My family's homeschool adventure began on a whim. My five children and I had just moved from England to Botswana. Homeschool was intended to be a one-term stopgap until I sought a permanent solution. If anyone had told me they would graduate to excellent colleges in America and the UK from our kitchen table under a tree in the Okavango Delta, I would have rolled about laughing. Impossible. Me? You must be joking.I'm not a teacher.
It's not uncommon for the first steps into homeschool to be driven by circumstances beyond our control. Whatever your reason for trying homeschool, two qualities are essential for success: curiosity and patience.
Being the font of all wisdom is not a requirement, but being a lifelong learner is essential. My power as a teacher is my curiosity. I have a rag-bag mind full of valuable snippets. Building a programme for a child is like creating a colourful patchwork. Whatever the topic, I had to make sure I had the connecting threads in maths, history, literature and science.
Good preparation enables flexibility for mixed-age classes I don't want to present a rose-tinted story. Working with mixed ages has benefits, but younger team members can feel either left behind or pressured to keep up at a pace that does not align with their developmental stage. I made mistakes, and there were hiccups. I sought advice from teachers in our local town who offered me excellent guidance. Guidance and inspiration from other teachers remain indispensable for my development as an educator. Getting into a muddle is human and mistakes are part of learning for everyone.
I read to my children at the end of every 'school' day until they left for college. It was comforting, relaxing and unifying. Books were read for pleasure and not analysed with a fine-tooth comb. They developed as analytical thinkers under their own steam, as a result of family discussions or contemplation, rather than through formulaic dissection of texts.
The youngest member of my tribe didn't officially 'come to the table' until he was seven. Before that, he joined hands-on science classes, end-of-the-day storytime, and he was always welcome to join classes if they interested him, but he received no formal schooling until he was seven. By then, he was keen to join the gang!
We had three golden rules.
No homework until they were fourteen. Afternoons were free time. They could play, explore, chill out, come and find the lions with me, do chores in camp or feed their curiosity with self-study.
What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. If they were being plonkers at breakfast and I was cross, that was never carried into school time. Equally, a bad day at school (of course, that happened) never carried over into home life.
I would make classes fun, interesting, and surprising, and they would be mindful and engaged.
Those rules were sacrosanct. Of course, we had good days and bad days; that's just life, but we never had any major issues. If someone was stroppy, it was usually because they hadn't understood something, or I had done a bad job at planning.
To follow curriculum or not to follow curriculum? The whole point of homeschooling is to be free from the constraints of a syllabus. When I was teaching my children, I found what I needed in the South African, UK, Australian, and USA curricula. I mixed and matched all the time, and I still do.
Tests
None of my children took formal standardised tests until the required university-entry tests: the SAT in the USA or A-Levels in the UK. I would create weekly informal quizzes and tests. These were helpful for the children and me alike. The results let me know what had been understood, or not, and helped to me improve and adjust the content of classes. After they graduated from homeschooling to University, I continued teaching because I loved it. I'm still teaching and guiding students of all ages.
Every student is a fresh adventure.