Posts Tagged ‘teaching’

Home Schooling And The Family

Sunday, May 9th, 2010

If a survey by the National Center For Education Statistics is to be believed, roughly 1.1 million children took home schooling in 2005 alone. That is a lot of children. Once upon a time, homeschooling used to be an extreme statement – something like a declaration of independence.

It was the conservative Christians who advocated homeschooling in the 1980’s and legalized it in every State. But these day, average homeschooling student is not religiously motivated.

Later surveys show that parents are actually fed up with the public school system where a lot of the learning is superficial and compulsory. They are also concerned about the negative environment in school, ranging from drugs and abuse to negative peer pressure.

Because of this, we have a surprising mixture of people who make up the homeschooling world of today. They cut across all religious creeds and all regional borders. Their chief aim is providing meaningful and productive learning through a method that strengthens the bond between the various members of the family.

All these families have one main thing in common – a long enduring commitment to the sanctity of childhood. The children in these families are accorded a primary position. Many believe, and, I think, rightly so, that home schooling allows parents to bring up their children in a more natural and caring environment.

Public schools can make a child anxious, subservient and downright mean. Children who get their education at home are protected from these damaging, negative influences until they reach an age where they can withstand them.

Home-schooling draws the whole family into the quasi religious job of teaching. Everyone is put to work. Both the parents together form a bond with the children. Any experience can be turned into an educational experience. Both the parents are aware of exactly what is going on in their child’s head.

Parents also have a greater control over the kind of religious and moral values that the child is taught. Even watching a film together can become a learning experience. Trips to the libraries, zoos, museums and other places become educational as well as recreational.

A home-schooling family is primarily dependent on the income of one earning member. That means that often spending has to be curtailed and proper planning of expenditure is necessary. This helps to bring the family members together and everybody gets involved in the task of not spending money.

Just having a parent at home to look after, to nurture and to care for the children brings with it a lot of love and caring. Even the husband takes part and there is just no room for complacency.

Yes, problems still do occur, and there will be many misgivings in your mind, but when you know that your kids can always count on you, and your kids know it too, then homeschooling becomes a richly rewarding experience.

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Avoiding Burnout In Home Schooling

Saturday, May 8th, 2010

No matter if you are teaching in a traditional school or in a home schooling program, there will come a time when you will experience burnout. This is something that you have to avoid so that your learning progress is not affected.

Here are a few useful tips that you can make use of to prevent possible home schooling burnout:

Know your limitations. From the very start, you should already know your limitations and your child’s limitations. You must be capable of taking things slowly sometimes, especially if your child is still young since you have to bear in mind your child’s learning capacity. Most students are average learners, obviously, so you have to give the lessons based on your child’s learning pace. Never expect your small child to read complicated reading selections nor your teen to ace SAT exams.

Try not to follow strict schedules, because this can put pressure on your child. You should simply set an interesting routine for your child to follow. Children spend most of their time doing routine activities like getting up in the mornings, eating hearty breakfasts, reading, writing, doing light jobs about the place, etc. You must insist that they finish their routine activities before they can play outside or with the computer. Even the routine activities vary from day to day but you have to make sure that your child follows these routine activities. You can add in occasional incentives or fun activities if they finish their routine tasks early.

You should try to enjoy home schooling with your child. This is a good way of developing a strong relationship with your child and if you and your child can relate to each other, you will find it very much simpler to handle curriculum struggles and motivation issues later on. Besides motivating and guiding your child, you can also follow some of your own interests like gardening or cooking. If your child sees you enjoying your own interests, then he or she will also be motivated to do likewise.

Since your child is in a home schooling program, you should not try to copy a traditional schools environment. Try to use non-conventional ways when teaching your child. Home schooling is also about flexibility and creativity, and if you can achieve an easy-going but firm atmosphere, you can more than likely avoid burnout.

Always try to remember that with home schooling, you don’t have to structure your teaching methods in the traditional way. You can just do things in a fun way especially with very young children so that they learn easily. Just ensure you keep the day in the right perspective to avoid burnout. Although your children might forget some of the day’s lessons, that’s all right too because somehow they grow in intelligence as well as in physique.

Your children will always look back on your home schooling days together and remember with fondness how well you treated them. The old song goes: “… there’s no place like home” and for little students, home is the best place to learn the first lessons of life. If your teenagers are already in high school or college, they can still pursue home schooling if they so desire. That would also a good idea since you would get a chance to watch your offsprings’ development.

Parents always try to look after their children’s best interests, so, if after careful consideration, you still think that home schooling is the best option for your family, then run with it. Just follow the advice mentioned previously to prevent burnout. Make time for enjoyable activities from time to time in order to prevent monotony.

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Home Schooling And The Study of History

Saturday, April 17th, 2010

Do you consider that spending time in traditional classrooms is a waste? For some people, that is true. For example, a test is coming up and the students are asked to memorize a lot of dates and names. However, after sitting the test, they will surely forget 75% of those dates and names. That’s what most students do when they have exams. If you are one of these people, you will find traditional history lessons boring, so home schooling, which focuses more on the history of the world, will surely be of more interest to you.

Simple memorization by rote is just not enough to realize the importance of historically famous people and important events. However, through home schooling in history, you can learn about the different cultures of the past in a different, but interesting way – that is your own way! By the study of history, you will also understand the situation of the world today.

However, if you think that home schooling is the best option for your child’s education, you should also be prepared to undertake certain responsibilities. As there will be no teacher present ‘on site’, you will have to oversee your child’s educational progress by yourself.

Let’s say your kid is interested in a particular sport. You could combine history and home schooling by just hanging a map on the wall of your child’s bedroom and mark the location of his favourite sports team. Make sure that you track all the team’s games, scores, activities and schedules. Then, you could go back to history lessons by reading biographies of the different athletes, who had been famous in the particular sport that your child enjoys. Aside from that, you could also look into the history of that particular sport and discover where it originated, its inventor, and the other things happening in that particular time in history.

For instance, let’s say your child follows baseball, you could teach your child about the history baseball, government hearings on the use of steroids and other favourite sports during that period of time. But remember that you can apply this method to any interest such as dancing, flight, cars or any invention. You can also have conversations with your child about current affairs or read interesting historical documents and other books. Aside from that, you can also watch documentaries together with the rest of the family. There are various resources that you can use while home schooling, like TV, maps, newspapers, books, a globe, an atlas, and encyclopedias. Due of the enthralling adventures that you and your child will read about and see on film, he/she will find it easier to remember the names and dates of the history lessons. After all, learning is best when it is done in a fun way.

These methods are recommended if your child is still young, but once your child is older, you must choose an appropriate home schooling program that is suitable for his/her age group. The programs are available at the elementary, high school, and even college levels. You simply have to search the Internet for these different programs. A good thing about these programs is that you can adapt them to fit the requirements of your child. However, you must make sure that all the lessons are followed by your child.

After you and your child have decided to go for home schooling, you must be prepared to make some changes in your life. The learning environment will now be in your home not at a school and through the various resources that you think best, such as a computer and the Internet.

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Home Schooling and Young Kids

Saturday, April 17th, 2010

In the last decade, home schooling has become very popular especially with the middle and upper-middle class families. There have been lots of arguments before about home schooling. Experts claim that there are advantages as well as disadvantages in home schooling but it seems that the former outweigh the latter and therefore, a lot of families are now choosing home schooling over the traditional schools.

Cultures vary enormously and relationships within families are strongly affected by culture too. In some cultures, family ties are fairly strong, but there are also those who don’t have very good bonds with other family members at all. However, by home schooling, family relationships can be improved. Parents have to spend more time with their kids because of the home schooling program and the children will have to listen to their parents too. Communication is much improved and both parties have to learn about the importance of both speaking and listening.

A lot of families opt for home schooling because of its diversity. However, since the cost of home education is a bit higher than traditional schools, the financial situation of the household is very important. However, even without considering money, many parents will still go for home schooling, because it can guarantee their children’s safety. Public schools often have dangerous situations that can influence kids terribly, but if they are in a home schooling program, they can stay away from these predicaments and their parents will be there to guide them.

Instead of placing the kids at a public school, many parents would prefer home schooling because the learning environment in public schools is not that good. In public schools, very young pupils can experience problems that can affect them socially, mentally, and academically for a long time. Experts who have conducted studies, claim that children learn better in a good environment surrounded by loved ones. Another advantage of home schooling is that children can learn according to their ability. You can’t just give a new lesson, if the previous one hasn’t been learned yet. It may take longer, but the results are better.

As mentioned earlier, home schooling is a bit more expensive. If you think that you might be able to reduce the educational expenses of your child, you’re wrong. Home schooling expenses are just about the same as those of traditional schools. However, if you participate in the forums of the parents of home-schoolers, you will discover that there are ways to cut down costs. Naturally, you will need to spend on the resource materials, computer, and internet, but you can also use outside resources like cultural events, public libraries and lots of others.

You will be given even more cost-cutting ideas, if you contact other parents. The Internet offers endless opportunities and with a bit of homework, you can surely come up with ways to reduce the costs. If you don’t want to pay for tutors, then you will have to learn the lessons as well. You have already studied the various subjects in your kids’ educational program, so you only need to review them. You can get further learning material online or the bookshop and later on, teach your kids.

Therefore, it is obvious, that home schooling is definitely the best option, especially, if your child is still quite young. So, it all depends on you and your child, whether they decide to continue this form of schooling until they graduate for college.

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Home Schooling and Learning by Computer

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

There is a computer in nearly every home in the West nowadays and the rest of the world is catching up very quickly. Therefore, it is extremely important for you to get one at home too, because of the many benefits it can bring, especially if you have an Internet connection. Nowadays, you must have some computer experience, if you want even a half-decent job, so learning how to use a computer must start at school. You and your child can have a interesting educational experience with a computer at home. Children of today must learn about this extremely important instrument at the very earliest age possible and one of the best ways to do that is through home schooling computer programs.

Currently, even kindergarten children are being taught how to use computers and their associated resources. If you opt for home schooling, you and your child will also spend a lot of your time making use of a computer and the Internet. Teaching your children can be much better when done online, because of the different resources available online. You and your child will have available some of the best educational resources, from which you will benefit hugely not least because job market trends today overwhelmingly involve the Internet.

One of the biggest ethnic groups who prefers to make use of home schooling is the African Americans because some see some society issues and they can keep themselves informed about their own heritage through home schooling. The parents of children from minority groups can help their offspring learn more about their history by having an Internet connection at home. The children’s education can be more strongly supported by parents and they can also assist in improving the mindset of their children as well. Parents can educate their children about their own particular heritage through the different online resources.

It is important to remember that home schooling only works if the parents are willing to support their children the whole works. They must also be steadfast and prepared for the challenges that they will encounter. The parents should look for a good computer program or book to assist their children learn about using computers. Frequently, the lessons are divided into various parts or series so that the children can learn them easily. Children have different learning abilities and since sometimes children are not given much chance in traditional schools, the use of computers is an ideal chance to bring out the best in them.

Home schooling is not new any more, so if you think that your child is not performing well in school, consult with the teachers and get some information regarding your child. The guidance counsellor can also help you determine the best education for you child. Home schooling is already accepted and perhaps it can help your child learn more in the comfort of your home.

If you are prepared to commit yourself to home schooling, you will need to discuss the subject with your child. You could start by asking your child about his experience in school and then raise the subject of home schooling. See what your child thinks about the idea. Explain its advantages. You could say that computer learning will be more beneficial. It’s better if you and your child both agree to home schooling, since you have to work closely together. It might not be easy to persuade your child to give up traditional schooling, where he has all his friends, so you will have to spend time with your child and know his/her interests. Explain that computer programs can help a great deal in home schooling. Tell your child that they can learn more about their particular interest, if they know how to use the computer.

So why not start looking for the most suitable home schooling computer program now? You could talk to your friends, ask at the library or / and go online and do your research. There are plenty of home schooling programs to pick from and it could take several weeks before you can find the appropriate one.

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