Family life Activities such as:
–Play time (Free time) – our children’s first classroom is that where they play. Toddlers learn about the world around them and how to relate to people as they play. As our children grow older they continue to learn by playing sports, board games, make-believe games. Our children learn by creating, discovering, and imagining.
–Talking time – talking gives us an opportunity to hear the heart of another person – and in the context of a family this goes both ways: We need to hear our children’s hearts, and they need to hear ours. Talking together will give you so many opportunities to teach into your child’s life.
–Time in Nature – getting away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life – whether you go bush, or to the water or up a mountain – being out in nature gives the family time to breathe and learn together.
–Driving in the Car – We live 15 minutes out of town so spend a fair bit of time in the car during the week. I use this time to talk, to laugh, to play games. We listen to music, and as the kids have grown older, sometimes we listen to the radio – both give us opportunities to talk.
–Family Celebrations and Family Nights – Whether you are planning a party, or playing board games – whatever you do as a family, there can be learning going on. Remember we want to teach our kids to grow in relationships, life skills, and character as much as we want them to grow in intellectual capacity.
Seeing learning value in our lifestyle:
At one point in my homeschool journey I stopped and thought about what I would be doing if I wasn’t homeschooling, I even asked the children what they thought. We came up with quite a list – we would still:
- Read
- Play games
- Do Church stuff
- Work on the farm, and around the house
- Have time with friends
- Create things
- Talk about everything
- Read the Bible, by ourselves and together as a family
What would your list look like?
It became obvious that these everyday activities hold learning value and if I was going to last the distance as a homeschool mum I needed to first recognize this and secondly consider these activities as I plan the education of our children. If there truly was learning experiences in these activities I didn’t have to replicate those in our lessons – when I recognised this, I reduced how much ‘homeschooling’ we had to do – and gave us time to enjoy being a family – learning and growing together.
Over to you:
What activity happens in your family where you know learning is happening?
I fully agree with everything you have said here. Children often imitate the behavior that they are watching and then that imitation turns into their own personality. Thank you for sharing this.