Using the For Dummies Books in Homeschooling

A few years back I called Barnes and Noble with a list of about eight ISBN numbers and asked if they could be pulled for me and waiting behind the counter. When I need to pick up books for homeschooling this is a practice of mine because I don't want to spend hours in the bookstore looking for what I need, only to find out that it needs ordered, while I have seven children each going their own way. No matter what I am doing in the way of shopping I like to get in and get out. Visiting the bookstore doesn't always work that way.

So I called Barnes and Noble with a list of about eight books, all in the Dummies series. The employee on the phone was not very happy with me and said "Are you just coming in to look at these or do you want to buy them?" I explained to him that I wanted the books; I was a homeschooler and he had the choice of pulling them for me and having them waiting behind the counter or I could come into his store, with my seven children, and let them run wild while I looked for them. He finally saw things my way, as I thought he would.

When I picked up my stack of yellow books at the bookstore, the cashier gave me a weird look. I explained again that I homeschool and I love Dummies books for homeschooling. She shrugged and rang me up sending me on my way. People look at me weird when I tell them that I love Dummies books for homeschooling. I don't know if it's because the word dummy is in the title or because when you say "homeschooling" people expect you to use text books and formal curriculum like public schools do. There is that misnomer that when you homeschool you duplicate what the public schools do in your home, most of the time that isn't the case. Yes, we use some formal text books in our home, especially for math, but I also use Dummies books in place of text books.

Some people reading this are thinking "Why didn't I think of that?" Others are thinking "Why?"

I wish I could remember who told me years back that books written by experts are for experts and the rest of us don't have a chance of understanding them. Every book has the potential to be a text book, but that doesn't mean that a student is going to learn anything from it. Say you want to learn something about plastic surgery. Would you rather read something written by an expert with large medical terms you don't understand or something written by someone who isn't a doctor that has done the research and written a book (double checked for accuracy by a plastic surgeon) that is easy to understand and doesn't read like a paper from a medical journal?

That is the joy of Dummies books. They don't take a degree in the topic to understand. They may or not be written by an expert in the field, but they are always double checked for accuracy and are written for the average person to understand. They are text books and how to books without being set up like a text book or how to book. They don't talk over your head and at the same time they don't insult your intelligence. This is what makes them idea for homeschooling. They are written where anyone can understand them from a child in middle school to someone with a college degree. This is a real plus for those of us that have been out of school for so long we need a refresher course ourselves. Parents can relearn (or learn) along side of their children and not feel lost.

One of the things that you will not get with Dummies books that you will with a formal text book is politically correct education. That is one thing that I hear a lot of parents, both homeschool and public school alike, complain about. Politically correct education. Topics like slavery are glossed over because it might offend someone. The Founding Fathers are no longer called "fathers" because the term is considered sexist. Current history books refer to them as simply "founders". The list goes on. I remember reading a thread on a homeschool message board a few years back when someone asked the difference between editions of a Saxon math book. It turned out that one of the reasons for revisions was that highly religious parents were offended that things like fairies were used in story problems. You never know what is going to offend someone and what people are going to complain about so the current trend in education is to make everything "one size fits all" and do everything that can be done not to offend anyone.

Other things that make Dummies books great are the little known facts that are pointed out in gray boxes. Especially with history, this can make things more interesting. They just don't throw a bunch of facts and dates at you. The important facts are also marked with an icon to make sure that attention is paid to them. Humor is also interjected into the books where the material isn't so dry keeping the attention of the reader.

Recently Wiley, the publisher of the For Dummies series, has started coming out with a line of workbooks to supplement their math books and some of their science books. What I have seen of these workbooks I am impressed and will probably use them in conjunction with the formal math text books we have for algebra and calculus when my children get to that point.

At the very least I would suggest keeping a supply of Dummies books around to use as supplemental teaching material or reference books to be used in the same way one would use Cliff's notes to help understand a piece of literature.