Natural Learning: An Update

This is an update about how our homeschool has been transformed using a new approach to learning. It’s really been working so well! You can go back and read the first 3 posts with my thoughts and studies about natural learning here: NATURAL LEARNING Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

So far, we have had four weeks of school. Every day the kids have Bible, Math, Grammar, and Literature, but we rotate other subjects. We have a week of history, a week of geography, a week of science, and a week of “interest-led learning”.  It works out really well for us to do a lot studying in one subject for a week because we can really dig into it. Our other rotation subjects are working very well too (Mon. Nature/Hymn study, Tues Poetry/Shakespeare study, Wed. Logic, Thurs. Habits and Good Deed, and Friday Art Appreciation.)

I really feel that by combining the Charlotte Mason idea of “spreading a feast of ideas” with the unschooling idea of following the child’s interests is what is making a difference in our days. We also use traditional workbooks for grammar and some classical style curriculum for logic and literature.

I am still offering them ideas, resources, assignments, and suggestions for new things to learn, but they are also being given the opportunity, the time, and the encouragement to pursue interests of their own.

So here’s the impact this free time for interest driven learning has had on my children…….

THE GIRL: My daughter has studied healthy living ideas like: Exercise, Healthy Foods, DNA, Protein, and Sugar

She checked out several library books and did some online research. After her studies, she has changed her eating habits on her own. She’s learned how to cook several new things and has been exercising regularly. She’s eating salads, eggs, fruit, and drinking more water. This is my child who ate syrup on everything if we were not looking! LOL! This is a big deal, let me tell you!

She has also been drawing for quite some time now, but has learned everything she knows on her own using resources that she found by herself. She actually gave me a lesson on how to draw recently and I was amazed by what she could do! She draws daily, on her own, without my prompting or pushing. 🙂 I love that!

THE BOY: My son recently struck up an interest in martial arts and began checking out books at the library.

He then began really digging and reading, watching YouTube videos, and asking us if he could find out where they gave lessons in this area. He did all of this on his own. Now he’s been taking taekwondo lessons for about a month and learning patterns, memorizing paragraphs, and practicing at home by himself. This is the first thing that he has EVER taken this sort of interest in and gone this far with without parental pushing, reminding, and coercing! He’s progressing very quickly and is now in the adult classes with several achievements under (well actually ON) his belt.

Right now my children are learning, being challenged, and enjoying these new things. What I’m seeing is not just knowledge but life changing learning happening. They are not just learning about the human body and how it digests food for energy so that they can pass a test but are actually changing their own eating habits because of what they have learned. They are not just watching martial arts films and playing video games with that theme because it’s cool but actually learning taekwondo first hand!

You know….my goal is to teach my children not someone else’s ideas, method, or scope and sequence. I think keeping that in mind is so very important, and when I do, homeschooling does not feel so artificial, stressful, time consuming, or burdensome. It’s natural, it’s simple, and it really just becomes a way of life.