Home Schooled Children

One thing that confuses a lot of parents who home school is what records do you need to have when you are home schooling your child? Your state may give you a list of some records that you must keep and be ready to inspections at any given time, but what about other records that you may need for your child if they go to college or need school records.

Keeping records and accurate records is very important and sometimes a legal requirement. There are several ways that you can keep school records for your home school.  Here are some of the most common records that you will need to keep.

Immunization records for your child. If you ever decide to place your child in a public or private school, you will need these records.

Subjects taken and grades for subjects. If you state requires you to give a yearly test, you will want to keep a copy of those records also.  This is necessary if your child wants to attend college and they will need a transcript of what classes they have taken.

Attendance records. This usually is required by many states to have. You mark down then days that your child did attend your home school.

Extra curriculum activities that your child has done. Maybe they have volunteered for a non profit organization, or attends dance classes or gymnastics. You will want o keep track of these for college applications and how long they have attended. Also mention in the records any awards that they have gotten while doing the extra curriculum activities.

How to keep the records.

Journal: You can keep a journal that will show what they have learned and achieved. This may include grades for the subjects and major tests that they have completed. You could keep track of which textbooks that you have used, and how many pages you have covered in that book.

Computer Program: You could set up a program on your computer or purchase computer programs that will sort everything that you have covered and your goals, so that you can plan lessons in advance. You can use Word Excel to set this up and keep track of what was taught, and what you need to teach.

A Daily Planning Calendar. You can use a simple calendar that you write what you have done, and what you have covered for that day. It’s a great way to keep up with everything, and you can keep the calendars for many years.

Portfolios.

This is where you can elaborate on what you have taught, and what you have learned, this could also include awards, and drawings that you child has done, it can be a progressive portfolio and include many different things. This would be harder to find paperwork that you are looking for as opposed to other record keeping ways, but this is more detailed.

You can set up different folders for your home schooled children and keep all the records that you need to keep. It is totally up to you on how you want o keep your records. But you will have to keep records over the years when you are homeschooling. Find an easy way that you can keep up with record keeping daily, whatever is easiest for you to keep track of your child’s progress in home school.