BJU Press Blog

Successful Learning

You want your children to succeed in their education. We do too. We offer practical tips for teaching your children math, science, writing, and more! These tips can be applied to any homeschool curriculum. There are also highlights of our new textbooks with examples of how our curriculum trains your children to have success in their learning.

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The Value of Handwriting Skills: Keep Writing

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the value of handwriting skills
With technology always available, there are many skills we might think would become obsolete. Handwriting skills among them. After all, if we can type emails with our thumbs or dictate messages on our phones, what’s the point of writing something with our hands? And if there’s no point in keeping the skill, why should we have our kids learn it?

Is handwriting still a vital skill to train? As many homeschool parents know, things aren’t always as they seem. There’s more to handwriting skills than just putting pen to paper.

Handwriting skills are linked to motor skills.

One critical reason to encourage handwriting is the motor skills it develops. Handwriting challenges the writer to integrate gross motor skills, fine motor skills, and visual motor skills. Gross motor skills are the basic, larger muscle functions we use on a daily basis. Can your child maintain maintain posture and grip a pencil? Fine motor skills make small, subtle manipulations. Is your child able to write different words on a piece of paper? Mastering these skills helps children produce clear and consistent written work. Finally, visual motor skills are what we know as hand-eye coordination. How well can your child write what he sees?

Encouraging your children to learn and master handwriting requires them to use all three skill sets to process, understand, and copy what they see. Using all three skills together enables them to comprehend and use the information they learn each day.

Handwriting has a greater impact on us and other people.

The act of writing out our thoughts and what we hear is helpful in engaging in the learning process. As your children write, they’re using those motor skills as well as their mind to process information in a new format. Studies show that writing helps memory more than just typing on a computer. If your children keep their writing skills sharp, they will retain more of what they learn and function better on a daily basis.

Writing also often has a greater impact on other people than something typed. In an age of instant communication, taking the time to craft a handwritten note can mean so much more to the person reading. Handwriting is personal. You invest time to choose words and write carefully. A text or email takes seconds to punch out. If you teach your children to write personal messages to friends and family, they learn to communicate with more depth and intentionality than typing an email or sending an instant message.

Fluency in handwriting opens artistic potential.

One more reason that handwriting is important is that the skills go beyond everyday use. True, we can create all sorts of fun and interactive designs with our digital software. But often a Scripture verse or quote can come alive to you if you write it in an artistic form like calligraphy. Part of stewarding our creativity is using it to help us focus on God and remember His truths. Have you seen people Bible journaling by pulling out verses that have touched them and writing them in a beautiful script in the margins of their Bibles? Handwritten calligraphy, more than just an elegant typed font, can help us meditate and integrate valuable truths in our lives. By encouraging your children to hone artistic skills, you’re also giving them another tool to use to meditate on Scripture and encourage others.

Even though handwriting may be less common today, its impact on the reader is no less powerful. Training your children to write well and write clearly can help them be more influential as they grow older.

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Matt recently graduated with an MA in communication studies and currently works as a freelance writer. He attributes the wild variety in his current opportunities to the exploration his parents gave him through the homeschooling experience. He enjoys theater, the gym, and choral music and will rarely say no to a cold glass of sweet tea.

New Homeschool Video Courses

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new video courses
New video courses are available for homeschool families! Each course includes age-appropriate segments, opportunities for hands-on learning, and video demonstrations. We’re excited to use some colorful new textbooks and materials with several of these courses. If you’d like to get a sneak peek at these courses, we’ll be introducing them all on our Facebook page, and you can look for the sample videos on our website!

Upcoming Video Courses for 2020

Focus on Fives with Mrs. Rulapaugh

This past year, Megan—one of our blog writers—had an opportunity to use the new Focus on Fives materials with her daughter for K5. Because of her experience with the textbooks, she’s had a wonderful time with her daughter. On the other hand, the video course gives you an opportunity for the same experiences with the added benefit of having a teacher. This new video course takes advantage of the materials for an exciting introduction to early learning. Mrs. Rulapaugh, who also teaches K5 Math, prepares her students for first grade with lessons in phonics and reading as well as heritage studies and science. This course is absolutely packed with exciting video segments that keep kids engaged and learning. It has animated stories and songs, biblical themes, phonics stories, science explorations, activities with Hopscotch, and more.

A day’s worth of lessons averages 60 minutes, but children will have many opportunities for breaks, games, and activities that keep them having fun. Mrs. Rulapaugh is excited to help her students love learning!

Reading 3 with Mrs. Walker

Kids who enjoyed Reading 2 with Mrs. Walker will be excited to join her again for Reading 3! This course uses Adventures in Reading 3 (3rd edition) with a travel theme. Mrs. Walker wants to inspire wonder and discovery in her students as she embarks on thoughtful discussions about each reading. As they journey through the material, children will have an opportunity to practice critical thinking and phonics skills. In this reading adventure, each lesson will include colorful segments of animated poems, story times, and more. As always, Mrs. Walker ends her lessons with a giggle to bring fun and joy to learning!

Pre-Algebra with Mr. Harmon

In this new Pre-Algebra video course, Mr. Harmon seeks to help students understand math by using simple explanations with real-life examples. Students will expand on the concepts they learned with him in Fundamentals of Math so that they can be prepared for Algebra 1. Math-Splaining segments use an illustrative approach to explain difficult math concepts for students.

United States History with Mrs. Bullock

A history class should be far more than a dry recitation of dates and facts. Mrs. Bullock encourages her students to get into the minds of historic figures so they can consider the thoughts and attitudes that led to events in American history. In addition to knowing the facts, she also wants her students to ask why things happened the way they did. This course uses the new United States History (5th edition) materials and covers history from the discovery of the American continents through to the present day. Mrs. Bullock includes segments that offer glimpses into the lives of American families, present unique historical perspectives, bring primary source documents to life, and provide dramatic readings of speeches.

Spanish 3 with Mrs. Kuhlewind

This course builds on the principles Mrs. Kuhlewind introduced in Spanish 2 and continues to help students develop skills in speaking, reading, listening, and writing. Her goal is for her students to become comfortable with a new language so that they can have confidence in using their new language skills. To that end, Mrs. Kuhlewind’s segments offer opportunities for Spanish listening and vocabulary building. The segments also provide introductions to Spanish cultures, architecture, cooking, and dialects.

Please note that this course will only be available as an online video course. A DVD option will not be available at this time.

Precalculus with Mr. Matesevac

The key to success in advanced mathematics is perseverance. Mr. Matesevac encourages his students to press on to master the challenging concepts of Precalculus so that they will develop wisdom and maturity. For students who apply themselves, this course provides a solid foundation for college-level math. Students will use the new Precalculus (2nd edition) materials which balance study of the foundations of calculus with practical, real-world applications. Mr. Matesevac works out difficult problems through Math Applied video segments to give students a different perspective on each problem.

Please note that this course will only be available as an online video course. A DVD option will not be available at this time.

Our team has been working hard to develop these video courses and fill each lesson with useful segments. We can’t wait to share them with you and your children! Which course are you most excited for?

A Mom’s Experience with Focus on Fives

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focus on fives
I have a confession—I never wanted to homeschool a kindergartner. I was afraid to. My training didn’t include early childhood education. I didn’t know how to teach someone to read. And I didn’t think that I was a good enough to teach my child all the foundational skills that she would need to succeed in her education. But the Lord made it abundantly clear that I was to be my daughter’s kindergarten teacher. I wrestled with the Lord about it, and He reminded me of the promise of I Thessalonians 5:24, “Faithful is He that calleth you, who also will do it.” The Lord did equip me for the task of homeschooling my daughter, and the main means that He used was the Focus on Fives curriculum from BJU Press.

An Introduction to the Focus on Fives Curriculum

The Focus on Fives curriculum replaces BJU Press’s former kindergarten curriculum, K5 Beginnings, and it is a major upgrade. The pedagogy—or teaching methods—and the scope and sequence are very similar to K5 Beginnings, but the format is streamlined and the content, including the artwork, has been updated.

When you order the Focus on Fives textbook kit, be ready for a lot of stuff. You receive 6 teacher editions—which initially looks very overwhelming, but it’s actually wonderful because everything you need as a teacher is in one place. Your child receives 2 workbooks—a general workbook and a phonics workbook—as well as 34 full-color reading books. You’ll also get the K5 Phonics and Review Cards, the Write Now! workbook, the Phonics charts, and the teaching visuals packet.

BJU Press is releasing the Focus on Fives video course for the 2020–21 school year. Mrs. Becky Rulapaugh teaches this course. She currently teaches the K5 Math video course that my daughter loves. She’s very good at keeping my daughter engaged.

Lesson Features of Focus on Fives

Heritage Studies and Science

Every Focus on Fives lesson starts off with a heritage studies or science connection. For example, the program starts off with a unit about community helpers. We learned about police officers, firefighters and fire safety, postal workers, doctors, and dentists. The program introduces the topics with a listening story or a composition activity to encourage critical thinking skills. Some lessons also include simple activities, like demonstrating how brushing helps your teeth, to enhance comprehension.

Phonics Foundations

At the heart of every lesson is language arts instruction. BJU Press teaches children to read using a combination of a phonics-based word-family approach along with sight words. The word-family approach ensures that every new sound your child learns can be easily “hooked onto” previous knowledge, and the use of high-frequency sight words helps your child read meaningful text even before you’ve introduced all the sounds.

Language Arts

In addition to phonics instruction, the language arts portion of the lesson covers basic English topics like sentence punctuation, capitalization, the use of plurals and other concepts necessary for reading comprehension. Some lessons will also use phonics characters to help your child identify syllabic patterns to aid them in reading unfamiliar words. Finally, all lessons include handwriting instruction and practice.

Enrichment Activities

Every lesson also includes a list of enrichment activities that go along with the lesson’s topic. The teacher edition includes suggested read-alouds, games, crafts, special snacks, and more. I don’t usually have time to do all the suggested activities, but I do like to pick and choose as time allows.

Reading Books

Although we practice reading every day with short phonics stories, the highlight of our week is our reading book lesson. On those days, we unveil our “big book” of the week. These 8-page, 4-color books reinforce everything that we have learned during the previous weeks and give us good opportunities to develop comprehension and critical thinking skills.

What I love about Focus on Fives

The Focus on Fives teacher editions, in my estimation, are invaluable because they have given me the confidence to teach my daughter. Everything is laid out for me in one place, so I know exactly what I need to do each day. And even though the lessons are not scripted, the teacher edition gives me all the help I need. It’s kind of like having a relative with medical training come with you to a doctor’s appointment—that relative might not be the one in charge, but his or her expert presence certainly makes you feel more confident.

I also love how the curriculum is very flexible. It’s easy to figure out what is necessary to cover in every lesson and what is optional. If I only cover the essentials, we can get through a lesson in about 45 minutes. However, I try to include 1 or 2 of the optional activities every lesson, so usually it takes about an hour a day. And it works fine with my 4-day-a-week schedule even though it’s set up for a more traditional 5-day-a-week schedule.

But Does it Work?

I have really enjoyed seeing my daughter thrive with this curriculum. She gets excited every time I introduce a new sound or a new word family—she loves dreaming up sentences for the new words she learns. She reads with confidence, and she reads with joy.  And I have confidence that she’s going to do great as she continues in her journey.

To learn more about the Focus on Fives materials, check out the subject kit on the BJU Press Homeschool website!

Choosing Curriculum to Encourage Confident Readers

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curriculum for confident readers
It’s wonderful to have options when you’re teaching your children. When something doesn’t work, you can always try something else and keep at it until your kids get what you’re teaching. So a lot of homeschool families wind up using curriculum from a bunch of different publishers for a single grade. And it works. But BJU Press has designed certain subjects to support each other in unique ways. Specifically, students who use Phonics and English 1 and Reading 1 together will be better equipped to be confident readers.

In K5, all of English language arts are integrated—you teach it all together. But in Grade 1, English and reading count as separate subjects. They’re separate, but they still correlate. The concepts and progression of skills support each other in both subjects. If you use a different curriculum for English or reading, then your child will miss the benefits of a correlated reading program and may find learning to read harder than it needs to be.

Opportunities for Practice and Review

Practice and review opportunities are an intrinsic part of each BJU Press textbook. Children need to see concepts repeatedly to develop automaticity—the ability to do something without thinking about it, or automatically. But when they’re just learning to read, children need more practice and review opportunities of the phonetic concepts they learn in English than are provided in the textbook itself. Reading 1 follows the same progression of skills as Phonics & English 1, so that children will find more opportunities for practice and review of concepts they learned in English while doing their reading books.

Application Skills

What’s the difference between practice and application? When we’re practicing a concept, we’re usually seeing the exact same concept over and over again. The more we see it, the more familiar it will be. But application is actually a little different. Application introduces a familiar concept in a new situation. It gives us a chance to apply what we know to figure out what we don’t know. It’s a critical thinking skill that most of us use regularly even if we don’t realize it. Because Phonics & English 1 and Reading 1 correlate to introduce and develop concepts at the same time, children will not only learn a new concept, but also have the opportunity to apply it.

For example, a phonics lesson might introduce the _at word family. Your child has practiced reading the words at, cat, and bat as a part of the phonics lesson. Later, in his reading lesson, he finds a new word, hat. Because he knows the h sound and he knows the _at word family, he can apply what he knows about the two sounds and read the new word. As he learns to recognize new words based on what he knows, his confidence in reading grows.

Please note that, while the progression of concepts do correlate, the lesson numbers don’t always correlate. There are fewer reading lessons than there are phonics lessons. This helps children to stay ahead in phonics and to master concepts in reading. We have created a correlation chart to show you which lessons you should be teaching together.

Prepared to Be Confident Readers

When English and reading lessons support each other by adding practice and application, your child will be better prepared to learn new skills and concepts going forward. First, she learns the skills she needs to be successful in Phonics and English 1. Then, she learns to use and expand on those skills in Reading 1. When she comes back for another English lesson, she’ll be prepared for it because she’s had time and opportunity to practice and apply what she learned before. She’ll have more confidence and certainty about what she knows in both English and reading.

Dangers of Mixing Curriculum

But what can happen if your English curriculum and reading curriculum don’t support each other? Your English materials may not prepare your children adequately for what they’ll encounter in reading, and their reading program may not give them the practice and application they will need to be confident in their phonics and English lessons. Programs that don’t correlate often introduce skills at different times. Children who are constantly running into new skills that they aren’t prepared for will either become overwhelmed by learning, or they’ll resort to guessing. Guessers can easily become confused and frustrated when they don’t understand why their guesses are right or wrong.

It’s easier to encourage your children to become lifelong readers when they have confidence in reading. Children who become confident readers are more equipped for success because they will be better prepared for the reading challenges they will face in later grades.

Teaching for Joy in Learning

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teaching for a joy of learning
Have you seen that brief animation of the learning process at a government school? I mean the one where a student, who’s sitting upright in a small, traditional desk, moves along a conveyor belt. At the student’s first stop, a robotic arms saws off the top of his cranium, revealing a light bulb. At the next stop, a robotic arm wielding a hammer smashes the lightbulb. And at the final stop, a robotic arm bestows a graduation cap. The process continues on and on with child after child moving through the “educational” process at government schools. This system was not designed for teaching children to take joy in learning.

This animation illustrates a critical fact: educational approaches have impacts on educational outcomes. So what outcome do we want for our children? We want them to think biblically about all of life. We also want them to receive the joy they can expect from their calling. In past blog posts, we’ve explored the scriptural reasons for expecting that our children can have this kind of joy. We’ve also examined reasons why our children’s experiences may be anything but joyful. While some of those reasons relate to factors inside our children, today we want to focus on the factors that we as parents and the educators of our children are responsible for. We need to create educational experiences for our children that most closely conform to how children learn.

When it comes to encouraging learning, I don’t have a comprehensive list of best teaching practices or foolproof methods. I hope to keep learning as my wife and I continue on our homeschool journey. But here are some effective approaches for teaching a joy of learning I’ve learned so far.

1. Teaching Joy with Understanding-Based Learning

Learning that focuses on understanding instead of performance cultivates joy in learning. It can be incredibly satisfying to have a child who performs off the charts on a standardized test or who can recite the Roman emperors’ names from memory. Your child might perform well on paper, but what about his or her understanding? If performance is what we’re aiming for, then we’re not concerned about children’s understanding, just their ability to memorize and regurgitate information. And what we get is children who do well on tests but can’t apply what they’ve learned. Unless they’re also focused on performance, then children who just learn for the grade get bored or frustrated.

Instead, we should be interested in comprehension. When a child understands math, it’s not only easier to learn, but the child has the tools to use math effectively. That’s why breaking out math manipulatives or engaging in other hands-on activities is so powerful. Understanding-based learning is the bridge to higher levels of learning. And Scripture reminds us that “knowledge is easy to him who understandeth” (Proverbs 14:6).

2. Sequenced Learning

Putting learning in the proper order, or sequence, prepares your child for the next step. When children have all the pieces they need for understanding at the time they need them, they’re equipped to find joy in learning. Has someone ever explained something to you, assuming that you already knew something that you didn’t know? Maybe there was important information that you’d never learned. When that happens to me, I get confused and frustrated. I want to stop.

In the kitchen, we wouldn’t ask our children to add three eggs to a mixture until we had taught them how to crack an egg. It’s often easy to approach learning by jumping around from topic to topic without a plan in mind.

With sequenced learning, our goal is to challenge our children without frustrating them. We plan each step carefully so that they have prior experiences and the knowledge they need so that they can take the next step in learning. I love it when my daughter encounters a familiar concept that has added depth and complexity to it. She’s seen it before, but it looks new to her. The new information is more challenging than what she learned before, but it is simple because of her prior experience with the topic.

3. Authentic Learning

Another way of teaching a joy in learning by focusing on the purpose for learning instead of the test. Has your child ever asked, “Will that be on the test?” It’s often an expression of frustration. Instead of taking joy in the experience of learning new things, he or she just wants to know how to pass the class. At that point, your child is probably just overwhelmed by all the extra, seemingly unnecessary information. Children also express this frustration when they ask, “When will I ever use this?”

When we teach our children, we need to regularly show them the real world application of what they’re learning. When learning is relevant to their lives, it becomes real and authentic. They can use math at the grocery story. Or they can apply what they studied in science to make a ramp to move a heavy object. Or take spelling, for example. If we give our children a list of random spelling words to recite back on their test, they’re likely going to get bored or frustrated, and they won’t remember it beyond the test. But when part of their spelling assignment is to proofread someone else’s writing, it’s authentic. They see how spelling is relevant and useful.

When children start to use their learning, they’re exercising good and wise dominion in this world. That is one of the purposes that God has given mankind. And it is the reason we educate our children.

The choices we make in teaching our children will have an incredible impact on how they view learning. If we don’t aim for comprehension, if we teach things out of order, or if we don’t give them a reason for learning, then we won’t be teaching them to have joy in learning. We’ll be crippling their joy of learning, instead. We need to choose teaching methods that support our children. Then we will be able to see the light of joy in our children’s eyes as they’re learning.