Under the influence

 

I have been homeschooling for several years now “officially”. Every one has a different definition of just when you can claim beginning homeschooling. This is especially true if you have a learning lifestyle- which we always have had.

Lately, I have been reading and skimming through some homeschool method books. Not really sure what motivated me to do this- the Lord has already refined quite a bit of what we do ("we" mostly means "I"). I have tried many different ways of doing things and little by little have come to where I stand now. You could say learning to homeschool is a process or an adventure- if you are willing to take it. If you are willing to grow as the Lord is leading.

Have you read any homeschool method books before and thought “wait a minute… we do that!” or “that’s what I’ve been saying!”

The books that kind of took me by surprise were:

• You can Teach Your Child Successfully  by Ruth Beechick

• Heart Of Wisdom Teaching Approach  by Robin Sampson

• Charlotte Mason Companion  by Karen Andreola

It seems that Charlotte Mason and Ruth Beechick sat in on our home school day and wrote books about it. LOL!
And Robin Sampson hits really strong on Bible first-and-all-day-in-every-subject .
Sampson also is a big promoter of the 4mat method which in a nutshell is: get them excited about the subject, study it, and show what you learned. You show what you learned best by lapbooking (scrapfolder) or notebooking or some other project- maybe a diorama or something.
Well, I am a strong believer in lots of Bible, but I did not teach it all school day. So, in that area, I was really challenged. I have committed to do this now.
If you have not read her book… I cannot recommend it highly enough. No other homeschool book has been more valuable. Worth every penny.

Isn't it funny to see that you didn't make up something- that it was already around- you just did not know?