What Difference Can 20 Hours of Homeschooling Really Make?

When we tell Orchard families that we expect around 20 hours of purposeful learning each week, I think it can be difficult to picture what that really means.

Twenty hours can sound like a lot.

Or, if you are comparing your homeschool with a child who leaves for school in the morning and doesn't return until mid-afternoon, it can sound surprisingly little.

So let's put those 20 hours into perspective.

A school week isn't 25 hours of lessons

A child may be away from home for six or seven hours a day, but not all of that time is teaching.

Even during the school day there is registration, assembly, moving between classrooms, getting books and equipment out, waiting for everyone to settle, giving out instructions and dealing with all the ordinary organisation involved in teaching a large group of children.

That isn't criticism of schools. It is simply part of running one.

A school might have around 25 hours available across the teaching week, but once all those necessary parts of school life are taken into account, the amount of time spent actually learning is considerably closer to the 20 purposeful hours we ask our homeschool families to provide.

The difference is what those hours can look like at home.

Homeschooling doesn't have to run on a school clock

If your child understands the maths after 25 minutes, you don't have to keep them sitting there because the lesson lasts an hour. You move on. If they don't understand it, you can spend longer.

If they become fascinated by something in science and disappear down a rabbit hole for an afternoon, you don't have to stop because a bell says it is time for geography.

And there aren't 29 other children who also need your attention.

That makes homeschool time surprisingly powerful.

Twenty hours doesn't mean twenty hours at the kitchen table

This is perhaps the most important part.

At Orchard, when we talk about purposeful learning, we don't mean 20 hours of worksheets.

• A maths sheet counts, so does using maths to work out whether you can afford something.

• Reading a comprehension counts, so does reading a library book for pleasure.

• Studying habitats counts, so does going to the park, identifying what is growing there, taking photographs and coming home to find out what you saw.

• Following a cookery lesson counts. Growing vegetables counts. Researching something counts. Making something counts. Visiting somewhere connected with what you are learning counts.

The question is not: “Was my child sitting at a desk?” It becomes: “Was my child learning?”

Twenty hours adds up very quickly

This is the bit we sometimes forget. Twenty hours each week over a 40-week Orchard year gives a child around: 800 hours of purposeful learning.

Eight hundred hours!

Compare that with a child receiving one hour of tuition each week. That would be 40 hours across the same period.

That tutor might be excellent, and they usually are. That hour might be focused, productive and exactly what that child needs.

However, 40 hours and 800 hours simply aren't the same educational opportunity over the course of a year.

That is why we cannot judge the potential progress of a homeschooled child by looking only at the hour they spend with a tutor, or the time they spend completing formal written work.

We have to look at the whole week.

And those 20 hours don't all need a parent sitting beside them

This matters too.

Homeschooling is not 20 hours of a parent teaching. As children grow, more of those hours should gradually become independent.

• They read.

• They research.

• They follow instructions.

• They complete work.

• They practise.

• They make things.

• They discover that they can get stuck, work something out and carry on.

A parent remains interested and involved, but doesn't have to stand over every minute of learning. In fact, becoming able to learn without somebody constantly directing you is part of the education.

So can 20 hours really be enough?

Yes — when they are 20 purposeful hours. Twenty hours in which a child reads, writes, thinks, calculates, discusses, discovers, practises, makes, explores and gradually takes greater responsibility for their own learning.

It may not always look like school. It isn't supposed to!

What matters isn't whether your homeschool day looks busy enough from the outside.

Homeschooling isn't just keeping them occupied. 

What matters is what your child is doing with the time they have. And across a year, 800 purposeful hours give us an enormous amount of time in which to learn.