Are you a Type A homeschooling mom who tends to over-schedule and struggle to find balance in your homeschool approach? Here are some tips for keeping the heart in your homeschool as a Type A mom.
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How “Type A” Moms Can Homeschool From The Heart
Are you a Type A mom like me? Do you love your spreadsheets and your curriculum research? Have you googled your state education standards and aligned your education goal accordingly?
Anyone?
If you’re any bit a #nerdmom like me, you might relate to a key moment of my homeschooling journey.
There I was, trucking merrily along with the curriculum I’d chosen for this year.
Things were going well. We were getting through the pages without too much difficulty. We were getting the work done.
But then I started to feel like something might be missing. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Could it be that all the busy work was choking out the valuable benefits that made me want to homeschool in the first place?
I wanted freedom and wonder to play a key part in my homeschooling days, but I was stressing constantly about not getting all the work done.
One of my anxieties coming into my first year of compulsory education was not knowing if I would be able to be disciplined enough to “check all the boxes” every day. What if I neglected History because I was too focused on Math? What if my daughter can read at a 2nd grade level but doesn’t know how to do double digit addition? That’s why I originally ended up with Heart of Dakota for our curriculum. I loved that there were boxes for each subject. I put a post it note on each box and then advanced it to the next day as we finished them. It made me feel like I was covering all the bases and doing what I was supposed to be doing.
But I have to tell you – after awhile it felt like something was missing.
Something started stirring in my heart. There are so many wonderful benefits to schooling our children in our homes and I began to realize I was missing out on them. I was so worried about keeping up with the public school system that I lacked the courage to allow my heart to guide my approach to educating my children.
I decided it was time to reevaluate my homeschool goals.
It wasn’t about what subjects or levels I wanted my daughters to complete by the end of the year. I realized I had dreams & visions about what I wanted them to fully absorb over the entire breadth of their education and I knew I had to write those down and study them.
My dad always taught me: “Until you know where you’re going, you’ll never figure out how to get there.” I decided I needed to take a break and figure out where I wanted my kids to end up at the end of their homeschooling journey.
So as I went about my day I wrote down every dream, vision, and goal that came into my heart and mind for my kids’ education and growth.

You can see the evolution of my approach to school with my class schedule on the right (we hardly follow this ever!)
Here’s the list I came up with:
Our Family Goals For Life & Education:
- Curiosity Driven Learning
- Effortless Recall Of Math Facts
- Love & Joy In Reading
- Research & Effectively Communicate Discoveries Through Report Writing & Presenting
- Exploration Of Nature
- Freedom In Artistic Expression (Facilitate With Stocked, Organized Craft Bucket)
- Love & Appreciation of Music
- Skilled In Growing Food
- Lifestyle Of Eating Healthy
- Operating As A Family Unit
- Self Responsibility
- Have A REAL 2-Way Relationship With Jesus
This is simply my first draft of visions and goals for our education and I’m open to it growing and changing. Having a list like this helps me to take another look at how I’m educating my children to make sure that I’m accurately representing what I feel God is calling me to focus on during their childhoods. I don’t want to be so focused on checking boxes of their curriculum that I miss the entire point completely.
Do you have a similar list?
Here are some list writing tips for us Type A moms to make sure we’re keeping our heart in homeschooling:
- Imagine your children when they’re 18 and write down the character traits, values & learning methods you desire that they have.
- Write down all the reasons you wanted to homeschool in the first place. Don’t let it get too logical – us Type A’s need to allow ourselves to use feelings as a reason sometimes!
- Discover and record all the things your kids love best about homeschooling. What wonderful things would they miss out on if they had to go to public school?
- Put your Type A skills to use! Compile all your above answers into one list of goals & dreams for homeschooling. Then create a brainstorming page (a.k.a. brain dump) of activities and approaches you can use to bring about the items on your goals & dreams list. For example, if you want to take more nature walks and let your kids direct their own study, you could add self-directed research projects to your brain dump list. Why not go for a hike and let your kids pick something they were curious about on their walk to study further? The possibilities are as endless as your children’s imaginations!
Don’t panic if you’re not checking all of your boxes every day. Remember to give yourself grace every day and travel in the direction of your goals. Doing so will bring amazing fruit I just know it!
I hope you found these ideas helpful. If you’re interested in more curiosity driven projects, you may like these free printables on my website:
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Linked Up At:
Made For Kids at The Resourceful Mama/ The Educators’ Spin On It / What Joy Is Mine / The Modest Mom Blog / Parent Teacher Meet Up / A Mama’s Story / Titus 2 Tuesdays on Cornerstone Confessions / Thoughtful Spot on P Is For Preschooler / Mommy Monday on Mrs. A Ok / Meetup Monday on The Quinntessential Mommy /Chaotic Bliss Homeschooling / Good Tips Tuesday / Laugh And Learn at Los Gringos Locos / Hip Homeschool Moms / True Aim Mom’s Library / Turn It Up Tuesday at Epic Mommy Adventures / A Little Bird Told Me / Resources and Solutions For Moms at Crystal & Co. / Ducks N A Row Wonderful Wednesday Blog Hop / Frugal Mommas / From House To Home at I Choose Joy / Tell It To Me Tuesdays / Hearts For Home / Happy Home Life/ Learning Kid Link Up at Tree Valley Academy / Dear Homeschooler / Family Fun Friday at Happy and Blessed Home / Homeschool Creations / Growing In Grace / TGI Saturdays / Mama Shares Monday
On more challenging days it definitely helps me to go back to my why. And to take a few days off to give everyone a break!
Ah yes, taking a break is good medicine sometimes! Thanks for stopping by :0)
How easy it is to be distracted from the things on our hearts. I love your process you share here. All the best as you realign your efforts with your goals.
You are so sweet, thank you for the encouragement! 🙂
Thank you so much for sharing your heart and wisdom. It is definitely easy to let things distract us or knock us of course. It’s good to see how others get back on track. Visiting you from Hip Homeschool Hop.
Thanks so much for visiting! :0)
Thanks for linking up at the Thoughtful Spot Blog Hop! 🙂
This is a fantastic post. Thank you for sharing! And thank you for linking up on my link up party this week!
You are so encouraging, thank you!
This is a great reminder that everyone needs. I love having the freedom to teach from real world experiences. I think it’s most meaningful that way.
Definitely – I was a straight A student in high school but only studied according to what would earn me the grade. I hardly remember anything! I want my kids to fully understand what they’re learning. Thanks so much for stopping by 🙂
We recently came to this same conclusion; something has been missing. When I reevaluated, I realized my #1 priority needs to be discipleship. We already had the material to work with, it was just a matter of being intentional and implementing this into our schedule. We are back on track, praise the Lord! Visiting you today via TGI Saturday.
Thanks so much for stopping by! I’m so thankful that God puts that stir in our hearts to lead us onto the right track. My husband and I have talked a few times about wishing we were more involved with our church but then realizing that we are full-on discipling three people (our kids). It’s all perspective 🙂 Thanks for commenting!
[…] Putting The Heart Back Into Homeschooling & Curiosity Driven Reports For PK1Kids […]
You have wonderful goals and i wish you lots of luck on your homeschooling journey. If i have to pick just one goal to talk about today, i pick independent thinking. I want my kids to think for themselves and be confident in their decision making skills.
Thank you so much for your encouragement <3 Independent thinking is definitely a top goal. Thanks for stopping by 🙂
Gardening wise – now is the time to plant winter crops like garlic, onions, peas, lettuce, carrots, etc. We have had good luck with garlic and peas especially. I find it easier in the winter as the rain mostly takes care of watering, and the weeds are much slower growing.
Here via Learning Kid link up.
This is good advice. I’m a newbie homeschooler and haven’t really thought about goals yet.
So glad you stopped by. I hope you find some other fun things on my site 🙂
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[…] found this post – Putting The Heart Back Into Homeschooling – quite helpful when it comes to setting goals in your […]
[…] Putting The Heart Back Into Homeschooling & Curiosity Driven Reports For PK1Kids […]
Amazing post! I love that you wrote down all of the dreams and visions of your heart. So great to visit with you tonight! Thank you so much for sharing! GOD bless you, Love! 🙂
Great list! Thank you for sharing. I can say from experience (21 years of homeschooling and at least 18 more to go lol!) that it is great you learned this early!
[…] my recent overhaul of my homeschooling approach, I completely changed how I approached every subject. Instead of checking off boxes in my original […]
Such a good post and encouragement to look at the big picture when homeschooling! Looking at what you want to accomplish for your family personally is such a good insight. Good work, mama!
You’re so encouraging, thank you for stopping by! 🙂
[…] featured post this week is Putting the Heart back into Homeschooling from PK1 Homeschool Fun. It’s so easy to get carried away by the check marks and loose […]
[…] featured post this week is Putting the Heart back into Homeschooling from PK1 Homeschool Fun. It’s so easy to get carried away by the check marks and loose […]