Archive for the ‘Articles & Info’ Category

Learning Styles & Methods

Monday, July 5th, 2010

“Avoid compulsion and let early education be a matter of amusement. Young children learn by games; compulsory education cannot remain in the soul.” – Plato

When families begin homeschooling, they often start by exploring how children learn, and familiarizing themselves with the many different educational methods and the different learning styles of children.

The articles and resources below provide a wealth of information and support for understanding Learning Styles and Methods

Winging it with Curriculum:Everything I Needed to Know I Learned from Geese – Stefanie Hofman

Everything I ever needed to know about homeschooling I learned from geese. Our recently thawed pond heralded the departure of winter and the arrival of spring. In Minnesota, spring brings cherry blossoms, red buds and Canadian geese. Unlike the colorful blossoms, the geese are not altogether welcome given their loud honking and prolific droppings. One day, from behind the willow tree, a new family of geese slowly wended its way onto my lawn. Seeing Mama and Papa Goose with seven geese babies piqued my sympathy and curiosity and I no longer wished to chase them off my yard.

Learning Logs - Ivy Rutledge

By writing down the things that do and don’t work for her, she is becoming aware of her best methods, helps, strengths and weaknesses. Metacognition, this is called in professional teaching circles, but it’s not rocket science and doesn’t need a fancy name; we’re just teaching her to know what she likes and where she would like to go with it.

Learning together has been a wonderful adventure for us, and we have been rewarded with the wonder of watching our children’s exploration and discovery turn into ideas that unfold in unpredictable and special ways.

Learning to Love Math by Alison Moore Smith

There are methods of teaching mathematics which encourage a love and interest in math, and those which tend to kill the joy. If I could give you one piece of advice, it would be this: Please avoid the drill-to-kill, memorize-to-mummify, repetition-without-reason textbooks!
What can you do to bring out a love of math in your kids?

It’s OK to count on your fingers1or pebbles or candies or pennies or rods or sticks or blocks even for advanced students. Use hands-on stuff and always have a manipulative to fall back on. Mess with real stuff first; experiment, discover. The algorithm comes last!

Leaving Public Education by Ellen C. Bicheler

One of my biggest challenges came from the scrutiny we received from the general public and in particular the neighbors about our methods of homeschooling. When the neighbors first asked Lindsay what she was doing for homeschooling, she would say, “Nothing.” She would say this because we were no longer studying out of textbooks. We were going to the pond to study pond life. We would supplement this with talks from naturalists and books from the library. Lindsay was no longer studying a prescribed curriculum and I guess nothing resembled her classroom from the previous year.

The Many Faces of Home Education - Tamara Orr

Perhaps homeschooling’s most precious advantage is that it is completely malleable; it can be shaped to whatever you need it to be. Instead of forcing your child to fit into public education, you have the chance to mold education around your child. While this is empowering, it can also be frightening. Where do you start? Whose theories are right? The decision to homeschool demands that you do some real research. First, you have to find out what your options are and then slowly, you can select the one that you think will fit you and your partner’s personality/philosophy of education, your children’s personalities and your lifestyle choices.

A Visit with Mary Hood – Janine Calsbeek

Chat with Mary Hood about learning centers, and you’ll get a short course on unschooling.

Pull the books and educational “stuff” out of the closet, she says. Put them where kids can see them. Keep things somewhat orderly, clean, and well-lit. React to your child’s initiative. If you really want a kid to read a certain book, don’t assign it. Just throw it on the couch.

This is Mary Hood, author of The Relaxed Home School, touted by some as “the Christian John Holt.” She is somewhat of an unusual item, you must admit. Her theology leans towards the conservative end, yet her educational style is, in a word, loose.

There’s no conflict in her mind. She sees how her children learn, and knows they learn best when they’re motivated. Her goals for her family include supporting everyone’s natural love of learning, not beating facts into their heads.

A Birthday a Day by Rebecca Rupp

Our kids’ learning styles seem to mesh better with what are popularly called “unit studies:” assorted projects, activities, and readings centered around a topic of kid-chosen interest. Here again, we’ve always invented our own, accumulating craft and science kits, and turning out piles of homemade activity books on such subjects as the Civil War, whales, stars, frogs, the heart, the eye, trees, bees, and map-making. Many of our past unit study topics were generated from the calendar, centering around the birthdays of famous persons, historical anniversaries, and unusual holidays. In past years, for example, we’ve celebrated – in detail – the birthdays of George Washington Carver, Benjamin Franklin, Louis Braille, Amelia Earhart, Thomas Jefferson, Daniel Boone, P.T. Barnum, Frank Lloyd Wright, Hans Christian Anderson, Tycho Brahe, Galileo, Susan B. Anthony, and Helen Keller; commemorated the launching the Sputnik, the Wright Brothers’ flight at Kitty Hawk, the opening of the Erie Canal, the completion of the transcontinental railroad, Boys’ Day in Japan, the opening of Tutankhamen’s tomb, the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill, and – month by month – the entry of all fifty states into the Union.

An Interview With Dr. Thomas Armstrong by Janie Bowman

Question: For parents teaching more than one child, any tips on how to juggle different ages and learning styles in the same family?

Answer: I think the more kids you have the more you should rely on peer tutoring, cross-age tutoring and having kids teach each other. You know, going back to the old one-room schoolhouse where kids of different ages typically did a lot of teaching of each other certainly takes a lot of the strain away from the parent of having to meet everybody’s needs.

Resources


Tags: A-Z Homescooling, Alison Moore Smith, American Homeschool Association, Ann Lahrson-Fisher, Carschooling, Children's Learning Styles, Creating your own curriculum, decision to homeschool, Deschooling, Diane Flynn Keith, Dr. Thomas Armstrong, Educationese, Ellen C. Bicheler, Home Education Magazine, homeschooling, How Children Learn, Ivy Rutledge, Jan Hunt, Janie Bowman, Janine Calsbeek, John Holt, learning styles, Learning Styles and Methods, Lillian Jones, Linda Dobson, Love of Learning, Mary Hood, Methods & Styles of Homeschooling, methods of homeschooling, one-room schoolhouse, Rebecca Rupp, schoolish ways, Stefanie Hofman, Tamara Orr, teaching more than one child, The Relaxed Home School, Unit Studies, unschooling
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What About Diplomas?

Sunday, June 6th, 2010

“Although credentials are defined as something that entitles one to confidence, credit, authority, or power, the term has come to refer primarily to formal pieces of paper that have been awarded through an institution. Yet in practice, employers, college admission committees, and others often quickly pass over these formal credentials and instead make decisions based on informal ones.” -Larry and Susan Kaseman

DiplomaA common question from those new to homeschooling is “How will my child receive a high school diploma?” and the corresponding question is “How will he or she get along without one?” The answers are as varied as the homeschooling families themselves, because ultimately the question of whether or not to pursue getting a diploma of some kind becomes a family decision.

The articles featured here offer a information on credentials, and they offer many options, both for those who decide to attain them and for those who decide they aren’t needed.

Read through several of these articles and discuss them with your family, and perhaps with a few friends who may be facing the same questions about whether or not to pursue a diploma.

Articles

Credentials for Homeschoolers: Problem or Opportunity? by Larry and Susan Kaseman – “This column discusses what credentials really are, distinguishes between formal and informal credentials, explores what homeschoolers have learned about credentials, and suggests ways homeschoolers can get effective credentials that will serve them well.”

“How Do We Know When We’re Done?” by Cafi Cohen – “But how do homeschooling families decide when their teenagers have completed high school? What combination of academic work, accomplishment, and time is enough? How do families evaluate their teenager’s learning and decide What’s Enough?”

Homeschool Diplomas by Valerie Bonham Moon – “It’s getting to be that time of the year when homeschoolers’ fancies turn to thoughts of diplomas. In the case of homeschooling, the parents probably put more thought into the diplomas than the kids do. To help with what may be the final act of ‘official’ homeschooling, Judy Aron has blogged about documenting the home ed adventure.”

High School Graduation and Homeschoolers by Larry and Susan Kaseman – “Public school students in 25 states are now or will soon be required to pass a state-mandated graduation test to receive a high school diploma. This column will discuss ways these tests are likely to affect us as homeschoolers, provide relevant information about the tests, and suggest what ways we can minimize the damage such tests could do to homeschooling.”

The GED Option by Karen Kirkwood – “The General Education Development (GED) certificate serves as a valuable stepping-stone for some homeschoolers. Three of my nephews also have received GED diplomas. One recently started community college and another is working as a teller at a bank. The other one just finished his B.S. and is headed for a doctoral program. For homeschool students not planning to attend college, the GED diploma serves as a sign of accomplishment.”

No Diploma? No Problem. by Valerie Bonham Moon – “The article’s focus is on New York state, and California, but the trend could be spreading. For homeschoolers, the problem of the authenticity of parent-granted diplomas may slowly fade.”

User Friendly Homeschooling Records by Larry and Susan Kaseman – “This column will explore reasons for keeping personal homeschooling records and ways of doing this that support learning and do not interfere with it.”

Homeschoolers Also Earn Diplomas by Valerie Bonham Moon – “Home-granted diplomas can be issued by parents, this isn’t a new ‘wrinkle.’ I remember reading in an earlier edition of Donn Reed’s book The Home School Source Book, about the ceremony he and Jean had for their oldest daughter when she completed her course of study.”

Don’t Let Credentials Get You Down by Larry and Susan Kaseman – “Should we homeschoolers be worried about getting conventional credentials? Are homeschoolers’ futures jeopardized because the path to a conventional diploma is less clear-cut than it is for a student in a conventional school? Why and how is the process of getting a diploma becoming more complex? What choices do we have? This column will address these questions.”

Alternatives for 18-Year- Old Homeschoolers by Larry and Susan Kaseman “Increasing numbers of homeschoolers (and conventionally-schooled young people) are choosing alternative ways of living and learning after they reach age 18. They are moving beyond the widespread assumption that high school graduates should either go to college, get a full-time job and live on their own, or join the military. Instead, many homeschoolers choose to build on and expand what they have been doing: learning through life experience; pursuing their passions; interacting with people of many different ages; and doing real work that contributes to their own growth and development and strengthens them, their families, and their communities.”

Resources

Homeschool Diploma Photoshop Template From A to Z Home’s Cool “This is a Photoshop 7 template for a homeschool diploma from high school. Click on the graphic or the link to download the full-sized Photoshop file to your computer. You will need to have Photoshop installed on your computer, Mac or Windows, in order to make use of and edit this document.”

Best Homeschooling: Teen Years “Articles and links to information about high school years, colleges, getting into college, financial aid, CHSPE, GED, KLEP, and preparation for tests – as well as career information and opportunities other than college.”

Reprinted with permission from Home Education Magazine, original compilation by Mary Nix. All rights reserved. For information about use contact Home Education Magazine.

Tags: "How Do We Know When We're Done?", A to Z Home's Cool, Best Homeschooling, Cafi Cohen, college admission committees, credentials for homeschoolers, Don't Let Credentials Get You Down, Donn Reed, GED diploma, General Education Development, high school diploma, Home Education Magazine, homeschool and credentials, Homeschool Diploma Photoshop Template, Homeschool Diplomas, homeschooling families, homeschooling records, Jean Reed, Judy Aron, Karen Kirkwood, Larry and Susan Kaseman, Lillian Jones, The GED Option, The Home School Source Book, Valerie Bonham Moon
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Standardized Testing

Monday, May 31st, 2010

“Standardized tests can’t measure initiative, creativity, imagination, conceptual thinking, curiosity, effort, irony, judgment, commitment, nuance, good will, ethical reflection, or a host of other valuable dispositions and attributes. What they can measure and count are isolated skills, specific facts and function, content knowledge, the least interesting and least significant aspects of learning.” — Bill Ayers, Distinguished Professor of Education and Senior University Scholar

atestTesting, like many other educational concerns, should be a personal decision. Some questions to consider before making this decision include: which tests will be used and why, how might the testing process affect the learner, how will the test results be used, and are there less intrusive alternatives that can be utilized instead? Testing, in the home environment where parents are always very aware of how well their children are doing, is unnecessary and intrusive. Testing is under fire from many teachers and educators ,and many educational establishments are attempting to eliminate standardized testing in their schools. Very careful consideration should be taken before any testing is done to children for any reason. Looking for good information and perspective on standardized testing? Try these resources:

• Home Education Magazine’s collected articles on Testing, Assessing and Evaluating Children’s Lives:

“How Do We Know When We’re Done?” by Cafi Cohen (J/A 98) If you attend high school, it’s simple. From roughly the ages of 14-18, you sit in a chair six hours a day for 180 days each year. You study carefully balanced amounts of English, math, social studies, and science, and take extras like foreign language, physical education, and drama. Do all that with passing grades, and they give you a diploma.

But how do homeschooling families decide when their teenagers have completed high school? What combination of academic work, accomplishment, and time is enough? How do families evaluate their teenager’s learning and decide What’s Enough?

The GED Option, by Karen Kirkwood (J/A 2006) The General Education Development (GED) certificate serves as a valuable stepping-stone for some homeschoolers. Three of my nephews also have received GED diplomas. One recently started community college and another is working as a teller at a bank. The other one just finished his B.S. and is headed for a doctoral program. For homeschool students not planning to attend college, the GED diploma serves as a sign of accomplishment.

College Level Examination Program (CLEP) tests are a very effective tool homeschoolers can use to solve many problems that legislation-happy folks might think required new laws. CLEP tests can be used to document high school transcripts and diplomas, strengthen applications for college admission and financial aid, convince potential employers and others that a young person is qualified, and support the claim that a homeschooler should be granted Tier I status when enlisting in the military. In short, when homeschoolers need to demonstrate, in conventional terms, what they have learned and how qualified they are, CLEP tests can be used.

CLEP – the College-Level Examination Program – testing. The College-Level Examination Program® or CLEP provides students of any age with the opportunity to demonstrate college-level achievement through a program of exams in undergraduate college courses. There are 2,900 colleges that grant credit and/or advanced standing for CLEP exams.

What Testing Was Like, Danetta Mecikkalski (M/J 96) My husband saw some of the emotional benefits of home education, and he knew that the boys were having fun, but for him the bottom line is education. Would they have more opportunities in the future if they attended school? Were we keeping up to grade level?

Lessons I’ve Learned from Standardized Tests, Sally Hunt (M/J 96) I have learned a lot from this testing game–things the educational authorities that sanction such tests probably never intended.

Portfolio Assessment, Ana McDonald (J/F 96) As committed as I am to home education, I’m fully aware that my children may someday want or need to enter the mass educational system. They shouldn’t be placed in remedial classes simply for lack of documentation of what they already know.

An Interview with Cafi Cohen, by Marsha Ransom. Home Education Magazine’s Older Kids’ columnist, Cafi Cohen, homeschooled her two children, Jeff and Tamara. Her first book, “And What About College?” (Holt Associates, 1997), is a guidebook for families looking toward college after homeschooling.

Test-Related Resources

• FairTest- The National Center for Fair & Open Testing (FairTest) works to end the misuses and flaws of standardized testing and to ensure that evaluation of students, teachers and schools is fair, open, valid and educationally beneficial.

• Parents & Kids Against Standardized Testing A new Facebook page created by homeschooling advocate and activist Melissa Platero.

• The Case Against Standardized Testing – Alfie Kohn’s devastating indictment of standardized testing. Drawing from the latest research, he concisely explains just how little test results really tell us and just how harmful a test-driven curriculum can be. Written in a highly readable question-and-answer format, The Case Against Standardized Testing — which includes some material previously published in The Schools Our Children Deserve — will help readers respond to common questions and challenges.

• Howard Gardner, author of The Disciplined Mind: Beyond Facts And Standardized Tests, Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences, and many more. One of the world’s foremost authorities on the topics of intelligence, creativity, leadership, professional responsibility, and the arts. This link goes to a biographical profile of Howard Gardner, focusing on his considerable contributions.

• David Elkind – From Lillian Jones’ Best Homeschooling site, the essay Much Too Early! by David Elkind, Ph.D.: Although David Elkind is a professional educator rather than a “homeschooler,” his writing offers the wisdom of experience and research that can be of great benefit to any parents concerned about providing the right start for their children.

• The Case Against Standardized Tests, by Chris Carter – “The not-for-profit are different from you and me. Tennis courts, a swimming pool, a baseball diamond, a croquet lawn, a private hotel, 400 acres of woods and rolling hills, cavorting deer, a resident flock of Canada geese – I’m loving every minute here at the Educational Testing Service, the great untaxed, unregulated, unblinking eye of the American meritocracy.”

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Bestselling Author’s Favorable Nod

Wednesday, October 28th, 2009

An encouraging post from Home Education Magazine, about the popular suspense thriller author Dean Koontz, who’s had several novels on the New York Times Bestseller List:

On the HEM Networking discussion group, longtime advocate and Texas homeschooling mom Susan Smylie, who was interviewed for HEM in 2007, shared a reference to homeschooling from an unexpected source. On Monday, Susan wrote to others on the HEM Networking group:

Dean Koontz is apparently a fan of homeschooling (I don’t think he has kids–not mentioned on his bio):

From Relentless (his newest book). The story is told in the first person by Cubby, who is married to Penny. Penny’s parents are demolition experts, survivalists, quirky and interesting. Cubby and Penny are on the run from horror (a pattern in Dean Koontz stories) and have visited her parents to stock up on weapons. They have an uber-genius son–six years old and doing Einstein-type work. (working on time travel and the like). Here is the homeschool quote:

Eyes closed, I sad to Penny, “Sometimes I worry about Milo. At the stronghold, I realized you had a childhood like his. Homeschooled. No friends your age. Your world limited to family, a kind of isolation. What were the negatives of a childhood like that?”

“None,” she said without hesitation. “Growing up in a loving family, with parents who have a sense of humor and common sense and a sense of wonder–that’s not isolation, that’s a wonderful haven.” …. “More than a haven, It’s a sanctuary, where you can decide who you are are, what you think about the world, before the world tells you who you are are and what you ought to think of it.”

Obviously, most of us don’t isolate our kids the way he describes here–there were/are reasons she and her son have that isolation. But, look at how Koontz turns even that criticism of homeschooling into a good thing. The passage goes on a bit longer, with her talking about how she would not be the artist she is if she’d had earlier formal instruction. Was a nice little surprise to find in this book (that otherwise does not mention homeschooling at all–it is just obvious their son has to be homeschooled, he is smarter than pretty much everyone else on the planet.)

best wishes, Susan Smylie

Tags: Dean Koontz, Home Education Magazine, homeschooling, homeschooling families, homeschooling reference, reasons to homeschool, Susan Smylie
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Peter Gray: Foundations for Learning

Friday, October 2nd, 2009

peter_grayPeter Gray, a research professor of psychology at Boston College, has conducted and published research in comparative, evolutionary, developmental, and educational psychology; published articles on innovative teaching methods and alternative approaches to education; and is author of an introductory college textbook on psychology. He is currently working on a book about the lifelong nature and functions of human play, tentatively titled Born to Play, and he writes a blog for Psychology Today titled Freedom to Learn: The roles of play and curiosity as foundations for learning.

In recent posts he’s been exploring the concept of what he terms ‘trustful parenting,’ and his August 26 post is actually titled ‘Trustful Parenting May Require an Alternative to Conventional Schooling’, and subtitled: ‘Trustful parenting may be incompatible with conventional schooling.’ He suggests two alternatives to consider: Sudbury model democratic schools, and homeschooling (or unschooling). He writes:

“For many parents, who do not have the choice of a Sudbury school, homeschooling may be the only alternative to conventional schooling. In recent decades, as schools have become increasingly intrusive in families’ lives, the number of families choosing homeschooling has risen sharply–to over a million in the United States today.”

More recent posts by Peter Gray:

September 30, 2009:
How Developmental Psychology’s Marriage to the School System Distorts Our Understanding of Children
To understand children we must observe them where they’re free.

In this post Peter Gray discusses The Handbook of Child Psychology:

“The list of authors could provide the foundation for a Who’s Who in developmental psychology. The work is intended as a full account of psychology’s findings and theories about children’s behavior.”

None of the 79 chapters are about play or even hint at play in their title. When I checked the subject indexes of each volume I found a few page references to play, but when I followed these up I discovered that, in all four volumes combined, slightly under 10 total pages are devoted to play. Ten pages out of 5,000–in other words, two-tenths of one percent of the whole–are devoted to the topic play in a work that is supposed to sum up all that we know about child psychology!

What about curiosity or exploration? Here the story is even worse.

September 2, 2009:
“Why Don’t Students Like School?” Well, Duhhhh…
Children don’t like school because they love freedom.

Everyone who has ever been to school knows that school is prison, but almost nobody says it. It’s not polite to say it. We all tiptoe around this truth, that school is prison, because telling the truth makes us all seem so mean. How could all these nice people be sending their children to prison for a good share of the first 18 years of their lives? How could our democratic government, which is founded on principles of freedom and self-determination, make laws requiring children and adolescents to spend a good portion of their days in prison? It’s unthinkable, and so we try hard to avoid thinking it. Or, if we think it, we at least don’t say it. When we talk about what’s wrong with schools we pretend not to see the elephant, and we talk instead about some of the dander that’s gathered around the elephant’s periphery.

But I think it is time that we say it out loud. School is prison.

Complete archive of Peter Gray’s posts on play and curiosity as the foundations of learning.

Tags: alternative approaches to education, Alternative to Conventional Schooling, alternatives to school, American Homeschool Association, Born to Play, compulsory attendance, compulsory education, democratic schools, education, educational psychology, Freedom to Learn, functions of human play, homeschooling, innovative teaching methods, learning, Peter Gray, Psychology Today, Sudbury model, trustful parenting, unschooling
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Busting Stereotypes

Monday, September 28th, 2009

There’s an interesting feature article at the well-known online newsmagazine, Salon.com, and it’s not only very favorable toward homeschooling, it’s written by a homeschooling dad with a smart, savvy sense of humor and a good understanding of what homeschooling is all about.

Confessions of a home-schooler, by Andrew O’Hehir, is a fun read, and worth linking to if you have a blog or a website. O’Hehir is the father of two young homeschoolers, and he’s taking his homeschooling dad duties seriously. Or not. His ‘public answer’ to the old socialization question is “…we’ve got a nice support network. They have a circle of friends. They do lots of classes and activities. They go to birthday parties and stuff.”

But then O’Hehir goes into an expanded explanation of the whys and wherefores of homeschooling. It’s very nicely done.

An interesting part of the article is the comments and letters it has generated already, over 14 pages of them as I write this! I haven’t tallied up the pros versus the cons, but in a quick run-through and an informal estimate it seems like the pro-homeschooling contingent are ahead by quite a margin, but the anti-homeschooling group are fairly ornery and accusing. As one commenter who signs his post ‘cabdriver’ notes: “…dogmatic anti-homeschoolers continue to apply finger-wagging worst-case scenarios and snarkily indulge their corny one-size-fits-all stereotypes, even as home-schoolers continue to relate their own stereotype-busting stories.”

This is only the first article in a series, but it’s a good start.

Tags: American education, home education, homeschool, homeschool advocacy, homeschool questions, homeschooling, homeschooling dads, homeschooling parents, strengths of homeschooling
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Pat Farenga

Friday, September 4th, 2009

In a recent article on unschooling for the Baltimore Sun, Holt Associates President and long-time homeschooling advocate Patrick Farenga noted “Interest in unschooling has skyrocketed,” and that comment landed him a debate with a school representative on the merits of unschooling tomorrow, Saturday Sept. 5, at 9:50 AM EST, on Fox and Friends. Currently in their banner for this weekend: “What the new trend of un-schooling means for students, parents.”

Tags: homeschooling, Pat Farenga, unschooling
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Homeschooling Freedoms

Friday, August 7th, 2009

“How tempting it is for us homeschoolers to think, ‘We’ll take care of our own family and figure out how we’re going to homeschool. Then when we have everything going smoothly, we can use some of our extra time, energy and money to work for homeschooling freedoms.’ Unfortunately, the world just doesn’t work that way. It is much easier to figure out how to homeschool our own children if we live in a state that has reasonable homeschooling laws and policies. It is much easier to decide how much emphasis we need to put on conventional academic subjects and when we need to work harder to help our children learn to read, to spell, or do algebra if we can focus on our family’s goals and priorities and on the needs of each individual child, without also having to worry about how well they will do on state-mandated tests, or what we will write on our quarterly or annual reports to public school officials. Therefore, figuring out how we’ll homeschool and working to maintain our homeschooling freedoms have to go hand in hand.”

From “Working for Homeschooling Freedoms: Chore or Opportunity?” by Larry and Susan Kaseman in the Jan/Feb, 2000 issue of Home Education Magazine, available to read free online at the link.

Tags: Home Education Magazine, homeschool advocacy, homeschool legislation, Homeschooling Freedoms, homeschooling laws, Larry and Susan Kaseman
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