How to Homeschool During the EARLY Years / Natural Learning Approach

hey guys hey it's Bethany here I'm a homeschool mom of three kids ages 13 9 & 4 welcome maybe you're finding yourself a bit stressed out because you're trying to figure out this whole educating at home stuff am i doing it right do they have the right curriculum am i starting too soon am I starting too late oh my gosh my kid doesn't know his ABCs but spouse kid over there knows all of her letter sounds and can count to 100 oh crap I have gleaned some valuable knowledge just from various resources as I'm on this more unconventional path of more natural learning I don't know about you but I want my child to love learning so how exactly do we accomplish that how exactly do we accomplish that well [Music] so I said I have three children but my youngest is four years old actually like two months shy of five years old so well he's growing he is in these early stages of development so I'm gonna be completely open and honest and really wrong my child cannot identify all of his letters he really could care less about sitting down and forming the letters of his name and we're lucky if he wants to count to 20 on any given day so there's his developmental process as far as academics go but you know what I'm not stressed out I'm really not even concerned why because I know it will happen when he is ready not I'm ready not when some method or philosophy one philosophy wants to tell me he's ready I know he will be ready when he is ready I have two others that are older than him I've been on a million rabbit trails of trying to come up with the most creative way to force a different concept or a different skill that I think because I've been told or it's something that I feel a pressure stressed a need to do is to force some concept or skill as creatively as I can onto my children well this typically leads to frustration on both ends I get stressed out therefore they get stressed out they start to sense my pressure and my stress and they get super uptight because they really know they can sense that if they don't grasp this concept but mom is trying to teach me then I'm probably going to get uptight and lose my cool gone are in those days thank you Jesus so this is a book by John Holt just an older educational critic how children learn and I've learned some valuable information in this book so in this book Holt states that learning is so natural it is natural as a child taking his first step or speaking its first word yet we are forcing these strategies on our child in the most unnatural ways and really what it's doing it's preventing them from growing and develop developing into really who they were designed to be each uniquely in their own way my four-year-old son has zero too little interest in really anything academic at this point he doesn't really care to sit down and work on worksheets he has a very little interest in the alphabet learning his letters and sounds writing his name trust me I have exposed him to this on many different occasions I still continue to in a very gentle approach but he much prefers being active being outside playing with his varsity digger trucks I'm the new marine his monster trucks that is what he likes to do that is what is so natural to him so yes I follow his lead this is natural to him and ultimately it is so beautiful to me as well to see this just naturally unfolding so as an encouragement to you that are watching maybe you are researching homeschooling you're interested in it or maybe you're already homeschooling and you're just super stressed to help placing so much pressure on yourself and advertently that is just passing that to your child and ultimately there is really no effective learning going on in your home whatever it is I know that ultimately all of us just want what is the best for our child I get it so I've put together just three tips that I want to share with you that really have helped me tremendously just speaking over my life and kind of my guide and how I'm educating my little one during these early developmental years number one learning can be natural we should be encouraging our children in these younger years much the same way that we encouraged them when they were beginning to say those first words are taking those first steps we just looked on our child with such delight as they began to progress and develop during these infant and toddler years it was such an exciting time and you know what we never forced these milestones on them I have so many memories of Joe but you look don't you Joe but you look I have so many memories of being just in different environments with other mothers and families that had children at the same age little babies and toddlers at the same age and there was always the encouraging reassurances of don't stress if your child is not saying something right now are they're not taking their first step it's all gonna happen when they're ready you can remember saying that to another mom every baby is just different okay but then the child turns four and all of those encouraging reassurances out the window and all of a sudden we are just bombarded with comparison and pressure and stress oh my gosh Kate ah she knows all her letters and balloons and sounds and she's reading short vowel worries oh my gosh that must mean my child needs to be doing the same thing but he's not ready when I sit him down to do it he freaks out he's super stressed but if cait's doing it my child must be doing that as well oh and then we hear of those parents that are sending their child to pre-kindergarten because we've all been told in order to enter kindergarten they have to know all of these skills and all of these concepts because I don't can be prepared unless they know all those before they go to kindergarten at the age of five I don't know about you but all of this seems absolutely so I'm natural to me why have things suddenly changed from that infancy and toddler stage now that they're the age four and five we're no longer concerned about every child is different or they'll naturally develop in their own timing so when I did I wanted to share some kind of just an absurd concept to really show how unnatural were kind of leading our kids into this growth and learning and educating experience so I'm just gonna read this suppose we decided that we had to teach children to speak how would we go about it first some committee of experts would analyze speech and break it down into a number of separate speech skills we would probably say that since speech is made up of sounds the child must be taught to make all the sounds of his language before he can be taught to speak the language itself doubtless we would list these sounds easiest and communist ones first harder and rare ones next then we would begin to teach infants these sounds working our way down the list perhaps in order not to confuse the child confused as an evil word to many educators we would not have the child here at much ordinary speech but would only expose him to the sounds we were trying to teach how certain is that but as soon as the child progresses you find your child at that four and five in those pre-kindergarten and kindergarten years we are so unnaturally forcing these concepts and skills on them learning is natural it is as natural as your child taking that first step and I have no doubt that my Charlie will grow a desire grow an interest to start learning the alphabet to begin to learn to read but this will all take place when he's ready you know some regress of a much sooner they have an interest much sooner there are four and five-year-olds that are that are so interested in reading so interested in sitting down and learning these skills at a much younger age because it's natural to them they are progressing just progressing sooner but their early proficiency cannot and it is not intimidating me to force some concept or skill into him before he is naturally or developmentally ready you see I still generally expose these concepts to him there's always letters books numbers there's always there's always exposure to that in our house on a weekly and on a daily basis but I will follow his cues on that and I am NOT going to force him to sit down and I cannot force him to grasp this concept before he is he's ready to learn them and number two the second thing that I like to tell myself just to keep myself and courage is trust myself you have to trust yourself and trust your child this can be a scary thing especially when the home school family down the street is doing things totally different than you or their children or learning things that you're not learning in your home or they're doing things at a faster rate than you're doing here in your home or maybe you are finding out that in the traditional school setting how long their lessons are or how the children are sitting down for these long periods time for structured busy seat work you have to take this leap of faith you have to shut out all that outside noise and you have to trust yourself you have to focus in on your child and you have to listen to that motherly intuition the same intuition that you honed it on whenever your child was an infant you knew what that your child needed and you gave that to him it's the same thing as they have progressed into this early stages of learning you have to trust them you have to see them it is so essential that you remember that each child is so uniquely different able to develop a various speeds and with differing capacities no child is the same you have to use these years to continue to deeply connect relationally these years are also a time with a foundation of who they are is beginning to be defined so it's super important to build their confidence through that happy and nurturing interactiveness we are forcing these concepts and these skills onto them before they are ready their confidence will begin to suffer and now their foundation is just weak and it's being built on just uncertainty and who they are and also a fear all right and now the last tip tip number three a child's play is a child's work in this phase of a child's life play is so important it is vital to their development through play they are able to grow emotionally socially intellectually and even physically play is so important if they are not allow this important piece of their development you could actually imperil further learning we allow play at this developmental stage they will actually progress into the next stages with much more confidence and they will actually relish learning and actually see this unfolding to my son's development we have not forced some numbers or letters or those types of concepts concepts on to him we've not forced it but I will be honest with you through his development and this capacity I really had to show a sign and push away some fear and doubt that I noticed come come up because it's really hard whenever you have older children not to compare the progression and my girls by this age they knew they knew their letters they knew the sounds they could blend words together but he's just not there that's it's super unnatural to him but I can see as he's developing developing and we have not forced me these concepts on him how his wills inside are just turned you know they're just spinning and he's starting to connect some pieces especially with numbers where he's he's learning that he needs this this skill to be able to solve this he needs to be able to account to know how good how things progress how he gets older or putting things together and counting and adding things up and it's so special to see this just naturally develop and the pride that he has in himself when he figures this out on his own and he's just so happy and so proud is such a cool thing to see I am actually seen the value that play is taking in his development and his progression of learning I always let him play over any structured activity he'd rather be outside digging than reading I let him you see his play is truly his work and I do not want to rob him of that alright guys I hope you have been encouraged in some way in some capacity by watching this video it is my intention to just share this information in this knowledge and my experience enjoying so that I encouraged other people along their journey as well I enjoy sharing things parenting homeschooling and all things family so if you're interested in following along click this that subscribe button hearty guys catch you next [Music] [Music]

Channel: Your Sacred Home

Views: 2,375

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: homeschool, unschooling, natural learning, child development, john holt, how children learn book, homeschool vlog, homeschool mom, homeschool research, thomas jefferson education, TJED, charlotte mason, child development vlog

Id: KFd3bazXT3Q

Length: 16min 4sec (964 seconds)

Published: Thu May 09 2019