Just Left School? Your First Weeks Home
A free kit for families who have just left school, or are about to. It is one HTML file: a learning log you can fill in on screen and print, plus the first official steps for your state or territory.
Check with your registering authority. This page is general information. It is not legal advice, and your registering authority decides.
What the kit is for
The first weeks at home can be quieter than school. Cooking, shopping, budgeting, books, conversations, hobbies, documentaries, outings and play still count as learning when you write down the date and what was learned. The log starts on the first day. It is a record of learning, not a gap with nothing written down.
This kit does not suggest a Maths or English level. The level check for Maths and English does that for Years 1 to 6.
76.81% of new Queensland registrations in 2024 came from school. In that collection, Queensland Home Education counted 4,720 registrations that came from a school and 1,425 that came another way. The department marks the split as indicative: collected for administration, and not validated. Queensland Department of Education, Home Education data, 2024 collection.
What is inside
- A learning log for one child, using a first name only. Each entry has a date, what happened, a short formal record, and an optional note in the child's own words.
- A checklist for the state or territory you pick. Every step is from that jurisdiction's home education authority, with the source beside it.
- Links to Plan Builder (opens in a new tab) and the Registration Pack (opens in a new tab). The kit does not copy those tools. In Tasmania, Plan Builder is a thinking aid only: the program you submit must be in your own words.
In the kit, the Queensland checklist links to What Queensland needs, and the New South Wales checklist links to What NSW needs. Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory link only to their official authority pages. For an example of the wording, see an example of how a learning record is worded.
The file works offline in your browser after you open it. Chrome or Edge work best. Use Print / Save as PDF inside the file if you want a paper copy. Nothing in the log is sent anywhere.
Later, if you want it
For a fuller guide to registration, evidence, reviews and renewals, see 28 Days — The Real Evidence Guide for Australian Home Educators (opens in a new tab).
When you're ready for structured lessons, there's Wattlewood.