Homeschooling in Zimbabwe: Our Farm Adventures Sept–Oct 2026

Homeschooling Activities

Homeschooling in Zimbabwe on the Farm

For our farm homeschooling family in Zimbabwe, September and October are always a time to regroup. The polo season ended in August, so now the children focus on catching up with their studies and their yearly academic goals.

Learning Independence

Paula Joy was unwell, so I took her to Johannesburg for three weeks to see specialists. That left Murray John on the farm with his father, doing his schoolwork, helping with the tobacco planting and getting ready for the barley harvest. He had to keep up with his academic work on his own so that he could achieve his September monthly goals. This is something I have spent years training the children to do, and they have had to learn time management from a very young age.

Why We Love the ACE Homeschool Programme

This is why we love the ACE programme so much. It sets clear monthly and yearly academic goals, so the children always know where they stand and what needs to be done. I leave it to them to decide when to fit their academics into the day around their farm responsibilities.

Some mornings Murray John has to GPS lands or fix the GPS on the tractors. Once the harvest started at the end of September, he spent hours in the combine adjusting the settings and making sure the land mapping was set up correctly. He often does this first thing, then comes back and does his schoolwork mid to late morning. His schoolwork takes him three to five hours, depending on the subjects.

Teen Drone Photography on the Farm

Murray John loves learning about drone photography and how to make reels that get high views on Instagram. Slowly, he is learning how Instagram and its algorithms work. This is as much of an education as his high school academic work, and his latest drone video got over 100,000 views! Follow Murray Whaley on Instagram.

Weekends

After a hectic six months of polo every weekend, we finally have weekends on the farm to catch our breath. For the men, however, they turn into hectic harvest and planting weekends with no days off in between. So although it’s our quiet time for sport, it’s a very busy time for farming.

Paula Joy’s Health

By the end of August, Paula Joy’s health wasn’t good, so we went to Johannesburg for specialist help. After three weeks and a visit to an endocrinologist, we now have a better plan. Her recovery will be slow, as her body needs time to adjust to the medication and heal. All her health issues have been caused by growing very fast during puberty, which threw her body completely out of balance.

Paula Joy celebrated her 17th birthday while she was receiving treatment in Johannesburg, so it was a quiet day. However, she did get to enjoy some shopping at the end of the trip. By mid-October she was feeling a little stronger and able to start some schoolwork. She has a couple of years of work to catch up on, which she’ll do as she recovers. I’m confident she’ll have all her studies completed by the time she is 19.

Horses

The horses rest through September and October and are turned out as a herd into a large paddock, so they have time to just be horses. This is so good for their bodies and minds.

This is also when the children go through all their tack, making sure it’s cleaned, repaired and ready for next season.

New Horses

We sold one of Murray John’s polo ponies that he had outgrown and replaced it with two young horses off the racetrack in South Africa. They’ll start training in January, ready for the polo season in April.

Homeschooling Sports

Golf

Murray John’s golf lessons and training started towards the end of September. He now goes to Harare every other week for a couple of days of lessons and practice. As a scratch golfer, he’s working on the small details that will get him where he wants to be by 18.

Murray John’s Added Fitness

To stay fit, he water-skis on the dam by the house during his lunch breaks, and he rides his motorbike around the farm all day. The farm is 4,500 hectares, so he clocks up some serious kilometres on his off-road bike. Now that the harvest is done, he’ll get back on the horses to keep up his polo skills.

Homeschooling Adventures

Farm Life

Karimba Estate

Karimba is a large farm. We planted 120 hectares of tobacco at the beginning of September and another 120 hectares from mid-October. The 450 hectares of barley were harvested in early October, and the 100 hectares of wheat were harvested in late October. Maize and tobacco will follow the barley, so land prep and seeding keep everyone busy.

Murray John on the Farm

Murray John is involved in all of it. He handles the computers linking the tractors and implements, and he enjoys working with the highly automated combine. He sets up its computer to manage the harvest, programming it for each land so that it calculates the yield per land. During the harvest, Murray John spent five to six hours in the combine every day, often harvesting until late at night. This allowed the other driver to have a rest while the combine kept going.

He does all the GPS work for the contours and the hectares of each land, and he flies his drone to map every land after planting so we can spot weak patches. He loves how modern technology helps with farm operations.

Zimbabwe’s Economy

Zimbabwe’s economy hasn’t changed, and life is very hard for most people here. With El Niño and a possible drought ahead, it may be a difficult year for everyone.

Looking Ahead

In November and December we’ll carry on with schoolwork, and hopefully Paula Joy will be well enough to do a bit more. We have a trip planned in November, and plenty of golf for Murray John.

We look forward to sharing more of our homeschooling adventures with you soon!

“While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.” Genesis 8:22 (KJV)