Louisiana Homeschool Subjects Required and How to Document Them

Every year, Louisiana BESE home study families have to submit a renewal packet proving they offered a "sustained curriculum of quality at least equal to that offered by public schools at the same grade level." The state gives you a list of what to include in that packet. What it doesn't give you is a single template, example, or form showing you how to actually put it together.

This post covers the specific subjects Louisiana requires, what goes into each section of your annual documentation packet, and how to structure your curriculum outline, bibliography, daily log, and progress evidence so the renewal goes smoothly.

What Subjects Louisiana BESE Requires

The BESE Home Study Program Guidelines specify four core subject areas that must be covered:

• Mathematics
• English Language Arts (reading, writing, grammar, composition)
• Science
• Social Studies (history, geography, civics)

These four are the non-negotiables. If your renewal packet doesn't show instruction in all four, you're at risk of a deficiency notice.

Beyond the core four, the guidelines also reference the expectation that instruction is "sustained" and "of quality"—language that gives parents substantial flexibility but also leaves room for subjective interpretation by reviewers. Including a fifth area like fine arts, foreign language, physical education, or electives strengthens your packet and demonstrates that you're offering a full program, not a minimum-compliance checklist. This matters especially for high school students pursuing TOPS, where the TOPS Core Curriculum requirements add their own subject mandates on top of the BESE documentation requirements.

Grade-level alignment: Louisiana doesn't specify separate subject lists by grade the way some states do, but "equal to public school at the same grade level" is the benchmark. For elementary students, this means covering the four core areas at an age-appropriate level. For middle and high school students, it means showing progression across distinct courses—Algebra I and Geometry rather than just "math," Biology and Chemistry rather than just "science."

The Four Components of Your BESE Renewal Packet

The BESE guidelines spell out what a "packet of materials" must include when a portfolio review is your chosen renewal method. There are four main components:

1. An outline of subjects taught
2. A list of books and materials used (bibliography)
3. Copies of the student's work
4. Evidence of academic progress

Let's go through each one.

1. The Curriculum Outline

Your curriculum outline is a structured summary of what you taught and how you organized it. Think of it as the table of contents for your academic year.

A strong curriculum outline lists each subject area and, under each one, describes what was covered. This doesn't need to be a day-by-day syllabus. A concise, organized overview works fine:

Example format:

Mathematics — Pre-Algebra Covered integer operations, fractions, decimals, ratios, proportions, introduction to algebraic expressions and equations, and basic geometry. Used Saxon Math 8/7 as the primary curriculum, supplemented with Khan Academy for video instruction and additional practice problems.

English Language Arts Reading comprehension and literary analysis using a mix of classic literature and contemporary novels. Grammar instruction through Easy Grammar Plus. Composition included weekly journal writing, three structured essays, and a research paper on the American Civil War.

Science — Life Science Biology basics including cell structure, genetics, ecosystems, and human body systems. Primary text: Apologia Exploring Creation with Biology. Lab work included dissection, microscope observation, and garden ecology project.

Social Studies — U.S. History American history from Reconstruction through World War II. Primary text: Story of the World Vol. 4, supplemented with primary source documents, documentary films, and a unit on Louisiana state history per state standards.

This level of detail is what reviewers need to verify your program meets the sustained curriculum requirement. Vague entries like "we covered science" don't meet the standard.

2. The Bibliography (Book List)

Louisiana explicitly requires a list of books and materials used. This is your bibliography—a catalog of every curriculum program, textbook, novel, workbook, online course, or resource that played a meaningful role in your child's education that year.

Format it simply: author/publisher, title, and a brief note on how it was used if the title isn't self-explanatory.

What to include:

• Core curriculum texts and workbooks
• Literature and read-aloud books (if used for English instruction)
• Reference materials (atlases, dictionaries, encyclopedias used regularly)
• Online programs (list the program name and subject area)
• Video courses or lecture series used for a full unit
• Supplemental workbooks used more than occasionally

What not to include:

• One-off resources you pulled for a single lesson (a YouTube video you watched once, an article you printed out)
• Library books checked out casually
• Recreational reading not connected to instruction

There's no required format for the bibliography—a simple numbered or bulleted list organized by subject is clean and easy for reviewers to scan. Aim for thoroughness without padding. If you genuinely used 8 resources for science, list 8. Don't inflate it to look more comprehensive, and don't omit materials to simplify the list.

3. Copies of Student Work

This is the evidence component—actual samples demonstrating that the instruction you described in your outline actually happened and produced results.

You don't need to submit every worksheet your child completed all year. Select representative samples that show:

• Work from each subject area
• Progress across the year (early, middle, and late-year samples)
• Variety in format (tests, essays, projects, narrations, lab reports)

For a single school year, 8-15 pages of work samples across all subjects is typically adequate. For high school students, include longer-form work—a graded essay, a research paper, a lab report—that demonstrates subject-level rigor.

Organize work samples by subject and label them clearly. A cover sheet for each section helps reviewers find what they need without hunting through a stack of unlabeled papers.

Digital vs. paper: If your child did most work digitally—typed essays, online assignments, interactive curricula—print the completed work or take screenshots of completed assignments and include those. A note explaining the curriculum platform (e.g., "All math work completed in Teaching Textbooks, graded by the program's automated system—scores attached") helps contextualize digital evidence.

4. Progress Evidence

Beyond raw work samples, your packet should include some form of summative progress documentation—evidence that your child moved forward academically over the course of the year.

This can take several forms:

Progress reports or report cards: A parent-written report card summarizing performance in each subject at the end of each semester or quarter. Include letter grades or narrative evaluations.

Test scores and assessments: Scores from chapter tests, unit tests, or end-of-year assessments within your curriculum. If you use a program like Saxon Math or Apologia Science that has built-in tests, include a selection of those test results showing scores over the year.

Written evaluations: A narrative description of your child's growth, strengths, and areas of development, written by you as the instructor. For high school students, this can be written in a format similar to a teacher recommendation letter.

Standardized testing (if used): If your child took a nationally normed standardized test (CAT, Stanford, Iowa Test), include the score report. Note that for families using the portfolio renewal option rather than the test score option, you aren't required to include standardized testing—but if you have it, it strengthens the packet.

Your Daily Log: The Backbone of the Packet

While the four components above are what you submit at renewal, the daily log is how you generate that evidence throughout the year. Without a consistent log, you'll be assembling your packet from memory—and memory is not reliable across nine months of instruction.

A basic daily log entry needs:

• Date
• Subject areas covered
• Brief description of activity or materials
• Optional: grade or outcome for assessed work

Keep this log in one place—a binder, a spreadsheet, a dedicated app, or even a simple Google Doc. The format matters less than the consistency. Update it daily or weekly so entries reflect what actually happened, not what you hope you remember.

At renewal time, your log becomes the source document for your curriculum outline and work sample selection. If you've maintained it well, compiling your renewal packet drops from a multi-day panic to an afternoon of organizing.

How to Organize the Completed Packet

BESE reviewers go through renewal packets from multiple families. A packet that's clearly organized and uses the state's own terminology signals that you understand the program requirements.

Structure your packet in this order:

1. Cover page (family name, child's name, grade level, program year, pathway certification)
2. Curriculum outline (by subject)
3. Bibliography (by subject)
4. Progress summary or report card
5. Work samples (by subject, labeled)
6. Any supplemental documentation (field trip logs, co-op class verification, evaluation letters if obtained)

Label each section with a tab or divider. Put your name and child's name on every page. If the packet comes apart in transit or during review, individual pages should be identifiable.

Use the exact language from the BESE guidelines when labeling your sections. "Sustained Curriculum of Quality" as a section header on your cover page, and "Outline of Subjects Taught" rather than "course list," signals that you're working directly from the official requirements.

Putting It Together Without Starting from Scratch

The single most time-consuming part of BESE documentation is creating the structure—designing your curriculum outline format, figuring out how a bibliography should look, formatting a report card from nothing. Once you've done it once, future years are faster. But the first year costs real hours.

The Louisiana Portfolio & Assessment Templates includes ready-to-use versions of every document covered in this post: a BESE-formatted curriculum outline template, a bibliography tracker organized by subject, a daily log template with statutory language pre-filled, a progress report card, and a cover sheet that uses the exact terminology LDOE reviewers expect to see. If you're building your first packet or rebuilding after a disorganized year, starting from existing templates cuts the setup time significantly.

The documentation itself is straightforward once you know what the state is actually asking for. The problem is that Louisiana never explains it clearly—which is why families end up guessing and hoping their packet is good enough.

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