Many people wonder what homeschoolers do all day. Do they get enough subjects in or do they just sit around and watch TV? It is said that public school children actually get 1 hour and 34 minutes of instruction time in a day. The rest of the time is spent on administrative tasks like switching classes, handing out papers, dealing with discipline issues, giving instructions, etc. I believe that homeschool students learn more subjects and have more productive learning time for these reasons:

1. Parents have a vested interest in seeing their child learn and succeed. If the student doesn't succeed or learn enough, usually the parent is to blame. Granted, there are homeschool parents that do no take this initiative, but for the most part, homeschool parents take more initiative and are more driven to pursue ideas and books that can enrich their child's learning environment. Parents have a natural and biological drive to help their children succeed, which in homeschooling drives them to pursue positive educational ideas and books.

2. Parents know their children better than anyone else. They can use the time that they have with their children to interject comments and instruction that they know will be interesting to their child. This can be done on evenings and weekends, even, when most people think that learning can't take place. Parents are teaching something all the time whether they know it or not. As the old saying goes, "More is caught than taught."

3. Homeschooling time is more like tutoring than dealing with a classroom of 25 students. Many children in public school receive one-on-one tutoring which increases their learning. Homeschooling is basically a tutoring time that is very focused and geared toward the individual needing help. Therefore, more subjects can be taught in a shorter period of time.

Not only do homeschoolers teach the "Three R's", reading, writing and arithmetic, they can teach a whole lot more than that based on the reasons given above. Here are just some of those extra subjects that can happen in the normal course of a homeschooling day: character development, time management skills, geology, fire safety, money management, nutrition, public speaking, traffic safety, music, patriotism, religion, cooking, current events and many more.

What should homeschoolers teach? Exactly what each child needs. Just as no 2 classrooms look alike, no 2 homeschools will look exactly alike. You need the basics subjects and then you can build from there.