Questions, answered.

Free resources are wonderful, and many families use them. Bloom puts it all in one place, in order: every subject for each child's grade, a teaching guide for every lesson, and every answer key, planned day by day. Your time goes to teaching, not searching and stitching it together.

RubyLou's lessons are reviewed, not generated. AI tools help us draft. Then every lesson is written to our lesson standard, every fact is checked against two sources, and every lesson passes an independent review before it reaches your table. Your child never talks to an AI, and your family's information is never used to train one.

Choose one approach or blend up to three: Charlotte Mason, Classical, Montessori, Waldorf, Unit Studies and Traditional. Your blend changes how each lesson is taught; what your child learns stays the same. Faith is yours to add, only if you want it, at the depth you choose.

You tell us the time you have, from about an hour of teaching a day to five or more, and the plan fits it. On our sample Grade 4 day, lessons take about 2 hours 20 minutes, and 1 hour 25 minutes of that is with you. Older children do more on their own. Some states set required hours or days, so check yours in your state guide.

Your state guide →

Yes. Every RubyLou lesson works on paper, including its pictures, quizzes and tests, and you can print your teaching guide too. Screens are your choice, never required.

Yes. Where it fits, siblings share one lesson, and each child's page fits their level. In Bloom, each additional child is $199. In Petal, a subject your children learn together counts once, at the oldest child's price.

Yes. Tell us your co-op days, and your home days are planned around them. Keep the books you love: RubyLou can add a teaching companion that follows them, or you can choose just the RubyLou subjects you need.

Tell us the book you use and where your child is in it. We'll confirm it's eligible and give you a ready-by date, within 30 days, before you pay anything. While you wait, RubyLou's own lessons for that subject are yours to use. Your refund window starts once your companion is ready, and if we can't deliver it, that subject is refunded in full.

Only what the lessons use, like the books you'll read together and simple supplies. Each lesson lists what you'll need, and whether to buy, borrow or use something from home. A printed book of your semester is an optional add-on.

Bloom isn't a book you finish. Each year brings the next grade's lessons, planned day by day, and next week's plan adjusts as you go. Each additional child is $199, not another full price.

Start free with Seed, and use it for as long as you like. When Petal and Bloom open, you'll have 30 days to try them, with a full refund if they aren't right for your family. If you pay with Arizona ESA funds, any refund goes back to your ESA account.

Our refund promise →

Seed is free and open now. Petal and Bloom open to founding families first, and nothing is charged until then. Join the founding families and we'll write when they're ready.

RubyLou is a homeschool companion for parents. You tell us how you want to teach — Charlotte Mason, Classical, Montessori, a blend of your own — and RubyLou turns that philosophy into a real, livable week: lessons, books, activities, and rhythms shaped to each of your children and to your family's actual capacity. Around your week, RubyLou quietly handles the rest: your state's compliance requirements, your records, and (on Bloom) your ESA documentation. You have the last word on everything. RubyLou plans; you teach; your child never needs a screen.

Families teaching at home in any form: full homeschool, hybrid (some days at home, some at a co-op or school), supplementing alongside school, or summer learning, from kindergarten through high school. Seed is free for the whole family. Petal is $149 a year for the first subject and $119 for each one after. Bloom is $499 a year for the first child and $199 for each additional child.

No — and that's deliberate. RubyLou is a parent tool. There are no child accounts, no child logins, and no child-facing screens. Your child's learning happens where it should: with books, materials, nature, and you.

Grades open one by one. Founding families hear first, and before you pay anything, we'll show you what's ready for your child's grade.

Seed — the operating system for the homeschool you already love: setup and your approach, a weekly plan built around the curriculum you already own, your record (grades, results, and portfolio), your state's requirements with the hours you record, the Living-books Library, activities, the Teaching Academy, a budget tracker, and the parent community, where every member completes a background check before joining. Petal — the same reviewed lessons, for just the subjects you choose. Bloom — everything in Seed, plus lessons from RubyLou's reviewed library, fitted to your approach: every lesson, daily teaching guide, and assessment for the subjects you choose, one subject or all of them, with placement, the Learning Twin, activities that know your house, faith & heritage layers, and high school courses, with your hours filled in as you teach. Seed is free for the whole family, Petal is priced by subject and Bloom by child, and you can change plans anytime.

Yes, with Petal. It's $149 a year for the first subject and $119 for each one after, for any child in your family. Each subject comes complete, with its tests and answer keys. One child's subjects never add up to more than $499 a year. For your first child, three subjects are $387 a year, and Bloom, with every subject, is $499. For each child after that, Bloom is $199, less than two subjects. If you move that child to Bloom later, what you've paid this year for their subjects counts toward it. We only offer subjects whose lessons are open.

When Petal and Bloom open, you'll have 30 days to try them, with a full refund if they aren't right. Your records — compliance logs, portfolios, ESA documentation — are yours: export them whenever you like, before or after cancelling. We never hold a family's own records hostage.

During setup you tell us your real teaching capacity — hours per day, days per week, your confidence level — and whether your week includes co-op days, school days, or a working parent's schedule. The plan is built inside that reality: a family with ninety minutes a day gets a rich ninety-minute plan, not a guilt-inducing six-hour one. Your daily check-ins ("good day / some friction / a hard one") quietly teach RubyLou when the load is wrong, and the plan adjusts. Rest is scheduled with the same care as lessons.

Overwhelm in homeschooling usually comes from three places: planning load, uncertainty ("am I doing enough?"), and isolation. RubyLou takes the planning hours off your plate, replaces the 9pm Pinterest spiral with a week that's already built. The compliance tracker answers "am I doing enough?" with your state's actual requirements instead of anxiety. The Teaching Academy builds your confidence as a teacher, the check-ins keep your load honest, and the community means you're never the only one. And we never use pressure tactics, rankings, or red warnings — there is no such thing as falling short in RubyLou, because the plan bends to your family, not the reverse.

Short, practical parent training matched to your philosophy: how to run a narration, what a Montessori work cycle looks like at your kitchen table, how to teach a subject you're nervous about, how to recognize and protect your own energy. It's there to help you feel ready to teach.

Each child can have one main book per subject, plus one swap per subject each year. Tell us the book and edition, and we'll confirm it's eligible and give you a ready-by date, within 30 days, before you pay anything. Supplementary books, like read-alouds and extra workbooks, can be logged for your hours and records.

No. Your companion points you to the pages in your own book, like "Read pages 42–51," and adds RubyLou's own teaching guide, practice, quizzes and answer keys. It never reproduces your book's text, problems or answers.

Tell us what you're using during setup, and whether you plan to keep it. If you're keeping it, RubyLou plans around it: that subject stays yours, and RubyLou builds the rest of your week to fit. You can also add a teaching companion for a book you already own: RubyLou lessons that follow your book in its order, taught in your approach.

The Library is a living-books collection matched to your philosophy and your child — real titles, not worksheets — with local library availability so most of your reading list is free. It feeds the curriculum: when your week includes a read-aloud, it's a specific book chosen for your child's level and interests. Included with Bloom.

On every plan, your weekly plan includes activities built from your philosophy, your child's interests, and what's already in your supply closet. Yes to multiple children: each child gets their own level-appropriate thread, and the week deliberately includes shared moments — morning baskets, nature walks, read-alouds — where the family learns together.

RubyLou explains your state's homeschool requirements in plain words and keeps your hours, lesson logs and records in one place, filled in as you teach. You stay in charge of anything your state asks you to file or report, so please confirm the details with your state.

If your state has an Education Savings Account or a similar program, RubyLou (Bloom) helps you keep it organized: your receipts in one place, purchases noted against your state's published rules, anything uncertain flagged for you to check, and documentation organized for you to submit. Each state's rules show the date we last checked them. You always submit to your state yourself, and you stay in charge of your account.

Yes. Homeschooled students go to college every year. High school courses, like U.S. History and Civics, are included in Bloom, or you can take them one at a time with Petal. Your records, work samples, and portfolio live in RubyLou all along, so nothing needs reconstructing senior year.

No — if anything, the opposite. RubyLou has no child accounts and no child-facing screens; it's a tool for you, used in the minutes you'd otherwise spend planning. The weeks it builds are full of the analog things home education does best: real books, handwork, nature, conversation.

RubyLou is in English. High school courses include Spanish, French and Latin, and younger children can add a language where it fits your approach.

This is where being a parent-only platform matters. Children never have accounts, we collect the minimum about them (a first name or nickname and birth month — never full birth dates, never medical records; learning supports, like reading aloud or movement breaks, are optional and you can delete them anytime), every family's data is isolated at the database layer with automated tests guarding that isolation on every change, we never sell data, we show no ads, and your family's information is never used to train AI models. You can export everything and delete your account at any time.

The RubyLou community is parent-to-parent. Every parent completes a third-party background check before joining, and children have no presence on RubyLou at all. You're matched with families nearby by approach and your children's ages, and you choose who to connect with, what to share, and whether and where to meet. A background check has limits, so please always use your own judgment when meeting anyone new.

RubyLou brings your homeschool into one home: reviewed lessons taught in your approach, each child at their own level in each subject, your records and state requirements, a library that feeds your week, training that helps you feel ready to teach, and a parent community where every member completes a background check before joining. Every lesson works on paper. And it's built calm on purpose: no pressure, no rankings, no red.

That's not a problem to fix — it's how children actually learn, and RubyLou is built for it. Each subject carries its own level: a reader two years ahead and a mathematician right on rhythm can be the same child, and the week honors both without ceremony.

We hope so. During setup you can tell us what helps your child learn, like reading aloud, movement breaks or fewer items on a page, and the plan uses it. It's always optional, we never ask for diagnoses or medical records, and you can delete it anytime.

A few minutes to set up, and a few seconds a day after that: the daily check-in is a few taps. The point is to give you time back, not add a dashboard to manage.

RubyLou was founded by Kaitlin Carroll — built in Boulder, Colorado with a conviction that home education deserves tools as thoughtful as the families who choose it.