I
homeschool. I guess that is supposed to mean that Max is "schooled at home". But, really, that's not true.
Max's schooling takes place everywhere - at the park, at co-operative preschool groups, in the garden, on field trips, in our amazing natural surroundings, and, yes, at home. And, honestly, Max is experiencing learning (child-led), rather than schooling (teacher-led). So I think I need a new term - maybe life-learning (though we all do that, don't we?)
A new friend asked me today about what our schedule is; what we do each day for homeschooling. I thought the answer might be interesting and helpful for those of our family and friends who think we're crazy.
Here's our loose weekly schedule for away-from-home time:
- Monday - Seminole Learning Community Co-op
- Tuesday - Playdate with one or more families in our circle of homeschooling friends
- Wednesday - once a month, our Little House Book Club, other weeks usually Confetti Club at the local library
- Thursday - Sometimes another co-op, often errands
- Friday - every other week is our Roots & Shoots group (Earth Friends), with a co-op class or field trip
We go on a LOT of field trips, with homeschooling groups and by ourselves. Just off the top of my head over the last few months: zoo, worm farm, regular farm, marine science center, regular science center, puppet theater, refuse transfer station, emergency vet clinic, and many more.
When we're at home, we try to balance toy and game play, chores, meal planning and prep, pretend play, and "homeschool" activities. However, we really practice "unschooling", which for us is a child-led learning approach that focuses on Max's current interests. We do NOT have structured time each day to sit down and do schoolwork. We don't do math from 10 to 11, and writing practice from 2 to 3. We don't use workbooks regularly.
Instead, we do lots of experiments and hands-on learning. We read tons of books every day. We talk. And talk. And talk.
(Have a mentioned that my son is a talker?)
We do a LOT of talking.
A few weeks ago, Max's passion was mummies. So, we made an apple mummy, we did a cool interactive online game on the mummification process, we read a book about ancient Egypt and we did a lot of pretend play (Max was usually wrapped up in something). Then, we led a co-op on mummies, and did this awesome new
pyramid excavation kit from
Usborne, and read the fantastically detailed book that came with it.
Now, Max is really interested in Legos, and is making up his inventions and building them. I really encourage this because he is learning all sorts of things through Lego - project planning, spatial visualization, geometry and other math. Plus, he makes up elaborate story lines to go along with his creations, usually involving dialogue from one or more "characters" (more often than not, they are robots).
I still worry sometimes that we won't learn everything he needs to know, and we may get more structured once he is officially homeschooling for kindergarten, but in general, he completely amazes me with what he learns each day.
