When Dennis and Debbi Tirjan began home-schooling their daughters 15 years ago, they had little to choose from when they began looking for textbooks.
''When we started, the only company that would sell homeschool materials was Alpha Omega,'' Debbi Tirjan said, referring to one of the best-known home-school publishers. Other companies ''didn't really know how to look at it,'' she said.
This year, Alpha Omega was among the more than 70 exhibitors at the convention of the Middle Tennessee Home Education Association, which the Tirjans helped found more than a decade ago. Home-school parents can buy books and other materials from powerhouses like Bob Jones University Press or from single-family operations like Arkansas-based New Horizons Publishing.
''Now there's such a market for it you can pretty much do whatever you want,'' said Amanda Suey of Mt. Juliet, who plans to begin home-schooling her child this fall and was looking through books in the convention's exhibit hall Friday. ''There's so much stuff; you kind of feel overwhelmed when you come out here.''
The number of options has grown as the number of homeschool families has grown, said Dave Bachman, who sells home school products for BJU Press. His company's sales to the home- school market are growing faster than any other segment of the business, he said.
There is no comprehensive count of home-schooling families in Middle Tennessee because families have the option of registering with public school districts or through private religious schools. But Tirjan said the Middle Tennessee Home Education Association has grown from a few mothers 10 years ago to about 1,000 families now, and she thinks there are several thousand more such families in the region. She said she expected 1,500 to 2,000 people to attend this year's convention, held Thursday through yesterday at the Nashville Convention Center.
Melanie Hackworth, whose family operates New Horizons Publishing, got into the business because she had home-schooled her own children and realized there was a market for a wider variety of materials. Her first product was ''Over 500 Educational Freebies,'' a simple list in a three-ring binder. She sold 600 at her first book fair about a year ago. Hackworth has since added a manual on homeschool organization written by her sister, a preschool portfolio kit she created herself and a classical literature curriculum produced by another company.
''When you find out what works for you, it's going to work for someone else, too,'' Hackworth said. ''You've just got to find those people.''
The products for sale at the convention ranged from comprehensive grade level kits costing up to $350 to individual books and toys that cost just a few dollars. Bob Jones University offers home- school courses via satellite, for $40 a month plus the purchase of a $280 special satellite dish. Most of the wares had a distinctly Christian bent, but Bachman said there also had been a boom in nonreligious curricula as more families decide to home-school for educational, rather than religious, reasons.
''When home-schooling started out, almost exclusively everyone was doing it because of religious'' reasons, he said. ''But it's gotten to the point now where that's not so much true anymore.''
Julie and Aaron Foster don't plan to start home-schooling their son for another year but are already researching curriculum options.
''It's overwhelming,'' Julie Foster said of the number of booths at the convention. ''But at the same time it's great that there are so many ways you can do it.''
Jennifer Barnett covers education for The Tennessean. She can be reached at 726-5694 or jbarnett@tennessean.com.