Homeschool Schedule
A good calendar is an ingredient not to be forgotten as part of your overall homeschool schedule and homeschool lesson plan.
After taking a high level look at your home school calendar integrated with your family calendar, you may decide that the traditional school year calendar of end of summer through early spring may not be the most advantageous.
There is no stringent time schedule that you must adhere to as is the case in public schools.
As with your home school lesson planning, your scheduling should take into careful consideration your child’s learning style and determine what will work best. If vacations aren’t a part of your plans, there are probably other reasons (such as birthdays) for tailor making your own home school calendar.
While mapping a home school yearly schedule is an excellent idea, remember to allow for flexibility in the schedule. Any school year, especially since the school year is taking place also centered around your home and your family, will have the need for unforeseen breaks and absences.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Homeschoing Curriculum
Homeschool Curriculum - Do I Need It?
Homeschool curriculum and books are plentiful. Do you really need to purchase a home school curriculum or can you save some money and home school with books alone? Here are some thoughts that can help you make your decision:
1. You need a core plan - Whether you purchase a home school curriculum or develop your own, you need to know what you want to accomplish.
2. Focus on reading, writing and arithmetic - Any good home school program focuses on the basics.
3. Know how you and your child learn best - Learning style plays a key role in how you and your children will learn. In public school teachers can’t really teach based on learning style because of the volume of students they have to work with. If you don’t know yours or your child’s learning style you can take an assessment online and find out. http://www.hjresources.com/hsrecommend Then when you decide to choose curriculum or books you will know what types of resources you need.
4. Use your resources - In the early days of home schooling there wasn’t much available to parents.
5. Do you use a curriculum to learn something yourself? Do you buy a curriculum to learn or do you read books, listen to audio and watch videos? Your children need to see you have a love for learning.
Homeschool curriculum and books are plentiful. Do you really need to purchase a home school curriculum or can you save some money and home school with books alone? Here are some thoughts that can help you make your decision:
1. You need a core plan - Whether you purchase a home school curriculum or develop your own, you need to know what you want to accomplish.
2. Focus on reading, writing and arithmetic - Any good home school program focuses on the basics.
3. Know how you and your child learn best - Learning style plays a key role in how you and your children will learn. In public school teachers can’t really teach based on learning style because of the volume of students they have to work with. If you don’t know yours or your child’s learning style you can take an assessment online and find out. http://www.hjresources.com/hsrecommend Then when you decide to choose curriculum or books you will know what types of resources you need.
4. Use your resources - In the early days of home schooling there wasn’t much available to parents.
5. Do you use a curriculum to learn something yourself? Do you buy a curriculum to learn or do you read books, listen to audio and watch videos? Your children need to see you have a love for learning.
Choose Homeschooling curriculum
How Do I Choose Homeschool Curriculum
Homeschool Curriculum - How Do I Choose?
The availability of home school curriculum can be a blessing and a curse. There are many books and programs to choose from, but trying to choose can be quite overwhelming.
1. Consider learning style - Look at how you and your child learn best. Knowing yours and your child’s learning style can help reduce the amount of “wrong” curriculum that you purchase. If you have a clear picture of how everyone in your home learns best, then you can choose books or curriculum accordingly. This can save money and frustration in the long run. You can go to home school conventions, used curriculum fairs or have the curriculum sent to you by using “Curriculum Fair in a Box.” As you are looking at or thinking about what your child needs, you can jot that down in the proper column for each child. You might have many items under each subject for each child.
Choosing books, curriculum, and resources to use in a school year doesn’t have to be an overwhelming task. If you know how your child learns best, know what is available, and focus on what you want to accomplish for that year you can save yourself quite a bit of frustration.
Homeschool Curriculum - How Do I Choose?
The availability of home school curriculum can be a blessing and a curse. There are many books and programs to choose from, but trying to choose can be quite overwhelming.
1. Consider learning style - Look at how you and your child learn best. Knowing yours and your child’s learning style can help reduce the amount of “wrong” curriculum that you purchase. If you have a clear picture of how everyone in your home learns best, then you can choose books or curriculum accordingly. This can save money and frustration in the long run. You can go to home school conventions, used curriculum fairs or have the curriculum sent to you by using “Curriculum Fair in a Box.” As you are looking at or thinking about what your child needs, you can jot that down in the proper column for each child. You might have many items under each subject for each child.
Choosing books, curriculum, and resources to use in a school year doesn’t have to be an overwhelming task. If you know how your child learns best, know what is available, and focus on what you want to accomplish for that year you can save yourself quite a bit of frustration.
Right Homeschool Programe
Finding The Right Homeschool Program
Probably the single most relevant point on this would be to keep in mind that the eventual best home education program for your situation and style may involve pulling home school resources from more than one home school curriculum.
Many homeschoolers start by using a complete curriculum package. As you gain more experience and confidence, you’ll see that effective teaching is using a combination of educational resources that are readily available (including online home school programs) that round out your personal program and insure your child’s success.
The key to a good homeschooling program is the ‘fit’. Both you and your child have to be comfortable with the homeschool study on an ongoing basis. If you start out with a good base program as a roadmap, you can then tailor it to fit your needs.
This helps to determine what type of learner your child is, and their ability to apply their skills.
As you now know, a good home school curriculum will draw from many educational sources and will direct the child to discover and learn the material and not just memorize answers.
Probably the single most relevant point on this would be to keep in mind that the eventual best home education program for your situation and style may involve pulling home school resources from more than one home school curriculum.
Many homeschoolers start by using a complete curriculum package. As you gain more experience and confidence, you’ll see that effective teaching is using a combination of educational resources that are readily available (including online home school programs) that round out your personal program and insure your child’s success.
The key to a good homeschooling program is the ‘fit’. Both you and your child have to be comfortable with the homeschool study on an ongoing basis. If you start out with a good base program as a roadmap, you can then tailor it to fit your needs.
This helps to determine what type of learner your child is, and their ability to apply their skills.
As you now know, a good home school curriculum will draw from many educational sources and will direct the child to discover and learn the material and not just memorize answers.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
How to Avoid Burnout
Home schooling: How to Avoid Burnout
By: Heidi Johnson
As with any project you take on, there is always the chance for burnout. Here are some simple steps you can take to help avoid burning out on home schooling.
1. Don’t try to do more than you or your child are capable of doing. Most students are average. Don’t expect your 3 year old to read novels or your teenager be able to ace the SAT test and get a full ride into college. These things happen, but they are not the norm.
2. Set a routine and skip the strict schedules. Do your children know what is expected of them each day? They need to get up, eat breakfast, do some chores, read, write, do arithmetic and a few other things that you set for them to do. They should not be playing on the computer or playing outside until their normal routine is finished. Some days are easier to accomplish than others. On the low motivation days, you can always throw in some fun or an occasional incentive.
3. Enjoy your children and develop your relationship with them. If you have a habit of relating with your child, with mutual listening, then you can work through any curriculum struggle or lack of motivation. You and your child should enjoy learning together and separately. If you are interested in a certain topic like cooking or gardening then your children should see you pursuing that knowledge. We all learn better when we are motivated to learn something ourselves.
4. When you home school you don’t have to mimic what the schools do. They have to structure their days a certain way because of the volume of students they have and the tests they have to pass. Homeschoolers can learn in many different ways using unusual methods like hopping up and down a step when you answer a flashcard or problem correctly. Use the flexibility of home schooling to avoid burnout by changing the atmosphere a little bit. Play music one day. Light some candles another day. Declare a “game day”.
If you keep your life and day in proper perspective, you can easily avoid burning out on home schooling. Your children probably won’t remember the lesson of the day although they will build on their knowledge and grow in their intelligence, just as they won’t remember the meal they eat, but it will help them grow physically. Your children will mostly remember the atmosphere of your home and how you treated them.
Homeschooling as Superior Education For Your Child
Homeschooling as Superior Education For Your Child
By: Joel Turtel
Home-schooling provides children with a superior education. Parents can quickly teach most kids the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic using excellent, creative, learn-to-read, or learn-math books, programs, or computer learning software. Once children become proficient readers, they can then study subjects they love in greater depth. If a child needs help on a special subject, parents can occasionally call in a tutor.
Many studies confirm that home-schooled kids learn more, learn better, and learn faster than public-school children. Christopher J. Klicka, author of "The Right Choice: Homeschooling," cites a nationwide study of more than 2,163 home-schooling families conducted in 1990 by the National Home Education Research Institute:
“The study found the average scores of the home school students were at or above the 80th percentile in all categories. This means that the homeschoolers scored, on the average, higher than 80 percent of the students in the nation. The home schooler’s national percentile mean was 84 for reading, 80 for language, 81 for math, 84 for science, and 83 for social studies."
Several state departments of education also conducted their own surveys on the academic achievement of home-schooled students. In 1987, much to its embarrassment, “the Tennessee Department of Education found that home-schooled children in second grade, on the average, scored in the 93rd percentile, while their public school counterparts, on the average, scored in the 52nd percentile on the Stanford Achievement Test” (the SAT-9 is a well-respected battery of multiple-choice academic achievement tests for public-school students).
These studies, and many others, confirm the fact that home-schooling parents can give their kids a superior education. This shouldn’t surprise us. Home-schooling parents succeed where public schools fail because parents give loving, personalized attention to their children, use innovative free-market educational materials, and nourish a love of learning in their kids.
By: Joel Turtel
Home-schooling provides children with a superior education. Parents can quickly teach most kids the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic using excellent, creative, learn-to-read, or learn-math books, programs, or computer learning software. Once children become proficient readers, they can then study subjects they love in greater depth. If a child needs help on a special subject, parents can occasionally call in a tutor.
Many studies confirm that home-schooled kids learn more, learn better, and learn faster than public-school children. Christopher J. Klicka, author of "The Right Choice: Homeschooling," cites a nationwide study of more than 2,163 home-schooling families conducted in 1990 by the National Home Education Research Institute:
“The study found the average scores of the home school students were at or above the 80th percentile in all categories. This means that the homeschoolers scored, on the average, higher than 80 percent of the students in the nation. The home schooler’s national percentile mean was 84 for reading, 80 for language, 81 for math, 84 for science, and 83 for social studies."
Several state departments of education also conducted their own surveys on the academic achievement of home-schooled students. In 1987, much to its embarrassment, “the Tennessee Department of Education found that home-schooled children in second grade, on the average, scored in the 93rd percentile, while their public school counterparts, on the average, scored in the 52nd percentile on the Stanford Achievement Test” (the SAT-9 is a well-respected battery of multiple-choice academic achievement tests for public-school students).
These studies, and many others, confirm the fact that home-schooling parents can give their kids a superior education. This shouldn’t surprise us. Home-schooling parents succeed where public schools fail because parents give loving, personalized attention to their children, use innovative free-market educational materials, and nourish a love of learning in their kids.
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