One of the fun things the TOS Homeschool Crew is doing this year is hosting a weekly Blog Carnival called the "Blog Cruise" with a variety of homeschool topics. The first Blog Cruise will be posted on Aug. 17 and the topic is advice for those who are considering homeschool or just starting out.
So let's see . . . my advice is, first pray about it and discuss it with your spouse, and if, at that point, you feel it is God's will for your family, don't stress about it too much!
If your children have been in school, there may be other considerations, like helping them re-discover a love of learning, and de-school and such, and I'm not going to even pretend to give advice on any of that because our children have never been to school. I'm sure there will be others on the Blog Cruise with great advice on those areas, but I'm going to speak with the assumption that your children are just approaching school age, and haven't been to school yet.
I see so many people worrying about "doing it right". When it all boils down to it, homeschooling is really just 24/7 parenting of your children, instead of sending them off to someone else to train for the better part of each day.
Young children love to learn. You would have to work at it to KEEP them from learning!! Do you worry and stress about teaching your infant to talk? No, they learn to talk by listening to you. And homeschooling is just continuing on, not sending them away to learn when they hit that magic age of 5 or 6 or whatever.
Ask your children what they'd like to learn about (my kids always have 101 ideas, but obviously not the attention span to learn it all at once), observe what they're interested in, and go with it.
I do have one more suggestion. Develop a "teacher mentality", when they ask questions, ANSWER them, or help them find the answers. My husband sometimes gets frustrated trying to watch shows from the History channel and TLC and such when the girls are around because they want to UNDERSTAND everything, but that's really a great thing, it's how they learn!
4 comments:
"develop a teacher mentality" great advice!
questions aren't being asked to annoy you, they are just trying to learn!
This is a great post. It's so true. when I relaxed a little, it really was fun watching them not only love learning again, but asking for more.
When I've been approached by someone thinking they can't homeschool...I remind they've homeschooled since birth, now just because they are 5 or 6 doesn't mean they stop being the parent and teaching, now add in reading, writing, and arithmetic.
God's Blessings
Great advice - answer your kids, or help them find the answers - it teaches them how to find them on their own too. They learn by example. Great post! Thanks for participating in the Blog Cruise this week!
Post a Comment