So how do we do it? part 1

Girly Monkey and Funky
Monkey at the park

   There is one thing evident when you start researching Homeschooling, and that is that there are as many ways to do it as there are families homeschooling. The different ways range from very little formal instruction, as in unschooling, to households with a replica of classroom in their nook equipped with everything from a black board to a large clock that signals lunch and recess. In my experience I have found that majority of homeschoolers fall somewhere in the middle.We do things the middle way too.

Exercise time

   When I first stared Homeschooling we used the Complete Canadian Curriculum Gr.1. One of the reason I used it was that it was formulated to reflect and follow Canadian Curriculum, including things like Canadian money, History and Geography. I found that when I looked at other systems from countries like US, or Australia, or UK I had to do a lot of supplementing for Canadian content. The only drawback with that workbook was that we were still doing "school-work" at home. In other words, we didn't have full benefit and flexibility of picking the things we wanted our kids to learn. Over the course of that first year I learned that Funky Monkey was less interested in what made the weather, or who firemen were and more interested in Dinosaurs.
That was his passion that year. So I slowly stopped using the Canadian Curriculum book in favor of printed pages featuring dinosaur theme. One great website that had a good selection of pages in many themes (including Dinosaurs) was Learning Page website. It was great and he really enjoyed doing anything from Math to Science based on dinosaurs. We also encouraged reading by having Funky Monkey read Dinosaur Cove Series. He loved the series and read it out loud to us. Reading out loud was very important because it gave us a chance to help him with big words and correct him in case he didn't read something the right way.

Board games are awesome lessons!

   Second year I was determined to make our homeschooling reflect what Funky Monkey's interests were. Since I wasn't very confident in dealing with math without some sort of a system we still got Complete MathSmart Gr.2. Now we were more free to spread our wings and customize our work. All through that year I was searching and looking for solutions. I was not quite convinced yet that this was the perfect solution to our schooling dilemma, but we were heading in the right direction. Throughout that year I also started doing preschool with Girly Monkey. She loved it. We got Brain Quest Workbook: Pre-K for her and she loved sitting at our big dining-room table just like her older brother. I was happy that both kids were learning, but it still didn't feel like this was the education I was striving for.

Funky Monkey in Ballet Lessons

Art Lessons

   Then one day I came across Charlotte Mason. I read some things online about her ideas on education and I wanted to know more. Since it was end of our second year homeschooling, I gave myself summer vacations to get to know this brilliant woman better. I ordered A Charlotte Mason Companion: Personal Reflections on the Gentle Art of Learning and waited patiently for it to come. About 2 weeks into our summer holidays I got the book. I read it everyday, and by another week I was all done. I loved what I was learning. Charlotte Mason was a proponent of well rounded education. She encouraged teaching kids through reading living books as opposed to dry, boring textbooks. She emphasized nature study, daily history lessons, copywork as form of grammar and writing lessons, and art and craft work. She believed that education was building a whole person and not just feeding information. If you care to read more about her here is a great website about her method: Simply Charlotte Mason. I researched more and I loved the idea: Home-school as a way of building a whole person! So I spent the next few days writing down ideas of what I wanted my kids to learn and how we were going to get there. I made a master plan and a schedule. I was ready for our next year of educating my kids the way I wanted to educate them. ...

Girly monkey busy doing preschool

Tomorrow, So how do we do it, part 2.