Homeschooling is my passion! I have long felt called to be a homeschool mommy and am blessed to be married to a man who was homeschooled therefore he is incredibly supportive. I truly believe it is by design that more and more I get asked advice about homeschooling. I feel that others are guided to me that may have questions or are pondering homeschooling themselves. It seems like daily the subject will come up in conversation; the cashier at the store will ask about my kids and when I say, oh we homeschool, she responds "ya know, I've been thinking about doing that but..." and the conversation takes off.
Does that mean I am an expert with years and years of experience, umm NO!! In fact my homeschooling style would be considered eclectic at best and I have only been homeschooling full time for a year now. I homeschooled my oldest son off and on in the past, but I was always working at the time so I didn't feel I was dedicated and invested as much as I wanted to be, the seeds were definitely there though.
But I thought today I would tell you a little bit about our homeschool. We have 5 children. Unfortunately, we do not have contact with my oldest step-son, something I would LOVE to change over the next year. But the children who live with us are Brainiac, 16, Drama Queen, 11, then our wild boys we call Bo and Luke Duke, 5 and 4.
Brainiac has just enrolled in a program with the local community college where he will be finishing high school and simultaneously earning his Associates Degree in Computer Programming. Unlike some high schools where kids go to high school and earn college credits, he will be attending college full time and earning his high school credits. When this program first presented itself I was very hesitant. I felt like I was rushing him, I wasn't ready to have a 16 year old aged child, LET ALONE A COLLEGE STUDENT. But he is incredibly smart, was in gifted programs and is super mature for his age. As much as I may not be ready for this adventure, he is.
Drama Queen is our dreamer, she is SO much like her mother in that respect. She's sweet and generous and has a fondness for animals that leads me to believe that is a career path she's headed for in one form or another. She also has a BIT of an attitude sometimes. Terrible twos were unmentionable and as she approaches her teens I see the same traits coming back to. She is creative and artistic, loves music and art. But, school... not so much (sigh).
Then there is Bo and Luke Duke. What one doesn't think up, the other does. Luke is a dare devil: the higher, the faster the better. Bo, is the most genuinely happy child in the world, he just wants to play and laugh (although also really has an ear for music) and if it looks like fun he's right in the middle of it.
So in order to me to attempt to educate the three youngest children I've found that eclectic unschooling works THE BEST for us. But to be honest, I am NOT the best at remembering that what works for me doesn't always work for everyone, I'm a work in progress. But I digress. At the beginning of the year I do my planning and decide what I want my children to learn, and what my goal is for the year. This year I've felt a major prompting to study American history, specifically the Revolution. And not the dates and names, I don't believe that teaches anything. But learn about the men, and women. Who they were, their backgrounds so we can understand WHY they did what they did and when.
For basics; reading, writing and arithmetic, I also look at benchmarks. Where should the kids be, so I know where to aim. Bo, will be "starting kindergarten" this year and will be learning to read and do basic addition and subtraction. Luke, who can never hold still, will just be along for the ride. If he's interested I will work with him, but forcing him to sit down and study at age 4 I think is ridiculous.
BUT here's the interesting part, and here's why I believe unschooling really works. Bo really WANTS to learn, he will ask me to get out his workbooks and ask "can I please do school work?" Luke, is always watching and learning by osmosis. Here is a perfect example. As I mentioned, Bo is learning basic addition and subtraction. Well, Bo and Luke are responsible for setting the table for dinner. The other night I intentionally gave Luke the wrong number of glasses. Without missing a beat, Luke said to me "Mom, you gave me too many. There are 6 cups, I only need 5 so you need to put 1 back." Mommy win!
I do leave learning tools everywhere around the house. I put some sight word magnets on the freezer awhile ago and never made a huge deal out of them. Today Luke was incredibly fascinated with them and he and I spent a while working with them.
The library is my best friend and we have library day once a week. The kids check out at least one book, ANY BOOK, any topic. Drama Queen typically prefers to just pick up a teen magazine so I am constantly urging her to also choose other reading material, but hey she's reading. :) I'll pick my battles carefully. Bo chooses a wide variety of topics, Luke will look for ANYTHING with a dinosaur or a shark. Although this week he surprised me with a book about spiders. As much as it grossed me out, he was fascinated and that is all that matters.
My homeschooling style may seemed disorganized, chaotic and unplanned at times but I promise there really is an underlying goal that I am always working towards...
one step at a time.
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