Oct. 13, 2008 - SELF-TEACHING
So I have returned to my ideas of when I was first given the privilege to home school. What were those ideas? School is a building you receive an education at that building. So if you have the same or better books that those who work in the school have why can’t you teach your own children? Or better yet teach them to teach themselves. So when people say they home school it gives the connotation that they have brought the school to their home. This I don’t want to do at all. If I wanted my children in school I would put them in there. Children were supposed to originally get an education in school. Now all of a sudden it is necessary for children to not only get an education from school but “socialization” as well. I am sorry I don’t buy into that. I won’t get on my soapbox today, that is a post for another day.
So now I try and not say home school. Home education to me is a better word for what it is that our family does. Our children are educated at home.
Now since they are educated at home it has been decided to teach them to teach themselves. I truly believe that teaching your children to teach themselves is the best thing you could ever do for them. Teaching them not to always sit and listen to spoon fed information. This is good for their education but also in seeking God. How many times have we heard or seen, and I am guilty of this myself, of someone regurgitating what they heard their Pastor or Elder say. They don’t look it up in the bible or do any study on it. The same is for education. The teacher says
So from all of this I have started teaching the children to teach themselves. We have just started so this is the “hard” part, but I have seen some fruits. To get started I didn’t want to buy new materials so I had to use what I have and convert it the best I could.
For D – (My nine year old) she needed and still needs some help with her comprehension skills. I had bought Christian Light Reading 100 for her to improve her comprehension skills. So she does this by herself and I correct it. At first she wasn’t doing so well but now she is only (if any) getting 1 or 2 wrong. She is in Math U See Beta and she does that on her on. I just print out her test and give her extra practice sheets if she needs it.
For History, we use The Story of the World. This was the hardest thing that I had to convert to self-teaching. But what I did was took the activity book and copied the pages for the chapter in OCR format. Then I can take off everything but the review questions. They listen or read the history book and then answer the questions. This part I was really worried about. Since D’ does not comprehend so well I thought this might be a problem. Surprising to me it was not. She listens to the history book on the CD and reads along. She has been doing a great job with the questions. They also do some of the activities and art projects that go along with the chapter.
D’ is not doing science right now because I thought it would be too much for her. I figured practicing with the Christian Light and her history would be enough for her right now.
As far as writing practice, I bought a cursive writing book from the BX and she does pages in that everyday.
She also has a silent reading book. Right now it is Misty of Chincoteaque. She has that on CD and reads along with the book. I believe that is it for her. Things are going good she is almost done with the Christian Light book. I have ordered the
For P’ – (My almost 8 year old) He was a little bit easier with his studies. For Science he does Alpha Omega Life Pac 3, which he can do by himself. I just check off for the teacher checks.
For Math he is also in Beta Math U See but he just started.
For History he is doing the same as D’
For writing he is doing a Zaner-bloser writing book. He is learning how to write cursive.
For reading right now he just reads literature books. So far he has read, from the top of my head, Dr. Mr. Henshaw, Mr. Poppers Penguins, James and the Giant Peach, The Great Brain, Oliver Twist (the kids version), and now he is reading Call of the Wild.
It looks to be going pretty well. My plan (prayfully) is that by September D’ will be on reading level (or at least closer than now) and I will probably buy either, Alpha Omega, ACES, Christian Light, or Rod and Staff for their English (
They will continue on with their Math U See as well as The Story of The World.
This is all God willing and their skills willing.
Anyway keep me in your prayers.
