Homeschool Record Keeping Reminders

Homeschool Picnic (Wikipedia)

by Lee Binz

Course descriptions are an important part of your homeschool student's high school records, because they give colleges a great picture of what your homeschool looked like. Good record keeping is key to creating those course descriptions.

If you don't keep good records, it will be hard to remember what you did, especially if you have multiple children. Use your records as the tools they are, and your course descriptions will be a breeze!

It's particularly easy to make a course description if you use a textbook. Keep a photocopy of the cover of the book and the table of contents, and you can create a whole course description with just that information. Another nice thing about using textbooks is that if you visit the publisher's website or catalog, they often have course descriptions there, already written out for you.

For the very easiest course description experience, keep track of everything you do that is educational, and use it to help write your course descriptions. If you go to a museum, put the receipt in your records binder (or however you keep your records). If your student creates a sculpture, take a picture and keep that in your records. Anytime you do anything or go anywhere educational, figure out where it fits, and keep a record of it.

Of course, you don't need to keep everything! Your child will take a lot of tests and write a lot of papers, but you don't have to keep each one. Just keep the ones that are out of the ordinary, special, or a good representation, and include them with your records.

It's important to remember that record keeping is not scrap booking! Those pretty pictures that you took of the state fair should be put in your scrap book and not in your record keeping. If you have a tall soccer trophy from when your child was in 5th grade and won most inspirational student, don't include that! That's a memento and not a part of your record keeping. Keep things that are academic in nature or things that are high school level.

Don't forget that it's relatively common for homeschool students to do high school level material when they are younger. If, for instance, your junior high student is doing Algebra right now, make sure to keep some records on Algebra even if they are not yet in 9th grade. It's academic, and it's high school level, so it goes on the record!

Did you know that failing to keep good homeschool records in high school is one of "The 5 Biggest Mistakes Parents Make When Homeschooling High School. Learn how to avoid all 5 mistakes in my free e-mail mini-course available on my website.

My Total Transcript Solution will show you how to create an AMAZING homeschool transcript that will impress the colleges!

Lee Binz, The HomeScholar, is a homeschool high school expert. Both her two boys earned full-tuition scholarships at their first choice university. Learn how she did it on www.TheHomeScholar.com.

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