Homeschools must operate on a regular daily and yearly schedule in most states. The state of North Carolina has moderately strict regulations and stipulates that the school must operate during at least nine calendar months of the year. Some states, like Tennessee, might send truancy officers to verify a child's attendance at a homeschool. Parents or guardians should consider maintaining lesson plans or a daily log book containing the subjects studied throughout the school year, the amount of study time for each day and the page numbers or unit in the textbooks used for the lesson as is recommended in North Carolina. Michigan is a lenient state which does not require these activities to be documented. According to homeschoolcurriculum.org, parents or guardians should also include in their schedule log books any relevant field trips such as zoos or museums that include learning activities. Some very strict states, such as Georgia, require that attendance and schedule logs be maintained for several years. Some states also require a minimum length for each day of instruction; in Georgia, this is 4.5 hours of instruction per school day.
Students of homeschools are usually required to take nationally standardized achievement tests each year. Individual states might have their own requirements for subject matter of the tests; for example, moderately strict North Carolina requires subject areas including English grammar, reading, spelling and mathematics. The parent or guardian administering the homeschool must maintain the records of test results and provide them to the state department of education upon request. In Indiana, a lenient state, there are no subject, grading or testing stipulations. States vary in requiring whether grades are kept for each semester or for a full school year, and the parent or guardian administering the homeschool might also need to calculate a grade point average, especially for homeschool students who plan to attend college.
In strict states such as North Dakota, parents or guardians must notify the state's department of education of their intent to operate a homeschool. In addition, the parent or guardian may have to declare the homeschool as either religious or non-religious, as is required in states such as Tennessee. The intent should include information like the names and ages of the students, address of the homeschool and dates of the school year. States often require the homeschool to have a name; the name must be appropriate for inclusion on the child's future graduation diploma. In lenient states such as Texas, parents do not have to notify the state's department of education of their intent to homeschool. Maintenance of immunization records is often required for each student of the homeschool. The state of Tennessee requires the facility in which the homeschool is conducted to follow all fire safety regulations stipulated by that state. If the homeschool includes children aged 15 to 17, North Carolina requires the administrator of the school to supply the state department of education with driver eligibility documentation in order for the child to qualify for testing for a learner's permit.