Missouri Laws and Record Keeping
The Missouri Home School law requires that you teach a minimum of 1,000 hours with at least 600 of those hours in core subjects, reading, math, social studies, language arts, and science. At least 400 hours of those 600 must occur at “the regular home school location.” The school year begins on July 1st and ends on June 31th of the following year.
The law requires three basic pieces of information per home schooled child.
A plan book, diary, log, etc.: This is to keep a record of the subject taught, the actual assignment and what day or week the lesson took place.
A portfolio of the child’s work: The law requires samples of the student’s work. A simple way to keep these would be to periodically insert samples of work into a pocket divider in a three ring binder that also holds the daily log of hours, diary, and record of evaluations. Each divider could house two- four subjects.
Record of evaluations: This could be done in many ways, for example: chapter tests, daily grades, professional testing, periodic reviews of progress, etc.
Additionally, the law states that a daily log would be a defense to any prosecution. A daily log is a record of hours broken into subjects, core and non-core; a tally of hours per day, month and year-to-date; core hours away; etc. There are a variety of daily logs, choose one that is simple to use yet is accurate and clear in presenting the student’s hourly progress.
Record Keeping Examples
Here you will find a few daily hour log and other record keeping examples. Some examples are links to other sites and some are actual documents that will pop open for you. Some are free to download and print, others are for a fee.
Two Fun Facts to Know
1) We are NOT required to log the hours taught in each subject. Most folks do, for their own benefit. The law only requires that you demonstrate sufficient Core and Non-core totals. Just something to think about, especially if you are teaching more than one student – if you schedule core time and non-core in your day, it can simplify your recordkeeping. ( example: 9 to 11 is two hours of core and everyone can do math work, science, history, reading, spelling, writing, etc. after lunch, there is a music practice time / art work time, chore time 12:30 to 1:30 etc., for whatever non-core work you have. You don’t need to record what time you closed math and started reading. ) This doesn’t mean your son can’t play piano when he wants to, but if you want to keep record of it, have a different system.
2) It is recommended by FHE that your plan book and your other records be kept separately. We are required to keep a “plan book, diary, daily log or other written record indicating subjects taught and the activities engaged in.” It does not say all of these; one OR the other is sufficient legally. You may want to use all of them for your own benefit, but if they are separate, and a legal challenge should arise, your attorney may advise you to simply submit the log, and not your plan book.
See www.fhe-mo.org for more info on Families for Home Education, our State Home School group for MO.
Homeschool Tracker A For FEE $ Software come highly recommened by some of our members.
https://www.homeschool-life.com/mo/wcche/recordkeepingexamples/HourlyLogByMonth.xls an excel spread sheet for a whole month that allows you to record your hours daily (free)
http://home.comcast.net/~askpauline/hs/homeschoolforms.html – These are from PA but would work for MO
http://donnayoung.org/forms/planners/index.htm – Donna Young always has many to choose from
http://www.thehomeschoolmom.com/gettingorganized/planner.php – The Homeschool Mom has one
http://www.successful-homeschooling.com/homeschool-record-keeping.html – There are a few options here
http://www.thatresourcesite.com/printables_for_homeschoolers_logs_learner.htm – Some cute ones here, but not sure how useful for MO
think the Homeschool Planbook by Sarah Crane in Cedar Hill MO is great! www.homeschoolplanbook.com about $15.
A Record of the Learning Lifestyle by Charlene Notgrass is very different and helpful with boxes for your child to draw or write what they did or for you to catagorize what they did. Notgrass does not have a place specifically to total hours. www.notgrass.com about $12
Some examples created by other homeschoolers locally:
