Top Picks for Helpful Free Homeschool Resources

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

 

by Peggy Ployhar, SPED Homeschool Founder & CEO

 

This month, as we are focusing on free resources for families homeschooling children with unique learning challenges, we wanted to share some or our top picks of helpful free homeschool resources. We hope that these resources from our amazing consulting partners will empower you as you home educate your unique learner.

 

From our partners at Inside Our Normal:

 

From our partners at Canary Academy Online:

 

From our partners at Goodschooling:

 

From our partners at Austin & Lily:

 

From our partners at Your Parent Help – Decoding Learning Differences:

 

From our partners at HomeLife Academy:

 

From our partners at Personalized Learning Solutions:

 

From our partners at Art of Special Needs Parenting:

 

For more helpful homeschool resources, check out our Free Downloads page. Here you will find a lot more, downloadable, content to help you homeschool your unique learner.

 

 

 

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Top Picks of Free Homeschool Therapy Resources

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

By Peggy Ployhar

 

This month, as we are focusing on free resources for families homeschooling children with unique learning challenges, we wanted to share some or our top picks of free homeschool therapy resources. We hope that these resources from our amazing therapy partners will empower you as you home educate your unique learner.

 

From our partners at Brain Sprints:

 

From our partners at Equipping Minds:

 

From our partners at Bjorem Speech Publications:

 

From our partners at Child Diagnostics:

 

From our partners at Cherish Child Ministries:

 

From our partners at Homeschool OT:

 

For more therapy resources, check out our Therapy-at-Home page. Here you will find more downloads and links to free parent-led therapy tools.

 

 

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Tons of Free Resources for Core Homeschool Subjects

Posted on by SPED Homeschool

 

By Stephanie Buckwalter from Art of Special Needs Parenting

 

I love homeschooling because I get to learn right alongside my kids. I’m also a researcher at heart, so as I’ve wandered the interwebs for the last 17 years of homeschooling, I’ve had the chance to sniff out a lot of really cool, free stuff. Here I have a sampling, for a variety of subjects. 

 

Math

  •  Free Math Games–  Plenty of variety in types of games to play to capture interest. My boys loved Fruit Shoot. There are more than math games available here.
  • Places to get free math worksheets: 
    •  Math-drills.com – My favorite for simple pages. You can limit the number of problems per page.
    •  MathisFun.com – My favorite for picture-based worksheets. These can be done online or printed. Includes a link at the bottom to their sister site Mathopolis.com where you can create your own worksheets.
    • Kidzone.ws – Worksheets for the early grades have black and white illustrations. You can use as a coloring page, too. They have multiplication table worksheets in a farm theme or jungle theme, in color or black and white, blank or filled in.
    • EducationWorld.com worksheets list – In case you need more, here is a list of websites that offer worksheets in multiple areas. Have fun!
    • You can find many more options by searching free math worksheets. However, a warning that many sites that provide worksheets are filled with ads. They are not really education sites. They are money-making machines for the owner of the site. The links above are subtle in their ad presence and you don’t have to jump through a bunch of hoops to get to the worksheets.
  • LD Online Article on Math – Helpful website overall. This article talks in depth about math struggles.

 

Reading and Comprehension

  • Reading Plus offers downloadable worksheets for reading and reading comprehension. 
  •  Read Naturally is a highly-recommended resource for fluency. You can try it out with a free trial for 60 days. 
  • I really like ReadWorks  for special needs. It is a completely free resource. The books are illustrated and offer the option of having the books read to the student by a real human voice, not a computer-generated one. You can do one page at a time or the whole book. You can create a library of books for your child to read. It includes some supplemental material such as worksheets and comprehension questions on some lessons.
  • If you want to get lost in the world of reading remediation, I recommend hopping on to  My Three Readers, a blog from a mom of three girls with reading problems. They share a lot of links and printables.

 

Social Studies & History

  •  Ducksters.com – Easy to read history, biography, geography, and science articles including activities, videos, quizzes, and worksheets. A great resource for helping you organize a lesson. You could take the information in each lesson and turn it into a lapbook or foldables project.
  •  Shmoop.com – The site material is written by high school teachers and college professors. There are multiple topics, not just history. Go to Free Stuff, then Study Guides to find a variety of topics. For special needs, the most helpful thing is the way it is organized. For history, you can trace themes through a time period. For historical literature, you can look up the themes or historical characters.
  • Geoguessr free Mapillary version– Teach deductive reasoning with a fun geography game. I like the classic version. You are plopped down somewhere in the world and have to guess where you are relying on things like the style of buildings, the landscape, which side of the road cars are driving on, language on signs and so on. Great for a group activity, too. To play unlimited free on a world map, you have to scroll to the bottom of the home page and choose MAPILLARY VERSION. 

 

Science

 

Life Skills and Communication

  • Smart Steps app – For building independence in older kids. It allows you to set up a decision tree for when things go differently than expected. For example, if your child is out and they need a ride, you can program choices, including contacts, to call for help. If your child is waiting for a ride, you can add comments like: “Stay where you agreed to be picked up. If you move around, you may miss your ride.” It could also be set up for if you have a car accident or a medical emergency. Any situation can be added like what to do when: having a meltdown, you don’t know what to do, the store is closed, you are lost, and so on. The possibilities are endless, but the key is your child can gain independence through decision-making support.
  • ASL Nook  – Context-sensitive ASL signs. Videos use young children, so you get a realistic view of what a sign may look like from a child as opposed to an adult.
  •  AAC Language Lab – (PRC – LAMP Words for Life creator) Resources for teaching your child to use an AAC device to communicate. 
  •  Quick Communication Boards – (AssistiveWare – ProLoQuo2Go creator) is using an AAC device too overwhelming for you? A download with these 4 pages of words that you can print and laminate. Put in convenient spots around the house and teach your child to point to words as needed. Look around the AssistiveWare site for more help with AAC. Communication boards are a great prelude to using an AAC device, Soma Rapid Prompting Method or touch to spell.

 

You can get an expanded version of these lists that include paid resources and teaching tips by signing up to receive How to Teach Your Special Needs Child at Home on my website.

 

BIO

Stephanie Buckwalter is a homeschooling mom, writer, researcher, and curriculum developer. She helps homeschooling parents and specializes in children who are nonverbal and those with intellectual disabilities. You can follow her work at ArtofSpecialNeedsParenting.com . 

 

 

 

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3 Crucial Supports For Home Educating Through Medical Challenges

Posted on by SPED Homeschool

 

By Julie Grosz, M.Ed., with Heart of Dakota Curriculum

 

Do you have a medical challenge or two in your life right now? If you do, please know you are definitely not alone! Now more than ever, it seems like medical challenges are mounting. In the past 20 years of homeschooling my own three sons, we have had multiple medical challenges. Some have lingered, and praise God – some have not. Faith, family, and homeschooling have held us together; they have given us much needed normality among the abnormality of medical challenges.

We’ve had medical challenges of high-risk pregnancies, months of complete bed rest, fibroids, cysts, dozens of hospital stays, premature babies, NICU hospitalizations, physical therapies, occupational therapies , speech therapies, helmet therapies, cardiologist appointments, epi-pens, severe reflux, thyroid disease, and hernia surgery, the list goes on. I’ve helped care for my dad through pancreatic cancer, my mom through high blood pressure, my sister through vertigo, my husband through COVID, and of course, the list could go on.

 

Your Own Medical Challenges

Many of you, just like me, have your own lengthy list of medical challenges. Some have lingered, but praise God, some have not. You have more than likely found yourself to be the patient needing care. You have likely found yourself to be the caregiver. Both the role of patient and caregiver pose medical related challenges. However, no matter what your circumstances may be, faith, family, and homeschooling can truly hold you together! They can be your calm in the storm. On the worst of days, they can be your anchor, holding you steady until the winds and the waves have passed.

 

Leaning on Faith in the Midst of Medical Challenges

You can lean on your faith  in the midst of medical challenges. I know because I’ve witnessed it firsthand from my dad. My dad was strong, happy, healthy, and a hard- working family man with a heart for the Lord. The other day I needed to list my dad’s medical challenges for my doctor, as we had to do some genetic testing for my son’s heart condition. I was shocked at the list! My dad had his gallbladder removed, had an abdominal aneurysm, needed 19 pins in a rotator cuff surgery, had seven blood clots pass through his heart, had a heart attack, a brain bleed, and pancreatic cancer. I had just told the doctor my dad was an incredibly healthy strong man. Where in the world did I get that idea?!? Well, I can tell you where, it was from my dad.

My dad’s faith made him strong. So strong, even through all his medical challenges, my mom, my sisters, and I still would all say he was a healthy man. Making that list showed me he doesn’t really look all that healthy on paper. Still, we remember him as a strong, healthy man who loved to laugh and who loved the Lord. People came to visit my dad during his pancreatic cancer, and they often left encouraged by my dad! He had his bad days, but overall, he was still quite happy. Faith, he leaned on his faith during medical challenges. They seemed to disappear right before our very eyes. We forgot them because he didn’t dwell on them. Lean on your faith in the midst of medical challenges. Talk to God  about it. He cares, and He will carry you through the storm.

 

Leaning on Family in the Midst of Medical Challenges

You can lean on your family in the midst of medical challenges. I know, because I have been leaned on, and done some leaning of my own. My husband got up before work to put a lunch he made for me in the fridge every day during my many months of bedrest. When doctors couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me, my sister hauled me from doctor to doctor until they figured it out. My mom came to care for my baby while I recovered from medical challenges that had brought sheer exhaustion. My dad came to help me care for my premature baby. Even my sons brought me food and blankets and hugs as I lay in bed recovering from surgery. I returned the favor by caring for my husband, my sons, my sister, my dad, and my Mom through some of their medical challenges.

Lean on your family  in the midst of medical challenges. Tell them what they can do to help. Be there for them in their medical challenges. Send a card, give them a call, make a meal, give a hug, get groceries, or simply ask what you can do to help and do it.. When my dad was at home in hospice care, he wanted me to take all the encyclopedia sets home in my car and disperse them among family. There were four complete sets. They were heavy, and they were in the basement. I carried them all to my car by myself, and they barely fit. It didn’t matter. He wanted it done, and he couldn’t do it. There is nothing wrong with helping with odd requests nor making odd requests. Family doesn’t judge; they help.

 

Leaning on Homeschooling in the Midst of Medical Challenges

You can lean on your homeschooling in the midst of medical challenges. Let homeschooling be your normal in the midst of the storm. Do what you can and do it as regularly as you can. If you are bedridden, have the children bring their books to you. If your children are bedridden, go to them. Homeschooling can work in a bed or on a couch. I’ve done both and actually still quite enjoyed it! Make your homeschool things mobile. Backpacks, canvas cubes, totes, wheeled suitcases, get creative! Mobile homeschooling means it can be done wherever you are.

If medical challenges require lengthy therapies for one child and your other children need to come, use that time to homeschool your other children. When my youngest son had helmet, physical, and occupational therapies in another city, my other two sons came to the appointments. My husband traveled for work and could not care for them. I brought my other two sons’ homeschooling things in backpacks. I also asked the nurse if they had an empty room or place I could quietly homeschool the boys. They did! In fact, they gave me my own room. They even let me use the physical therapy room for indoor recess. It was full of balls, ramps, mats, and hoops. The boys loved it!

Maybe you’re in the middle of a major medical challenge, and maybe you don’t see it going away any time soon or maybe ever. Do what you can. If you have two good hours a day to homeschool, then homeschool those two hours. Move slowly, steadily forward. Maintain routine and balance by moving through subjects in the same order. Write down the order you’d like: Bible, history, geography, science, math, reading, read-alouds, spelling, music, grammar, art, etc. Maybe on Monday you have two good hours and you start with the Bible and make it through science. On Tuesday, maybe you have three good hours, so you start with math and make it through art. Maintain a routine, and homeschooling can still be your normal.

 

In Closing

If you find yourself in the midst of medical challenges, take heart! You are not alone. Lean on your faith, your family, and your homeschooling. Give yourself, your spouse, your children, and your extended family a LOT of grace. Looking back, I see God’s hand in all we have been through. I rest in the promise that His plan is good; it is better than mine. Medical challenges come and go; even medical challenges that hang around have periods of respite and times of hardship. Hold strong in the storm; celebrate in the calm. Look back and marvel at all God has brought you through. Know in the depths of your soul, God is good. He loves you. He is with you in the storm, and the storm will not last forever.

In Christ,

Julie

 

Julie Grosz, M.Ed., is a placement specialist and professional blogger for  Heart of Dakota. Julie is a former public school teacher who lives in South Dakota, where she and her husband have homeschooled their three sons. Julie has enjoyed helping Heart of Dakota families on the phone and at conventions with placement, questions, and orders for the past 20 years. Her passion is writing, however, homeschooling her own sons from preschool to twelfth grade has been her most fulfilling adventure of all!

 

 

 

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A 3-Step Process for Homeschooling with Health Issues

Posted on by Charl Rae Cobb

 

By Charl Rae Cobb

 

Denial, anger, rationalization, bargaining, depression, anxiety, and eventual acceptance. In nursing school, I learned that everyone goes through several stages during the grieving process. I was taught to help support people whose loved ones have died. What I now recognize is that every diagnosis, whether it is medical or not, brings out these emotions. Realizing it is a natural, and unfortunately, a necessary process helps our family deal with each new health challenge.

 

Whether we are dealing with the symptoms of an acute illness like a virus or an allergic reaction, a long-term condition such as an auto-immune disorder or cancer, or an unexpected change in medication, illnesses wind up disrupting our current and carefully planned academic and household schedule. Honestly, it can be upsetting, overwhelming, and confusing until I remind myself that teaching my child how to handle change is as important as teaching math and writing skills.

 

Some days I want to cry because of the unfairness and disappointment of a new medical diagnosis or medicine that we now have to deal with. At times, I am anxious or fearful that the academics will slide. Sometimes I feel emotionally and or physically exhausted. Some days I want someone else to take over the multiple roles I am responsible for in our home: teacher, cook, laundress, chauffeur, social coordinator, cheerleader, budget balancer, time manager, etc. Just so that I can be the mom and/or nurse that my child needs or I can just focus on my own health needs or those of another family member.

 

After I allow myself some private time to identify that as part of the grieving process, I find myself better prepared to move myself and my student who studies and learns from everything I do as well as say into the acceptance stage of the grieving process where we can empower ourselves with education and a can do attitude. This has become our “Step Number One“.

 

Step Two, is a chance to reassess our priorities. We like the analogy of filling a glass jar with large rocks, small rocks, sand, and water. No one can be successful in filling the jar with all the items if they try to put all the small things in first. Anyone can be successful if they put the largest rocks in, then the smaller rocks, then the sand followed by the water. Our family finds success and satisfaction when we prioritize our needs and our wants. This becomes an important life lesson that translates into financial budgeting and time management as well as health and academics. We also find this to be a powerful opportunity to teach discernment. If our child learns a healthy decision-making process so that he can continue to do so independently as an adult, then we have invested our time in a worthwhile endeavor rather than wasting it with worry.

 

Step Three is based on Step Two. If one or more of our family members need to focus on sleep, bedrest and antibiotics or other treatments to recover from a short-term illness, that becomes the priority and other things can wait. We may choose to progress slowly toward reading literature, watching documentaries, or playing games prior to resuming academics. It has been helpful to record what we did in our lesson planner retrospectively during these times. We have been pleased to see that we actually have satisfying discussions about a story we read together or a documentary we watched and were inspired to explore more about that particular topic or interest. When social distancing is due to illness, it has been helpful to maintain connections with others via FaceTime, phone calls, texting, and letter writing. It has amazed me at how much my child and his pen pals are lengthy and detailed letters to each other as well as watching their handwriting, typing, and spelling skills improve!

 

If I am the one who is ill, my child may proceed with lessons he feels more confident about. He may give me a short progress report each day or ask his dad or grandmother to help him work through a question if he did not find understanding by searching the Internet or textbook. If we are dealing with a long term health challenge or a newly diagnosed learning disability related to an illness, we tend to approach it as a health related unit study and learn what we can about the symptoms, treatment or therapy, etc. Therefore we can plan for success with physical health, social interactions, and schoolwork. Occasionally, this has led to combining nutrition and cooking lessons with biology, physics, and physiology in fun and memorable ways!

  

Every family goes through health challenges in their own unique ways. I hope that sharing our perspective might encourage someone else, as I have been encouraged by other parents who are homeschooling through medical challenges.

 

Charl’s work experiences include writing, education, healthcare, and art. She loves helping homeschoolers learn how to identify dominant learning styles and how to plan strategies for success. Respecting the individual requirements of her multi-generational household, she strives to create tasty, family-friendly meals while juggling multiple dietary requirements, provide social and educational activities that encourage those dealing with multiple special needs, and balance life in general. 

 

 

 

 

 

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Balancing Homeschooling and Medical Needs

Posted on by SPED Homeschool

 

by the SPED Homeschool Team

 

Learn how three long-time special needs homeschooling moms learned to balance education and medical needs in their homes by properly orienting priorities, energy, and choices.

 

Balancing Priorities

Home educating through illnesses is something our team wrote about a few years ago, just as I was going through the third of three surgeries in 2020. What I learned through that experience is that priorities are a must because there isn’t time to do everything you would like to do when illness upends your life. However, there is always time for the things you put at the top of your list as long as you focus on prioritizing them. For school work, that means numbering subjects in order of importance and then doing them in that order. For daily chores, it means doing your best to have everyone focus on the day’s top chore and being thankful if it gets done between doctor appointments planned or not, necessary breaks for cuddles, telling your kids how much you love them, and taking a much needed nap.The best advice I can give, though, is to focus on what you have to be thankful for each day. Even if it was the gift of another day of life that you get to spend with your kids because you are blessed with the opportunity to homeschool.

-Peggy Ployhar

 

Balancing Energy

The amount of school we do is in inverse proportion to the severity of what’s going on, be it illness or sensory meltdowns. We take sick days when we are really sick. When things are milder and ongoing, I try to get at least some school done. We may not do core subjects those days because I’d rather have my child at full capacity for those. We might do low-energy activities that teach the same material, like watch videos, or explore the topic in ways other than using our regular curriculum. That way, learning continues, but not at the same intensity or duration as a normal school day. Once the crisis has passed, we get back on track.

-Stephanie Buckwalter

 

Balancing Choices

Many types of illnesses have affected our family and our homeschool life over the years. The first question I try to ask myself is what am I willing to give up and what is my goal at the time. Small quick illnesses I give whoever is sick a day or two of rest and then we pick back up. The chronic illnesses are the ones that I have to ask myself what is the most important need right now. When I studied education we learned about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and basically the bottom of the pyramid is that if our basic physiological needs are not being met like sleep, food, breathing and I will add in here being well our motivation will be low resulting in low output. This is what I try to remember during illnesses: do I just want stuff done for the sake of getting it done or do I want it done well? The times when we are going through more chronic issues, I use more games, documentaries, movies that touch on what we are learning, and most important rest. Rest during an illness is one of the most important lessons we can teach our children. Our bodies need rest to heal, and it is important that we learn to listen to our bodies. Finding a place where you are comfortable letting up on school during an illness is a personal choice, but sometimes we have no choice but to stop and heal and that is okay.

-Dawn Spence

 

 

 

 

 

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The Best Way to Home Educate Students with Profound Learning Difficulties

Posted on by SPED Homeschool

 

by Cheryl Swope, M.Ed.with Simply Classical Curriculum

 

Have you ever listed all of the medical, educational, and other diagnoses your child has been given or the diagnoses you suspect? Lined up in a row, the terms appear as heavy as artillery ready to overtake your child and you. As their parent, sometimes you may feel as if you stand alone in your child’s defense.

 

Your child’s diagnoses, given or suspected, may sometimes ring in your ears or haunt you day and night. Surrounding you with a clinical grimness, words such as disorder, impairment, syndrome, and disability may threaten to rob you of the God-given love, respect, and persevering care for your child. When you homeschool a child whose medical conditions, daily care, or puzzling diagnoses seem overwhelming, formidable pressure can seem to push from all sides. What are you to do?

 

Cast care aside, lean on your guide;

His boundless mercy will provide.

Trust, and enduring faith shall prove

Christ is your life and Christ your love.

 

In my homeschool, our boy/girl twins’ list of medical conditions and diagnostic terms fill more than a single spaced page. The pages of terms continue to grow, as if more troops march forth to assail my children and myself. My role as my defender, advocate, and counter-assailant can only grow to meet them if the Lord equips me with His love, His mercy, His wisdom, and His armor for each day. 

 

Fight the good fight with all your might;

Christ is your strength, and Christ your right.

Lay hold on life, and it shall be

Your joy and crown eternally.

 

With the help of God, in our homeschool when conditions and diagnoses began mounting in my children’s early years, we found ourselves becoming resourceful. When doctor appointments, hospital stays, and therapy visits filled our days, “portable education,” became clever tools for academic progress. This also modeled making the most of the time. I describe in greater detail within the pages of Simply Classical: A Beautiful Education for Any Child and sometimes marvel that we listened to poetry, cradle songs, and silly songs set to music when traveling to and from appointments. As caregivers, you do such things too. We played memory games or I Spy to pass the time in waiting rooms and kept the children’s minds relaxed and light-hearted. We found parks or made a trip to the zoo for taking long, relaxing walks after evaluations. When home for extended periods due to illness or recovery, we created artistic history notebooks that became keepsakes still on our shelves. 

 

To this day, my son finds discussions with the doctors “fascinating” as we often tied medical terminology to etymology (oto-scope = Greek ear/look). Recently my daughter occupied herself in an exam room by calculating the total number of floor tile squares, as we once did while learning multiplication and area years ago. She finds art or photography on the walls and asks me the questions I asked long ago, “Which is your favorite? Why?” and then shares hers. Not long ago in a gastroenterologist’s office she shuddered with dismay at the many posters of intestines. “They really need some beautiful artwork in here!”

 

When mood disorders and mental illness were added to the daunting legion, I did not know what we would do. I recall crying out to a Christian friend. “I feel as if I’m barely holding on by a thread.” She reassured me with words I still remember, “Do not worry about your ability to hold on. The Lord is holding on to YOU!” 

 

Faint not nor fear, His arms are near;

He changes not who holds you dear;

Only believe, and you will see

That Christ is all eternally.

 

Today as medical conditions continue to assail my children, “faint not” remains sufficient because He remains sufficient. The Lord strengthens us, upholds us, and fights for us. Sometimes medical conditions become too powerful or urgent to allow the teaching of etymology, math, or art; but we can teach our children this: Jesus is with us. 

 

If you are in the throes of this battle, hold on. Hold on to your children. Hold on to your family. Hold on to your friends. Most of all, hold on to the One who holds on to you. “For I, the Lord your God, will hold your right hand, saying to you, ‘Fear not, I will help you.’” (Isaiah 41:13). Yes, He will.

 

*Hymn stanzas from “Fight the Good Fight,” written by John S. B. Monsell, 1811-1875.

Cheryl Swope, M.Ed., is the author of Simply Classical: A Beautiful Education for Any Child (Memoria Press, 2nd edition, 2019). With Memoria Press, Cheryl has created award-winning homeschooling resources for all ages of children with autism, adhd, dyslexia, Down syndrome, medical conditions, and other learning challenges, SimplyClassical.com.

Cheryl has a master’s degree in special education. She and her husband of 31 years homeschooled adopted boy/girl twins with autism, mental illness, and learning disabilities. They homeschooled through high school graduation. The family lives in a quiet lake community in southeast Missouri.

 

 

 

 

 

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When Your Student Needs a Multifaceted Learning Approach

Posted on by Dawn Spence

 

By Dawn Spence, SPED Homeschool Teaching Manager

 

Homeschooling a child with special needs and medical needs can provide many challenges. Yet, provide wonderful challenges for teaching your student more creatively.

 

When I started homeschooling my daughter with special needs, I knew she had multiple needs. I also knew not one curriculum or way of teaching would meet all her needs. Her brain and mind were bright, but learning was challenging. My daughter’s multifaceted learning disabilities called for a wide variety of tools.

 

To learn how to teach my daughter, I started reaching out to experts who were willing to help me teach my daughter.

 

To learn more about how I could use neurodevelopmental strategies, I spoke with Dr. Jan Bedell, the President of Little Giant Steps. Jan helped me find which of the learning tools she developed would work best in helping me address my daughter’s auditory processing issues.

 

I also spoke with Dr. Carol Brown, the founder of Equipping Minds, and found her games could help my daughter improve her working memory and executive functioning.

 

But, my daughter needed more, so I turned to Dianne Craft and from her Right-Brained Learning Approach, I realized my daughter also needed visuals to learn sight words.

 

From there, I learned from other experts and uncovered more strategies and tools that I use for teaching my daughter.

 

Using multiple strategies can be overwhelming for a homeschooling parent, but I can confidently say all my research was worth it, because my daughter is learning! She is reading AND retaining information.

 

If you are frustrated and find yourself saying, “I need to find a new curriculum. What I am using is not working.” You are not alone.

 

When things are not working, it is best to start by figuring out what your child needs and then research how you can help teach to those needs. Once you figure out what your child needs, you open the door to approaches, tools, or curriculum that will unlock your child’s unique learning path.

 

When your child has so much going on with medical or learning needs, unlocking the puzzle can take time and lots of trial and error, but fear not, you are not alone and there are lots of people who people who are more than happy to help you learn how to best meet your child’s learning needs, but you need to be willing to ask for help, learn new strategies, and combine multiple approaches. The time and effort it takes to figure out what your child needs is worth it.

 

Every day I see my daughter striving and thriving and learning more than I ever could have imagined just a few years ago. I encourage you to keep searching and learning. You won’t regret the investment you made in helping your child strive to their full learning potential.

 

Dawn Spence is the SPED Homeschool Teaching Manager and a former public school teacher who has a passion to help all children to learn and to help parents find what their children need to succeed. 

 

 

 

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6 Guidelines for Making Effective Homeschool Curriculum Choices

Posted on by SPED Homeschool

 

By Heather Walton from A+ Education Solutions

 

The search for the right curriculum can be overwhelming, given the sheer amount of choices available. Not only are there various vendors, but there are also many philosophical and methodological differences. If you’re like me, you might feel pressured to find the perfect curriculum; you may even worry that your children’s entire education is contingent on your quest. I have some refreshing news for you. There is no perfect curriculum, nor ideal method, for homeschooling your children, apart from that which is laid out in Deuteronomy 6:1-9.

According to this model, we are to diligently teach our children to love God, obey His commands, serve their fellow man, and pass this knowledge to the next generation. That is the content we are to teach. The curriculum, delivery method, is life itself. Parents are commanded to disciple the next generation “when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise” (Deuteronomy 6:7 ESV). With that in mind, here are some tips for crafting your family’s curriculum:

  1. Foster relationships: The Biblical model laid out in Deuteronomy 6 and practiced by Jesus during His ministry clearly demonstrated relational discipleship. Generations passed God’s Word through conversations and everyday life. Until recently, people were present with one another, engaging in conversation and going deep into relatively few relationships. Discipleship happens best through proximity, conversation, and example.
  2. Academics are only part of your children’s education: God created humans as His image bearers; as such, we are multifaceted beings with various talents and intelligences. Our culture emphasizes academic and athletic intelligence, to the point of excluding: pursuits in trades, arts, and the hospitality business. We tend to neglect life skills and self-sufficiency tasks, instead raising students equipped for college but not for life, and possibly not for eternity.
  3. Worldview matters: My top goal, aside from raising children who accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, is that they embrace a Biblical worldview. I spend more time and energy on this than any other facet of their education. We begin our day with my husband leading us in prayer and Scripture reading. Then I read from a text or two that emphasizes Biblical character. We also read aloud and discuss material written by Biblically-minded writers. When it comes to selecting curriculum, this is my number one prerequisite. I choose well-written real books over traditional textbooks whenever practical, because they are generally more interesting and provide higher quality learning. There are excellent homeschool texts, written from subject-matter experts that combine a textbook format with the narrative quality of a novel. Biblical worldview needs to be presented with the utmost respect and highest quality.
  4. Curriculum is your servant, not your master: Many people stress about finishing the curriculum. Others use the curriculum even if it clearly doesn’t suit the child. I know from experience that professional educators rarely finish books, and when they do, they often haven’t gone into enough depth to have thoroughly taught the material. If you give the curriculum a fair chance and you aren’t satisfied with the results, or it’s like pulling teeth daily to get your student to complete it, I urge you to prayerfully consider switching, or taking a break and coming back to it once your student gains more maturity or ability. 
  5. Not every method or curriculum suits every family: Just because an educational method or curriculum works great for a friend or has a compelling presentation at a conference, doesn’t mean it will be perfect for your family. Even if it worked for one child in the family, that doesn’t guarantee success with their siblings. One of the greatest benefits of homeschooling is the ability to tailor your children’s education to their needs and to your family’s needs. Don’t feel boxed in by other’s appraisals. Study your children, and do what works for your family situation without feeling pressured to conform to someone else’s standards.
  6. Aim your arrows toward the right target: Each child is uniquely created with his own talents, abilities, and challenges. If your child shines in an area, allow them the latitude to pursue that interest more intently than others, even if it’s not academic. If your child needs extra focus in an area, you may need to remediate that area and let others go for a season. It’s a mistake to try to focus on everything at once. Our gracious God doesn’t do that with us, and we need to allow our children the same grace.

Ultimately, I want to equip my children for life and eternity. I used to pour over curriculum catalogs and research my choices. After 8 years of professionally educating and 10 years of homeschooling, I’ve realized that I’m not going to cover everything I’d like to, and I’m not going to choose the “best” curriculum all the time. If I diligently disciple my children to love God, follow his commands, and love their fellow man, I will have reached the goals the Lord set for parents in educating their children.

 

Heather Walton lives in Taylorsville, Kentucky, where she and her husband homeschool four children and she operates A+ Education Solutions, LLC, through which she performs educational assessment, consulting, and tutoring services in person or online. You can follow her at apluseducationalsolutions.com.

 

 

 

 

 

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Curriculum Choices that Match Your Student’s Learning Needs

Posted on by SPED Homeschool

 

 by Susan Leckband from Help Elevate Learning Processing

 

A great many homeschool parents come to our facility with these questions, “Why doesn’t my kid remember this? We went over this yesterday, and he had it and now it is like he never saw or heard it before. Am I not a good teacher?”  

 

I had the same questions. Why did my bright boy not retain things? How did 5 + 4 not relate to 4 + 5? Why was spelling so difficult? If he just read the word dog, why didn’t he recognize it when it was surrounded by different words in a new sentence?  

 

After having my son’s information processing evaluated, I found out that my son had extremely low visual and auditory processing. That explained why I could tell him the same thing over and over, but he just did not retain it and why he had so much trouble retaining and recalling visual information. I finally understood why reading and writing were extremely difficult and frustrating and why those tricky, timed math facts tests were all but impossible to master. I discovered he was a very kinesthetic learner. If we got his hands involved, things stuck. We learned how to develop the immature areas of processing and I learned how to teach him things more kinesthetically. Shaving cream on the counter or wet sand became surfaces to practice writing and spelling. Jumping rope became a way to learn to skip count. 

 

Many students who struggle with auditory processing but do well visually benefit from a curriculum that is more written, picture and diagram based, rather than lecture based. A primarily auditory learner who has low visual processing might learn with audio books rather than getting frustrated by reading the same passage with dismal results. 

 

 A child who has trouble with temporal-spatial concepts may have trouble with place values, understanding time and calendars. Their handwriting and math may be messy, unorganized, and hard to read. Every parent who has tried to teach their child to keep nice, neat columns in multiplication or division knows how frustrating math can be for the child whose columns wander around like snakes.  

 

Most of the students we see tend to be very right-brained, creative, non-linear thinkers. Their creativity is astounding! However, this creative right-side often has trouble showing their work and may solve a math puzzle several different ways in their head. They have a challenging time showing their work because of the unique way they figured it out each time. Sometimes manipulatives and a more visual, hands-on approach can allow the student to understand the more left-brain concepts of place values in math, time, and space, as well as correct auditory and visual sequencing. 

 

Finding out whether taking notes benefits or impedes your child is also an important thing to determine. Some students with auditory challenges are focusing so hard on writing down what they have heard that they lose all of what is currently being said. Likewise, students with visual processing challenges may struggle with taking notes from visual presentations and reading because they cannot retain what they are trying to remember to write down. Looking back and forth from the visually presented material to their notes can be exhausting.

 

There are three very individual aspects of both auditory and visual processing that are important. The first is understanding. Is your child able to correctly understand presented auditory and visual information? Second is sequencing. Can they keep what they have seen or heard in order? Third, can they remember what has been said or seen? Often, someone may remember an incorrect version of what was presented much like a saved corrupt file in your computer. This, of course, can lead to misunderstandings, hurt feelings and discord. What may seem like inattention or lack of attention to detail can be due to an underlying, but correctable processing weakness.   

 

While having several types of curricula may not seem to not be a logical thing as a homeschool teacher, understanding that a one size does not fit all approach will aid you in providing the best way to communicate concepts and ideas to your diverse learning style children. Flexibility and patience are key in developing lesson plans for a child with a less conventional learning style. Do not be afraid to try something new. Be intuitive. You probably know by now what does not work for a particular child, so mix it up. Add music, manipulatives, and movement for the kinesthetic learner. Add colored pencils, pens, and pictures for the visual learner. Use interesting accents, rhymes, and poems to tickle the auditory learner’s interest. Make learning interesting and fun! Try not to project any disappointment or make the child feel he is not measuring up. Children really want to please their parents and their perception, accurate or not, of whether they are disappointing you can hinder their learning and growth. 

 

Determining and understanding how EACH of your children learns will make picking out curriculum for and teaching to that child’s strengths so much easier and less frustrating for everyone. A curriculum that focuses on auditory lessons could be disastrous for a non-auditory learner. A visual based curriculum could make a non-visual learner feel unsuccessful and harm their self-esteem. Your children may each have different learning strengths and learning what they are, getting a supportive curriculum for each child and teaching to their individual learning style will provide each child with a more positive, successful, and less stressful homeschool experience. That will make your job as their teacher more enjoyable and fulfilling. 

 

About the author: Susan Leckband is the Executive Director of Help Elevate Learning Processing and has been with HELP for nearly 20 years.  

 

 

 

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