Homeschooling

There is such a stigma around homeschooling and it really bothers me! Homeschooling has been the BEST choice for our family and I am so happy to continue teaching our boys. Not only do we get to decide what we do in our day, but we get to explore interests and hobbies that would have otherwise been missed by busy days.

The pandemic did make our choice to home school at the very beginning, but now we have chosen to continue after seeing the huge benefits with our lifestyle. I am a full-time photographer, my husband works for the City and we both end up having days off where we can travel together as a family. We all enjoy being outside, learning new things and adventuring, not to mention gardening and dreaming about our hobby farm!

Here are a few questions that I have received about our homeschooling journey:

So what curriculum’s do we use?

To be honest, I was so confused when it came to start our homeschooling journey. I had no idea how to begin or even what curriculum’s were out there. Hopefully this may help out other families who are on the beginning stages of their homeschooling journey!

We signed up under Koinania Christian School. This means that we meet up with our support teacher twice a year. We can request testing, join programs within Koinania and have the ability to get some money back to help ease the financial aspect of teaching your own kiddos.

After what felt like months looking into curriculum I finally fell in love with two companies. Christian Light Education and Gather Round Home school.

We chose to go with Christian Light Math and English for my 7 year old who is in grade 2. Both of these are super rigorous and are quite time consuming compared to what my 5 year old does during school. Christian Light Education is very redundant learning. You will repeat certain things until you have mastered them. This is perfect for my fact and math loving 7 year old. I know that I will not go this route for my 5 year old next year because he is a very different learner! He has more energy, can’t sit as long as his older brother, BUT boy does he pick-up quickly on things! He enjoys having pictures in his workbooks as he is a very visual learner, whereas my 7 year old can look at a boring math book full of sums and love it! My 7 year old will sit at the table longer than my 5 year old, but that is ok!

We then have gone with Gather Round Home school for our Science and Social studies. This month we are ending Antarctica, prior to that was Oceans, Space and Inventions and Ideas. The boys enjoy this specific curriculum as they both get to sit in on the SAME lessons! Both boys are super eager learners and tend to soak up so many facts about our given curriculum for the month. I absolutely love Gather Round as well because it allows me to teach both boys at the same time! There are so many cool units that we cannot wait to delve into them all!

Do we have a routine or schedule?

The answer to this is no. With our hobbies, jobs and lifestyle we go with the flow. We do school close to 4 days a week while taking a break when Dad is home sometimes. We do a lot of outside time, more so in the spring and summer than the winter-time. We listen to audio books, I read aloud to the boys with my coffee, we do play dough, cooking, cleaning, each boy has their own business they work on and so much more. With each thing we do in our day I count it as school. They are learning both academically AND they are learning everyday life skills that will be vital to their adulthood.

How do we socialize?

I get it with this question. Being at home it might seem like we wouldn’t get out much to socialize, but it really is the opposite of that. Instead of the boys focusing on the typical social norms or appearance, friends and of course….girls, we have eliminated all of the unnecessary stress of a typical school setting. Instead we have a group of homeschooling friends that share beliefs and interests with the boys, which make get togethers super fun!! With Covid easing up, we are looking forward to joining more programs, visiting museums and all of your typical home school perks. I recommend reaching out on your local buy and sells to find other homeschooling families. Meet-up together and see if you and your kiddos get along with these other families. It might take a couple tries to find your peeps, but once you do, these friendships are so meaningful!! I absolutely LOVE our homeschooling tribe and I am excited to do more hands on learning and field trips with them 🙂

What do you do if your child doesn’t want to do school on a school day?

My husband and I have a bit of a different view on this one, but with me being the sole teacher 95% of schooling days, I have seen what works best for our boys! There are times where one of the kiddos feels sick, they are tired from a bad sleep, or they just have a brain fog for the morning. That is OK! Don’t feel like you have to sit for 6 hours to teach your kids adequately. We do about 2-4 hours of school a day depending on our lessons. Here are a few tricks for those stubborn learner days!

1. Get up and stretch. Get your blood flowing to help your brain focus! We love our Yoga cards that we can pull out during these moments and take a pause to focus on stretching and breathing.
2. Take a tea break. We love to have a cup of tea together to talk about our dreams and goals for the year. Having a moment to think about those fun plans for the Summer, or your family dreams, this really gives the brain a reset and gets your kid hyper focused on life!
3. Go outside. Even if its cold, get the kids outside, as well as yourself! Take a 15 minute breather of fresh air to reset your brain and lungs.
4. Get comfy and read aloud! We love sitting on the couch together with a good picture or chapter book! Reading aloud brings your child’s attention and focus on imagination, which calms the nerves and allows them to reset for their day and prepare for their lesson.
5. Free time. Get the kids to play with play dough, kinetic sand, marble runs, Lego etc. Something constructive that allows fine motor skills and building.
6. Get out of the house! Sometimes all it takes is a quick drive or walk to the post office or book houses in our town. We love to have a family drive to the city or a walk around our town.
7. Visit with friends. Yes, this might take up your school day, but what a wonderful way to get your kiddos excited for school with a play date! Sometimes I use this as a bribe to get them to sit down and focus so they can get their work done before their friends come over.

My child doesn’t want to free write. What can I do?

My 7 year old loathed free writing. Anytime he was asked to write a sentence, a story or a paragraph he would freeze up and tears would start to flow. I don’t quite know why he put such a wall up when it came to writing, but I know when you just leave it alone and you don’t push, they will come back to it and exceed their own expectations. My 7 year old is in grade 2, so it has been 2 years of homeschooling and he has written 2 stories, and a couple of sentences here and there. Just those few things took sooooo much effort and work from him! Then guess what happened after I just left the written portions out of his schooling? He wrote his favourite dream into a story with at least 10 sentences….all on his own accord! Not only did he write and sound out all the words by himself, he wrote it out TWICE!! One to keep and one to give to his Aunt. He now absolutely enjoys free writing and gets excited thinking about things to write. Sometimes leaving one of those troubled areas alone for a bit, gives them some time to think and build their confidence. I am not saying this is a smart move for all children, but this was the best move for mine.

Make Learning Fun!

My biggest tip for new homeschoolers is to keep learning fun! Instead of looking at math as a chore, use chocolate chips, raisins or cheerios to help count, add, subtract etc. They then get a fun treat to eat at the end. Try and read ahead on lessons to omit boring or unnecessary information for their current lessons. This helps tremendously on keeping their attention! After awhile, you will learn what works and what doesn’t work for EACH child. Remember that each child is so unique, and what works with one, may not work with the other. It’s trial and error, but when you get it right, boy to you see your kiddos soar!!!

If you have any other questions that were not covered in this blog, you can e-mail me at: hello@rusticrabbit.ca and I will try my best to answer them. If you are a homeschooling parent and would love to get together with us, or other families in our area, send me a message and we can get together! Thanks for taking the time to listen 🙂