"I hate school!"
"I never learn anything!"
"How is this going to help me on the real world?"
We have all children say things like that; we may remember feeling the same way ourselves. I was surprised, however, when my kids started saying that after several months of us homeschooling.
My number one goal as a home educator is to instill the love of learning in my children. When children are excited and interested, learning comes naturally! That's when the magic happens! We have fun and they get so much out of it. Developing the love of learning early on life will encourage a future life full of eager learning seeking. Their education won't end on graduation day.
So when I started hearing similar complaints from my children about our homeschool lessons I decided it was time for a change. Up to that point, we'd been strictly following a curriculum. Mostly it was workbooks and lectures. I decided to try something radically different. Because I want to fuel my children's natural desires to learn about things they are interested in, I decided to let them set the curriculum that week. We'd spend one day covering a topic they wanted to know more about. We'd integrate that topic into the other subjects.
My six year old said he wanted to learn about pandas. So, we checked out a library book which we read together. Then we watched a couple sorry documentaries online to learn more. We drew pictures of pandas and wrote a short story. We made pandas using cotton balls and glue and practiced counting how many pieces of bamboo the panda ate . We still covered reading, language arts, math and art, but the kids were so much more excited about it!
We did the same thing in the weeks since with trains, volcanoes, race cars, gummy worms, chicks and motorcycles. I am so encouraged! I want to share this unconventional approach and see what other ideas are out there! Please share any tips or suggestions you have!
Let's liberate learning!
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