homeschool

Is Your Child Ready for Homeschooling?

July 21, 2015 by Megan

Closeup of cute little girl drawing with color pencils 10415731 — © iStockphoto.com/vgajic

Is it time to start homeschooling your young child? As I pointed out in my previous post, people start homeschooling their children at different ages. Individual family situations play a large role in the decision about when to start homeschooling, so I listed a few questions to help you think through your unique situation. But there’s another major factor in the decision—your child. How can you tell if your child is ready?

If you were placing your child in a school setting, the school would probably give your child a kindergarten-readiness test. You can do a similar assessment at home. Think about the following questions, and jot down your observations.

1. How well does your child listen and follow directions?

A good early childhood curriculum includes a lot of active learning, but your child does need to have the ability to sit and focus for short periods of time (ten to fifteen minutes is a good goal). Your child also needs to be able to listen carefully, to respond to questions, and to follow directions so that he or she can get the most out of learning activities.

2. Does your child have the necessary fine motor skills?

Can he or she use a child-sized pair of scissors? Does your child attempt to color within the lines when coloring? Is your child able to hold a pencil correctly and do simple tracking and tracing activities? (These skills should be refined before attempts are made at writing letters and numbers.) Your child needs to have strong fine motor skills in order to learn how to write.

3. Is your child enthusiastic about learning?

Most experts agree that a child’s individual enthusiasm for learning is the strongest indicator of future success in school. Does your child ask to “do school”? Does he or she pretend to read or write?

You know your child best, but if you want a second opinion about whether your child is ready for school, you might want to consult your child’s Sunday school teacher, pediatrician, or other family members and friends who have had multiple opportunities to observe your child. And don’t forget to pray! The Lord promises to give wisdom to all who come to Him in faith.

When my oldest daughter was ready to start formal schooling, BJU Press materials helped guide her learning. Next week I’ll share my family’s experience with their Footsteps for Fours curriculum.

Make It a Moon Day!

July 16, 2015 by Guest Writer

American Astronaut Buzz Aldrin on the moon — Astronaut Buzz Aldrin on the moon by NASA/Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain

On July 20, 1969, one man took a small step, and mankind leaped over another hurdle in its exploration of what lies beyond Earth. When Neil Armstrong set his foot on the moon’s surface, he became the first human being to ever stand on another celestial body besides our world. With some hands-on activities and interesting facts, you can make the moon landing more real and more amazing to your kids this July.

Fantastic Facts

Younger kids like my preschool-aged son appreciate the story aspect of the moon landing, while older children enjoy hearing fascinating facts. For example, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin gathered 47.5 pounds of moon objects, including rocks and other material, to bring back for scientists to study. Another key fact is that the Apollo 11 mission marked the end of the space race between the United States and Russia. Also, the mission’s command module, the Columbia, was named after the science fiction spacecraft in Jules Verne’s 1865 novel, From the Earth to the Moon.

The Unsung Hero

One astronaut on the mission never got to step onto the moon’s surface. His name was Michael Collins, and he was the pilot of the command craft orbiting the moon. He faithfully stayed at his post and waited for Aldrin and Armstrong to come back so that he could take everyone safely home. This Moon Day, let’s take a few moments to talk to our kids about Collins’s job. What was interesting and important about it? Although he didn’t get the opportunity to walk on the moon, he does have the distinction of being one of just twenty-four people who have flown to the moon.

Moon Modeling

Now it’s time to cement the facts into those young minds with a little hands-on fun! Try a moon model craft. (You’ll find a step-by-step example in the BJU Press Science 4 textbook, page 147.) For this activity, kids create their own model of the moon out of clay. Shape the clay into a ball if you want to make the entire moon, or lay it out flat if you plan to model one section of the moon’s surface. Do an online search to find a close-up of the moon. Fingers, bottle caps, and pencils are great tools for creating the pits, dents, and ridges of the moonscape. If the kids have a tiny space shuttle, astronaut figure, or US flag, they can add it to their clay moon surface.

Moon Day Snack Time

Moon pies are the perfect snack on Moon Day. With a simple recipe, you can make the cookies the day before and then let your kids help you add the creamy white filling on Moon Day. If you have no time to make moon pies, substitute round creme-filled cookies or wheat crackers and spread out a chart of the moon’s phases on the table. Your kids will have fun taking smaller and larger bites to make their round crackers or cookies match the moon’s shape in each phase.

Moon Watch

In the evening, if the night is clear, your whole family can spread out blankets in the backyard for some good old-fashioned moon-watching. Powerful binoculars or a telescope make this activity much more interesting since the children will be able to see the night sky in more detail. As our kids identify the current phase of the moon, let’s remind them of its importance to our world, reflecting the sunlight at nighttime and moving the tides back and forth as God ordained.

Moon Movie Night

If the night is cloudy or rainy and you cannot spend time moon-gazing together, consider treating your little ones to an age-appropriate, moon-themed movie that fits your family’s entertainment guidelines. Gathering around the computer and watching a video of the moon landing helps children of any age understand the event more clearly. A quick clip of President John F. Kennedy making his moon landing promise to the American people helps children understand how important the event was for that generation of Americans. Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown and Papa, Please Get the Moon for Me by Eric Carle are two classic children’s books whose gentle tone, vivid illustrations, and simple storytelling make them ideal choices to close out a wonderful Moon Day.

As we tell our kids about the moon landing, the wonder in their eyes reminds us of one reason why we homeschool─to share these special moments with them.

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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.

Gaining Knowledge

July 7, 2015 by BJU Press Writer

With a runner on first base and only one out, a ground ball is hit to the shortstop. Where does the shortstop make a play—first base or second base? How does a person know the best answer to this baseball question? A ball player learns the game by practicing, asking questions, observing games in person or on TV, listening to the coach, and playing the game. Finding answers to baseball questions illustrates how we learn facts and find answers to questions about a particular academic subject; we find them in the process of gaining knowledge.

Knowledge is gained through personal and vicarious experiences and through studying various sources. A student learns best when his educational experiences are age appropriate, developmentally suitable, purposeful by design, and regularly evaluated. Gaining knowledge is not just for the sake of having knowledge. It is the means to a much greater end—glorifying God in whatever task He has placed before the student.

Methods and Knowledge

The baseball player needs a coach to present the “how-tos” of the game. Just as in baseball, the student needs a teacher to present the academic subject in such a way that the facts are understood and learned. However, the student needs to do much more than just accumulate memorized facts. The student needs to gain knowledge by way of understanding and remembering those facts with an emphasis on analyzing and appying them so that he can evaluate and create. How does a teacher know the student is truly learning? By giving a student opportunities to demonstrate his knowledge through formal and informal questioning, individual and group projects, academic tests utilizing many different types of questions, and presentations.

Curriculum and Knowledge

As a baseball player has rules and plays to learn, a student has concepts and facts to learn. Gaining knowledge takes place best with a curriculum that blends factual knowledge and critical thinking skills with a biblical worldview. Textbooks are an essential part of gaining factual knowledge. However, all textbooks are not created equal. To be most effective in facilitating knowledge acquisition, the textbook’s worldview, methods of teaching, depth of content, and literary quality should promote critical and creative thinking that is foundationally biblical.

Proverbs 18:15 says, “The heart of the prudent getteth knowledge; and the ear of the wise seeketh knowledge.” The discerning student should always be ready to pursue and expand his knowledge and to learn more in order to have a greater opportunity to glorify God in following His leading.

This post is part of our ongoing series highlighting our 2015 theme Gaining Wisdom and Knowledge and Joy. Jeff has served in local church ministry, secondary education, and higher education for more than thirty years. Jeff holds a doctorate in education and is the senior manager of academic integrity at BJU Press. He and his wife have three children, five grandchildren, and two goldendoodles.

Summer Fun Meets Summer Reading

June 23, 2015 by Guest Writer

What’s the best way to keep your children learning during the summer? You guessed it─a nonstop parade of good books. With the strong pull of technology and outdoor fun, it may seem impossible for us to get our kids to sit still long enough to focus on a book. Regular library visits, a reward system, and some fun role-play after the summer reading session are just a few ways I recommend engaging your active brood in that most vital skill─reading.

Library Day

Scheduling a library day, either weekly or biweekly, sets aside a defined time for books and reading. If my kids have finished with their books, we return them on library day and get new ones. If a child is still enjoying a book, we renew it or bring it along to read while at the library. Make sure that the children know your family’s reading philosophy and guidelines; then set them free to wander among the shelves. They may come back with a random assortment of treasures─a pop-up book, a book about robots, a volume of fairy tales, and a historical novel─but if they’re excited about what they found, it’s a win-win.

Picture This!

Tiny preschoolers and early readers enjoy having plenty of pictures to go along with the story, like the beautiful illustrations in A King for Brass Cobweb. The images help their minds engage in the action, stimulating their imaginations. Eventually, the child’s imagination is mature enough to go off on its own, automatically creating the scenes and characters found in books without pictures. One way to help your little one’s imagination grow is to help him or her draw a new illustration for part of the story.

Chapter by Chapter

Once children pass the picture book phase, chapter books like Mice of the Herring Bone transition them to stories that last beyond a single reading session. They have a sense of accomplishment as each chapter ends, blended with anticipation for the next phase of the story. Read to them, and encourage them to read to you as well. Some parents of reluctant readers like to reward completion of chapters or whole books with a sticker, a treat, a trip to the playground, or a little time with the tablet or TV.

Girl Time

For moms of girls, starting a mother-daughter book club or girls’ reading time yields a closer bond and plenty of precious memories. My sister and I vividly recall curling up in our bunk bed each night, listening to my mother read Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. When I was older, I read the The Journeyman by Elizabeth Yates aloud to my mom while she cooked dinner every evening. To pique your daughter’s interest, find books that address current issues, such as Capturing Jasmina, with its thoughtful yet dramatic depiction of child labor and trafficking. Or look to the past and imagine what life must have been like in Old Testament times with the book Where I Belong.

For the Guys

Boys typically love action-packed stories. They also appreciate strategy, cleverness, and a fight for survival. Wartime struggles or wild westerns are perfect for teenage boys. If elementary-aged boys have trouble settling down to read, promise to act out the story with them after they read a chapter or two. For example, after reading part of Brave the Wild Trail, you might set up a cowboy camp in the backyard.

With boys and girls alike, associating imaginative play and outdoor fun with a great book brings them that much closer to a lifelong love of reading.

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My Commitment to Biblical Worldview Education

June 16, 2015 by Ben

As a dad, I’ve appreciated Karin’s posts on family devotions. Family worship offers me the opportunity to disciple my children with intentionality. As I gather my three daughters daily to read God’s Word, I’m trying to obey the command in Deuteronomy 6:7 to “teach them diligently.” So it’s encouraging to hear about others practicing family worship and to learn that they’re experiencing (and overcoming) the same difficulties.

Of course, our obligation to diligently teach our families to love God isn’t fulfilled in a routine Bible time. We’re supposed to teach God’s Word when we’re sitting, when we’re walking, when we’re lying down, and when we’re waking up. It’s an all-day, every-day commitment.

For my girls, a large part of their daily life is education, so it’s important to me that their education is contributing to their discipleship. In fact, since education is worship, I want to give my daughters a biblical worldview education.

Education Is Worship

It’s easy to look at teaching kids how to subtract or read as “neutral.” After all, 2 + 2 = 4 whether you’re a Christian, a Buddhist, or an atheist. But education is far too foundational an undertaking to occur without a purpose. From age five to eighteen, my girls will spend over fourteen thousand hours learning math, science, history, and language arts. All of that effort has to be for a purpose, or it’s a waste of time. Even children know that education needs a purpose. While answering their twenty-three math problems, they will ask the critical question: “Why do I have to learn this?”

In his book The End of Education: Redefining the Value of School, Neil Postman observed that education is worship when he said, “For school to make sense, the young, their parents, and their teachers must have a god to serve, or even better, several gods.” He argues that American public schools are dedicated to serving, among others, the god of consumerism. Worshipers of consumerism learn so that they can get jobs and buy the best cars, houses, and vacations. If Postman, who was a secular humanist, sees the religious nature of education, we Christian dads need to think through the worship implications of the education choices we make for our children.

The Purpose of Education

After my wife and I got engaged, we would take long walks where we’d discuss how we planned to run our household. Since both of us received a biblical worldview education, we wanted this same education for our children. It was and still is important to us that we teach our children to glorify God and love their neighbor as themselves through math, science, history, and language arts. My daughters need to know that math isn’t the key to financial security and prosperity; it’s a tool God gives us to obey His commands. That context is crucial for using education to serve God instead of the god of consumerism. If I am going to obey Deuteronomy 6:7, I have to diligently teach my daughters that the purpose of their education is serving God.

Before I was born, my dad determined that his children would be homeschooled so that they could receive a biblical worldview education. I owe so much to my dad for that gift. Now as a dad, I want to teach my daughters that worshiping God isn’t limited to Sunday church services. We serve God through the right kind of education; therefore, my wife and I are committed to providing our daughters with a biblical worldview education.