The Many Approaches to Homeschooling

Homeschooling a child is a huge undertaking for a parent but one that many parents are now utilizing. In all 50 states of the USA, homeschooling is a legal method of schooling a child. There may be different rules and regulations for each state but it can be done! Parents have many different reasons for homeschooling their children.

Though homeschooling is not necessarily easy, it is almost always rewarding. Homeschooling has many advantages over sending a child to a school setting. And, parents are using a wide variety of methods to educate their children. Let's explore some of the most popular methods.

Textbook Approach
In the textbook approach, parents generally try to replicate what is happening in the local public schools but they do it at home. Textbooks can be purchased from publishers or other sources. In many cases, a teacher's manual/text is also available to help parents in the planning. Parents, however, have to do all the planning of lessons.

Correspondence School
There are many correspondence schools available for students to study through. Usually, for a fee, students receive all books and materials for the class and then send work back to the school for grading. This method may or may not use textbooks, real books, or no books. They may use classes taped on VHS video or DVD or they may use classes that students can access right on line. This method requires little parent planning but, at least for younger students, it does require supervision. It is usually not a very flexible method of home education.

Unit Study
Using a unit study method brings all the classic school subjects some cohesiveness. In a unit study, one particular unit or theme is chosen and all subjects revolve around that same theme. For example, if one wants to study the Civil War, that is history and geography. In addition, students can read a number of books about the civil war, learn spelling words that are Civil War related and learn grammar using sentences that are from Civil War era. Science can be the study of machines used in the Civil War and math can be studied using facts and figures from the Civil War. There are so many ways to tie subjects into one theme. This type of home education requires a lot of planning on the part of the parent to pull everything together. It can be student or parent directed. Students can pick the themes based on what they are interested in at any given time

Montessori
The Montessori method is based on an approach begun by Maria Montessori. It is a very hands on method of learning where children learn by doing things rather than just reading about them.

Unschooling
Unschooling is a method of learning that is very child centered. Parents do not have to plan studies but they facilitate learning based on their child's interests. In other words, if a child displays an interest in bugs, parents would help the child find books on bugs to read and may help the child to start a bug collection. Students learn subjects when they are ready to learn and none of the learning is "forced" by the parent. Many call unschooling, "life learning" where children learn what they need to just by living.

Literature Based
There is a wealth of good literature available. Literature based homeschoolers use literature as the starting point of their studies. Instead of reading a textbook about history, they will read actual historical accounts or historical fiction. Instead of reading a textbook about new technology, they may read biographies about the inventor. They may use a thematic approach to use the same book for many subjects or they may read many books at one time.

Eclectic
This is probably the most popular method of homeschooling but one that is least easily defined. Eclectic homeschoolers use a wide variety of methods to homeschool students. They may combine two or more of the methods at the same time to educate their children.

Homeschoolers use many different ways to educate their children. Homeschooling in one house will not look the same as homeschooling in another house. This is a great advantage of homeschooling because parents can choose the method that works best with their particular child. And, they may use one method with one child in the house and a different method for another child, depending on the needs of the children.