My first suggestion is to take it one day at a time. We started "emergency homeschooling" with plans to return to some bricks & mortar school after a year. We just started our third year, with no plans for that b & m school on our horizon. It's hard to predict the future!
I'm not saying that you shouldn't think about the future at all, of course, but I feel like it's hard enough to make a good choice for right this second. Trying to anticipate what my kids will need years--or even a decade!--from now is just impossible. Small steps...
If your kids do well with all styles of learning, then don't worry about that. Do a little bit of everything and adjust as needed. I think some kids really require a certain teaching stye. Others don't. If you have a "don't" kid, then rejoice in your good fortune and don't worry about it. One less thing.
Are your kids onboard about homeschooling? Do they like the idea? If not, then it will be significantly harder to do it. My current homeschooling motto is "You can lead a kid to homeschooling, but you can't make him learn." So if they aren't buying in, you will have a hard year.
If they are buying in, then the conversation(s) about it should be pretty easy. Because I'm homeschooling one and have one in public school (who may well go to a private school next year...), I talk about homeschooling--and school in general, for that matter--in terms of meeting needs. Different kids have different needs. It's hard for a classroom to meet the learning needs of some kids, so we'll try something else. A laidback, nonthreatening, non-critical attitude helps, I think. That's not easy if you feel let down by the school system. I know from personal experience!
But it is helpful, especially if you want your kids to be able to play with kids who are in a b & m school.
My best advice is to buy VERY little/nothing your first year. Most of what you buy won't work for you. If you buy, I'd recommend that you buy cheap stuff you won't feel bad about dumping if it doesn't work. The first year of homeschooling is more of a learning period for you than for your kids. It is NOT the time for big investments.
As for how long we plan to homeschool...until it doesn't work for him as well as something else would, I guess. I suspect that he may want to do something different at puberty (though he currently attends a "school for homeschoolers" a couple of days a week, so he sees some girls). That would be fine with me. But he's only 8. I have a hard time thinking that far ahead!
Keep talking, if it helps.
