I Could Not Homeschool

Homeschoolers are familiar with comments from non-homeschool parents saying things like I could never do that  and You must be so patient  and things like this. Comments that suggest that homeschooling parents have talents and skills that other parents don't have. But I surmise that parents have come to believe that certain people should teach their children certain things and other people should teach their children other things.

The truth is, we've been kind of taught to believe that we are generally not qualified to teach our own children. The truth is, we're just out of practice. I ran across this meme today and had to run here to post it.

Give it some thought.

You CAN do it.

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Corona: Schooling at Home:

Hello Schooling-at-Home Parents!
Welcome.
I'm here to answer any questions you might have about having lessons at home with your children. If you have any questions for me, homeschooling mother of two now-college students, please write comments below and I'll answer them for you.

In the meantime, here are a few of my homeschool hints from the past:

• Remember: your goal is learning, not being manacled to a schedule.
• Watch Crash Course World History by John Green on youtube. When we do this we watch each episode twice: once for the entertainment value (which is considerable) and once to take notes and to really hear everything that goes by so quickly in John Green's inimitable repartee. We then Wiki everything we don't know, research the people, places, and events mentioned, and follow our own interests until they run out.
• Relax. This takes time to figure out.
• Live with the failures and the successes. Again, life is full of these moments every single day. Keep your cool and accept each moment as a life lesson.
• Schooling at home give you some freedom to loosen things up a little bit. Do something unusual, ask your child what they'd like to do for lessons that day. When I've done this, I've always found my kids more willing to do the work and more likely to have more content to their day than I would have given.
• Love them. Your children will bring the craziest things into your home and, somehow, you will be enriched for all of it! 
• It's an unprecedented situation. Take a little time to relax into it.
  It will be OK.

I'm here.
I'm on your side.
You can do this! 

Corona: Schooling at Home: Resources

I've noticed a large surge in readers of this blog lately, presumably due to the large number of families now schooling their kids at home. I'm assuming people are looking for ideas, support, or something! So, New Parent Schooling at Home, this blog post is for you.

Next, let's think about resources.
You are beginning with som resoeurces from school. Online lectures or lessons followed by daily work to complete. (At least that is what I'm seeing.)

• A friend on Facebook just posted a link to this film Your Inner Fish, available HHMI: BioInteractive, a website for science teachers to share tons of media materials. SHARE THIS LINK! It's absolutely wonderful.
• PLEASE check out the main website called TheKidsShouldSeeThis. The site has THOUSANDS of videos of so many different subjects, from sciences to musics, to particles, to animation, to, well, you name it, with a special focus on STEAM—science, technology, engineering, art, and math.
• OpenStaxis a global collection of educational materials completely coordinated by volunteers and maintained by generous donations by philanthropists like Bill and Melinda Gates, Andrew W. Mellon, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and others under the auspices of Rice University in Houston. The entire collection is available completely free of charge. It can be downloaded in various digital forms and can also be remixed and edited.
• MIT also has Open CourseWare here.
• Joy Hakim is an American author/past school teacher who has written a ten-volume history of the United States, A History of US, and Freedom: A History of US (a trade book to accompany a 16-part PBS series), and Reading Science Stories, all published by Oxford University Press. Hakim is also the author of The Story of Science, three volumes co-published by Smithsonian Books and the National Science Teachers Association.
  Also, please check out this phenomenal accompanying website for Freedom: A History of US.
• We LOVED edhelper.com back in the day.
• Coursera and The Great Courses offer wonderful material in various formats.
• We also use the many online resources at our disposal from whitehouse.gov to the many, many excellent videos on youtube.

    

There's a decent start. Let me know what you think!

 Please send me specific questions,.

 otherwise I'm just guessing!.

Corona: Schooling at Home

I've noticed a large surge in readers of this blog lately, presumably due to the large number of families now schooling their kids at home. I'm assuming people are looking for ideas, support, or something! So, new parent schooling at home, this blog post is for you.

First, maybe you're thinking about scheduling and time management. 

School is divided into six/seven hours a day with a different subject each hour or unit. And that's fine, but let's think about how our interests work. If we're into something fun or engaging it can be hard to switch gears on the hour. I recommend a slightly different way to schedule your week.

Some subjects are best touching on and practicing daily, namely language and math. Everything else, every other day or so.
For an example, consider this idea, each line is an hour or unit of time that works for you. Keep in mind, it's always more about what is working than what is planned. Think about four structured hours a day...max.

Here's how I handled it, in general:

I recommend, any age, reading every single day. If your child is older, grab a good book or two and read daily. If younger, have reading time every day.

So, scheduling is an ongoing challenge.

My biggest reminder: Relax.
It will all be totally fine. 
No need to worry about keeping up. You'll do just fine.

I'll post more tomorrow.
Tomorrow I will post some great online resources. 

 
If you have specific questions, please ask!

..... 
If you like this, please check out these links:
Homeschool Curriculum: High School
Homeschool: Tricks for Improving Your Day
A Note to Myself at the Beginning of Homeschooling