Educating your children at home is a full-time job. To cover the required curriculum, you will need to devote many hours each day to teaching, just as traditional schoolteachers do. Home schooling significantly cuts into your personal time, so if you expect to juggle other responsibilities -- cooking, cleaning, other household chores, errand running or pursuing a career -- with teaching, you may find yourself overwhelmed.
You may feel more than capable of educating your child, particularly when armed with the best teaching materials available. However, chances are your expertise does not compare to that of specialized teachers who have years of education and experience. Even if you have an advanced degree, as your child gets older, your own knowledge cannot possibly stack up to schoolteachers' expertise in every subject. Though you have to handle all subjects, teachers at school specialize in a select few areas.
By keeping your child in a home school environment, you can't provide the social atmosphere he would get in a traditional school. He will miss out on the opportunity to make friends in class, attend dances and join a school sports team. Children who are isolated in their homes throughout the educational process miss out on critical interactions that teach them basic social skills.
When you take on the responsibility of educating your child, it's up to you to finance the entire experience. Learning materials, computer software and books that are otherwise paid for by the public school are needed, in addition to the regular school supplies all parents must purchase for their children. Every field trip or academic outing comes out of your pocket as well. Considering that the parent doing the home schooling is unlikely to manage a full-time job on the side, these expenses are tough for some families to meet.