BJU Press Blog

Simplified Homeschool

You know that organization is the key to a smooth homeschool day. We share tips on planning your time and lessons as well as advice from other homeschool parents. There are also highlights from our Distance Learning daily video-lesson program, which is designed to simplify your homeschool.

Start here:

5 Ways to See if Your Child is Learning

by

Have you ever instructed your child to clean their room without checking on their work? Would you let your child bake some cookies by themselves before you observed that they’ve mastered measuring ingredients or using the oven? In the same way, we have to check on our children to make sure they’ve learned what we’re trying to teach. What we need are assessments.

An assessment is simply a way of finding out if your child learned what you set out to teach. Most of the time we think about assessments as only tests and quizzes. In reality you can assess what your child has learned in a number of ways, some of which are fun for her.

5-ways

What Kinds of Assessments?

So if we want to see if our children, particularly the young ones, have learned something and we don’t want to give them quizzes every day, how do we see what they’re learning? We can use an assessment that matches our child’s way of learning. Here are five fun ways to see if your child is learning what you’re teaching.

  1. Ask Questions

Most children know far more than they can write on the page. So ask them questions that they can respond to verbally.  You shouldn’t grade these questions. If your child reads about the life cycle of a butterfly in science, ask them what the four stages of the butterfly’s life are. If they miss the question, have them reread the appropriate paragraph. Our teacher’s editions provide great suggested questions you can use to see if your children understood what they were reading.

  1. Draw pictures

This is what I did with the 5 themes for Heritage Studies 2. I didn’t expect my daughter to memorize a definition she could write out on a test, but I wanted to see that she got the ideas. So I had her draw pictures of something from history, geography, culture, economics, and American citizenship. My daughter likes to draw, so she loved this activity.

  1. Act out an idea

If you want to see if your child understood a story they’ve read, have them act it out. If your child likes pretending, they’ll love playing the story, and you might get a chuckle yourself. In the meantime, you’ll know they understood the Reading story.

  1. Make something

When we learned about producers and consumers in Heritage Studies 2, I had my daughter create a “business” and a flyer that advertised what she could produce. She decided to make paper dogs and sell them for 10 cents each. I bought one of her paper dogs and asked “who was the producer, and who was the consumer?”

  1. Use the skill

When your children learn how to use a math concept, have them use it. So if we’ve baked 24 brownies for Bible Club and we’re expecting 18 children, I ask my daughter how many extra brownies we should expect to have. If we have 13 children, I ask if we have enough brownies to give each child two.

Can you think of other fun, hands-on ways to assess what your child’s learned?

How Long Should a Homeschool Day Last?

by

image

Have you ever heard the question: “How long should a homeschool day last”? Maybe you’ve even asked yourself this question. You can relax because there’s really no right or wrong answer. But if you’re concerned, here are some things to consider about the length of your school day:

  • What criteria are you using to evaluate your school day to determine why it’s taking so long? Choose a schedule that works for your family—not one set by other families’ clocks.
  • Do your children learn better by studying the lesson and then doing all the homework immediately with concepts still fresh in their minds? Or is it better when they have a more regimented routine with “subject hours” in which to learn their lessons and then use the remaining time for homework? Remember that you are always in charge of the schedule (even when using Distance Learning). How you organize the day may vary depending on what works best for you and your children.
  • Are your children goofing off or really struggling? Evaluating their activities during lesson time by noting any distractions or excuses to get up from the lesson could key you in on how well your child is learning.
  • How involved are you with your children’s progress? It’s important to make sure they comprehend and properly apply the information they learn.
  • How are you balancing extracurricular activities in your regular day? Do music lessons or sports overlap with academic lessons, pushing them back and extending your day? Have your other children bring independent work to complete, or watch Distance Learning video lessons in the car.
  • How many breaks do you take during the school day? How long do you take for lunch? Making a meal every day takes time (for you and your children); try getting ahead with food preparation. If your kids are older, they can serve themselves with something like DIY Lunch Stations.
  • Are your children studying every subject daily? Keep in mind that each subject is a minimum of a full semester of study. So in order to stay on schedule, they may need to study a subject only two or three days a week rather than daily.
  • Do you have your children estimate the time they think it will take to accomplish a task? Both average and special-needs students often benefit from a physical timer to help them stay focused and to learn to complete tasks within certain time limits. If you give your child the responsibility of choosing the time limit and finishing within the allotted time, it can help him develop analytical estimation and scheduling skills.
  • Are you able to prepare ahead for material that will be covered? Being prepared is a major part in keeping you and your children on the track to academic success and regular routine.

Find these tips helpful? Sign up for our homeschool email to receive more.

5 Fun Things to Do on Your First Day of Homeschool

by

5 Things

Are you ready to jump back into homeschooling? Summer is fun and relaxing, but for busy little minds it can eventually become boring. Your kids are probably eager to hold their new textbooks in their hands and start on new projects. Here are some ways to feed that excitement and make good memories on your first day of homeschool.

1. A Special Breakfast

On the first morning of the homeschool year, you’ll have a lot of things to do, but make time to eat a nutritious breakfast together. Whether you add extra bacon to the plate, indulge in doughnuts or cinnamon rolls alongside the scrambled eggs, or whip up some pancakes in unique shapes, the breakfast becomes special and memorable. You could even make a breakfast casserole the previous evening and warm it up in the oven that morning.

2. Annual Photos

Many families take a few pictures before the first day of school begins, and  you can do the same thing with your kids on the first day of your homeschool. Gather everyone on the doorstep, in front of a big tree, or in the driveway, and snap a photo. If you take your “back-to-school” photos in the same spot annually, you’ll be able to look back at the pictures someday and see your kids’ growth from year to year.

3. Journal Entries and Surveys

Are your kids involved in journaling? Have them write an entry about their interests, expectations, and dreams for the year. Save the entries in a special envelope or notebook and read last year’s entry at the beginning of each new homeschool year. Another way to do this is to have the children take the same survey every year and record their answers.

4. Surprises and Gifts

Is there something useful or educational that your children want? Maybe you can give it to them on the first day of homeschool. The surprise gift could be as simple as binders with their favorite characters on them, or as complex as a science kit or an art set.

5. Games, Crafts, and Scavenger Hunts

Remember that the kids are transitioning from a summer of outside learning fun. You can keep the workload a bit lighter on the first day by including an exciting craft or an educational game or two. A “back-to-school” scavenger hunt for their supplies or their new textbooks is another way to keep the summer spirit alive as everyone eases back into the homeschool routine.

Share some of the traditions that your family enjoys on the first day of your homeschool!

• • • • •

Rebecca is a work-at-home freelance writer, novelist, wife, and the mom of two bright-eyed little ones. She credits her success in writing and her love of books to her own mom, who homeschooled three kids from pre-K through high school.

Our First Curriculum Unboxing

by

My wife and I are starting to homeschool our oldest daughter this fall. It was just like Christmas when we received the boxes of BJU Press curriculum that we’ll be using. The two of us enjoyed unboxing textbooks, Teacher’s Editions, novels, and DVDs. We’re using BJU Press Distance Learning for Science, English (new edition now available), and Bible. Megan is teaching Reading, Handwriting, Spelling, and Math while I get to teach Heritage Studies. You can see our unboxing experience on the BJU Press Homeschool YouTube™ channel.

When this video was shared on the BJU Press Facebook® page, a homeschool mom shared a very helpful tip that I want to pass on. She said, “The box that contained the DVDs also has a return shipping label. It’s a good idea to go ahead and place that return label on the box and place the box and any packing materials in a safe location. When it’s time to return your DVDs, you won’t be searching for the label or the box!”

Another homeschool family filmed their unboxing of BJU Press curriculum. Watch the girls’ reactions in this YouTube™ video.

If you recorded your unboxing of BJU Press curriculum, we’d love to see it! Share a link in the comments or post it on the BJU Press Homeschool Facebook® page.

How Do You Plan Your Homeschool Year?

by

Planning Your Homeschool

One of my earliest homeschool memories is that Mom had a plan. She might not have printed it out for me to read, but it was clear that our day followed an organized schedule. Some homeschool days we stayed at home; other days I took my textbooks with me while we ran errands. Some were longer; others shorter, like the Fridays I attended art class with other homeschool kids.

Having a plan meant Mom could leave the room to take a long distance call and expect me to do what was next on the schedule. It also was a way to make sure that I reached the academic goals that she and my dad had set for me. But the plan was also flexible enough to allow for events that interrupted our day, like days at the park or doctor appointments.

As you prepare for the new homeschool year, what thought have you put into planning a daily, weekly, or monthly schedule? Here are some tips and helpful suggestions to plan your homeschool.

Now please don’t fall into the trap of “over-planning.” Some people might argue there’s no such thing, but I have learned that there’s a balance that must be learned, and it looks different for every family. You might be a minute-by-minute-schedule person, but that kind of planning overwhelms me. The real key is to keep Isaiah 46:8–10 in mind. God is in control of all (including the “interruptions” to our plans) and always works out His good pleasure. There’s comfort in that truth.

What does your homeschool schedule look like?