Keywords: School-At-Home, Single Child, Primary Aged, Structured
Children: One – 8yrs
A typical day for us would be as follows:
8.00am Wake up and start housework together, breakfast
9:30am Read a book or chat
10.00am Lessons are done online using a purchased curriculum (breaks added in as needed)
12.00pm Lunch
2.00pm Finish any lessons as required, read a bit together, play, go for a walk, etc
This changes depending on if we have something on during the day. Lessons are done inside or outside depending on the weather.
Keywords: Unschooling, Single Child, Gifted, Primary Aged, Semi-Structured
Children: One – 9yrs
We started homeschooling because my daughter is profoundly gifted and was bored to the point of acute daily distress, despite attending a highly supportive school where she had been accelerated by two years. Both my husband and I work part time from home and need to have time each day for our paid work. We and believe in learning as a “seeded” process of discovery. We have a simple daily routine so we can manage our work hours. We start the day with a family fitness session at 9am (if everybody is out of bed in time!). I start work at 9.30am and my husband spends the morning with our daughter focusing primarily on seeds related to maths, science, technology, communications, media, and music. After lunch, our daughter has personal time while her dad starts his work, and this continues until I am available at 2.30pm. The work I do with our daughter might follow on from ideas developed that morning (eg. researching a related topic in an area of my strengths such as literature or classical civilisation, or doing something crafty connected with the morning’s investigations), or might continue from what we did the previous afternoon, or might start from an unrelated seed (such as a trip to the beach), or may involve a formal class or other structured activity away from home or a playdate. Evenings are often spent watching semi-educational TV as a family, playing games or reading stories aloud to each other. The daily routine varies if my husband needs to be out of the house for his work – sometimes he can take our daughter, but if not then she spends the morning with me in my home office, doing her own quiet work (eg. writing, drawing, maths, English, workbooks, etc). On these days she also has plenty of time to simply sit and read – one of her favourite things of all. We have a “curfew” of 9pm, at which point our daughter heads upstairs so that my husband and I can have some adult time. She rarely goes straight to bed, she normally sits up and reads or plays quietly for another hour or so.
Keywords: Unschooling, Single Child, Gifted, Primary Aged, Unstructured
Children: One – 8yrs
Every day is so unique and different (one of the treasures of home education), there is no ‘one typical day’ which would properly convey what day-to-day life looks like for us. Our goal is to offer a kind and respectful learning environment that nurtures the whole child – that celebrates and extends her talents, nourishes her passions, encourages her to learn at her own pace (ignoring grade level), and supports her uniqueness. A learning environment that helps the child to discover, day-by-day, who she is and all she can be. This is why we chose to home educate our gifted daughter. Our daughter is drawn to novelty. She loves to have the time and space to fully explore her many interests (and uncover and discover new ones). Being able to explore a topic, uninterrupted, helps her to develop her concentration and to engage at a deeper level. Home education supports her social and emotional growth, and allows her to develop her resilience and manage her intensity. It also enables us to include a lot of physical activity (trampolining, trips to the beach, bush walks, playgrounds, etc). We enjoy the family bonding time we have together. We embrace the flexibility home educating gives us. Each day is
totally different and we work with her interests, learning style, personal rhythm and the rhythms of nature (we make the most of the outdoors whenever possible). We talk (a lot!) about a broad variety of topics and read a wide range of materials every day. My daughter often sits and writes stories or poems. Sometimes she uses a computer for learning (maths, writing, graphic design or general research). She takes classes – real-life and online (drama, creative writing, kids yoga) – and we join other home educating families for social gatherings and trips. She also loves to create and invent – just about anything. There always seems to be a new invention on the go! We don’t follow any one, single curricula – anything and everything becomes part of our curriculum. A news story can turn into a deep, philosophical discussion about the environment or issues facing society; a scientific study could be the impetus for a mini project or experiment; anything can be the seed of an idea for a new invention. For her, home education is creating a lifelong passion for learning – to her, learning is fun.