Erin Napier is new to homeschooling her kids this year, but everyone is thriving with the arrangement. The HGTV star shared a rare look into what a typical day of schooling looks like and how it works while they’re filming “Home Town.”
Erin Napier Shares the Details of Their Homeschool Routine
On April 19, Napier took to Instagram with a video showing their “day in the life” at homeschool.
“My favorite IG posts are ‘day in the life,’ especially seeing how other homeschool families do it,” she wrote in the caption.
She gave an overview of what schooling looks like, sharing, “If you’re curious, like lots of my traditional school mom friends are” … beginning with a look at their schedule.
“When we school: We have school 4x a week. Our team generously carves out 2 or more hours from our filming day to teach the girls 3 of those days, sometimes 4,” she explained. “If there’s a day that construction needs us the whole day, our friend who is a retired teacher subs those 2 hours for us.”
Napier continued, explaining how and what they teach. “Ben has a degree in history, minor in English and is a former youth pastor, so he does a daily deep dive on teaching history, Bible and math,” she shared. “While he does his subjects, I work with Mae on phonics and simple arithmetic.”
“Then we switch, and I teach Helen language arts (grammar, spelling, poetry, cursive), etiquette (I’m learning some things alongside her best of all!), art and science,” Napier explained. “We do classic literature read alouds (we only have time for 1 chapter a day), with narration afterward where Helen tells us everything that happened first, then next, then last. We ask her a lot of questions that require logic to answer.”
Sunday afternoons are reserved for planning. “I fill out the week at a glance and make the lesson plan,” she shared.
And their day off? Well, there’s still a lot going on for the Napiers! “They have French lessons, piano lessons, go to work with us and learn how we do our jobs, job shadow the vet taking care of our animals (Helen’s dream job!), they go horseback riding or to museums or homeschool courses at the zoo,” the HGTV star explained.
“They pick the vegetables they grew in the garden, and last week they learned canning from my parents (just in case we need to be pioneers one day??). I plan to have Ben’s mom teach them sewing soon,” she noted. “Sometimes, they are traveling with us for work.”
She also answered the question of the social aspect of homeschooling, sharing that their daughters get plenty or time to spend with friends. “Every day they have group extracurriculars or sports: gymnastics, tennis, ballet, art class, track team. They see 12-20 of their friends for about an hour every day,” she explained. “There are even homeschool reading fairs and science fairs and field trips to be part of.”
“We hope to do this for as long as it serves the girls, and someday send them to high school,” Napier explained. “It has been the best season of our life as a family that I thank God for every night.”
Fans Praise Napiers for Homeschooling
In the video, Napier shows their homeschooling in action, sharing her lesson planning and giving a classroom tour including their materials and lessons. She admits in text over the video, “Some people think homeschooling is weird. I did too when I was young.”
“Around the time Helen was born, we met some homeschoolers who were so remarkable, so mature, so communicative, and interested in learning, it made us realize we wanted whatever that was,” she added.
Fans flooded the comments section to praise the Napiers for making this choice. “It’s the best time with your children. I would do it all again. My grown children now say it was the best,” one fan wrote.
Another fan noted, “Erin, I am a public school teacher, who is retiring after 27 years. You are doing the absolute right thing by homeschooling your girls. Great job, mama!”
“I homeschooled mine until college,” another fan shared. “The only regret is not starting from kindergarten. It’s hard but so very worth it!!!”
One fan commented, “You will never regret this time you spent with your girls!! Homeschooling is such a beautiful sacrifice!! We are heading into year 12 and I love every minute!!”
