by Author Name Withheld 26

Created on: May 16, 2008

Homeschooling methods can vary almost as much as homeschoolers themselves, but a handful of popular styles dominate the movement.

All-in-one curriculums: Some parents, especially those just starting out in homeschooling, are reluctant to abandon traditional approaches to education, such as workbooks, textbooks and scope-and-sequence curriculums. Several homeschool publishers provide a boxed curriculum for all subjects by grade, allaying fears of "gaps" and offering structured lesson plans and schedules. Some of these publishers are also widely used in private schools.

Charlotte Mason: Miss Mason was a British educator in the 19th and early 20th centuries who believed that education is "an atmosphere, a discipline, a life." She rejected "twaddle" in favor of what she called living books. As opposed to textbooks, written by committee and crammed with facts, living books are written by authors who share their favorite subjects with us, dispensing knowledge along with passion. Narration, in which children tell in their own words what they have learned, replaces tests. Copywork, in which students copy quotations from great poetry or literature, serves as handwriting practice and allows them to soak up proper grammar and punctuation. Nature, art and music study are also big pieces of a Charlotte Mason education.

Classical: The classical model is built on the ancient trivium of grammar, dialectic and rhetoric. The young child in the grammar stage concentrates on memorization of facts. This is the time for multiplication tables, grammar and spelling rules, historical dates and the like. As the child matures, he is ready to apply logic to those facts in the dialectic stage. This is when he learns how to analyze what he knows. Finally, the older student moves into the rhetoric stage, when he learns how to shape and present his ideas in an appealing way.

Unit studies: Rather than following a scope and sequence, unit studies immerse children in one topic but draw lessons from all disciplines. For instance, if the students are learning about elephants, they might study its anatomy for science, learn about its African habitat for geography, write a paragraph on its eating habits for language arts, discuss its weight and relative size for math, etc. Parents who choose to use unit studies usually supplement them with sequential math and reading programs.

Unschooling: Unschoolers put their faith in the natural curiosity of children. They believe that providing many learning possibilities, a rich learning environment, great books and a free rein will motivate children to follow their own interests and learn what they need to know. The parent becomes a facilitator, letting the students choose the path and then helping them find the resources they need to travel it.

Many families blend some or all of these approaches to form their own eclectic method, leaning toward certain styles but not committing entirely to one approach. This is one of the huge advantages of homeschooling: being able to experiment and mold methods and curriculums to children, rather than the other way around. Even within families, one approach may not work for all children. How wonderful that the square peg does not have to fit into the round hole.

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