A Father's Role In Homeschooling

by Wes Koerner

​Homeschooling as a father isn’t what I expected.  I thought I’d be more involved somehow, although as the main breadwinner I knew my role would be somewhat limited.  I guess I thought I’d have more time, more energy, and when I would get home from work I would jump in and help with the homeschooling.  It hasn’t worked out that way, possibly due to my own deficiencies.  Lack of time and the general tiredness after work kept me from being heavily involved in most of the schooling itself, although my wife always has consulted with me along the journey regarding curriculum and methods; she would do the research and pick curricula, then present me the pertinent points and we would agree on the choices.  But most of the actual schooling, teaching and learning, is going on without me, while I think I envisioned being more involved at the start.  Still, perhaps it’s better that way, and it’s working out well.  My wife and daughter are both happy and content with homeschooling, and my daughter is a bright, happy, and intelligent student.

I thought, after we began, that while I wasn’t so involved in the day to day, I might be more involved in the education in the summers, as I am a public school teacher and have summers off.  I had glowing visions of happily teaching my daughter a few additional subjects in that free time, like Spanish, shooting, self- defense, survival skills.  My wife thought I could help my daughter catch up on subjects not finished, like the math curriculum which never seems to quite be concluded.  But there again, we are both, my daughter and I, so exhausted by the end of our respective school years, that we mostly spend the summers relaxing and enjoying the outdoors, talking and laughing together, playing with the animals or watching the moonrise and listening to the wind in the leaves.

​We have done a little of the catch up here and there, and I always plan to get to those extra subjects, but the summers fly by with the express speed of all good things, and although we have a great time and create wonderful memories, we don’t get much homeschooling done.  After all these years, my wife still does the homeschooling, and thank God she’s good at it, and I work.

​But you know, I’ve found that for me, the homeschooling I’m mostly involved in is the informal stuff, and I guess some of the less formal stuff.  The best part of each day is often the family reading time before bed.  The books we read together, and the discussions and commentaries by all three of us, are I think an important part of my daughter's education (and, incidentally, of mine and my wife's as well).  Our family church time, when we read scripture or theology or listen to a podcast, and discuss theological and spiritual points and viewpoints, is a great learning and spiritual growing time for all of us.  Our kickball games we do with PLANT, in which my wife and I coach and ref, are a wonderful social environment for my daughter and her friends, and she has made some good new friends there.  I get to be a part of that, and it has been a treasure for me.

​This is all, you might say, just fathering, not homeschooling.  And you might be right.  But it is what I can do, and how things worked out, and maybe that’s the hand of God at work.  Life is, after all, very short, and children grow so fast, and, it is said, Men plan, and God laughs.  One thing I hope I’ve learned in life is to accept things, and go with the flow.  Maybe 'just fathering' is a critical part of homeschooling, and it is a gift we should cherish.

Wes Koerner

Wes Koerner is a public school teacher, the husband of a homeschooling mother, the father of a homeschooled daughter, and a founding member of PLANT, Inc.