The Minimalist Homeschool aims to help homeschool parents gain confidence, simplify learning, and experience joy in their homeschool journey. Here are 3 things I hope to convey.
Empower parents with the tools they need to teach their children
In today’s world, we have countless resources available to us as homeschooling parents but how are we supposed to sift through all of those resources without getting overwhelmed and completely burned out? Many years ago, when I attended a homeschool convention for the very first time, one of the speakers stated that what we saw in the exhibit hall was mayyybe 10% of what was available to us as homeschool parents. And there were about 300 vendors. At first I was absolutely giddy at the thought of that and let me tell you, I. went. to. town. I bought all the things. Workbooks, story books, movies, manipulatives, educational toys, subscriptions, ecourses, you name it, I bought it. Because the more my children had available to them, the better their education would be, right? Wrong. Turns out children who are overwhelmed and overloaded while simultaneously drowning in clutter just get stressed out and build resentment towards learning. Over the years, I’ve learned that the ‘less is more’ mentality definitely applies to education as well. I want to empower others to simplify their homeschool journey while at the same time enriching it. Not only is that possible, but it’s also fun! Which brings me to my next point.
Provide helpful information to make learning fun
I firmly believe that learning should be fun. And I don’t mean in a sneaky “They won’t even know they’re learning!” kind of way. If someone forced you to read a dry textbook about something you had absolutely no interest in, would you retain that information and be able to tell someone about it a year later? Probably not. But what if you were curious about gardening and someone offered to help you get a garden started and then also recommended several books and documentaries that they had enjoyed as an avid gardener? Chances are, you would grow to love gardening and have no problems relaying the information you had learned to someone else in years to come. I have seen this play out in my own children time and time again. When they are engaged and curious, learning flourishes but the moment they become frustrated or bored, the learning stops. Obviously not every moment will be filled with rainbows and unicorns but generally speaking, I believe learning can be fun most of the time. I also think it’s important that we cultivate a love for learning in our children so that they can become lifelong learners, which is a must in our rapidly evolving world.
Recommend only the best books for young readers
There is no shortage of children’s books available today but are they really all worth reading? As much as I don’t like the word itself, ‘twaddle’ does describe a lot of today’s children’s books perfectly. If you’ve never heard of the this term before, Simply Charlotte Mason has a wonderful explanation of it, which you can find HERE. The point that stands out most to me is undervaluing the intelligence of a child. Children are much more intelligent than we often give them credit for and I think it’s important to nourish that instead of watering it down with subpar literature. Over the years I’ve gotten a little better at discerning in this area and I’ve found that there is so much rich literature available to us that we should never have to read anything subpar to our children!
Final thoughts…
We are about to wrap up our 8th year of homeschooling and there’s been a lot of learning for me in that journey. I hope that my creative outlet in sharing some of what I’ve learned can also serve to encourage and inspire you on your own homeschooling journey. Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have any questions, I’d love to help if I’m able!
Leave a Reply