The notion that home schooling is much less expensive than sending your child to an educational institution is prevalent, but not necessarily true. This is because there are many hidden costs that are present and is really not obvious at first glance.

Firstly, you will have to get the curriculum issue sorted. There are out of the box curriculum that is available for a fee varying between $300 and $1500. However if you have a teaching background or some prior knowledge of homeschooling this is not required.

Then you will have to consider the cost of supplies that will help your children with their studies. This includes stuffs such as books, workbooks pens and pencils. The costs of reference materials such as Encyclopedias need also to be included in the budget. In certain cases, there is also the need for subscriptions to online information databases.
These costs can easily be reduced if you want to by buying used books and by visiting yard sales.

Costs of furniture and equipments should also not be overlooked. In order to study in the best condition your children will need to have access to a good desk and chairs. This can indeed encourage greater concentration and better understanding. There is also the need for a computer or laptop for the student to work properly. However, in certain families these costs are not a big issue because the parents already have all these equipments ready.

You should also take into account the cost of certain curriculum. Special classes such as piano, dancing or photography can only be taught by certain people. So, if you are seeking to give a quality education to your children you will have to put some dollars aside for these classes. Furthermore, certain classes such as history will require trips to museum and this should be catered for in the budget.

The costs for homeschooling a child can be difficult to calculate but an estimate will be in the range of $300 to $ 700 depending on the curriculum you choose, the books and stationeries you use, the furniture and equipment that your children will use and the amount of private tuitions that you will give to your kids.

Despite all these costs, that we have listed above there is still one cost that is not always obvious. It is the cost of having one parent not working. Indeed this can be more important if the parent has a degree and is not working in order to cater for the education of the children. In fact, research has shown that a mother staying at home, instead of working, costs the family an estimated $38,000 every year. This situation can be changed by the mother finding a part-time job or by working at home.

Writen by Dorothy Beckmann for homeschoolingexplained.com where you can find information on homeschooling, Home Schooling Requirements and more.

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