Are you considering homeschooling but don’t know if you can do it? Are you currently homeschooling but are feeling burnt out? Then I would recommend Successful Homeschooling Made Easy for you. For this review, I received the 26-week-long online course for homeschooling parents. I have been receiving the lessons each week through an email with the lesson attached as a pdf. To date I have received and completed 9 weeks of the course.
Lesson 1: You Can Start Homeschooling Today
Lesson 1 focuses on establishing a simple homeschooling routine that fits your family. Walmsley introduces the idea of Literacy Hour. The homework section goes through a series of questions that you answer in order to help establish the schedule that will work for your family.
Lesson 2: Math Made Easy
This lesson focuses on introducing math to your schedule . Walmsley includes tips on how to choose a math curriculum that will work for your family. There is even a Bonus lesson that has ideas for fun math games!
Lesson 3: Welcome Home
According to Walmsley, “If a child has been to school before he starts being homeschooled, it’s different. It feels different, the children respond to homeschooling in a variety of different ways, and it takes time to settle into homeschooling.” In this lesson she interviews 16 different parents who give wonderful advise about bring your children home from school.
Lesson 4: Fireproof Your Homeschool
Homework for this lesson involves answering some very important questions: What is your life vision, why is that vision important to you, and where are you now compared to where you want to be? Why do you want to home educate? In SHME Walmsley says that once you “have the answer to these questions in place it will be much easier for you to know WHAT you want your child to learn and HOW you will go about homeschooling your child and organizing your daily life…”
Lesson 5: Three Key Ingredients for Success
What achievements would you like to make or see your child make? What is important for you and your child? These are the type of though provoking questions that make up lesson 5.
Lesson 6: Fulfill Your Dreams
Walmsley says, “It is not admirable to be mean to yourself. It’s not holy and it’s not spiritual. It’s foolish. If you are not in top form, feeling rested each morning, feeling confident about each day, how can you give your best to your family and homeschool in the way that you want to do it? Be a wise mother and take time to care for yourself. ” She goes on to say that we need to take care of ourselves, do something we enjoy, something we have maybe wanted to do or learn about for a long time and just haven’t taken the time to do it.
I am planning to really work on doing something I have wanted to for several years. I want to record the stories from my Grandma’s childhood in written form for my children and grandchildren. I know they will enjoy them and I need to act now while I can interview my grandma and get all the details right!
Lesson 7: Why Curriculum Doesn’t Matter
In Lesson 7, Walsmley gives an overview about the different types of home education. She also recommendations that we read some of the books she has mentioned throughout the course to help us determine what methodology we would like to use.
[su_button background=”#e12925″]Be careful not to try and slot yourself into a particular type of education, and be extra careful that you don’t accidentally slip into trying to incorporate all the best bits of various philosophies. You just won’t be able to do it, and you will start heading towards confusion and burnout. ~ Stephanie Walmsley[/su_button]
Lesson 8: Why You Might Need to Let Go Of Good Things
Walmsley addresses those really, wonderful opportunities that happen outside the home and helps give guidelines for finding a balance that allows the children time to “just be.” She says that although those outside activities (i.e. sports, music lessons, drama lessons, etc) are great activities we need to be cautious and not over schedule our family. Children “need time to process all the activities; they need time to think things through;” and that, “they need time for imaginative play.”
[su_button background=”#e12925″]Sometimes we have to let go of good and worthy things to have the very best things in life. ~ Stephanie Walmsley[/su_button]
Lesson 9: Housework and Homeschool
This lesson walks you through how to keep up with the house work while still homeschooling by teaching your children to help. Walmsley even includes a list of chores that children can complete, broken down by the ages that these chores are well suited for.
Even though we have homeschooled from the beginning I found many useful tips and ideas to make our home run smoothly. I would recommend Successful Homeschooling Made Easy for anyone considering homeschooling or anyone who would like to have their home run more efficiently.
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Blessings,
Jennifer
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What a wonderful resource !