Why TeenTurf?

Join our movement in approaching homeschooling/unschooling in a whole new way! Teens live for socialization during this critical stage of development and the typical homeschool world can be challenging to navigate and foster the close relationships that teens need. Read on to better understand what makes us unique and how TeenTurf can help your teen through these homeschooling/unschooling years.

Spend less time schedule planning.

Keep your teen’s schedule full with a click of a button! With this new concept, it really is that easy! No more spending hours every week scrolling through homeschool events at different locations all around town, measuring the distance from your house, checking to see if it works with you and your teen’s schedule., and then asking if your teen wants to go, with each and every event. I’ve been there and know just how exhausting and time consuming this process is and a large reason why I created something different. At TeenTurf, we keep it simple - same time, same place, same people. Once you sign up, that’s your schedule for the rest of the semester. Since we are only 2 days a week, you can still fit in fun events planned by typical homeschool/unschool groups out there. We will plan some additional events, but we try to keep those on the same scheduling rhythm too. Keep reading to see how all this greatly improves your teen’s confidence and builds them more friends and closer relationships.

Spend less time researching activities.

Fun activities are already planned and built into our program. We do a variety of activities including ice breakers, board games, sports, and outdoor games. We vary things up every week and no two days are just alike, so your teen continues to feel stimulated and engaged. We plan community events at public venues and the teens help decide the place. We do the event planning, so you can just leave the research to us!

Access to a consistent group space.

Please read on, as our consistency model is a larger benefit than one may realize. We choose and rotate spaces for the teens to consistently meet up. We have noticed the teens’ comfort level increase due to returning back to the same space, time and again, which in turn helps them feel more comfortable with each other. This is also a neutral space, which feels different than being at someone’s house - so the teens are on equal ground. The teens also feel they can be themselves away from any distractions or stressors they may have at home and allows them the opportunity to explore themselves in a different way than when they are around family versus friends. It is truly the teens’ “Turf“ and we are constantly witnessing all the benefits that come with them having their own safe territory to retreat to on a weekly basis. Again, another large benefit we completely underestimated when we first began.

Build close relationships.

Our primary goal at TeenTurf is to help the teens make close friends with each other. I can’t tell you how many times my teen daughter and I have gone through talks, tears, and trials of different strategies to make her close friends since starting homeschooling. You can read more about our story here. I feel developing close relationships with other teens is vital and key to helping them thrive in many different aspects of their lives. Seeing the same people several times a week at the same place inevitably builds close relationships. At TeenTurf, we even take this a step further by incorporating friend matching services, exchanging teen phone numbers, ice breakers, and social platform invitations between each other, and more. If you think of adult friendships, they are quickly made by working together at the same place everyday. For kids, they make them through going to school everyday. There are other ways to make friends, but most of the time, the close ones are made through the place they most frequent. But what about our homeschool kids? They need a consistent place to go on a frequent basis too, and that’s what TeenTurf is all about.

Connect and build a strong community.

We specialize in helping all teens feel comfortable. I bring my skillsets to the table from my work as a psychotherapist, community organizer, and teen camp leader - this includes relating to people in a close way, working with teens, connecting group members, leadership qualities, youth camp experience, creating varying types of communities from the ground up. My skillsets help isolated teens connect so they can have closer friendships they are longing for in the homeschool/unschool world. It's not uncommon to hear that teens love the homeschool life but find they lack the socialization, despite the many homeschool groups and events they attend. This is where TeenTurf shines, as we specialize in filling this missing gap. We also foster close relationships among the teen parents through our private Facebook group to help parents and families stay connected too. We are truly all about building a tight-knit community and we work hard to make sure each and every person stays included and is accommodated, no matter who they are.

Drop-off at a supervised program.

Parents drop off their teens here, which makes us very different than a typical homeschool/unschool group. This allows you to get your teen involved while you’re working, tend to younger siblings without arranging for childcare, worrying about the added headache of your own scheduling difficulties, the list goes on…..so can enjoy a guilt-free time doing whatever it is you need to do, while your teen is doing what they need to do. I’ve been there too and this is also a big reason why I started TeenTurf. Just drop off and pick up and leave the rest to us! However, the benefit doesn’t end there! We have noticed, since starting the program, the teens actually connect so much better when the parents are not around. We didn’t know this, but it’s really interesting to see the difference. Without the parent there to lean on for talking and interaction, the teens know they must depend on themselves to make the connections, so they try harder. Read below for more on this point.

A teen-only space.

And last but certainly not least, we provide a teen-only space. We have found at this particular stage of life development involving independence and identity formation, teens can benefit from being socially exclusive with other teens while away from their families in order to explore and foster this new stage of development. As a result, the teens connect much easier when only around other teens. Trust us, we have seen this in action! When the parents are around, the teens are shy and not talking much, but as soon as all the parents drop-off, it's an entirely different story. We’ve even noticed a huge difference in how the teens interact at the community events with the parents around versus at the teen-only space. We did not know this, until we saw it. So, our teen-only space helps to foster this stage of development for your homeschool teen, who may otherwise not have many of these opportunities.