How I manage homeschooling with children across such a broad age range (10, 6, 4, 2 and 4 months) is probably the most common question I am asked. It is also one of the more difficult ones for me to answer. The hardest is “How do you get it all done?” Because I don’t. And really, the answer is the same regarding managing homeschooling different ages.
I simply don’t. At least not in the way the other person seems to think. Most people seem to be under the impression that having two school-aged children means I have two separate curricula to go through, while pulling off a little preschool with the four year old and keeping the younger two occupied as best I can.
Answering questions based on a misperception has always been difficult for me, especially when the conversation is with someone I scarcely know who is just curious about homeschooling. Answering directly makes it sound like I’m not really doing anything with the younger children, while discussions regarding the differences between schooling and home education take longer than the normal social limits set on small talk.
Sometimes, I really do feel like I’m speaking a different language.
My eldest is really the only one who ever balks at homeschooling. I made most of my mistakes with her, and there is a lot I would change about how we started if I could. For the younger ones, however, it is all they’ve ever known. They have grown up playing at my feet while Mouse and I discussed a book, went over math or tried a science experiment. When they were old enough, they were drawn into the conversation.
Or more accurately, they demanded to be a part of it. My two year old breaks down in tears if I call for the children to come to the table and I have nothing prepared for her. My six year old wants to know more about everything and is continually asking me to write new things he has learned in his old lapbooks.
I teach and they learn what they are ready for. But then there is this notion that somehow the younger children will miss out on something. As if the fact we covered amphibians last month means we will never talk about them again and my younger children will grow into adulthood never knowing the life cycle of a frog. But around here, no lesson is ever really over. In fact, that is why we are drifting away from lapbooks. They run out of room for all the additions my children want to make over time, and these additions represent something very important in education I want to encourage: Just because the unit has ended doesn’t mean we are finished learning about the subject.
And that all goes to show that I should have foreseen the first real difficulty I’ve experienced teaching children of different ages together. How, in all my planning, did I think I was going to get away with assigning The Hobbit as silent reading? Barely into the introduction, as I mentioned that JRR Tolkein and C.S. Lewis were friends, I had the rapt attention of four little imaginations.
Send Mouse off with the book by herself? I think there would have been a revolt and definite claims of favoritism.
homeschool homeschooling home education multi-aged homeschooling
I love this! I’ve not done a thing with my toddler, yet he’s picked up on the alphabet just by hanging around as big brother learns to read. He’s counting just by being there when big brother learns to tell time. On that note my oldest learns so much just by sitting there listening to conversations among the adults.
I loved this article. I have a wide age range myself. (19,18,17,15,13,10,8,4) Yes thats 8. You know what I find very funny. People have a hard time defining, what it means to get it all done? That is the secret to what we do. We get what we want done, done. What is most important to us gets done. Our kids are home, so probably love our kids is the top of the list. Then training, then school, then maybe some housework. If the first one is done right, then the other follow right along behind. Great article.
Wow this was great! It made me feel like I was not alone! I need to read more from other homeschoolers. I don’t know hardly any where I live.
Love when you say “the lesson is never really over”. That is so true. We actually did tadpoles a few years ago and just today our last fish died. I told the boys that we were putting the tank away and the younger one asked if we could get tadpoles again
It’s all because people keep thinking “school.” I’m beginning to hate the term “homeschooling” – is putting a bandaid on your child’s knee “home pharmacy”? Does cooking dinner mean that we are playing at “home restaurant”?
Totally off topic, suburbancorrespondent, but that reminds me of “home cooked” meals at restaurants. If only schools realized they were trying to do their best to replicate what is often best done in the home.
Exactly.
I really appreciate this post. So far I’ve only homeschooled one (3rd grade this year), but next year I’ll add my younger daughter (kindergarten). Going into my third year of home educating, I have relaxed a good deal since year one. This post reminds me that my relaxing is what enables the majors to rise to prominence, and the minors to shrink down to size.
I also enjoyed reading about your “mistakes” post. I taught college English before I started homeschooling, and I think I have been undergoing a similar transition into the realities and joys of what homeschooling can be.