New to homeschooling

[Niniedney]

I have recentyly began thinking of homeschooling my little ones. I have 2 girls, 2 1/2 and 5 months. I know nothing about homeschooling. Help me please, . Is it too soon to think about homeschooling? When do I start? Where do I get materials? How does it All work? 

[LM]

Where do you live?

[Niniedney]

 I live in the u.s. In Washington, but we are planning on moving to California soon.

[DadDude]

Ours is almost four years old, and I've been reading and thinking about homeschooling for a few years now.  There are many books to read about the subject, although there are probably too many introductory books and not enough that go into useful detail.  If you want to do a lot of reading in advance, it's a good idea to start now, as far as I'm concerned.  What I recommend (so far!):

"The Well-Trained Mind" by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise - the "Bible" of the classical education movement, definitely above average, but a little too prescriptive for my taste and doesn't go into enough detail about the thinking behind the classical method

 "Dumbing Us Down" by John Taylor Gatto - a "modern classic," a very forceful indictment of ordinary classroom education, which he compares to an assembly line - a little over-the-top and not exactly balanced, but very, very thought-provoking

"Teach Your Own" by John Holt - I find this guy, a father of "unschooling," quite annoying, and not exactly a rigorous thinker, but he does manage to capture a whole way of thinking about education.  I'm not sorry I read it...

[Niniedney]

Thank you for the suggested reading

[Twinergy]

My sister (in Vancouver) and cousin (in Edmonds) both homeschooled in Washington state.  In some areas the local school district may have a resource center for homeschooled children.   Parents must attend school with their children and I think assist with classes.  The children can sign up for one class or several classes.  They can take classes there that may be difficult to duplicate at home, a foreign language, theater, band, science lab classes are a few examples.  Or they can take all their classes there.  Classes are not segregated by age but advance according to their abilities.  So a math class may have a gifted 8 year old along with a special needs 15 year old.  If this sounds interesting to you contact your local school district and ask if this is available in your area.

[shadah]

   I agree with APP about the Well-Trained Mind. Just remember that is has suggestions not must-haves. It is a very rigid method, but is also rich in ideas.

   And this to APP: How did you ever make it through that John Holt book? I almost made it through, but got so frustrated.  He made me mad in some places. Children can teach themselves, but can't take simple instruction???? He just didn't make sense for me.

[Krista G]

I started a JOhn Holt book, but I couldn't get through it.  It just didn't capture me, and I rarely leave a book unfinished.

I want to recommend a great book for parents to use with their 4 year olds and up.  It is First Language Lessons.  It covers first and second grade and teaches kids all about language, the parts of speech and so on.  I started it with my 4 year old and he has learned so much about language.  It builds a really good foundation and the lessons are easy and short.  It is not a workbook, but a guidebook.  It tells the teacher what to say.  We have to repeat the definitions of the parts of speech often and I know that even my 3 year old is catching some of it.  It is designed for 1st and 2nd graders but it was not too much for a 4 year old.  You are just explaining to them what a noun is and so forth.  I am almost done with the book and will definitely be ordering the next one.

I just wanted to share this great resource.  It is put out by Peace Hill Press and you can probably view a sample on their website.  I like all their stuff so far.

[kizudo]

I attended a home schooling conference this weekend and these were a few from their recommended reading lists:
"Things We Wish We Had Known" Bill & Diana Waring
"A Survivor's Guide to Home Schooling" Luanne Shackelford & Susan White
and...Raymond & Dorothy Moore have a handful of books to google...I didn't catch all the titles as they were rattled off.

[DadDude]

Krista, thanks for the tip on the beginning grammar book.  I was thinking about looking for one.  It is the one by Jessie Wise, right?  Some of the negative reviews on Amazon are pretty scathing.

I got through the Holt book mostly--I don't know if I actually finished it to the last chapter.  I don't know, I guess I am used to reading stuff that I disagree with, and interspersed among the nonsense there were some thought-provoking points.  And besides, reading it really did help to clue me in a little better to the whole unschooling mind-set.

[Krista G]

DadDude,

I was specifically thinking of sharing that book with you, First Language Lessons.  I think you would really like it.  It is by Jessie Wise.  A friend of mine had it and as I looked through it I thought it would be great to introduce grammar to my little guy.  He was four at the time.  She is very thorough in teaching the parts of speech and types of sentences.  The lessons take about 10 minutes or less to get through.  I don't think I ever learned the definitions as thoroughly as a child in school.  I think it is a great book.

I had heard so much about Holt that I got How Children Fail.  I just never got into it.  I respect and admire the unschooling movement.  I did try to do it a little with my crew but I just lacked the faith that we would cover all that we needed to cover.  I like have a starting and ending point.  I do feel that the Classical education has been superb compared to what we tried in the past.  I love the STory of the World.  I have learned a lot about history myself.  I love Writing With Ease.  The focus is on narration and writing.  You get an excerpt of good literature.  Read it to your child and then ask them questions and they are taught to answer in a complete sentence.  Then they write a 3 or 4 sentence narration.  Some days they have copy work and some days dictation to teach them to write what they hear.  The point with this type of work is that if you want a child to be able to write you have to fill them with great literature.  These lessons don;t take long either and I just love the book.  My son loves Story of the World because there are so many activities you can do to bring the lessons to life.  If he had his way we would do history projects all day.  It is the first subject he wants to do each day.

I recently came across Noeo Science and it is similar to Story of the World.  You read real books and then ask questions and write narrations and write definitions and make notebook pages.  It is not fill in the blanks or multiple choice.  It forces children to take in information, digest it and then reword it.  Noeo is a creation based classical education science curriculum but I have not noticed that Story of the World is.

I am so pleased with the curriculum from Jessie Wise and Susan Wise Bauer so far.  I think it is top notch.

If you try it I would love to know your thoughts.

[Krista G]

I just checked out one review on Amazon and the reviewer wrongly quotes the definition of a noun.  She says that the books says a noun is a person, place thing or idea.  That is not what the definition is in the book.  The book states, " A noun is the name of a person, place thing or idea."

Also, she has you go back through poems that are taught and identify the verbs and the nouns in the poems.  I had a lot of fun with this because as we would be driving somewhere I would point out nouns to my son.  He has a firm grasp of what a noun, verb, and adjective are. 

I did notice that one of the poems was slightly different when I went to print it out online.  Hardly so, not enough to make a fuss about.   Anyway, Jessie Wise was a teacher and did a superb job of teaching her own children.  Her daughter homeschools her four boys, is a college professor, author and creates homeschool curriculum.  That speaks volumes to me.

[L and J]

I will not homeschooling my kids, I know I'll be frustrade. So we gonna put the kids in a catholic school.
I will work with the kids in the house like I have being doing, but not homescholling      

[L and J]

digo, schooling, aff

[princessclem]

I have 4 small kids All under 4 and we homeschool them now. there is nothing wrong with starting early. we focus mostly on languages right now. I am teaching them french and sign language and we do little reader every day. we do math that is practical and they are having lots of fun. we read every book in sight and go to the library, park and museum often. there is a lot of things that I would recommend but I will have to look at my list I am not really into books on how to teach my kids I just go with the thought that God gave them to us to teach and mold and prepare and I go out and find things that I think will help me make them into good people. Hope that you have great luck in your search into teaching your children.   

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