How to Know if Deschooling is Right for You: 7 Signs you Need to Deschool

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If you’ve been homeschooling for a few years and something feels off, you’re not alone — and there’s a name for what you’re experiencing. In this post, I’m sharing seven signs you need to deschool, and what they might look like in your real homeschool life.

Deschooling isn’t about abandoning structure or learning. It’s about stepping back from inherited beliefs about what homeschooling should look like, and getting curious about what your family actually needs.

Feeling the Signs You Need to Deschool? Grab your checklist.

If the signs you need to deschool are clear, it’s time to take action. The Deschool Checklist helps you spot all the sneaky school-ish ideas you didn’t even realize you brought into your homeschool—so you can start building a home education that actually fits your family.

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What Does It Mean to Deschool Your Homeschool?

Have you been hearing about this popular word, DESCHOOL, and wondering what it even means & how to even DO it?

I think this is a word yet to be defined in a universal way once and for all. Originally, it was a term penned by Austrian philosopher Ivan Illich.

Deschooling is a highly effective tool that helps us release doubt, uncertainty, and that not-good-enough feeling in our home-educating families.

Deschooling helps us (& our kids) zero in on the most important elements of learning & education for our kids AND to live our lives on purpose.

I’ve been learning about learning, learning about living with my kids, and learning about what an education is anyway, and in this post, I intend to help you walk toward your freedom and more individualization in your homeschool and life just as I have.

Learning about learning, learning about living with my kids, and learning about what an education is anyway isn’t what I thought it was.

(Is that your experience too?)

Turns out, I didn’t need to have a teaching degree, I didn’t need to lesson plan every homeschool day, and I don’t even need a report card (well, one year I did, because the kids asked me for one!)

I’ve had to address boredom, motivation, schedules, and curriculum choices, and begin to understand the unhelpful, oxymoronic word, homeschool differently. 

Let me share what I’ve learned so you can be at ease in your homeschool with confidence and clarity too.

These are 7 Common Signs You Need To Deschool…

Sign 1: You Need to Deschool When You’re Conforming to Someone Else’s Standard

I was in a homeschool co-op with another mom who had seven children. Every one of her kids who could hold a violin was practicing an hour a day. Solid, disciplined, impressive.

My four kids could barely do fifteen minutes.

And I felt it — that silent pressure. Am I doing enough? Should my kids be practicing more? Why can’t I get them to commit the way she does? I was measuring my homeschool against hers, conforming to a standard that wasn’t mine, in a family that wasn’t hers.

It took me years to realize: her approach was right for her family. Mine needed to be right for mine.

If you find yourself constantly comparing, constantly buying what everyone else is buying, constantly doing what everyone else is doing — even though something inside you knows it’s not quite right — that’s a sign you need to deschool. You’re living someone else’s homeschool, not yours.

Sign 2: You Need to Deschool When Resistance Is Growing

My oldest daughter started pushing back hard. She was upset, difficult, resistant to the homeschool activities we’d planned. One day my husband took her for a drive around town because we couldn’t get her to participate the way we’d structured it.

That drive changed everything.

Later, as she got older, we realized she was highly sensitive. Noise was overwhelming. The structured schedule, the group activities, the rigid routine — it was overcapacity for who she actually was.

When resistance isn’t just a bad attitude — when it’s telling you something real about your child — that’s a sign you need to deschool. Your child is trying to tell you that the system doesn’t fit them. Listen.

Sign 3: You Need to Deschool When Learning Isn’t Sticking

We used Story of the World with narration, the Charlotte Mason way. It was beautiful in theory. I’d have the kids narrate back what they’d learned, checking all the boxes of a classical education.

But when I’d refer back to those lessons weeks later and ask what they remembered? Nothing. Or worse — they didn’t care enough to try to remember.

The truth was, those stories didn’t belong to them. They had no reason to care. I was asking them to narrate someone else’s curriculum, not follow their own curiosity.

If you’re noticing that what you teach one week is forgotten the next, that your kids can’t tell you what they’ve been learning, that information goes in one ear and out the other — that’s a sign you need to deschool. Real learning sticks when it belongs to the child.

Sign 4: You Need to Deschool When Your Purchases Don’t Match Your Values

I bought this comprehensive language arts anthology — grammar, sentence construction, vocabulary, sentence diagramming. All the things a “well-educated” child should learn.

But when I watched my kids do the sentence diagramming worksheets, I realized: they don’t care whether a verb comes before or after a noun. These grammar concepts had no application or meaning in their lives. They weren’t trying to construct something beautiful or express a thought more deeply. The worksheets had no real purpose — just blanks to fill.

I’d purchased someone else’s vision of education and tried to force my kids into it.

If your shelf is full of curricula you don’t actually believe in, if you’re buying things because everyone else is, if your purchases look good on paper but feel empty in practice — that’s a sign you need to deschool. Your resources should reflect your actual values, not your imagined ones.

Sign 5: You Need to Deschool When Your Vision and Reality Don’t Match

I created these beautiful, detailed plans. Color-coded planners. Schedules built on Charlotte Mason and Susan Wise Bauer principles. A “feast of ideas” approach that sounded magical.

I loved it. I was learning and excited about these concepts.

But my kids? They were bickering. Resisting. Fighting with each other. The homeschool atmosphere got unhappy instead of joyful. The reality of my actual family didn’t match the vision I’d built in my head.

If you’re spending more time managing conflict than enjoying learning, if the beautiful plan you created is creating an unhappy home, if your vision of homeschooling doesn’t match what’s actually happening — that’s a sign you need to deschool. It’s time to let go of the ideal and work with what’s real.

👉 Ready to know if deschooling is your missing piece? The Deschool Your Homeschool Checklist is a free guide that helps you identify exactly where you are right now and what’s keeping you stuck. Grab it free here.

Sign 6: You Need to Deschool When Burnout Is Calling the Shots

Third or fourth year of homeschooling. New town. I woke up foggy, tired, irritable. My kids brought me a cold cup of coffee to bed — such a sweet gesture. I was grateful. But I was also completely fried.

Downstairs, the kids were making pancakes, fighting playfully over the flipper. Pancake batter on the floor. It should have been a joyful morning.

Instead, I rushed them. Smoothed over the conflict. Moved them into the read-aloud space. And when they started fighting over seats, I lost it. Not even aware I was losing it. Just mad. Stop. Sit down. Do what I said. Let’s go.

I was so burned out that I couldn’t even see the joy happening right in front of me. I was just trying to survive the day.

If you’re foggy, tired, irritable — if you’re snapping at your kids without meaning to, if you’re just trying to get through each day instead of enjoying it, if burnout is the thing running your homeschool — that’s a sign you need to deschool. You can’t pour from an empty cup, and right now yours is bone dry.

Sign 7: You Need to Deschool When You’ve Lost the Joy

I always believed homeschooling was the best thing for my kids. I wanted it. I built it. I gave them incredible opportunities and created beautiful memories.

But with my second daughter and my son in the later years, I remember thinking: I want to enjoy these years with them. I want to create memories. And I also want to do something else with my life.

I felt guilty about that. Shouldn’t I want to keep building the same offerings for my youngest? Wanting something for myself felt like betraying them.

But the truth was: I’d lost the joy because I’d lost myself. Homeschooling had become something I should do instead of something I wanted to do.

If you’re feeling resentful about homeschooling, if you’ve lost sight of who you are outside of being a homeschool mom, if you want to reclaim something for yourself — that’s not a failure. That’s a sign you need to deschool. You deserve to enjoy this season of life too.

If you’re reading this and recognizing yourself in these signs, you’re not alone — and you’re not failing.

What you’re experiencing is what happens when we inherit someone else’s vision of homeschooling instead of building our own. When we prioritize the checklist over the child. When we say yes to everything instead of saying yes to what actually matters.

Deschooling is the reset button. It’s the permission slip you’ve been waiting for to stop doing what you think you should do and start doing what actually works for your real family.

You Don’t Have to Keep Homeschooling This Way

👉 If you’re ready to go deeper and actually do the work of deschooling — the Deschooling Breakthrough Workbook is a self-directed guide for the mom who wants to examine her mindsets, get curious about her kids, and build something that fits. You don’t need a coach. You just need the right questions. Find it here.

And if you’ve read all seven signs and thought — this is me, but I have no idea where to start — you don’t have to figure it out alone.

The Aligned Homeschool Reset Session is a free 30-minute coaching conversation where we talk about what’s working, what’s not, and what you actually need right now — in your homeschool and in your life. It’s not a sales pitch. It’s a warm, grounded conversation, mom to mom, to help you gain clarity and find your next step.

You got into homeschooling to give your kids something better. You deserve to actually enjoy it.

👉 Book your free session here and take the first step toward reclaiming your rhythm, your joy, and your homeschool.

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Until next time — take care of yourself, nurture the nurturer, and lead your homeschool life from the inside out. 🤍

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