Just like no two kids are alike, every homeschool family will be different. If you are choosing to homeschool overseas, you’ll find some interesting aspects you’ll want to address. Whatever the reason may be for finding an alternative to the local school, homeschooling can be a very good solution for families living overseas and it can be accomplished with just a little bit of creativity and the right kind of information.
What is Overseas Homeschooling?
Homeschooling overseas is much like homeschooling is in the U.S. Instead of being taught in a traditional school setting, the child is taught from home.
If I Homeschool Overseas Who Will Teach My Child?
There’s more than one right answer to this question. It just depends on what works best for both you and your child. Many parents in the United States reserve the position as “teacher” for themselves. But living overseas with corporate benefits that cover tuition costs, many “expats” are open to another interesting concept — hiring a teacher or tutor to do the teaching for them.
Hiring someone outside of the family to do the teaching offers some great advantages.
1. Having a teacher who is familiar with learning disabilities or the challenges of teaching a gifted child can relieve a lot of the pressure, especially if the diagnosis is new.
2. When living internationally and away from family and friends, your personal social life will never be more important. Remaining active and social is a critical element to overcoming culture shock. Having an outside teacher and a good homeschool schedule can create a healthy balance for the entire family.
How Can You Afford to Pay for a Private Teacher?
Many employers are open to using the tuition that would normally be applied towards a very expensive international school (where tuition can run into many thousands of dollars a year per child), and putting it towards homeschooling instead. Explain your situation to your employer and ask for what may be considered a special consideration. It’s important to remember that most companies have placed a large investment in their international service employees who themselves have committed to three to five-year assignments. Employers choose to be more flexible under those circumstances.
Online Options for Homeschool Overseas
Keystone National High School
- Allows you to study on your own time and at your own pace. You will develop time management and organizational skills along the way.
- Provides you and your family with the latest distance learning techniques, one-on-one instruction from certified teachers, guidance and support, and unlimited access to the greater Keystone community.
- Offers 60+ online and correspondence courses as part of an award-winning curriculum so you can personalize your education.
- Offers simple single fee pricing: tuition costs include textbooks and course materials—there are no hidden fees.
Today, more than 20,000 students are enrolled at Keystone National High School.
The benefits of using Keystone: It’s accredited and they have 30 Years of Distance Learning Experience. They are flexible with an open enrollment and students can study at their own time and pace. Graduates receive a valid high school diploma. Past students have been accepted at over 140 colleges and universities through an award-winning Program and Curriculum. Keystone can also help with credit completion.
Time4Learning
Time4Learning is a convenient, online homeschool curriculum that combines education and online fun. Students can customize learning to fit their exact mastery levels. Time4Learning allows families to access the grade above and below the one they choose.
The Time4Learning homeschooling curriculum gives students independence as they progress at their own pace. Parents like that it tracks progress through the curriculum and helps kids advance by teaching with an individualized curriculum that assures mastery of the skills and concepts that makes kids succeed. Time4Learning is proven effective, has a low monthly price, and provides a money-back guarantee so you can make sure that it works for your kids, risk-free.
Time4Learning is a great homeschool education partner because it offers each child their own learning path, with animated lessons, interactive activities, unit assessments, and integrated printable worksheets for reinforcement.
The Christian Liberty Academy School System
The Christian Liberty Academy School System (CLASS) is an independent and non-denominational K–12 home school program. CLASS was established in 1967 by Dr. Paul Lindstrom (1939–2002), a pioneer of the modern home school movement. CLASS has helped thousands of families to get started—and succeed—in homeschooling. Today, CLASS consists of thousands of home schools throughout the United States and around the world, with students ranging in age from four to adult. CLASS graduates are being accepted by leading colleges, universities, and military academies.
Citizens’ High School
Since 1981, Citizens’ High School provides quality coursework for people to earn an actual high school diploma, not a GED, from an Accredited High School Program. Citizens’ High School serves a wide variety of special groups: teenagers from home school families in all 50 states; children of American families living overseas; students unable to pursue their education in a resident setting due to unique personal situations, family or work commitments, illness, or handicaps; and professional athletes and entertainers. Citizens’ High School provides a 9th – 12th grade high school diploma program accredited by the Accrediting Commission of the Distance Education and Training Council.
When using a distance learning school, keep in mind that, unlike a traditional school, the only person responsible for making sure grades and transcripts are complete is you. Homeschooling requires more than just teaching on your part; it requires following up with the distance school to make sure your child’s work has been received, evaluated, and given a documented grade. And continue to follow up until you know that the school on the other end has done its job.
What Does “Accreditation” Mean?
It means that the homeschool or homeschool academy has been inspected by an outside, independent agency that has determined it to meet accepted standards for schools. These standards include the seriousness of the course of studies, the managing of academic records, accounting practices, and business practices.
What do I Need to Begin Homeschool Overseas?
1. A teacher
If you choose to be the teacher, move on to step number two, but if you’ve decided to hire, then you need to begin looking for a teacher soon.
Where to find a teacher:
To find someone outside of your home to guide both you and your child through the homeschool process, you’ll need to first determine what kind of teacher you’ll need. Maybe it’s someone familiar with learning disabilities or a particular style of teaching. If so, then get as close to the source as you can. For example, an after-school tutor, the unemployed spouse of a school teacher or friend, a stay-at-home mom/ex-teacher looking for part-time work, or try recruiting a budding teacher from a local teacher training school.
But by far the most effective way to find anything out while overseas, is through the word of mouth that the expatriate community is so famous for — especially among U.S. embassy employees where people are coming and going all the time. Try advertising in the local American/Canadian/Australian/British Association monthly newsletters. Advertising for members is often free.
Keep An Open Mind
When making the final decision of which person to hire, always remember that trust in this situation is vital. The homeschool teacher will be alone with your child much of the time and the quality of work your child puts out will be a direct reflection of the quality of teacher you have hired. He or she must be someone who comes highly recommended (ask for references) with a clean track record and qualified to teach in the manner you see fit. Good chemistry between the outside teacher and your child is also very important, but the chemistry you have with the teacher is just as important. You will be spending a lot of time together.
2. Space.
3. Supplies.
A communication notebook (if someone other than yourself is teaching), a whiteboard (You can go to a local hardware store’s cut wood section and find wall size whiteboards that you can hang on our classroom wall), craft/art supplies, a homework reward chart, a large desk with plenty of light, and a computer.
Sometimes families living outside the U.S. may have trouble finding atlases, maps, and posters, and even the right kind of handwriting notebooks so you may want to pick these up in an American school supply store before you leave. It will hardly cost a thing and will add very little weight to your probably already over-weight luggage.
3. Text Books from an Accredited Distance Learning School.
4. A schedule.
The beauty of homeschooling is that you can be flexible enough to be flexible. A homeschooler’s day is typically shorter than the traditional school day because of its condensed style of learning. Many parents only need to devote three to four hours a day to structured learning, and their schedules vary depending on how many of their children are being home-schooled or by when their child is most alert and at his best.
5. Time.
You will need to arrange your personal time accordingly. If you will be teaching, all your out-of-house social activities and errands (coffees, lunches, lessons, the grocery store) will need to be scheduled before or after homeschooling. If you’ve hired a teacher, you may choose to be home at lunchtime or to shuttle your child to after-school activities. Obviously, having an outside teacher offers more flexibility to the parent.
6. When working with a hired teacher, you will need to establish some “house rules.”
A few situations to consider:
- Personal phone and computer use. Make it clear when and where phone calls can be made, whose phone they should be made from, and how and in what manner the computer should be used.
- Lunch hour. Thirty to forty-five minutes is a good lunch hour for the teacher and a good lunch and break/recess for your child. It’s a good idea for teachers and students to eat and spend that time separately for a true break in the day.
- Paid vacation and sick days. How many? What are the guidelines for calling in sick? How much time in advance should the teacher give for vacation days?
- Tardies. What happens when the teacher arrives late several mornings in a row?
Get all house rules in writing to prevent future misunderstandings.
7. After establishing ground rules, you and your teacher will need to decide on responsibilities.
How to Socialize With Homeschool Overseas?
Socialization comes in many different forms for children — birthday parties, sports, children of parents’ workmates, play dates, organizations like Girl Scouts/Boy Scouts and of course, in the traditional school setting. Many parents are fearful of homeschooling because such a large part of children’s socialization comes from their time spent with classmates. And when living overseas, there is the additional fear that their child might miss out on making connections with the local culture. But with just a little creativity and asking around, a good balance can be found between homeschooling and friends.
1. Just ask.
If you were in the U.S., you might go to the local public school and ask to have your child participate in their physical education program or in the after-school activities — so why can’t you do that right where you are now? By approaching the principal or headmaster and explaining your homeschool situation, chances are they will be happy to include your child in the school’s after-school activities (this is especially so if the child has siblings already attending the school).
Being a part of the international schools (or other local English-taught schools) after-school programs not only gives your son or daughter a chance to make friends, but also helps them pick up what they might be missing at home — art, sports, and a language. (* The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of America are truly global organizations, tending to be non-school affiliated, meaning that generally speaking, no special arrangements need to be made with the host school — only with the leaders.)
2. Encourage “play dates.”
Once a week, have your child pick a friend to come over and play.
3. Consider adding other children to your homeschool.
Chances are you’re not the only one experiencing a school crisis, so why not add another child to the home school environment you’ve already created? You’d not only be helping someone else but giving your child a classmate or two, and if you plan to return to a traditional school in the future it encourages a more realistic school environment with noises and raised hands.
4. Some employers will pay for activities that would normally take place in a traditional school setting.
Once again, ask around. Find out what some of your child’s closest friends are doing and enroll him in the same sport or organization, either in a school or through a club or gym. And to step outside the “expatriate bubble” for a few hours a week, try finding an instructor that teaches in the country’s native language and where teammates are most likely made up of different nationalities.
Places Where Parents can Find Support and Guidance for Homeschool Overseas
Support can come from the teacher you correspond with at the distance learning school (to make international phone calls cheaper, check out Whatsapp), international and national online support, websites meant to lend a helping hand to parents of children with learning disabilities, homeschool newsletters, books (Amazon.com delivers internationally with no hassles and usually within the week) and other parents of local homeschooled children. Seek out and use these resources, especially as problems arise to find or offer new solutions.
