Ms. Duffy wrote about how students learn and has her top choices rated but the types of learning that kids do. It was an incredibly helpful tool for getting started.

If you have any other questions or want to know how to get in touch with the HSDLA, please feel free to pm me... ;-)

Good Luck and know that whatever choices you make are the right ones for you and your family... ;-)

Home schooling is great. It does have a bit of a stigma though. I prefer to say we are doing a "home based education". In Texas the laws are great. You can create your own curriculum. Your main obstical is going to be documenting/tracking what you have done. For example; during the last two elections I have taken my kids down to the polling places. We spoke to a few poll workers about what that day meant to them. We spoke of what America stands for and why we vote. Then we did work understanding the three branches of Government and what their responsibilities are. My kids are 11,9&6. In Texas your requiered to do 180 days of lessons. How long those lessons take and what they consist of is up to you. You do have to teach in some form the following; math, language arts, science of some sort and character education. Again, what you teach and how you teach is up to you. I found the my kids were able to do an entire days lessons (as they would in a public school)in just about 2 hours. You do not have to stop to take roll or to change classes. You do not have to stop to get the kids to "settle down" so you can teach. This all takes up a lot of time in a regular school setting. Trips to the museum or zoo or even the grocery store are considered "field trips" and you just document what your topic of discussion was. At the Witte it might be the GNOME exhibit. At the HEB you could work on weight, mass, percentages, reading, just by having your kids help. Like weighing things. Comparing size and price to figure out the best deal. Ingredients, for health. If you do not want to do your own curriculum then I would look in to the following. Oak Meadow, ABEKA, and my favorite is Texas Tech. They have a great home based program. You can use their materials. You can use your own. You can have them grade the work and keep track of it. You can even set it up so all the work is done my logging into their system and doing the work as assigned. There is a FEAST office here in San Antonio off of Blanco. They are the experts in home based education. You will love them. They even offer classes for those of us who are not sure how to teach say; chemistry or if you need PE credits they have sports teams. They are worth looking into. They can help you meet more home schooling parents. Now one more thing before I forget. I do not know if your kids have attended any schools before. Since the school year is about to start you can request to pick up last years records and just tell the staff you are not sure what school he will be attending since you are moving and just keep the records for yourself. Keeping records is key. (BTW there are on line schools who like Texas Tech that at the completion of the 12th grade the kids get an actual diploma from that school. Which helps when it is time for college.) Second you can just not show up for school and leave it at that. You are NOT required to speak to anyone from any district office or explain anything to them. Kids under 17 are required to be with an adult between the hours of 8-2 in Texas. If they are not with an adult they will be "checked out" by the local police. SO, if you are taking an older kid on a field trip just make sure you are with them and that they did not go alone for very long. Just to avoid any hassle. If for some reason, (I have never met anyone who this happened to.) Someone from the local school district shows up asking why your kid is not in school you simply say you have made other educational arrangements for the child. You are not obligated to explain anything to them. Or even open the door to them for that matter. I find they tend to treat home schooling parents like we are crazy. After all, THEY went to school to learn how to teach. My kids are currently enrolled at Harmony Science Academy. ONLY because I have one child who is a social butterfly and just needed more interaction with people than she was getting at home. Even with ballet, church, and jujitsu, oh and play group. I love the school it is a small school in # of students. My eldest kids (now 25 & 20)went to local public schools and had about 800 kids in elem. The public schools now seem to be out of control with the politically correct mess and everything is now a felony. Like, writing your name on a bathroom wall. Considered a felony because it happened on school premises. I actually have a neighbor who's kid went to alternative school because of this. He had to go for about 1/2 the year. He was an A student and he made one bad choice and they put him in with gang members and such. The public school have too many kids and many kids get lost in the mess. Issues like length of hair take up precious time. It is nonsense. Harmony goes from k-12 and we don't have 800 students all together. We have about 30 kids in each grade level (2-3 classes per grade level) and my kids get a lot more one on one. Plus as a charter school they are not required to deal with or even take children with behavioral issues. We are not set up to offer them the help they need. Our Dean of Students and the rest of the staff very much have the attitude "if you are not here to learn then you need to find another school". We have a waiting list to get in and I have found that only those parents who are active in schooling of their kids tend to go to our school. We do not offer transportation even on field trips. We do not get the billions that NEISD or NISD get. SO, our parents all pitch in together to help the kids. If not for this school my kids would be back at home doing the Texas Tech program. I love the school. We have been open 3 years and received an Exemplary rating from TEA each year. We are at 151 & 410 in the school building behind Home Depot. We are at the corner of cable ranch and lakeshore. Again though, I do firmly believe in Home Based education. I have done it and might do it again. Best of luck to you in your schooling efforts. God Bless and take care.

We just withdrew my oldest from public school this month. He had just finished kindergarten. I have 3 younger children who will also be homeschooled.

When my husband and I started considering it, I read Mary Pride's Complete Guide to Homeschooling. It is a HUGE book that answered all of my questions. I felt very confident after reading her book. I then read through Cathy Duffy's Top 100 Curriculum. What I liked most about that book was how each curriculum was scored by the learning style it best fit.

Southeast Texas Home School Association just had it's annual conference back in June. www.sethsa.org

We are also members of HLSDA and THSC.

We are super excited!!! In fact, we have already started teaching Math since it is my son's favorite subject.

I, personally, bought my curriculum from www.timberdoodle.com

I hope you enjoy this new adventure!!

I agree with all of the other moms that there are no requirements. I further agree to join HSLDA. My recommendation for homeschooling is Sycamore Academy. They have everything you need right down to daily lesson plans. Best wishes!

Correction for J.S.'s comment: [In Texas your requiered to do 180 days of lessons. How long those lessons take and what they consist of is up to you.]

According to the Texas Home School Coalition & the Home School Legal Defense Assoc. Texas homeschools are NOT required to meet for any certain number of days:

The Texas Education Code requires that public schools meet 180 days per year; public school students must attend 170 days/year. This ruling applies to public schools only. Home schools in Texas are private schools, and the state of Texas does not regulate the number of days per year that private schools must be in session or the number of days a student must attend.

Thank you for your response Jamie. The curriculum that you choose is so important. Our company uses TTISD to work with our students. Because it is accredited, students can transfer back in without having to test into the school district. Their curriculum is honored by all the districts in the Houston area. It also is a great and challenging curriculum as well. I recommend it too.

If you plan to do this in Texas, go to the website for Texas Home School Coalition and check out what they have to say.

We are considered private schools and are required to teach, in a bona fide manner, courses in: Spelling, Reading, Writing, Arithmetic and Good Citizenship. No taks, no attendence, no paperwork...which is good because there is not a moment to spare for all the things family life and schooling itself require.

There is a wonderful convention at the Woodlands near Houston that will have speakers (like Sally Clarkson) that are very encouraging in your efforts to parent and school your children, this August.

Your first step isn't necessarily to pick curriculum, (though its always the most tempting :) but to dream a little, pray, consider your style, and children's styles, for learning and look for inspiration from folks who have done this awhile. Time and family growth are the blessings home schooling gives. Super blessings to you as you look into this.

If your children have never been to public school then there are no requirements. If they have been to school then you just need to inform the school that you plan to homeschool your child. It really is that simple. I have been homeschooling for 3yrs.

You have a lot of freedom home schooling in Texas. We have been so blessed to have this as part of our lives for the past several years. The high school graduation requirements are found here: http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/student.assessment/resource...

There are many great options for curriculum too...you'll find your way!!! Best wishes!!!

Hello Y.,
I didn't closely read all of the responses, but the few I did read failed to mention that not all curriculum is created equal. Should you choose to change your mind and enroll in private or public school later on, you may encounter problems with transferability of the courses your child completed. This happened to my little sister when she was in high school years ago. My parents pulled her out to home school her for a couple of years before they eventually enrolled her in a private Christian school. Unfortunately not all of her courses (which are still out there being used today) were considered equivalent and she had to repeat several classes during her freshman year at the Christian school.

We pulled our daughter out of public school last January to improve her failing grades. The curriculum choices were pretty overwhelming and we weren't quite sure just how long we wanted to home school. We were pressed for time and wanted to leave the option of later transferring to a private or public school open. So after researching, we chose to enroll her in an accredited program that was sure to transfer no matter what we later chose to do. Texas Tech University Independent School District (TTUISD) is a division of the University that is an accredited public school that is a TEA approved distant learning program and will transfer anywhere you go. In fact, several of the textbooks that she used in her public school are the same that she's using with TTUISD. I also love the fact that they handle all of her grades so there is no question about how much she did on her own. We submit her completed lessons via fax or mail and they are graded and sent back with notes from her teacher. Final exams are proctored (through one of your choosing but approved by TTUISD). They are mailed by TTUISD directly to the proctor and then the proctor mails the completed test back to TTUISD for grading. (We use the local community college where they only charge homeschoolers $5 to come in and take tests in their testing center.) We check her grades online in a secure site with a login ID and password and once the semester is finished they mail us an actual hard copy report card for our records. As for her religious training, we are very involved in our church, listen to Christian radio and read Christian books that I order online.

I recommend TTUISD if not permanently, at least temporarily while you are spending the countless hours researching the hundreds of other programs out there! You can checkout TTUISD online at www.k12.ttu.edu.

Good luck and God Bless!
J. F.

Hi,

I had a great experience homeschooling my son in 3rd and half of 4th grades. Would have kept it up, but had to go back to work full-time. One of the greatest things for us was being part of local home school groups - if you're in Austin, I recommend you find Austin Area Homeschoolers (AAH) is the best!! It's a secular, loosely strung-together group of a couple of hundred families - there are meetings; get-togethers; clubs; resources and shared information; a forum for getting people together for a project, a field trip, or just for fun; old hands to help newcomers. In fact, here's a newcomers' guide AAH maintains: http://www.geocities.com/austinareahomeschoolers/online/.

One more suggestion: do a look-up of "unschooling."

Best wishes on finding the right education solution for your children! - J.

Hi Y.,
There are several programs out there that are acceptable to the state of Texas. I would choose a christian based plan and you can get these and other suggested plans at Mardell Book Stores. They can also advise you on the most acceptable ones under Texas state education laws.
good luck and blessings

We home schooled 2 of our 3 children. Requirements, Reading, Writing, Math and Good Citizenship. In high school I used the A Beke Video Program and it was great. But in the younger years we used many different programs, so what ever works for you. Do lots of field trips and join a home school group they will have some co-op classes including music. We co-op music and biology and PE. If you do not like one home school group keep looking until you find one that fits your family. Ours was not religious based and all religions belonged to it. My kids are very successful in life.
Colleges like home school kids as well.