Amy Knepper - Blueprint Homeschooling: How to Plan a Year of Home Education That Fits the Reality of Your Life

I always thought writing a book was a secret and solitary achievementa thing that you do by yourself in a quiet room when no one is looking. Boy, was I wrong. I am eternally grateful to the many people who have supported and encouraged me through the two-year long process of writing, editing, and publishing Blueprint Homeschooling.

I owe the idea itself to the families in the Lewis County Elementary Homeschool Co-op, who asked for help and advice as they started homeschooling and then encouraged me to write a book about my ideas. I am eternally grateful to Sarah Gallagher, whose consistent nagging forced me to keep working when I wanted to quit. Christy Johnson, Angela Wilcox, Janessa Anzelini, Stella Eiswald, and many others will see themselves in my stories. Thank you for being a part of my life.

My move to California introduced me to the Arroyo Verde Explorers, the best group of homeschoolers in Southern California. I feel blessed to be part of such a welcoming group. Holly, Nichole, Gabi, Michelle, Crystal, Bruce, and anyone else who listened to me rattle on about this and made the mistake of telling me it was a good ideathank you.

It's still hard for me to believe that I was able to get Karen Conlin from Grammargeddon as my editor, but I'm so glad she agreed to work with me! She cleaned up my words and made them shine, and for that, I am incredibly grateful.

I never would have called myself a writer without meeting my tribe: Amy Ryding, Liz Kellebrew, Larry Roth, and Holly St. Clair. I'm thankful we're on this journey together. My writing has only improved since meeting the generous writers in the Writers' Discussion Group and the Pixel-Stained Writers community on Google+. It would take pages to list everyone, but I'm especially thankful to John Ward, Nathan Lowell, and Lisa Cohen, who made me believe I was up to the challenge. The Warren, the Shively, my arch-nemesis Rachel Desilets, Hobgoblin Greg, Jon Stone, Maya, Marti, and Masha have all kept me going when things were tough. Thank you all.

My parents always told me I could be whatever I wanted to be and meant it, and I'm thankful for their unconditional love and encouragement. I also have some of the most awesome kids in the world. I'm not sure I could do it without their constant cheerleading and ideas.

And last, but not least, I am incredibly thankful for my husband and best friend forever, Dave. He makes me laugh. I can't think of anything in life worth more than that.

For Sarah, Angela, and Janessa, because they asked.

This book isn't really about planning. After you've gone through it, you'll have a great plan for your school year, but that's just a bonus. This book is really about dreaming, envisioning, discovering, and preparing an ideal year of homeschooling for your whole family. Rather than having you fill in a bunch of charts and calendars, I will walk you through the process of discovering why you homeschool, what you hope each of your children will get out of homeschooling, and how you will make those dreams happen with a solid, workable plan.

By the time you're done reading this book and working through some of the questions and projects included in each section, you'll have two plans, or blueprints, for your year. Your first blueprint will be the one for your dream home: your ideal homeschool year. If you had unlimited time, energy, money, and resources, this is the plan you would go with. Your second blueprint will be the one for the house you live in while you build your dream home. This is the homeschool year that is interrupted by illnesses, unplanned activities, unexpected visitors, and those days when no one, including you, wants to do anything.

I think it is rare for two families to have the same dream for their homeschool year. Just as people live in all sorts of different houses, they will value different things in the education of their children. One homeschool year might be like living in an igloo: streamlined and simple and short on amenities. Another family's homeschool year might be like Disneyland: full of costume parties, beautiful images, and sensational experiences. Your ideal year will probably fall somewhere in between those two extremes.

I have been homeschooling my two children for six years now. When I first started, I felt like I was wandering down a dark hallway, looking for a light switch. What do I teach? What do I need to prepare? What supplies do I need? Am I doing this right? Am I really qualified for this? What if I miss something important?

The planning process in this book is the way I answer all those questions. I have been planning this way for four years. Every year is a little different from the last, but each time I go through this process I get a clearer view of the work ahead and more confidence that I can complete it. As you go through the process, you'll find your values, set your goals, and then choose some very concrete ways of managing your expectations through the school year. You'll also learn some tricks to keep encouragement visible so that you don't fall prey to winter despair and give up. I hope this process will help you as much as it has helped me.

Blueprint Homeschooling is for anyone looking for a better way to plan a homeschool year. Maybe you're brand new to homeschooling and you're looking for help getting started. I hope this book encourages you and offers ideas about how to make it work for you and your family.

Maybe you're a veteran homeschooler with a few wild years already under your belt. Maybe you feel like you're missing something or it seems like things are too hectic. Maybe you're like me and need a little encouragement and some fresh ideas to liven things up a bit. I hope you find something here to help you keep going.

Maybe you aren't a homeschooler yet, but you're considering your educational options. In that case, I hope this book helps you better visualize what homeschooling might look like for your family.

Blueprint Homeschooling contains a variety of tasks and exercises you can do to help you plan a full year of homeschooling activities in advance. I recommend you read through it twiceonce to get an overview of the process, and a second time in order to answer the questions and do the project suggestions that you find helpful.

I've arranged this book to take a top-down approach to planning. At the beginning, we'll be exploring values and answering the big question: "Why?" We're going to talk about the things that are most important to you as a person, as an educator, and as a homeschooling family. Please don't skip this step. I think it's the most important part of the whole process. Find your big picture first, and all those little details will fall into place.

After exploring values, we'll talk about the different methods you might use that would fit your values for education. I'll offer some different ideas to help you find the curriculum or methods that would be of most value for you. While you read, I want you to keep an open mind about your family and your methods. You've probably been told a lot of things about what you should do and how you should go about this thing called homeschooling. Forget all that for a little bit and use this process to imagine the best possible methods for you and your family.

After that, we'll talk about goal setting. This is where you'll dream up some possibilities for long-term goals and then whittle them down to things you can do this year, this month, or even this week. Then, and only then, we'll get to calendars and charts and all the nuts and bolts that keep things going during the year. I'll show you how to look ahead through your year to block out time for recurring events and holidays. I'll show you how to educate in the midst of your busiest seasons. We'll break everything down by months, weeks, and days so you can see exactly how much time and effort you and your children will be putting in to meet your goals. We'll adjust those schedules to make them more realistic, dropping or adding things as needed.