If there's one thing that seems to be weirdly absent on social media, it's the content on homeschooling middle schoolers and high schoolers. It almost feels mythical, like teens just vanish from homeschool Instagram the minute they hit puberty. Meanwhile, your feed is packed with preschool crafts and phonics flashcards. But what about algebra, chemistry labs, and essay writing? Right?

Not as glamorous. There's a reason why this stage gets a wee bit quiet on social media. It's where families start to feel in over their heads. And sadly, it's also a time where a lot of people stop homeschooling. But here's the truth.

The upper years aren't the end of the homeschool story. They're actually pretty sweet and amazing. And in my opinion, when it starts to get fun. Navigating the junior and high school years in homeschooling can feel like diving into uncharted waters. Whether you're a seasoned homeschooler or just getting started, I wanna explore how to thrive during these crucial stages with outsourcing, pivoting, and zero pressure to fake a degree in quantum physics.

In this episode today, we're gonna dive into why people panic or peace out when the upper grades begin, how the successful homeschoolers do it, which is confidently homeschooling without teaching everything yourself, what to do when a subject feels out of our depth, and practical resources to make it all doable, and dare I say, enjoyable. Stick around. This is gonna be a fun if you're a first time listener or welcome back. Hi. I'm Christy Faith, author of Homeschool Rising, speaker and founder of Thrive Homeschool Community, a place where you can find real connection, solid mentorship, experts, and support from parents who really care about being the best homeschoolers they can be.

So let's talk about it. Why don't we see the upper years represented as much online? Well, it's because this is where a lot of people quietly tap out. Middle school hits, high school looms, and suddenly the homeschool dream starts feeling like a science fair gone wrong. Let's just go ahead and normalize the panic right now.

You thought it was hard when they were learning to read. Now granted that actually can be difficult or a breeze. It really does depend on the kid. But now you're being asked to explain the periodic table in Latin while also teaching geometry that you barely survived yourself. It's understandable that the idea of homeschooling the upper levels is daunting and overwhelming.

A 2024 study published in the Journal of School Choice found that while over a third of homeschool students continue through eighth grade, nearly one third of them switch to traditional school for ninth grade. So, yes, there is a clear drop off when the high school years hit. But this doesn't mean homeschoolers are failing. In my opinion, it means that a lot of us have reached the part of homeschooling that no one really prepared us for. Now if you were homeschooled all the way through, this stage probably feels a little bit more familiar.

You might have a rough mental map of how the upper grades look, how to build a transcript, and the general homeschool setting. But if you came through the traditional system, especially the modern public one, you're likely realizing that you were never actually taught how to learn. You were taught how to memorize, how to pass a test, how to follow a system. So now being in charge of said system, it's disorienting. But hear me out.

This is not a you problem. This is a systemic problem. And lucky for you and for me, we can now do things differently, and we're free to do so. Because I hope you know that you don't need to teach everything yourself. The ninja skills we do need though, it's how to source well, pivot when needed, and build a plan that supports our values and our teams, not someone else's agenda.

Alright. So now that we face the panic head on, let's talk about the part that makes homeschooling in the upper grades actually doable, and it is you don't have to teach everything yourself. That's not what we're doing over here. Let me say it again for the mom in the back currently googling how to explain DNA replication with a whiteboard and no will to live. You don't have to teach it all.

You don't have to have a degree in biology, And yet my kid's learning it and really well might I add. How? I source really well. That's the beauty of homeschooling in the twenty first century. We're not limited to what's inside our own head or the dusty stack of textbooks from 1997.

Here's what smart sourcing actually looks like. Online courses. There are self paced, live taught, and hybrid options for nearly every subject under the sun. Some even grade the assignments for you, aka my personal love language. Dual enrollment.

If your kid is ready, they can earn college credit and high school credit at the same time. And bonus, someone else is teaching them how to write a college level paper. Co ops. Whether it's a formal academic co op with labs and deadlines or a casual group of families doing book clubs and history projects, co ops can help cover your weaker spots. Tutors.

Tutors can do classes. You can meet with them several times a week, once a week, once a month. It doesn't matter. There are some pretty amazing teachers who are also tutors out there, who are fantastic. YouTube professors.

Honestly, some of these YouTube teachers are better than the ones I paid thousands for in college, and they're explaining trigonometry with a whiteboard and a cheerful Australian accent. It's actually oddly soothing. The point, you do not need to pretend to be an expert in every subject to give your teen a rich, well rounded education. And here's the thing that's super amazing is we actually have world class resources and instructors at our fingertips. We are not limited to our particular school or our particular district and stuck with only the instructors there.

We literally have our choice. The education that I've been able to provide for my children by sourcing really well is better than the education that the kids were getting that we taught who were going through the best of the best private schools in our country, and I'm doing it for so much less too. Now we all have that moment where we're sitting at the kitchen table and the content is starting to feel like out of our pay grade. For me, it's third grade math. After third grade, I'm out.

A lot of people take this as a sign that maybe their homeschool days are gonna come to an end, but it's not a sign that you're failing. What it means is that it's time to pivot. Because here's the deal. In the upper grades, successful homeschooling isn't about doing more. It's about knowing when to shift your approach and embrace the fact that you don't have to do it all.

So what do these pivots actually look like? I'm gonna give you real life examples right after this. As a homeschool mom who values a family together approach and leans towards the classical and Charlotte Mason styles, I often struggle to bring my educational vision to life with my kids' diverse ages and learning needs. With all our interests and super packed schedule, bridging that gap between the dreamy homeschool I want and reality, I gotta be honest, it's a challenge. Now, yes, I know perfection isn't the goal.

But if you're listening and you could use a little easing of your mental load in your day to day, I found a resource that has become the quiet hero of our routine, and it could be a really great option for you too. BJU Press homeschool curriculum. Now many think that BJU Press homeschool is solely an all in one option, and though it does excel in that role, did you know you can also opt for specific courses and tailor them to fit your family's needs just as I have? BJU Press Homeschool provides the perfect balance of structure and flexibility and easily complements my family's mixed age family together on the couch learning style. They are second to none in integrating a biblical worldview, stimulating critical thinking, and offering tons of hands on activities in the lessons.

To find out how BJU Press Homeschool can come alongside you in your homeschooling goals too, visit bjupresshomeschool.com or click the link in the show notes. Sometimes it looks like changing your curriculum. Here's the scenario. You've tried it all. The box sets, the planners, the systems, and yet your teen is still staring at you like you're speaking a foreign language while you go over the periodic table for the fifth time this week.

Sometimes it's not you. It's the curriculum. It's time for a change. It's okay to let go of what's not working. This is what the public school and private schools can't do, but this is our superpower.

Curriculum isn't sacred. It's there to serve your family to help you reach your goals, not the other way around. You may need to take a hot minute and figure out what clicks with your teen. It may be an online course, a more interactive workbook, or even a completely different style of learning. If something's broken, don't be afraid to fix it even midyear.

But here is a word of caution. If you are in the middle of a year, particularly in the January and February months, sometimes it's not about switching the curriculum. It's about taking a break too because this is the time of year where the homeschooling blues can really start to settle in for many of us. If you're feeling burnt out or unsure if curriculum is the problem, it might just be that your family needs a little bit of breather and a little recharge. And if you aren't sure what's going on and you need a little bit of guidance, I highly recommend joining Thrive Homeschool Community.

It's where I offer monthly master classes taught by experts. We have five live office hour sessions per month. Yes. One even dedicated just to homeschooling teens and tons of other resources and camaraderie to help you get through the rough spots of homeschooling because we all have them. The point is you don't have to do this alone.

Sometimes just having someone to talk things through with can make all the difference. Every month, we have quite a few Zooms, but three in particular that the listeners of this episode might be interested in attending are our homeschooling teens Zoom, our seasoned homeschool mom Zoom, and our special needs homeschooling Zoom. Thrive is where you get experts at your fingertips. Moving right along. Besides reevaluating curriculum, it can also look like leaning into your kid's passions.

Remember those Pinterest boards full of perfect schedules, every subject listed? Throw it out, girl. The beauty of homeschooling at the upper levels is that you get to follow the spark. If your kid has a burning passion for graphic design, guess what? Math, science, and even history can live there.

Let them dive deep. If they're fascinated by filmmaking, guess what they're gonna learn? They're gonna learn project management, writing, tech skills, and even physics as they create their own films. We can stop worrying about checking every box. We can focus on deep learning and real world skills instead because not every learning moment has to come from a textbook.

And yes, even if your student is college bound, we actually have a lot more freedom than people think. Another real life pivot can look like utilizing outside mentors and self paced learning. Now this is a game changer. I've already covered that you don't have to be an expert in everything. If your teen is struggling with chemistry, why not hand it off to someone who really loves it?

That might mean hiring a tutor or finding an online course. Mentors, whether through co ops or tutors or even YouTube professors can teach tricky stuff in ways you might not be able to. And your kid will probably enjoy it because these people are passionate about the subject, and that's contagious. Plus self paced learning, which by the way, are courses where the kids can go through the lessons according to their own schedule, helps kids build independence and time management skills. In my own homeschooling journey, I realized that trying to figure out how to teach Latin alongside everything else that I was doing was just too much.

With multiple kids to home school, I knew I needed to make sure I wasn't wearing myself too thin. Also, I'm not an expert in Latin. I never learned it. And I really didn't wanna give my kids a half baked learning experience because I was stretched too thin. So I made the decision to outsource Latin to an instructor who actually knew Latin inside and out.

An expert who could teach it better than I ever could. And you know what? It was one of the best homeschooling decisions I've ever made. Not only did my kids benefit from learning Latin from someone who loved the subject, but it also took a huge weight off of my plate. The point, sometimes you have to know when to step aside and let an expert take the reins.

Now does this mean that you're only half homeschooling or you're not really a homeschooler? Not at all. This is homeschooling. This isn't about giving up. It's about recognizing that you don't have to do it all yourself, and outsourcing a subject that you're not an expert in can benefit your kids more than you trying to juggle it all.

Now I know a lot of homeschool moms that are excited about some of these because they wanna learn it alongside their kids, and I love that. It's fantastic and a huge benefit to homeschool. For me though, I don't wanna do that with every single subject. Plus, I'm a working homeschool mom, so I gotta figure out ways to make this work for my family. So I handed off Latin, not because I was failing, but because I was doing something even more important, protecting my energy, my time, and my sanity.

I've got multiple kids, a busy life, and obviously a healthy respect for dead languages. And that brings me to something homeschool parents really need to hear, and we'll get into that right after this. Before we continue, I wanna share with you a program that's been a game changer for our homeschool. At our center, we instructed and help kids through pretty much every math program on the market and know firsthand just how important a solid math foundation is for our kids' futures. As a career educator with high standards, finding the right program that checked all the boxes felt like too tall of an order until one day I tried CTC Math.

CTC Math is an online math curriculum for k to 12 students with motivating interactive lessons that allow kids to learn at their own pace. It does all the teaching and grading so you don't have to and their adaptive lessons adjust so your child is progressing confidently. With CTC Math, your child is getting a top notch education and you just made your homeschool life easier. Visit ctcmath.com to start your free trial today or click the link in the show notes. I've got some news.

There's a new reading curriculum that ditches workbooks and drills for fun and games. If you're thinking fun and games sounds a little too good to be true, it's not. Ninety eight percent of children improved their reading test scores in just six weeks with the reading skill set by Love Every. It's a phonics based program that follows the science of reading, but makes learning to read fun, motivating, and confidence boosting because it happens by playing games and then practicing with just right skill level books. Kids love it and parent educators love it, and it works.

Visit lovevery.com/christyfaith today and use code Christy 10 to get 10% off your purchase of the reading skill set by Love Every. That's lovevery.com/christyfaith. Look. We don't win gold medals for burning out or trying to explain topics that we barely survived ourself in high school. Nobody is mailing us a trophy for white knuckling our way through physics formulas while our eyes twitch and our kids cry.

I'm speaking the truth right now. You don't need to teach what you do not know, and this is not a failure. You know what it is? It's a model. It's okay to teach just what you're confident in and what you enjoy and source for the other things.

You're still there supporting your child, holding them accountable, and honestly, it's gonna give your kid a better education, a deeper, stronger foundation. You're showing them that learning is about problem solving and pivoting and it can be exciting. When things aren't going right, you look at other options, and you can involve them in this process too. And let's be real. Our public education system didn't do most of us any favors here.

If you were homeschooled yourself, you might already have an instinct for how to navigate learning gaps, how to think critically, and how to explore information without spoon feeding. But if you're a product of the traditional school system like I was, you might be experiencing this weird disorienting moment where you realize they never actually taught me how to learn, just how to pass tests. So now here you are homeschooling moms and dads with a teen asking about macroeconomics and mitosis, and you're blinking back at them like, I need help. Good. That's growth because this, that moment, that's where you model something powerful.

Lifelong learning. You show your child that learning doesn't stop at graduation, that smart people know their limits, and that asking for help or bringing in experts isn't a weakness. It's a superpower. So here you go. I love history.

I could teach history while making dinner and folding laundry and quoting Hamilton. But math? You guys already know. I have no interest in reliving calculus. But math, it's not that I was bad at it, but I don't really wanna teach it anymore.

I will absolutely lead the next revolution, but someone else is gonna need to do the quadratic equations. Same goes for high level science. A lot of us don't have degrees in microbiology, but yet it's pretty amazing that our kids can still learn about plankton ecosystems like tiny little Jacques Cousteau's. Why? Because we're finding really cool people to teach it for us and no guilt required.

And here's a bonus stat because you know how I love my receipts. Parents without teaching certificates still homeschool students who outperform their public school peers on standardized tests. Homeschooled students typically score 15 to 30 percentile points above the public school average regardless of the parent's formal education level. So you can officially stop googling, do I need to be certified to homeschool high school? Because the data says you're good.

The takeaway? Not only do you not have to do it all, but you shouldn't have to do it all. Instead, teach what you love, model curiosity, and outsource the rest like a homeschool CEO. Because homeschooling isn't about checking every box. It's about raising capable, confident, lifelong learners.

And once you embrace that mindset of leading where you shine and delegating where you don't, something surprising happens. The upper grades stop feeling like a burden and they start feeling like the gift that they are. Really? Because despite what the fear mongering Internet might tell you, these years, they're actually the sweet spot of homeschooling. And I know that sounds crazy, especially if your current reality includes slamming your head against a stack of biology worksheets or googling how to explain Shakespeare to a hormonal 13 year old.

But hear me out. These years, they're the best kept secret of homeschooling. You finally get to have real conversations. Not why is the sky blue, but what does it mean to live a good life? Do you think we're too dependent on technology?

What would you have done differently if you were in that historical moment? Because in these years, we're not just teaching facts anymore. Well, hopefully, we never were, but this is where we're shaping thinkers. You've done all the hard work of teaching them how to read and to tie their shoes and to not lick the science experiments, but now these upper years, they can run with it. Assignments become projects.

Interests become rabbit holes. You move from teacher to mentor and it's a beautiful thing. This is the time to lean into what makes your kid light up. And what's so cool about homeschooling is that homeschooling the high school years can be done in such fewer hours than the system. Our kids have time for the internships and the jobs and the exploration of their interests.

Coding, creative writing, marine biology, Japanese history, whatever it is. You can create a custom road map. These are the really cool years where you're preparing for real life, not just tests. Because look, why are we homeschooling? We're not just doing this to help them prepare for the next Scantron.

It's to help them step confidently into adulthood knowing how to learn, how to adapt, and how to take ownership of their education. And that starts now in your house with you. So we don't need to know it all. We just need to know how to find it. And we have world class resources at our fingertips that rival the best of the best schools.

As always, if you want more guidance, more mentorship, or just a community that gets you, we would love to have you in Thrive Homeschool Community because you do not have to homeschool these teen years alone. And there's a lot of us making it all the way to the finish line and loving every second of it. See you next time. Bye.