Why do some homeschoolers choose not to use one of the many complete math curricula available today? And what do they do instead? To many homeschooling parents, math feels like the one thing that must be taught and learned in a systematic way even for very young children. Even many people who are otherwise attracted to or influenced by a version of interest-based learning or unschooling often say– “except for math.”
Curriculum
When You Need More Than One Curriculum For the Same Subject
One of the main benefits of homeschooling is the ability to tailor educational materials to each individual child. Rather than fitting the child to the curriculum, homeschooling enables a parent to fit the curriculum to the child. It is not uncommon to find different children in the same family working in completely different materials for the same subject, because they have different learning styles and strengths. And while some homeschoolers use an all-in-one curriculum approach, which offers all subjects through the same curriculum/publisher (such as Sonlight or Abeka), others use a variety of different publishers and curricula for different subjects. Regardless of the approach you choose, there may come a time when a single curriculum for a particular subject does not seem to meet your needs. Continue reading »
How Did Your Curriculum Work For You?
You have probably either finished the year or are winding up the year. It’s a good time to reflect on how your curriculum worked for you in each subject (if you use curriculum). Did you find yourself dreading a particular subject? Did your children complain about the curriculum? Did they accomplish the goals that you had set for the year? Continue reading »
Choosing a Homeschool Language Arts Curriculum
What does a homeschool language arts curriculum need to have to make it useful, interesting and comprehensive? Are there language arts lesson plans which I can use over a number of ages? Well, firstly we need to consider what language arts lessons makes a language arts curriculum. It would need to include reading, writing, speaking and listening. Getting to finer details, it would need to teach writing skills from handwriting to written sentences, paragraphs, essays and writing in a wide variety of forms. It should teach interesting use of words, sentence grammar and the use of a variety of sentence structures. It should include listening, reading aloud, discussion of character, themes, actions, morals and personal application. Quite a range of skills! Continue reading »
Choosing Your History Curriculum
For homeschool moms and other teachers who are able to choose their own history curriculum, selecting the book(s) that will keep you energized all year long is a crucial decision. Whether you call them spines, source books, core books, or textbooks, you can’t ignore the importance of having one all-encompassing history guide to keep you grounded and make sure you leave no obvious gaps. This book will reinforce the flow of events, even if your extended reading is chronologically a little before or behind it in time sequence. Continue reading »