The journey

Homeschooling is hard. Plain and simple. The reason this is so hard is because these are your kids. You have more than just a passing interest in seeing that they do well in school and in life. Add the stress of trying to find the perfect match in every curriculum and subject and it's enough to make anyone's head spin.

Some things I've learned along the way... not every curriculum has to be an exact perfect match for my kids. They will still gain something from a curriculum even if it isn't tailor made for them. Obviously something that is completely a bad fit isn't good but I had to learn to stop nit-picking everything we tried, the perfect curriculum does not exist because they all have faults.

In a loving home with parents who are available to answer questions, spell words when asked, help research questions they can't answer themselves, expose the kids to new ideas, talk to their children throughout the day and make available things like paper, pencils and other "creative supplies", THEY WILL LEARN. I know it's hard to see sometimes, I remember being just few years into our journey and people telling me the same thing and thinking "I can't see how that can work, if I don't "teach" them, how will they learn?" But they do, you can't stop them from learning. All you need to do is facilitate by answering questions and making materials available and maybe make a suggestion or two if things get stagnate.

They might not follow an outlined progression developed by someone with a PhD in Education but they will follow their own timeline which IMO makes things easier for everyone. I tried to make sure they were up to par with the public schools but I only accomplished the same thing the public schools seem to do, suck the fun out of learning. When I relaxed and let them take things at their pace, they made giant leaps. Literally sometimes they would jump a grade level in understanding in just one day. Not everyday mind you but just when I'd start to worry they were dreadfully behind, they would make a giant leap and be on level or ahead. It took a while but I've finally become comfortable with the fact that learning at their pace does not look the same as learning at the public school pace and not only is that ok but it causes less tears and frustration. (Notice I didn't say "no tears or frustration" just less. )

As for how to teach without planning, that's easy, I don't teach. I facilitate their learning. I make available the supplies for them to teach themselves. I have a big cabinet in my den full of every imaginable art and science supplies, everything from paint, pencils, crayons and a dozen different kinds of paper to a microscope and supplies, magnets, dissection tools, wildlife identification books and glass prisms. Did I have all this stuff when my oldest was 6yo? No. Did I need all of it then? Not at all, I've picked things up here and there as I could afford them or could find them for free. Do I always have exactly everything I need for an experiment? Usually, but not always. But the anticipation of a much awaited science project hasn't killed anyone yet. And they are now pretty good about when we go out shopping to say, "Mom don't forget we need xyz to do that science project."

I know it's hard but relaxing and letting things go might be just what you need to do. Think long and hard about why you choose to homeschool. Most people don't choose to homeschool just so they can mimic school at home. Set priorities, for your homeschool and for each child. For instance, in K-3, my goal for my children is for them to be reading, writing and able to do basic arithmetic. Everything else like history and science sit on the back burner. We get them here and there but the 3r's are our priority. Manners and character are things I would teach my children no matter how they were schooled, public, private or at home. I teach those the same no matter what, I use teachable moments throughout the day. No one can do everything and do it well. Set priorities and re-evaluate them every few months and change them as needed. If you focused on reading for a few months and now your child is doing fairly well with it, change your focus to math for a while. If the child is still struggling, work on reading for a little while longer or if you seem to have hit a wall, change focus anyways and come back to reading in a few months.

No one is going to ask your child as an adult when they started reading, how old they were when they first wrote a sentence or if they were reading chapter books by second grade. You have more than 10 years to teach these basic skills. As for knowledge subjects, like science and history, no one knows it all and everyone has certain subjects they know more about that others. They will have gaps and they have a lifetime, their entire life time, to learn everything there is to know. Think about it, how much have you learned since you started teaching your own children? Were you limping through life without that information before you starting teaching them? You can't teach them everything there is to know but you can give them the tools for learning so they will be learning for a lifetime.

This was a response I wrote to someone on a message board asking about how to "do it all".

Read it again Mom! A review of FIAR

(This is a repost from my old blog. Originally posted July 24, 2008)

As promised, here is the first in a series of posts about the curriculum we use. This week I've chosen to talk about our main curriculum, Five In A Row.

Five In A Row is a unit study center around wonderful children's books. A unit study is where all your studies (history, science, literature, art and even some math) center around a particular theme for a prescribed amount of time. In Five In A Row (FIAR), we read a children's book each day of the week and then discuss and find out more about a different subject relating to the book each day of the week. For example, if the book we read is about cowboys, we could learn about the American West one day (history), the desert habitat another day (science), tall tales of the American West another day (literature), study the pictures in the book another day and compare it to other works of art and prehaps try to create our own works another day (FIAR picture book selections are known for their beautiful pictures) and measure our rainfall for a week and see how it compares to the average rainfall in the desert (math and science).

There are 4 FIAR manuals aimed at elementary school aged children containing a total of 70 children's book selections. The book selections are classics and twaddle-free. Many of them have become my children's favorite stories. The manuals contain many ideas for topics of study while reading each book. Some are obvious, like studying the Old West while reading about cowboys, others are more subtle and obscure like figuring years between events in the book and events in the child's life. You could probably come up with many of the ideas yourself but I really appreciate having all the ideas ready and waiting for me to use when we choose a book or subject to study. It saves me time and energy I can use to teach and play with my children rather than having to think up lessons all the time. There is also Before Five In A Row which is aimed at preschool children or very early elementary (K-1) and has 24 book selections plus a myriad of just plain fun learning ideas. And for older children there are 3 Beyond Five In A Row manuals which are aimed at upper elementary and middle school aged children. Beyond Five In A Row uses chapter books rather than picture books and there are 4 book selections per manual, 2 fiction and 2 non-fiction biographies.

Before FIAR is simple a collection of ideas for adding little bits of learning to your young child's day. It's not a structured preschool program or a means of accelerating your child's education. Just fun ideas to show your child the wonders of the world in a sweet and gentle way. My 2yo dd loves many of the Before FIAR books and I have put some of the lessons associated with the books on index cards so my older children can read the book with her and choose an activity to do with her. They get to "play school" with her and actual learning takes place for both children, how can you beat that?

FIAR is more structured in that there is a subject assigned to each day of the week. Mondays are history and geography, the lessons include map work, country studies, culture studies, relationship and character studies and of course history studies. Tuesday is Language Arts, the lessons include analyzing literature, vocabulary, author's techniques, types of writing and genre. Wednesday is Art, the lessons include picture study, artist technique and style and applying those things to the child's own artwork. Thursday is Applied Math and includes lessons on math in real world situations. It may be as simple as counting and grouping things in the book or it may be measurement or geometry all related to something with in the book. Friday is Science and FIAR runs the gamut from nature study to chemistry to physics and everything in between. You read the book each day before doing the activities. That may sound redundant but each day the child is assimilating the lessons he learned the day before each time it is read. It's like built in daily review. Plus, as I said before these books usually become fast favorites, what child doesn't want a favorite story read over and over again?

Beyond Five In A Row recognizes that older children tend to out grow the desire to read the same story over and over again. Chapter books are used instead of picture books and instead of assigning a subject to each day, each chapter has a list of study suggestions. Not every chapter has every subject, some weeks will be heavier with science topics to study, others will be heavier on history and some will have a good mix of all subjects. It's up to you and your child how many days you spend on a subject or chapter. The lessons in Beyond FIAR ask more of the child than the FIAR lessons. They do more research and dig deeper into subjects. These studies can be almost completely self directed if your child is a motivated learner.

We started using FIAR when my oldest son was in K. Since then we've strayed in different directions but we always seem to return to FIAR. Most recently, our return to FIAR was at my children's request. To me, that really says something about this curriculum. FIAR can be a structured or relaxed as you want and it is easy to add other studies as you desire but it's not necessary to do so. While FIAR was originally designed to spend a week on a book, nothing says you have to spend only a week. You can spend as much time as you want if a subject interests your children. I think one of the biggest advantages of this curriculum is that it's extremely flexible.

I'm so glad we found FIAR early in our homeschool journey. My children love the short, gentle lessons and with the frame work already laid out for me, implementing FIAR is very simple for me. "Deceptively simple" is the best way I like to describe FIAR. Learning hardly feels like work at all with FIAR which is the way it ought to be. ;)

We love Math On The Level!

Math On The Level has got to be one of my favorite homeschool finds of all time. People ask you to compare different curricula, like say Saxon to Singapore or Math U See to Horizons, but honestly there is nothing that can compare Math On The Level. It is so different from anything else out there for homeschoolers that it really is in a class by itself.

Most math curricula are divided up by grade level, with a teacher's manual containing lessons plans and a student book sometimes containing lesson pages to be read and almost always containing worksheets to be done. Math On The Level has no lesson plans, no student book and no worksheets. It is suitable for children from a preschool level all the way through pre-algebra (which most children doing pre-algebra in late middle school or junior high). Math On The Level (hereafter referred to as MOTL) is more of a backbone to making up your own math curriculum. You choose the topics of study that your child is maturationally ready for (more on that later) and go as quickly or as slowly as your child needs. Do you ever find that your child has caught on to a math topic quickly but the math book you are using insists on drilling it into their head as if they still did not understand? Or maybe your child is still struggling to understand adding mixed numbers but the math book has already moved on and assumes your child understands. This is never a problem with MOTL because if you hit a brick wall in your child's learning or if they seem to be soaking it all up with ease, you can move at your child's pace and not a curriculum advisor's idea of how fast your child should be able to learn.

You wouldn't try to force a 12 month old to walk just because most other 12 month olds are walking, why do we push an 8 year old to multiply just because most other 8 year olds can multiply? Does it really matter if they could multiply at 8 or if they took longer to master it? Why can't they just work on other areas of math while waiting for their brains to be ready to handle it? With Math On The Level, you can do just that. So your child is having trouble understanding the concept of multiplication, you can work laterally on other areas of math that she is ready for and come back to the multiplication. Waiting until your child is maturationally ready to handle certain concepts means waiting until the child is ready to understand before asking for mastery of a subject. Some kids have no problem understanding things in the order presented in a math books. Others struggle even though it has been presented at least a million different ways and get stuck in a math rut. They can't go on in the math book because the next lesson assumes they understood the previous one. Their brain just isn't ready to wrap around the information yet. It has nothing to do with age or intelligence but everyone progresses at their own rate.

A big part of the program is the daily review sheets called 5-a-days. They have 5 problems a day to solve on their own that are review. You have to make these yourself. It's not terribly difficult to do and you can be fancy and make it on the computer or just write it out on lined paper. I've done both and really prefer to write it out, it's just easier to me that way. There is talk of a program being written that will produce 5-a-days for you but it think it is still a work in progress. The only thing we add to this is drill of math facts. MOTL has a drill program and there are lots of others but I just print drill sheets from the internet.

The only drawbacks to this program, I would say, is that you have to be comfortable planning your own lessons. The MOTL manuals give you lots of help but it still gives you lots of freedom to do it how you want. We love that freedom but others are paralysed by it. Also, while not really needed, it helps if you have lots of manipulatives and fun math things at your disposable. Like I said they aren't needed but it's nice to have. Since MOTL is a one time purchase, non-comsumable and completely reusable you could use the portion of your homeschool budget that would go to buying math curriculum every year toward buying fun math things. Oh one more drawback is that MOTL is expensive, when you break it down over the course of 9 years (K-8) it's not expensive but it is a lot to put down up front. It was totally worth it for us but it can be a barrier for some.

Here is a post I made on the Five In A Row message boards about MOTL (the bold statements are the criteria she was looking for in a math program)

"Math on the Level would definitely help with a lot of your criteria

-can review with her addition and subtraction but not in a babyish way
You choose how to review math facts with MOTL. Personally, I print out drill sheets from Donna Young's website and require that they complete 2 rows (20 problems) each day. This is in one of their workboxes. MOTL also has their own fact drill books called "9's Down". I haven't used them but the idea is that they begin with the 9's facts and work down to the 1's so the more difficult upper facts get more practice.

-has lots of manipulative work and not just blocks
You choose the manipulatives you work with. The yahoo group is a great resource for ideas. We use MUS blocks, Funtastic Frog counters, RightStart card games, Muggins math games, play money, real money, craft sticks, sales ads, toys...a lot of these we had on hand from trying different curricula. The MOTL manual makes suggestions for inexpensive manipulatives as well.

-has lots and lots of review before moving on, lots and lots
MOTL has your older child doing 5-A-Days, personalized review every day. The manual suggests most topics be kept on review for a year at least. The downside is you have to make these yourself but it isn't as bad as it sounds. There are sections in each guide with ready made 5-A-Day problems for each topic, you can just copy these from the book or make up your own problems.

-has quite a bit of repetition, including worksheets
Again, you are in control with MOTL, you can repeat what ever you need to for as long as you need to. Worksheets are easy to find on the internet when you need them. We also use Singapore workbooks when I need a worksheet. I'm looking into Math Mammoth and the Keys to...series for this purpose as well.

-can be adapted to include movement while learning
-perhaps has a variety of ways to learn, including seeing, hearing, touching, doing
With MOTL you can do what ever you need to to teach the lesson. There are lots of teaching suggestions in the manual but if you have a better idea for teaching something, you are not bound to the manual.

-incorporates real-world uses of math
There is a whole manual dedicated to pulling the math out of everyday experiences. The whole idea of MOTL is that math can be taught as naturally and easily as teaching them to walk and talk."

Getting off my soap box but that's my plug for Math on the Level.