Homeschooling While Working Full Time Is Possible

Have you been interested in homeschooling but you work full time? Wondering how you will fit homeschooling into your already busy schedule?  Wondering if you can afford to homeschool? Well, guess what… Homeschooling while working full time IS possible!

If you have not registered or enrolled your children yet, you can get a quick guide to register for homeschooling.

We work and are homeschooling our sons with a pretty tight budget.  We live in California where EVERYTHING is expensive.  Even our toilet paper! So if we can do it, you can too.

Before I get into how and what we decided on, let’s talk about private homeschooling versus public homeschooling.  The idea for both private and public is the same.  You get to use your preferred teaching style to teach your kids on your own time, using materials and methods you choose.  The goal is to help them excel academically and be more responsible as they get older.  The major differences between the two are listed below:

Public Homeschool:

• Your students must be enrolled in a public charter school. Charter schools are run by various organizations.  Enrollment deadlines depend on the school you choose.  Make sure the school you choose covers your county/area.
• Students and parents must meet with an Education Specialist (ES – your assigned supervising teacher who will follow your student/child’s progress).  This person provides you with a curriculum and grade standards.  He/she will meet with you and your student once a month. Your ES will ask for samples of your student’s work from required subjects, such as history, math, language arts, and science. They also check your student’s attendance.  If you have problems or concerns about your student, this person can help guide you in the right direction.  They have many resources to share with you, as they are your support person.
• Funding!  You will receive funding from the state to help you find the necessary resources to help educate your student.  Your funding can be used for books, materials, electronic materials, tablets, classes, sports, field trips, etc.  Remember, all purchases must be approved before reimbursement can be issued.  In most cases, your ES can help you with this.  All electronics must be returned at the end of the year.  In exchange for this funding, you must abide by their rules and curriculum.  Hence, the requirement to meet with an ES to check on your progress.

Private Homeschool:

• You are essentially running a private homeschool.  So your student(s) must enroll with your state’s department of education.  The enrollment deadline is usually early October.  To be safe, you should confirm with your state’s department of education.  For California residents, you must file an enrollment affidavit.
• There is no need for you to meet with an ES.  You will generate your own curriculum and teach accordingly.
• You will not receive any funding for your student.
• If you need support, you can get it through your community.  You can find group forums or Facebook groups for homeschoolers in your area.

We are new to homeschooling so we definitely saw value in an ES’s guidance and support. The funding portion definitely helped sway our decision. It also helped that we got along well with our ES.

Now let’s get into the specifics of how homeschooling while working full time is possible.

We started homeschooling when our eldest son began Kindergarten.  That meant the curriculum and standards were pretty basic and do not require much (expensive) materials to teach.  As your student advances in grade level, their materials will be getting more expensive.

The advantage parents have over teachers is that parents know their kids well. So we don’t have to spend much time figuring out the best way to teach our kids.

With our sons, they learn best when we turn things into a game or song.  So most of our teaching materials are out in nature or laying around our home or yard.  The only real materials we purchased were workbooks/worksheets and school supplies (paper, pencils, crayons, index cards, etc.).  

This post contains affiliate links and we may earn compensation when you click on the links on this page to purchase – at NO additional cost to you.  Please see our disclosure policy for details.

Homeschooling Materials (Workbooks)

Most workbooks should not put you over $20 each, they average about $5-15. You can purchase them anywhere, but as working parents of 3 little boys, Amazon is our preferred place to shop.  Below, we’ve listed a couple of workbooks we purchased and really liked.

School Zone – Big Kindergarten Workbook – Ages 5-6yo – Early Reading and Writing, Numbers 0-20, Matching, Story Order, and More – Our sons love this series.  If you only want to purchase one workbook, for now, this is a great start.  It has a little bit of everything for your Kindergartener.  There’s also one for first grade, second grade, third grade, and preschool.  See how your student responds to this workbook, then go from there.

Learning Resources All Ready for Kindergarten Readiness Kit – This is a great starter kit.  It comes with a variety of materials to help your student with counting, addition & subtraction, word building, and handwriting.  Basically, your one-stop-shop to get your Kindergartener started.

100 Write-and-Learn Sight Word Practice Pages – Sight words are all about repetition and memorization.  The activities in this workbook are great.  It is very clear and easy to follow.  Lots of repetition and pictures to help identify the word. Site words were hard to teach our sons, but this workbook made it easier.

Phonics for Kindergarten – Each word is accompanied by a drawing to help your student understand what they are writing and reading. There are also some stickers to help you reward your student – a great incentive for our boys.

DK’s Math Learn and Explore – I love anything from DK publishing.  Their worksheets are so simple and easy to understand. Simple design means less distraction for our short-attention-span boys.

Wipe Clean My Big Activity Workbook – Don’t like wasting paper?  How about a book you can write on over and over again with a dry erase marker?  We have this book and have used it well before our sons started Kindergarten.  It also makes a great travel activity book.

As you can see, the workbooks are quite affordable.  Therefore, most parents use their provided funding on extracurricular activities – sports, martial arts, music, swimming, etc.  Some parents use it to cover camps for their children.  Some opt to use it on electronics – small laptops, tablets, calculators, etc.  The only catch with electronics is you have to return those products at the end of the school year.  It’s all up to you how you spend your funding.  Just make sure they get approved by the school first.

Homeschooling Schedule

Scheduling time out to homeschool is a lot easier than most would think. It is possible to homeschool while working full time.

Think about it.  When you were in Kindergarten.  Did you spend more than an hour per subject in the classroom?  No.  You would spend about 20-30 minutes per subject. Keep in mind, your teacher had to make sure all 20 students understood the material/subject before moving on to the next subject.  And when you’re not covering a subject, you get two recess breaks, one lunch, and sometimes a nap break. The day gets broken down, a lot.

One of the best things about homeschooling is, you get to decide when and how you teach your student.  You can break up the time you spend teaching in multiple ways.  Making homeschooling while working full time very possible.

We usually teach a little bit in the morning before work, a little bit when you get home from work, a little bit right before dinner, and light reading right before bed. We use the weekends to catch up on topics we did not get a chance to cover during the week.  

Every month, we meet with our ES at a local library.  Show her our sons’ sample work from the subjects required.  We chat a bit about how things are going.  Then we part and move onto the next activity.

In short, you can make homeschooling as simple or as complicated as you want.  It’s a huge learning curve for your student AND YOU.  Let your student be your guide.  Have him/her guide you on how they learn best.  And most importantly, have fun and be creative!

Homeschooling while working full time is completely doable and possible. So many other families are doing it. You can do it!

If you like what you read or benefit from my article, please subscribe and join me on this journey of simplifying parenthood while working full-time.  And don’t forget to share it with your friends and family.

Stay healthy. Stay Warm. Stay Safe.

Peace & Blessings to you all!

Bahry & The Boys