Homeschooling is something that’s fast becoming the norm for many parents and children. Many mothers, in particular, are having to give up their jobs to homeschool their children to give them the best possible start in life because of an ineffective education system. This can be quite a lot of pressure for a parent; however, when it comes to earning potential, it might be something that could provide the light bulb moment many parents need. Homeschooling requires a number of skills that can turn into a career, either after the child has finished their education or alongside the homeschooling setup. So what can parents do to leverage their skills as a homeschooling parent and turn it into an amazing career?
Document the Skills You Are Developing, They’re All Useful
While it may not seem like it, you are cultivating a whole range of amazing soft skills. Even though you don’t have formal education qualifications, you are gaining valuable teaching experience. Take the time to identify the soft skills you are honing, such as adaptability, time management, organisation, problem-solving, and so much more.
When you start to look at the skills you are developing based on how you are adapting your role to your child, you may uncover a whole wealth of abilities you didn’t know you had that could, with a little bit more time and effort, translate into an excellent career choice. For example, if you are spending a lot of time creating learning materials for your child, it’s not an exaggeration that you could start to sell workbooks or educational resources that may help other homeschooling parents or educational organisations, but it all begins with the skills you are currently developing as a homeschooling parent.
One of the most amazing skills we have to develop as homeschooling parents is problem-solving as one of the biggest obstacles is that we have being a teacher to our children, not just a parent, which means changing the overall parent-child dynamics. This can translate into transferable skills that are at home in a wide range of industries:
- You learn how to express ideas clearly, and remain calm and understanding.
- Adapting your teaching styles.
- Balancing multiple responsibilities and schedules.
- Breaking down complex topics into simpler concepts.
- Facilitating group learning (if you are teaching siblings).
- Adjusting plans based on children’s needs and interests.
- Handling situations with resilience.
- Interpreting information and evaluating resources to guide instructional decisions.
There’s a huge range of transferable skills that you can develop through your homeschooling journey, and this doesn’t just mean an instant translation to jobs in the education sector, but community service, business, project management, and so much more can be skills you will be able to utilise because of your homeschooling prowess.
Of course, so many parents feel these aren’t worthwhile skills because they’ve been using them at home, but the key is to truly identify what you know you can do and highlight them in a way that appeals to hiring managers or just use your LinkedIn profile as a way to get an understanding of what types of roles would truly be suitable for you.
Seeking out the Right Opportunities
If you are homeschooling your children and are just starting out on this journey, it will take some time for you to get into the rhythm of things, but there may come a time when you have a solid schedule in place and you know how to teach your child effectively, in which case, you will then need to start seeking out opportunities that will provide you with additional income. The best place to be is to start looking for remote or flexible working arrangements that allow you to continue homeschooling your children. For many parents, this may seem like a pipe dream; however, since the pandemic, job seekers and indeed people in permanent roles have demanded a greater degree of flexibility.
It’s always worth starting out your job hunt by searching for flexible roles, even if it’s not necessarily the best fit for your skills. There’s a variety of freelance roles available, and you can look at numerous freelance websites to see what can work well for you. There could be many lucrative roles based on the workload; for example, copywriting, which can be an excellent transferable skill if you are creating your own easy-to-read educational resources, and is another transferable skill that you can highlight. However, there’s a variety of other virtual assistant-type roles that could be an excellent fit because of the diverse nature of the role, and sometimes being a virtual assistant just allows the person you are supporting to get on with the job they are meant to do, and they just require a little bit more organised into a spreadsheet or a calendar. This, again, is another transferable skill you will have as a homeschooling parent.
You can find many virtual assistant roles online, but you could also look for specific social enterprises that require this type of role. For example, the organisation Inclusive Change is a social enterprise that helps neurodivergent business owners organise themselves and is an excellent combination of being a virtual assistant while also being a life coach. This, again, is another collection of skills that you definitely have learned as a homeschooling parent.
Additionally, there are other ways for you to make a living around your homeschooling. There are many short-term opportunities that could be very suitable, such as websites like Pactera and Appen, which give you short-term roles that are paid on a per-task basis, for example, logging voice commands. When you are teaching your child at home, it is important to be flexible to ensure that you are prioritising them and not worrying about the money you are (or are not) earning.
Is Homeschooling Actually the Ideal Career Opportunity?
You may very well find your feet in homeschooling, and it can make logical sense to start a career in homeschooling. This can pretty much seem like being a tutor, but homeschooling is fast becoming the solution for parents whose children are getting bullied or can’t keep up with the school system, as well as a multitude of issues in relation to finding the right setting for them, especially with neurodivergent children. This could mean that actually homeschooling is the perfect career for you.
If you are teaching one child, then would you benefit from turning your home into a classroom setting? Of course, it’s not as straightforward as just setting up a business and charging for it; you need to understand the legal and regulatory requirements, such as teacher qualifications, curriculum standards, and registering your business. Registering as a teacher might very well be an excellent solution for you, in which case, training for a teaching qualification such as a PGCE can give you an advantage not just because you are learning how to be a property, but this can be a big part of your unique selling proposition (USP). There are many parents out there who teach their children at home in a homeschooling environment, and therefore having the best of both worlds as a personable parent who is empathetic to other parents’ needs and having a real qualification in teaching can ensure that you give parents peace of mind because ultimately homeschooling can be a very loose concept.
Giving other parents the confidence in your abilities that you are able to prepare their kids for the real world can make a huge difference. Ultimately, if you are starting out homeschooling your child, this isn’t the ideal time to start preparing yourself in terms of the skills you need to acquire but also the rigours of the role. Many teachers give up the profession for various reasons, particularly the workloads because they are easily teaching at least 30 children. Therefore, it could be a very different scenario as a homeschooling teacher of a handful of children. You may find an excellent work-life balance in doing something like this and could turn into an excellent side hustle, either as a standard tutor or utilising this unique teach-from-home setup that could be an excellent way to earn a living but also harness your passions to help others.
Being a parent is an incredible challenge, and homeschooling a child is a major challenge in itself, therefore, if you are wondering how you can get the most out of your skills as a homeschooling parent, rest assured there are so many options out there. We have to remember that there are thousands of homeschooling parents out there who have taken it upon themselves to help their children through this difficult phase of life and once their children have grown up and gone into work, the parents are then looking for their own jobs. Perhaps homeschooling can be something that doesn’t just help your child but actually helps yourself? You learn so much as a parent, and when you are homeschooling your kids, you are giving yourself so many opportunities that you potentially don’t realise are there.
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This is a contributed post.
