Anyone else whose husband supports hs but does nothing to help?

[Cake and Pi]

Yep, its the same way in my house.  I think it's a pretty good system.

 

DH has said before that he wants to teach the kids stuff that I've been to chicken to attempt, like music (he plays several instruments and I play nothing) and coding, but him actually doing this with the boys on the weekend has only happened a handful of times.  I've decided I will need to figure out how to teach them these things myself.

[Guest]

Well I mean DH will do specific things I ask him to do, and he gets great satisfaction out of it. And he loves to hear from the kids what new things they know and what new questions they are exploring and trying to answer...But no, he's not up to speed with our 12 year writing plan, or how we are hitting logic from different angles or whatever.

 

But! Let me say, OP, that if you want your husband to be more involved on some level, you know that's perfectly legitimate, even if a million posters on the internet are perfectly happy to have totally hands-off husbands. You don't need our validation! Tell him how you feel and see what he thinks he can do to help...maybe reading a story every day or doing a science experiment every Saturday or sitting down and going over a learning journal with your kids at the end of the week. Whatever would float your boat.

 

Good luck! I'm sorry you're going through something kind of annoying right now.

[Janeway]

My husband "helped." LOL...count your blessings. If you had his help, you might find it to be more of "help." If you do get him to help, pick a subject on the side, where you do not need continuity. Like, art, or history topics, or even science labs, but nothing where what you do depends on what he does. 

[madteaparty]

My hubby brags to others about homeschooling and completely supports me in every way. But, he has absolutely nothing to do with it. He doesn't help teach anything, nor does he want to talk about

any of the curriculum. He completely trusts me & does not question me at all nor does he limit my budget which is a blessing but sometimes I wish he would ask me how the kids are doing, what we use, or just make any input. Once in a while, I will ask him "Do the kids seem like they're doing ok school-wise?" to which he gives a resounding "YES!". He goes to work very early & gets home after dark so I know he's "spent" and ready to rest. BTW: He's a great dad, ya'll. He plays with them & spends time with them.

When I used to work two days a week, DH would consistently forget to help DS log into his online classes. That's why I had to give up my part time job. When I asked him to help with math (we've had well documented struggles with AoPS), it was even more of a disaster than my help had been. No, his job is to make money, my job is to educate. The key to not being disappointed is to expect very little.

[Mergath]

I'm a control freak, so I prefer it that way. And I love my husband, but he's not overly, shall we say, academic. He has to use computers and do mathy things at his job, but if I ever asked him to teach that kind of thing, he'd be lost. He works extremely hard (usually six days a week) so that we can live comfortably on one income. I think that's enough of a contribution on his end.

 

Plus, I love everything about homeschooling. I love researching it and looking at new books and curricula, and I love teaching dd. I'd probably be a little miffed if he wanted to do some of it for me. 

[MeaganS]

I'm similar to most of the PPs. DH has nothing more to do with homeschooling than he would have to do with public schooling. He asks the girls about what they learned, listens to me talk and nods, and basically gives me free reign budget-wise. When he's home, school doesn't get done. Since his schedule is sporadic, we just consider it a day off if he's here. I would never ask him to teach the girls a class. He simply doesn't have the time and personality style for it. Occasionally, I have had him tell them about an anatomy concept but that is more like a one-off conversation sort of thing. We do have a weekly religious family night that incorporates a lesson that he is very involved in, we do family scripture study nightly, and he reads the girls a bedtime story if he's here, but I don't consider any of those school.

 

This works very well for us. I am very independent in my style (have to be with a DH going through residency) and if I had to fight him on every choice, and it would be a fight because of our personalities, it would get tedious fast. It is much better that he just trusts me. :)

 

Conversation from yesterday:

Me: "I am about to spend about $90 on school stuff, is that cool with you?"

Him: "What's it for?"

Me: "DD7 will finish her grammar and spelling soon so I need the next levels and I wanted to get a word problems book for DD5."

Him: "Oh, OK. Whatever you think you need."

 

Best. Husband. Ever. :)

 

ETA: In all fairness, I do the same for him. He takes lots of major exams to get licensed and will often tell me, "I'm going to spend $xxx on study materials for the upcoming exam. Is that alright?" And I just tell him yes, because I trust that he wouldn't do it if he didn't need it or feel like it would help him. But I don't know the ins and outs of what he's studying.

[Sugarfoot]

Yes, and to be honest, I wouldn't want it any other way.  ;)  

 

My DH is a great dad and is very appreciative of what I do. After 15 years, he's finally starting to see the "big" picture. Last year, when oldest DS was finishing his first semester of college, DH asked him what he thought his grades would be. He said he had all As, and DH said, "You have your mother to thank for that."  :coolgleamA:

[Jennifer132]

My husband is the same way. He'll let me jabber on about curriculum, but only to be polite. I do the same thing about listening to him talk about his career. 😊 He's a great dad, but his only contribution to homeschooling is taking the children camping, to museums, trips and such. He's my field trip guy, I guess!

[Dramorellis]

I thought the OP was asking about expressing interest in her daily activities and education of the children not in if your DH actually teaches any "subjects".I definitely would be disappointed if my husband appeared to be uninterested in what I spent most of my waking hours doing and how my "work" was going.I listen to my husband tell me about his day, he doesn't go into intricate details but I am familiar with some of his duties, his coworkers etc. He can come and talk to me about an interesting meeting he had and I will know the players and basically what they were discussing. I expect the same level of interest if I want to tell him about what happened at co-op today or how much our son is enjoying the new Latin curriculum. We don't do it to be polite to one another. I think we are both genuinely interested in each other's jobs or at the very least interested in how the other feels about their job performance. That's what friends do, right?

[Peaceful Isle]

My dh supports me by paying for all the curriculum I buy! lol

 

 

[wintermom]

I'm finding that as the dc are getting older and their maths and sciences are more complex, I'm going to dh more to help the dc with specific questions. It wouldn't work out time-wise to have him be responsible for teaching the entire subject/curriculum, but he's a WONDERFUL expert teacher and resource in these and other areas. Otherwise, he's supportive financially and only steps in when asked or a specific issue comes up. 

 

I'm extremely lucky to have a dh who is both an amazing hands-on teacher and support, and also knows enough to stay back and let me do my thing.  :hurray:

[The Princess and the Jedi]

My hubs is supposedly "el professor de Espanol" since Spanish is his first language...but he rarely speaks Spanish with the kids. On the other hand, he takes the kids out to play basketball a couple of times a week, makes them help around the house, and takes them to work ever so often, and for that I am grateful! He also supports everything I do and is on board with everything I buy.

[Miss Marple]

Yes, my dh supported me in the effort but never really helped.  He often told people how "easy" homeschooling is/was  :confused1:   He had a major surgery when the boys were young which necessitated him being at home for about 4 weeks.  I thought it would be such a help to have him listen to the boys practice reading.  What a disaster that was!  I heard him telling the youngest that "a" says "ah" as in father...son #4 ran to me to tell me that "daddy doesn't know what "a" says".  At that point, I decided it was just easier to do it myself lol.  He was very positive about homeschooling...he just assumed all was good unless I brought something to his attention.

[mamiof5]

Same here. Mine doesn't brag about it, but I think he likes it. He helps in other areas, taking kids to activities when he can, to run errands related to their activities (or the library, etc), he stops by grocery stores when I need him to... and once in a while he does help with short school activities. He helps out in other ways and I appreciate it :)

ETA: just read a post above and I totally agree. Just because things are certain way for most of us (who have answered so far) it doesn't mean it has to be like that for you. I don't know what your dh's schedule looks like and how often he's home? If you'd like him to be more involved I'd just ask, and maybe give him a few options he could choose from? Maybe he'd like science, or reading?

[Jean in Newcastle]

Some of it is personality and desire too.  Dh is a teacher but has never learned how to relate to anyone younger than a teen when teaching. And he's never learned to teach in any way that doesn't involve a lecture.   And he doesn't want to.  He did help out the kids with their multiplication flashcards.  And he's rescued a few science experiments that were flopping.  If dh had expressed an interest in being more involved in homeschooling and had done the things I do to try to be better at it, then I would have welcomed his help.  But I don't want unwilling help.  And I don't want inexpert help.  Dh is very valuable to our homelife and does a lot of things with the kids but actually teaching subjects just isn't in his wheelhouse.  And it isn't something that I want to force.  

[cintinative]

I used to think I wanted my dh to be more involved. I tried asking gently for him to cover music, since that is not a strength of mine and it is of his. It didn't happen, and I grew to be grateful for what he was doing--watching the kids from dinner on so I can tinker on here or exercise or read a book or research curriculum.  Playing with our kids. Reading a book aloud to them before bed.  As others have mentioned, I am grateful for the opportunity to stay home and homeschool my kids, which is only possible because he works. I also am grateful for the tremendous trust he puts in me to make all these decisions and execute them with little input from him. It says a lot about his confidence in me. So I guess what I am saying is, it is not really a negative in my view. It's different than some people's families, but it works for us. 

[TKDmom]

Yep. I like the autonomy, but sometimes it's frustrating. Sometimes he feels like I'm leaving him out of major decisions involving our children. Sometimes I'm struggling to make a decision, and I try to talk to him about it, but we don't speak the same language. I can't just mention a class or a book without going into a lot of background info that bores both of us. So we mostly avoid those conversations.

 

I'm starting to get him involved in my eldest's education. He really has no time to be involved in teaching. But he can sit down with her at the end of the day, look through her planner and discuss what she did or didn't do and why, then discuss what she's been reading. That's one of his real strengths. He had an excellent education and can spend a few minutes talking with anyone about most subjects. And he can draw the themes out of literature and give dd a little preview of what's coming up next in Huckleberry Finn (for example) so she has something to look forward to.

[TheAutumnOak]

My husband is pretty much this way, in all areas of homeschooling and homemaking and I love it!...I choose the curricula we use, the furniture in the house, the supplies and whatever we need for the home...My husband feels like I am the one in the house all day, so I should put in it what I want to - he doesn't care...I know some husbands who need to be involved in every decision, from drapes in the livingroom to the books the kids read...I would never want that...I love the freedom of not having to come to an agreement with him on every single aspect of our lives together...On the flip side, he likes to choose the cars and what happens to the outside of the house...I don't care about those things at all, so we get along just fine :-)

 

If I were to ask for his help, I am sure he would give it, but I am glad that he is not controlling or overly involved...

[happypamama]

My husband is very supportive and trusting. He's really just the right level of support for me, I think, neither uninvolved nor a micromanager.

 

He works long hours, so he isn't here for the day to day much. In a perfect world, he'd be able to offer regular instruction in some subjects, but he simply doesn't have the time. He's a gifted writer; I'm merely competent. If he had more time to discuss and instruct and critique regularly, he would. He mainly sticks to teaching the children informally when he can, but there's not a regular schedule to it. I think we all look at it as really nice enrichment, rather than anything to fulfill portfolio requirements. Sometimes, even often, that means he gets to do the fun stuff, while I get to insist that they do the less interesting stuff (but, y'know, I get to be with them all day and do field trips and watch them learn new concepts, so it's a pretty fair trade off). He's there when he can be as much as possible (I think he has missed one belt test so far; when they're during the day, he does the extra hour and a half of driving mid-day so that he can be there), although having a semi-flexible office helps.

 

He has my back. If a kid gets an attitude with me, they know that Daddy will hear about it, and then they will have to face Daddy about it. Boys seem to need him looking them straight in the eye and asking, "What happened today?"

 

He's really great about hearing what they've learned or read, or making much over the little guys' drawings. They love recounting their days to Daddy! Very often, if the older ones have read something in history or science, he has some interesting tidbit to share that is related.

 

He trusts that I spend what I need to spend, and he doesn't worry much. I'm pretty frugal but will spend what I need to spend. He understands that sometimes it just takes a certain amount of money to achieve a goal, and that's okay. I appreciate that. I do sometimes ask his opinion on materials. Mostly, I pick based on reviews and price and what works for me, since I'm the primary teacher, but we recently had a good discussion about science materials, in which I asked for his thoughts, and then I picked the one he thought looked good to start with. I don't ask him to debate math programs with me; I'm pretty confident there, but not so much with science.

 

He's a pretty good guy all around, though. :)

[happypamama]

Also, I think sometimes the non-homeschooling parent can feel out of the loop. We spend so many hours looking at samples and planning and researching and all of that, and sometimes we forget how foreign it sounds to someone else. I know exactly why I use Saxon for one child, Singapore for another, and MEP for a third, but that might sound crazy to someone who doesn't do it regularly. I know my ILs are supportive of homeschooling but don't always know the right questions to ask. I think that can happen for dads too, that they're supportive but don't always know how to ask in ways that show support.

 

DH is great at helping me work through my questions because he's a step removed from them, not right in the midst of them all day. I need that more than I need a micromanager.

[Guest]

^^^ <3

 

Homeschool Ryan Gosling can be overtly passive aggressive as long as he keeps his face.

[Wabi Sabi]

My dh is a big supporter of homeschooling and I suspect that he often brags about our kids and all of the fabulous things they get to do because they're homeschooled to his co-workers and business acquaintances, all of whom think it sounds amazing (he's never had anyone respond negatively, FWIW.) That said, he then follows it up with, "Well, it's really my wife who does all of the homeschooling, not me." Yep. Sounds about right. 

As supportive and proud as he is, dh is generally just not too interested in hearing the details of our curriculum. He just wants to hear about the highlights: The kids got to be on a PBS show yesterday! They dissected a sheep's brain! Youngest child earned $32 walking neighbors' dogs while they were all at school/work last week! They used a bowdrill to start a fire and built an awesome shelter in their nature class! He's not so interested, however, in talking about why I chose one grammar over the other or discussion about the pros and cons of spiral vs. mastery math, etc. He just wants to hear about the fun parts and the daily mundane stuff just isn't as braggable, I suppose. 

(And really, it's probably for the best that homeschooling remains my domain, not his. The times he's been asked to help the kids haven't gone so well and the kids end up frustrated. He's a great dad and very hands on in all other parts of child rearing, but teaching is not one of his strengths. ) 

[Coco_Clark]

Didn't have time to read the whole thread but that's a similar attitude to my husband. Although I'm not sure he brags about it.

 

But supportive, generous with the budget, and clueless as to our curriculum/methods? Yep.

 

I don't see a problem with it. I mean, I don't ask about his work all that often either- I don't know what programs he favors or how a project is going at any given time (unless it goes right up to deadline and he's pulling 2 or 3 day workdays). I get that homeschooling is more than a job because it's also our kids, but if they were in public school I wouldn't expect him to know what curriculum they use either.