Contact your state educational board to see what the laws governing special education children are in your state. You will need to register as a homeschool family and there may be other requirements where you live. Make sure you take care of the paperwork before proceeding.
Design your child’s curriculum by assessing his or her special needs. This is the most important part of preparing to homeschool a special education child. A youngster with dyslexia will require a much different learning plan than a child who suffers from Down’s syndrome. Your entire day will revolve around this plan.
List your child’s special educational needs in the order of their importance and then write each of the top eight needs on a separate sheet of paper and expand upon the ways in which you will deal with each need. At the bottom of each sheet, write your short and long-term goals for this need. Update these sheets as you go.
Schedule your homeschool day to include activities that address each educational need you previously listed. Depending upon the degree of disability your child experiences, you may be required to spend a minimum of eight hours per day in educational pursuits. The general rule is that fifty minutes of each hour is adequate for record-keeping purposes.
Relax. Homeschooling a special education child isn’t about cramming as much learning down his throat as you possibly can. It’s about finding out the methods that work the best for both of you and adapting them to various subjects. New homeschool parents are often worried that they won’t do enough, when in reality their child will be getting much more hands-on learning experience than is usually offered in public school.
Use books, toys, household items and anything else you can think of to demonstrate the subjects you are teaching. Visit the public library to check out free resources or join a home school swap-club and purchase inexpensive materials from other parents.
Make the whole world your classroom. Special education children often respond well to alternate learning environments. Trips to the museum, zoo and art gallery offer real-life learning opportunities.