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Homeschooling
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From Life Learning Magazine Jan/Feb. 2008:
Q: Describe
how you homeschooled.
Play was one mainstay of how our children
learned. Stories and books were another. I read out loud to various combinations
of my children from three to six hours
a day broken up into smaller chunks throughout the day. Picture books, chapter books, comic books, etc. were
all part of what I read. I read throughout the day as well as at bedtime. It was a delightful way to take a mini-holiday.
We’d sit together on the couch or in a big chair and go off to some other place and visit with people who became our
friends. Through the stories my husband and I read to our children, as well as the recorded stories they listened to,
they learned many things. Books were a big part of our homeschooling life.
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Learning At Home: A Mother's Guide To Homeschooling
Chapter 1
Can I Do This - Teach My Child At Home?
page 12
Before
I list the characteristics which I think are important in
order to be able to teach your child at home, let
me define what I mean by teaching. The New Lexicon Webster’s Encyclopedic
Dictionary of the English Language, Canadian Edition lists four definitions
for teach, three of which I quote “to give instruction to, to train; to
give to another knowledge or skill which one has oneself; to cause to understand.”
With this as a basis, I extend this definition to also mean being aware
of when the child is ready to receive the teaching. In other words,
just because I am ready to give my child instruction in reading doesn’t
mean my child is ready or able to receive it.
When I taught, I tried to be aware of my child’s ability,
readiness, and desire to learn a particular subject; to be sensitive to
my child’s motivation; and to be aware of my own motivation in wanting
to teach a particular something to my child. Teaching can only happen
when there is someone willing to be the learner as well as someone willing
to be the teacher. The method used to instruct needs to be suitable
to the person receiving the instruction.
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From Chapter 2 - "Creating a Learning Environment"
We
in our North American culture have formalized learning to such a great
extent (classes for toddlers and preschoolers on how to do everything
from singing to working a computer), that it may be difficult to accept
that the time children spend “messing around” has any value whatsoever
much less an educational value. Yet play, non-adult directed play, is
vital to a child’s intellectual growth and creative abilities. In order
for us to understand things, we need to have a primary experience of
what we are trying to understand. We need something to hang our
experience on. "La experiencia es la madre de la ciencia. Experience is the mother of knowledge." Cervantes
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Homeschooling
