You would like your homeschool experience to be fuill of joy and bliss, yet it often ends up in disapointement and lack of achievement?
You would like your children to be eager to learn and to embrace the great material you’ve put together for them, yet you end up fighting and coercing?
Why Aren’t They Happy Learners To Start With?
Parents don’t choose homeschooling to quarrel with their children but to offer them a better education. But how can you achieve that if they are not takers of what you give?
Children natural goal is to learn. It is in their genes, they are made for it. Yet, a lot of moms struggle with school work and homeschooling.
A mom once told me that she would spend her evenings preparing amazing material, she would research and put together information and print outs, just to see her children not caring at all the next day. She couldn’t engage them in her plan. And yet she did a great preliminary work. It felt like so much wasted energy.
Homeschool Moms Are Full of Motivation and Good Will
No one choose homescholing because it is the easy way. The easy way is to send your children to school and have the day fo yourself while someone else gets the arduous job of geting something in their brain.
Homeschooling comes from a desire to do more for our children, from a hope to give them a better, more suitable education, from a belief that we can do this. Maybe your child isn’t a good fit for the educational system, maybe they have special needs, or maybe you don’t share the system’s values. Surveys (https://www.calverteducation.com/should-i-homeschool/top-5-reasons-parents-homeschool-kids) show that top reasons for homeschooling are:
Make a change from a negative school environment
Get a higher quality education
Improve social interactions
Support a learning disabled child
Family relocation
After 8 years of homeschooling, I’ve grown a deep respect for homeschool moms. It is not an easy task. It is not a year-long holiday. The pressure and self-expectations are high as is the guilt and the fears of failing.
Homeschool Is A Great Tool To Raise And Educate A Child
Here are a few numbers (https://markinstyle.co.uk/homeschooling-statistics/) that show how homeschooling is becoming more and more present in our life (and I am not talking pandemic side effect):
There are 2.5 million homeschooled children in the United States.
Homeschooling is experiencing a steady growth rate of 2% to 8% every year.
Homeschooling in the UK has increased by 40% during the last three years.
Homeschoolers score 15% to 30% higher on tests than public-school students.
Homeschooling erases racial disparities in academic achievement.
The freedom you get when homeschooling is the real gem of it. You can do absolutely what you want, the way you want it.
You can adapt the program to meet your children’s needs and give them a tailored education.
But, if children are natural learners, and parents eager teachers, how come it’s not easier?
Happy learners Might Not Be What We Think
What is a happy learner? First of all, children have needs (https://berenicegoin.com/childrens-needs-an-easy-yet-expert-introduction/) that need to be fullfilled in order to be able to give you their full attention.
On top how the needs we all share as humans, children have some specific needs that shouldn’t be overlooked. Your issues might be as simple as answering one of the following need:
The need for sleep, children need way more rest than adults, with newborn sleeping up to 20 hours a day.
The need for security, children need clear boundaries and limits. This is how they feel the safest.
The need for stability, which is linked to security. For a good development, children need routines and life habits.
The need for communication, one of the first things a baby tries to learn is communication.
The need for freedom, for children can only truly develop themselves with freedom and trust.
Think of homeschooling as a beautiful house qou’re trying to build. Those needs are the fundations.
Regardless of the obvious (a tired, sick or hungry child cannot learn efficiently), their need for
structure is essential. Once the structure is here (security (https://berenicegoin.com/can-limits-be-set-in-a-positive-way-absolutely/ ) and stability) children have the emotional space for learning.
Children Need Clarity To Be Happy Learners
There are a few things to keep in mind about our children when it comes to homeschooling:
Children’s curiosity naturally pull them in many directions.
The relationship with the parents is the most important thing in a child’s emotional life.
Children live in the present.
Children experience many emotions and don’t have to ability to manage them yet.
Children don’t have the mental ability to see the big picture.
Many things remain mysterious to children.
With those statements in mind, you can see why children need boundaries and a routine. If they know what’s expected of them, it lifts a big weight of their shoulders, because they want to please you, to secure the attachment between you.
I am not talking abstarct expectations here like « I want you to be nice », « I want you to learn more », not even « I want you to do some English ».
Think about it. Think hard. Between what you think, what’s in your mind as a mother when you say « now it is time to do some English » (the lesson plan, the week’s plan, the month’s plan, the year’s plan, the connections, the program for the day, the breaks you know they’ll have, the afternoon crafts to have fun,…) and what the child gets as information (now is English), the gap is huge!
Your child doesn’t know that he will have to do a certain amount of English before they have a break. They don’t know that in the afternoon there will be a great craft activity. They don’t know why they should do English when really, they’d love to play with their play-doh.
Can you feel how unsettling is can be for your child? Like walking in the dark.
When you put energy in setting clear boundaries and creating a healthy routine, you communicate with your child. You tell them they are important, that they matter.
A Happy Learner Knows What Is Happening And Why
A good start here? Get clear for yourself first! It doesn’t mean that you need to have a detailed schedule for the coming year.
It means to you need to get clear on what you want to achieve, what’s your goal and how and when you will reach it.
Is your goal that your children learn about stars and planets this trimester? Good, let them know and make it happen.
Even if younger children don’t understand the concept of time perfectly (or at all), having a calendar is always a great idea. You can also give them time helpers like « we’ll study the sky until Easter holiday » or use beans in a big jar « every day, you’ll put a bean from this jar to this one, when they will be no more beans, the sky study will be completed ».
The idea is to let them know what’s your plan. If you don’t have one ( I often don’t), create a system that works for you. For example, my children know that every day they will have 1 period of English, one of mathematic and one of French every day. They know that every period lasts 45 minutes and that they have a 15 minutes break in between.
The important is to find a system that works for your family and to stick to it. Children need stability and routine. Even if the routine can be flexible (school between breakfast and lunch, no matter what time is will be for example), children will benefit from it.
Then, all that’s left is how you communicate and how much freedom do you give them.
Without Freedom There Is No Learning
In last week’s blog post, I discuss the challenges of freedom in education (https://berenicegoin.com/40-can-you-raise-a-child-and-still-keep-them-free-the-challenges-of-education/). We are the products of our education, and not passing our definitely not free education on is not an easy task.
But here is something to cheer you up. Children are made to learn. From birth to our death, we learn and we love doing it. Not in a school kind of way but in an interests-based way.
When you’re about to go in Costa Rica for a month, you feel eager to learn about the country. When you’re invited at a friend’s place and the food is delicious, you fell motivated to learn to cook it. When you read a book about a new communication method you’re intrigued into trying it.
But if I told you to learn this and that, that I would give you a book to do it and not even telling you the benefits of it, how motivated would you be?
Children are great learners, but what they need from us is not to be their teachers but facilitators. They need us to introduce them to this big world of us, to give them access to the ressources they need and to be a reassurinf figure in the lot of mysteries they have to unflod.
Share Your World To Raise Happy Learners
If we try to feed children with knowledge they didn’t ask for, we take a great risk, killing their curiosity.
« It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education » – Albert Einstein
Are you willing to take the risk? So how can you share the world you know in a way children will be receptive to? Here are some little things that can change big ones.
Share what we know without being overwhelming
Children have a short attention spam, do not overflow them in informtaion or they won’t listen anymore (and you might end up vexed).
Be curious and voice your wonders
There are many things I don’t know, and I always ask about them aloud. It sparks the children curiosity AND shows them it’s okay not to know.
Invite your children to join in your activities
Our western world created clear boundaries between adults and children, and it’s a shame. Going to a yoga class with you, watching you work, even looking at the hairdresser doing your hair, everything is interesting to children.
Offer them new experiences
I am not talking skydiving but simple things like walking barefoot on a hike, paddling on a lake, going to places you wouldn’t usually go, going to the city if you’re in the country and vice versa.
Make learning material available, not only during school but all day long
Children learn all the time, so why keep this energy for school time? Have some beautiful books lying around, an anatomical model, a map of the world, some music instruments, whatever inspires you!
Again, by doing so you learn a more positive way to communicate with your child. Instead of giving, you ar sharing. You make them feel important and respected. You grow their self-esteem. Why would you care to share our thoughts or your activities if you didn’t value them? Children are very sensitive to those attentions.
What Your Children Need To Become Happy Learners
See it like a house again.
Your goals and values are the land.
The boundaries and routines are the fundations.
The communication is the roof
The freedom is the landscape.
What does your ideal house looks like?
