Books, Dirt, and the Question 'Why?'
What should homeschooling look like for early elementary age children? Pre-K, K, 1st, even 2nd graders don’t need much. In fact, my philosophy for what children need can be summed up by the three basic tools I recommend for anyone considering homeschooling early elementary aged children – books, dirt, and the question ‘why?’.
First off, books. Read to your children. This may seem like the most obvious statement ever, but reading is truly one of the best things you can do for your child. Reading to your children builds vocabulary, attention spans, and comprehension skills; feeds imagination; explains topics of interest; introduces new people; makes history come alive; and lets your children defeat dragons and save the day. Reading with your children also builds relationships so snuggle up on the couch together, eat a snack while reading, make it cozy. Or read outside on a blanket, enjoying nature sounds as the soundtrack to your story. Let your child swing or roll in the grass or ride their scooter as you read. Listen to an audiobook while you are doing household chores or when you are stuck together in the car on a long road trip. Build inside jokes based on a shared listening experience.
Recommended resources
The Read Aloud Revival – book lists and recommendations, meet the authors, strategies and ideas for engaging readers
A few of my favorite books, starting with youngest audience and increasing in age
- Moo by David LaRochelle
- Seven Silly Eaters by Mary Ann Hoberman
- Because by Mo Willems
- Home in the Woods by Eliza Wheeler
- The Book with No Pictures by B. J. Novak
- Anne Arrives by Kallie George and Abigail Halpin
- The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis
- A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snickett
- Hans Christian Anderson Fairy Tales
Second tool….dirt. Let your children play outside. Let them get dirty. Let them explore nature. Young children do not need to be seated at a table or desk for hours to do school. Give them open ended time to just engage, explore, wander, and wonder in nature. If you can’t go outside, have sensory bins filled with dirt or sand or dried rice or beans. Let them exercise their fine motor and gross motor skills. Let them run around, climb and clamor over rocks. Go for nature walks. Jump at a trampoline park. This does not need to be a highly structured activity. All you need to do is provide the opportunity for movement and engagement with nature, children will naturally fill that time.
Recommended Resources
Lastly, the question ‘WHY?’. Most people associate the question Why? with three and four year olds repeating the question over and over and over. Believe me, I get the exhaustion that comes from hearing that question ad nauseam. But to home school an early elementary schooler, you, as a parent, don’t need to ANSWER the question why a million times a day. You, as a parent, need to ASK the question why (maybe not a million times a day but at least a couple of times a day).
Why? Let’s say you are on a walk with your kid, getting in that exercise, soaking up some vitamin D, you notice a bird’s nest in a tree. Rather than just pointing out the birds nest and moving on, ask your child “why do you think the nest is up in the tree?” This will engage your child’s thinking process. They will start to synthesize, put together, their existing knowledge of the world to create a bigger picture of reality. Maybe they don’t have enough background knowledge. Maybe they give you a wrong answer. You could give the answer if you know it (to protect the defenseless babies from predators), you could uncover the answer together, or you could let their answer stand on its own. Sometimes the question why is good for engaging the thinking process, it doesn’t always need to end in a definitive answer. You can modeling curiosity, wonder, and attention to the world through the question Why.
That’s it – that is all you need for homeschooling in those early years. As children get a little older, 1st and 2nd grade, they can start doing some formal work at a desk, but the majority of their day should be filled with books, dirt, and the question ‘why?’.