Where do I start?

[quiltinggal]

I'm new to this forum and the concept of homeschooling.  Over the past few weeks I've read as much as I can, and this AL board is where I keep landing.  My oldest is 4, and he is why I'm here.  He is an avid self-motivated learner, and I have never had to teach him a thing in his life.  I never really even read to him a whole lot because he was never interested.  His mind goes a thousand miles a minute and is constantly processing; you see it in his eyes, in his body movements, in the way he interacts with the world.  Everything about him screams "more" - I hope this might be something to which other AL parents can relate, because everyone else I know cannot relate.  He overloads most peoples senses within 30 minutes, if that makes any sense at all.

He has been attending a 3 day/week preschool for the past 3 years.  Each year he has been far ahead the other kids, and the gap keeps widening year by year.  In his 18 month old class he pointed to letters on the wall and yelled them out.  In his 3 year old class he had mastered the curriculum before the year even started, and I never taught him a thing.  Our needs and goals for preschool have not been academic, so it wasn't a huge concern.  And I've always wanted him to be a kid and not force learning but let it come naturally and fun. 

 

I recently introduced him to the dreambox "game" because I thought he would find it fun.  It really opened my eyes to the level of his capabilities, and now I'm seriously questioning public school.  I come from a long line of public educators, and I myself was an accelerated learner in public school before that was even a thing.  I've convinced my husband to give home learning a try for this year to see how we both do.  DS would still go to pre-k, but I would gently introduce new concepts to him at home and see what he does with them.  Then at the end of the school year we can assess where he is and make a decision about kinder.  Sort of a trial period to see how we both do.  My mom, a retired public educator, is no fan of homeschool because she saw all the "bad" examples (think neglect), but she is fully supportive of me homeschooling DS for the accelerated learning and 1-1 attention she thinks he will need because of his "more" personality.

 

So where would you start if you were me?  I'm hesitant to introduce formal learning before kinder, but I don't want to hold him back either.  I know I can't go wrong with picture books.  I considered assessing him against the state (Texas) curriculum so I can target areas where he might have a blind spot.  But honestly, I'm mostly at a complete loss.  I would love input from others who have been there (even if you can't identify with the personality lol).

 

 

[Starr]

Read The Well Trained Mind by Susan Wise Bauer who hosts this site.  It will keep you going for some time. 

[quark]

We started homeschooling when DS was 4 too. I tried teaching mine. I bought The Well Trained Mind. I bookmarked many of the pages. Took copious notes. Eventually (about 2 head-banging years later), I learned to just get out of his way. We read a lot of good books, listened to lots of music, he did a lot of puzzles while I cooked/ cleaned/ did my own stuff. I'm a planner and it is very hard for me to not be in control. So as a compromise, I bought some of the resources Susan mentions and strewed them (as well as books on the Living Math booklist). Then, I taught/ introduced the things *I* loved like singing, dance, animals, photography, funny movies, and books. Respecting that he is a different learner and needed to find his own way (and eventually realizing I wouldn't have made a good classical homeschooler myself) has worked very well for our relationship.

 

Some materials/ habits we really really couldn't have done without:

• Audio versions of wonderful books to listen to in the car while ferrying him to various outside opportunities.
• A good whiteboard/ lapboard with non toxic markers.
• Lots of duct tape and popsicle sticks and cardboard (he wasn't a Lego kind of kid).
• Lots and lots of graph paper (you can download them free -- we splurged on notebooks when we could) for everything from handwriting practice to making up puzzles and mazes and stories. I save these now in tote boxes. Some of what he did was later very handy to use for the portfolio application to the Davidson Young Scholars program.
• As many visual materials as we could find e.g. good documentaries, The Happy Scientist science videos, and online educational games. And Ellen McHenry writes some good materials that can be adapted to a wide age range.
• Teaching him to Google and teaching him good online habits (he started around 6 years old).
• Teaching him from young to present at our homeschool presentations days.

 

Unwritten rules we naturally fell into were:

• don't follow age-specific grades/ guidelines if the kid is wanting more (unless it will affect health/ safety) -- we eventually stopped following "Grade" levels and instead called our school years by the years we had been homeschooling (so 4yo was Year 1, 5yo was Year 2...eventually, we stopped doing that too).
• always make things a tad harder...believe me, it really helps. Not only with boredom but also teaching them to be down to earth about their smarts.
• if things come too easily, look for ideas outside the traditional box e.g. learn more than one language, try different instruments, find out what other math there is outside of what is taught in schools, find more challenging puzzles, build something harder, instead of just English, learn linguistics, etc.
• don't ever forget to take breaks (there will be those plateau/ asynchronous development days when you will be frustrated/ scratching head) and enjoy each other because you know, sometimes these kids are ready to fly the coop a lot earlier than when you are willing to let them go. :crying:  (but there's time for that yet for your little guy :laugh: )

Enjoy yourselves. Time flies too quickly.

Edited August 24, 2016 by quark

[quiltinggal]

Definitely!  It's currently in transit from another library; should be able to pick up tomorrow or Friday.  I'm just anxious to hear first hand experience :)

[Shred Betty]

I was curious about explode the code phonics virtual version. I've seen my daughter use dreambox, how it adapts to skill level and when I read about explode the code online I thought it would be similar to dreambox except for phonics. Allowing him to progress to his level, helping you understand where he is in the process.

 

I've no idea if it's a good or bad program but something to check out.

The above poster recommending the "well trained mind" is not doing free advertising: it really is a great suggestion.

 

I also really enjoyed recently reading a bit about Charlotte Mason style - what I personally got from that was support for my instinct to read my DD7 classic style and more difficult literature amazingly she seems to understand way more than I'd ever expected) and more importantly the whole idea of "getting out of my daughter's way, allowing myself to be invisible not insert myself into her process.

 

This is such a great reminder for me. My DD7 just instinctively does some amazing stuff when it comes to learning, and the best thing I can do many days is just let her take the reins and shelve my ego. For example I often find myself handing her the teachers manual, she reads the lesson herself and delivers it to me now. she asks me to make sure I make mistakes so she can check my answers herself and teach me. LOL.

 

This past week I loved coming across the suggested reading list for Ambleside Online year 1. It's absolutely overwhelming and I do not really personally "like" the approach they are suggesting, however their suggested reading list and the project Gutenberg links to free downloads of book is just so, so cool. Once you calm down and read the legend for the links anyway ;)

 

It sounds to me like with his obvious hunger you will be mainly finding ways to provide materials to support his curosity at the right time / fast enough.

 

Im just starting my first year of homeschooling and we all love it so far! DD did k and gr 1 public school and while she is not an "accelerated" learner, it's already pretty obvious to me that with the focused 1-on-1 that HS allows and flexibility, she will be better off than in a PS setting.

-GG

[Black-eyed Suzan]

Welcome! :)

 

I found the book The Homeschooling Option: How to Decide When It's Right for Your Family by Lisa Rivero helpful. I checked books out about all different styles of homeschooling to see what resonated with me. We did a trial year for Kindergarten, and are still going. :)

 

Quark's post above is fabulous. The preschool years are a great time to explore and have fun learning.

 

My son and I love board games, so we played a lot of games when he was that age. (We still do.) :) Don't just think about educational games - even regular games can teach. For example, around that age he learned how to make change by playing Monopoly and learned some US geography from Ticket to Ride.

 

Other things we did: bike riding, walks, field trips to museums/zoo, children's theater, child-friendly concerts, lots of read alouds, audiobooks. As they've gotten older we travel a lot more.

 

One thing I wished I'd have done more of in the preschool years: working on fine motor skill activities. He avoided them, and I didn't think much about working to incorporate them.

 

Enjoy!

 

 

[quiltinggal]

 

My son and I love board games, so we played a lot of games when he was that age.

Yes!  He LOVES games and playing them with someone else!  I got the idea from a WTM friend to do checkers.  Sometimes I feel like a real slacker when I think about all the enrichment I could have been offering and have not.  He also likes dominoes and manipulating scrabble tiles.  I was thinking to look for different ways of using one game to get the most use.  I also came across the Smart games last night and was intrigued.  Can you point me in the direction of a good game list?  Or just the top 10 (or so) off the top of your head? 

[Black-eyed Suzan]

Off the top of my head:

Blokus

Connect 4

Yahtzee

Uno

War (can do Multiplication or addition war with 2 cards each to practice math facts) On someone here's recommendation, we've used the into the forest card game to play war.

Chess

Logic games like Rush Hour, Chocolate Fix, Laser Maze

Apples to Apples (Jr version, or take out cards that are not age appropriate)

Backgammon

Mancala

 

And you already know Scrabble, Monopoly, dominoes, Ticket to Ride. My older likes chemistry, and has enjoyed Compounded, but he was older.

[Josh Blade]

We started with just a single piece of curriculum (Teach Your Child to read in 100 Easy Lessons for us). We did a lesson 3-5 days per week, depending on her interest. Our daughter was enjoying school time and we added in math (Right Start A for us, but there are a ton of options). She wanted to learn to write and we added in Handwriting without Tears. We eventually added in very basic early american history and science from the What your X grader should know series (Kindergarten). Somewhere along the line Explode the Code replaced 100EL. That's the stuff we do daily now during "school" time, which typically takes around an hour to an hour and a half. We do all kinds of other supplements throughout the day though: Library books relating to the history/science we're currently talking about, readers for her, Life of Fred most nights before bed, other bedtime stories where we take turns reading, bringing up science lessons when they relate to real life (asking which state of matter different things around the house are or the different foods at dinner), card games, apps like Dragonbox Numbers, Teach Your Monster to Read on PC (this was mostly to get her used to using a mouse), MysteryScience (they still have free memberships for the year if you haven't signed up - the lessons are pretty fun and can be as short as 15 minutes or so if you don't go super deep into the extra activities or longer with the supplements) on the weekend, and then all of the general life experiences like having fun playing games, helping with cooking and cleaning, going to the zoo, swimming, playing etc. 

 

For us, while we have school time in the morning, education can happen any time. 

[Jackie]

My kid overwhelmed *my* senses constantly as a 2-4 year old. 5 was better. 6 has been pretty great, though I hope I didn't just jinx myself.

 

With the picture books, remember that the nonfiction section has tons of picture books, too. You may already do that. My daughter has gone through several stages in which she highly preferred nonfiction and tore through topics.

 

From your post, I'm not sure if he is reading independently. Is he? If not, is he ready to blend? We never did use a reading curric, but did go through sets of Bob Books in order. Independent reading made everything easier with my daughter, because it made it easier for me to get out of her way. I could stock the library bin, give her limited online access, and let her be.

 

In addition to suggestions already given, I'll add BrainPop. You can start with the Jr version, but DD moved to the regular version before turning 5. She knows more science and social studies from BrainPop than I remember learning in all of elementary school. My kid gets bored with all the online educational games (usually about 3 weeks after I would buy a year-long subscription) but has loved BrainPop for years.

 

Music was also a great thing to add. An instrument if he is ready and you have a teacher experienced with very young kids. Otherwise, a book about different instruments. Books about composers and then listening to their music. The book Story of the Orchestra was a good jumping off point for us.

 

Physical exercise was (and is) essential. My kid tends more towards sitting to read and do art, so we joined classes - gymnastics, dance, and swim are all typically available at that age.

 

Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding is a science curric that can be done without ever having a formal lesson time, al least for the K-2 book. And there's nothing in the K-2 book that I found too difficult for my 4-5 year old. It's very flexible.

 

As for assessing against a curric, I wouldn't. Gifted kids tend to be asynchronous - ahead in some areas, more ahead in others, on target for some, behind for some. Assessing my daughter that way would give me headaches. I do annual testing, though, purely for my own information, wanting to find comparative strengths and weaknesses, My kid, who only gets the one test a year, thinks they're super fun and wishes we would do more; if she felt differently, I might not even do that.

[quiltinggal]

Thank you all for the excellent suggestions.  I can't wait to get the WTM book and look into everything you've mentioned.  I *think* I have an idea of what we will do this semester, but it may get refined as I learn more.  He is obsessed with maps and countries right now (just got a globe 2 weeks ago), and we travel a lot, so I picked up the galloping the globe curriculum.  Planning to do 1 country a month (or however it progresses lol), starting with our family countries of origin and where we are traveling this fall.  The kids (#2 is 2) have 3 citizenships, so that takes us through the end of the year.  I think they both will enjoy the suggested literature, coloring the maps, making the foods, and learning about the wildlife, nature and culture - all just built into our normal every day activities.  Since he enjoys the dreambox math "game", I'm just going to let him self pace and see what happens.  He spent 2 hours on it today over 2 sessions and met some standards.  I've put a few living math picture books on hold at the library as well and am looking to build our library.  I picked up a couple of traditional games today and will keep adding to that game collection (he taught DH how to play connect 4 tonight :)).  A WTM friend of mine has daily activity boxes, so I'm thinking of reorganizing all the "stuff" we have into something like that so we can rotate and make the best use of everything.

It sounds like SO MUCH when it's all written out, but can I tell you that today has been the best day he has had in several months.  I don't know why it took me so long to figure out that he was needing more structure and challenge.  I also formalized his household responsibilities last week, and he is thriving with the formality.  I feel kind of bad that he is 4 and one of his responsibilities is to vacuum the floor around the table after each meal, but he LOVES it and takes it so seriously.  He is also now responsible for making the vegetable at dinner.  I help with the safety stuff, but he loves it, and we are discussing things about food that I never thought we would.  Then he gets on facetime with my mom and tells her step by step what he did to make the vegetable.  Even though it's formalized, I don't make him do any of it - I give him the option, and he chooses to do it, again and again.
 

With the picture books, remember that the nonfiction section has tons of picture books, too. You may already do that. My daughter has gone through several stages in which she highly preferred nonfiction and tore through topics.

From your post, I'm not sure if he is reading independently. Is he? If not, is he ready to blend? We never did use a reading curric, but did go through sets of Bob Books in order. Independent reading made everything easier with my daughter, because it made it easier for me to get out of her way. I could stock the library bin, give her limited online access, and let her be.

Jackie, he likes a blend of fiction and non-fiction.  He likes studying the pictures in the non-fiction (mainly atlases and other reference books) and trying to read the fiction.  At the moment he is not interested in the story line and is eagerly putting sounds and words together.  I don't even know what blending is, and he may be doing some, but I honestly have no idea.  He is self taught, has known letter sounds for a couple of years (I think from watching superwhy 2 years ago when I was nursing #2 lol).  At the moment he is doing a sort of basic sounding out, combined with contextual guessing, and just word recognition.  I feel like he is on the cusp of reading, and I'm just not sure about direction or the kind of support he needs.  I was thinking of checking out a few of the Usborne readers from the library and seeing what he does with them.  I'll look into the Bob books and explode the code (since it's mentioned a few times in this post) as well. In general, how many books at a time do you keep in the library bin?

 

Edited August 25, 2016 by quiltinggal

[Jackie]

Blending is just another name for sounding out - putting letter sounds together to make sounds/words. Another option to look at is Progressive Phonics, which is free online. It's silly snippets of stories, with the parent reading a majority and the child sounding out the highlighted words. DD and I occasionally did that, just reading off the iPad screen.

 

The library bin is ridiculous. I usually have 30-50 books checked out. It's a mush of books related to things she is learning about, junky/fun fiction that she chooses, poetry, biographies, great picture books, folk tales, living math, and whatever else we pull off the shelves during our weekly library trip. One bin for unread books, another for ones ready to be returned.

[mommy2ella]

As far as reading support, you may want to let him use Reading Eggs for a bit if you're looking for something to get him to take off in reading.  It doesn't sound like he'd need it for too terribly long before he's off and running.  

 

Another thing mine started loving at that age was logic.  Mind Benders, Perplexors, etc. were, and are, a favorite around here.  Some other fun games are Lab Mice and Logic Links.