One of the most powerful aspects of Sonlight curriculum is the Bible memorization included in the History / Bible / Literature programs. When your child meditates on and memorizes Scripture, he is storing gold in the savings account of his mind—useful today and far into the future.
It is well worth our time and effort to help our children faithfully memorize Scripture. Consider these five ways to make Bible memorization a natural part of your homeschool day.
1. Use Music
Many HBL levels include and schedule songs from Sing the Word that teach each passage through music. Listen to, dance, drive, and sing along with the Sing the Word albums. If there's no album in your program, encourage your children to compose a melody themselves. If they can pair the song with rhythmic movements, all the better!
2. Use Car Rides
Write this week’s memory verse on a sticky note and affix it to your car or van's dashboard. Get in the habit of reading aloud the passage every time you start the engine.
Play round robin in the car as each person says the next part of the passage until it is complete.
3. Use Daily Moments
Review your Bible memory passage while eating breakfast, cleaning up lunch dishes, or getting ready for bed.
Your child may enjoy writing the verse on the bathroom mirror in erasable marker, then reviewing the verse while she brushes her teeth.
Write the verse on an index card and put it in a plastic ziploc bag. Hang the bag in the shower so that your child can review while bathing.
4. Use a Whiteboard
I've found this five-day system effective for memorizing Bible verses:
Day 1: Write the verse while saying it aloud.
Day 2: Read the verse aloud together.
Day 3: Erase a few key words. Then read the verse aloud.
Day 4: Erase a few more words. Then read the verse aloud.
Day 5: Erase the entire verse; try to rewrite from memory.
5. Use Index Cards
The same kind of method works with index cards, too. As a bonus, cards are much more portable, so you can tuck them into your tote bag and take them on your roadschooling adventures.
Day 1: Write the verse while saying it aloud.
Day 2: Read the verse at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Day 3: Read the verse at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Day 4: Cut the index card into pieces and put it together like a puzzle.
Day 5: Try to recite and rewrite the verse from memory.
Which of these methods are your favorite? Remember you can layer multiple options for even more repetition of Scripture memory verses. With repetition comes familiarity. The principles sink in, and eventually—with deliberate effort—kids can memorize them entirely by heart. What greater gift can your homeschool provide your children than to give them nuggets of Scripture, committed to memory?
Sonlight's Christ-centered literature-rich curriculum teaches from the perspective of God's truth and his love for all people of the world. It gives parents tools to guide their children in the way of Christ as they learn about their own faith and heritage and interact with a wide variety of ideas and cultures.
Here, Miriam (12, HBL F) reads Science E texts to Jonathan (2) and Rebekah (5), while Cameron and Phillipa (10 and 7, HBL C) sneak in some educational swinging in the autumn sunshine.
"Our family has thrived with Sonlight over the past seven years! It was Sonlight that first gave me the courage to try the homeschooling adventure we felt God calling us to. As we added new babies to the clan, Sonlight provided just the right amount of structure and guidance for my poor, sleep-deprived brain to cope. Now, as we stand on the brink of high school, I feel confident I can trust the Sonlight material to grow and stretch both the kids and me through these potentially tumultuous years. And we just love rereading the old favourites, yet again, as a new crop of kids come through!"
Juanita G. of North Lambton, Australia
I’m the mother of six children, ranging in age from six-months to 14 years old. As you can imagine, I don’t often get a full night of sleep. I’ve discovered that the health and happiness of our home depends largely on how I respond to sleep-deprivation.
I imagine that most homeschool moms are in the same situation. We’re up feeding newborns, comforting toddlers, soothing coughs, cleaning sheets, talking with teens, planning for tomorrow, or praying through our cares and worries. How can you and I have a good day after a rough night?
Sometimes after a rough night, I simply have a bad day. If I don’t get a good night’s sleep, I’m prone to be cranky… all day long. I lose my temper, I have no patience, I’m angry, I blunder through our school day, and it’s just ugly.
There are those days. But there are also days when God gives me the grace to thrive in the midst of this hardship. Despite sleep-deprivation, He helps me to lead and love my family well. Here are five things that I do to recover from a rough night of sleep and rejoice in the day that the Lord has made.
1. A Sleep-Deprived Mom Must Pray
Our all-powerful Heavenly Father sees us and loves us. He knows our situation and establishes the work of our hands for us. He ordains the work we do through the night and will give us grace for day ahead.
God’s mercies are new every morning.
The most practical thing we can do after a poor night’s sleep is turn to our Heavenly Father and say, “I’m exhausted. Can you please restore me? Can you please give me what I need to do this day well and homeschool my children?”
Time after time, God has saved the day for me when my brain feels so foggy and I feel like I’m dragging around a burden.
2. Don’t Count the Hours that You Slept (or Didn’t Sleep)
There are certain things that we can’t think about too much. We could totally psyche ourselves out if we calculated our insufficient sleep. What we’d discover is that we got the same amount of sleep—and in the same REM-hijacked pattern—of a tortured prisoner.
If you’re tallying up those hours (or lack thereof) and they’re starting to get you down, move on. It is what it is, and you’ve got a day to live!
3. Instead of Complaining, Ask for Help
The days that I complain, “I’m so exhausted. I’m worn out. I’m tired.” are so much worse than the days when I choose not to complain.
I complain because I want pity, compassion, sympathy, and help, but it backfires by making me—and everyone around me—miserable. Instead of complaining, I simply have to ask for help. This is much more productive!
I’m improving at recognizing my need and asking my husband, family, and friends for help when I know I’m weak from exhaustion. They are happy to come to my rescue.
4. Do the Next Positive Thing
When I wake-up from a rough night’s sleep, I look for the first possible positive thing that I can do. Somehow, this starts me in a good direction for the day and puts some wind in my sails. It helps me to say, “I’m alive, and I have a day to live. I’m going to make good choices even though I’m tired. I’m moving forward!”
I make sure I get a refreshing shower in the morning. I add a squirt of fresh lemon juice to my glass of water to get my metabolism going. I take my vitamins. I open my Sonlight Instructor's Guide and get the lay of the land for the day, knowing Sonlight has already planned out my homeschool lessons (one less thing for me to have to do). I might go for a quick 10-minute walk to get my blood pumping.
Whatever it is, take that step in the right direction and you’ll feel invigorated for the day ahead.
5. Look for Opportunities to Sleep
If you are caring for a newborn or for a child who is sick or having a series of nightmares, consider adjusting your schedule so that you can sleep longer in the morning, take an afternoon nap, or go to bed earlier than usual.
Seasons of sleep-deprivation call for a change in priorities: maintaining your own health is at the top of the list! Look for opportunities to sleep and care for yourself so that you can be strong to care for the ones who need you.
God cares about us when we’re up at night, loving and serving our children. Let’s discover the surprising ways He’ll strengthen and help us during the day.
Sonlight Instructor's Guides really do save you lots of time and energy... Learn how.
Whether you have a full-time job, a side gig, or volunteer in some capacity, that job takes a significant time commitment. Throw homeschooling into the mix, and your life may seem upside down very quickly. To create a lifestyle that isn’t engulfed in stress, I've found I have to be diligent to set boundaries and create order.
When determining how you will find balance in your daily schedule, there are five things I suggest you consider. These are the guideposts that help me juggle the plates of working and homeschooling.
1. Determine What Is Most Important To You
My primary roles right now are
to help my husband, a senior pastor, minister to our church
There are a lot of plates to keep spinning, so I have to be diligent to determine what is most important to me in these roles and say no to everything else. If you are someone who has a hard time saying no, practice saying it and stick to your guns about what matters most to you. Otherwise you will find yourself taking cover from the hurricane of events bombarding you.
Make sure you physically write
down what is most important to you, things that are non-negotiable, and keep
them where you can see them often. This will help motivate you to stick to
them.
Use this free printable journal to document what's important to you.
2. Make Each Job a Priority
Scheduling your time is important if you want to accomplish everything that is required of you. Pick a specific time for work and for homeschooling (and any other role you have), and schedule it with your family. Discuss with them what is expected of you in your various roles and what you are required to do. Having everything open on the table will help get everyone on the same page and help things run smoother. The biggest key here is that you show up to each job at your selected time and not allow other less important things to get in the way.
It helps to have a paper or digital planner where you can keep track of work things and homeschool things. Spend time each night writing out important tasks for the next day, as well as reviewing your appointments on the calendar. Or this task can also be done first thing in the morning. Keeping records is a vital key to balancing work and homeschool.
3. Set Boundaries in Your Homeschool Schedule
Sometimes my children and I get distracted during school time and lose track of time. When we all get behind, sometimes we neglect our other work. My children sometimes get stuck on a certain subject and take more time than normal, or they start daydreaming.
I have learned the hard way that I have to give clear expectations and set boundaries to make sure we stay on task. If one of my children gets stuck on a subject and I have re-explained something multiple times, we just put it aside and come back to it later, sometimes even waiting until the next day. This habit helps us stay on task and helps clear our minds so we can revisit the subject with clarity.
My Instructor's Guide serves as a foundation to maintain boundaries in our homeschool. While it's a flexible plan, it gives me ready-made goals for each week and day of the homeschool year.
4. Give Yourself Lots of Grace
I have a tendency to be really hard on myself and not give myself much grace when I get sidetracked and don’t complete my to-do list of jobs. God has shown me that there is so much more to life than a to-do list.
If our job is required to pay the bills, then we have to accomplish all the tasks, but allowing our self some wiggle room will decrease the stress in our life. Set goals, make lists, get your work done, but remember: we can only push so far before we give out. So grant yourself time, rest, and much grace.
At the beginning of each day, we all have the same 24 hours to spend. We must look at each second of the day that is entrusted to us as a stewardship to honor God with. If we are wise, we will start each day asking God how to best invest the time He has given us. He gives us time to use for His purpose and His glory, so why not ask Him how to fit the important things into that time?
With Sonlight's Instructor's Guides, you won't have to worry about scheduling, comprehension questions, activity sheets. None of it. Because we've already done it for you.
Charlotte Mason was a school teacher in England during the late 1800s. Her dissatisfaction with the education practices of her day impelled her to devise a new method of teaching that would provide a broad curriculum to all her students, regardless of social class. In her day students from the lower economic class learned trades while students from the upper economic classes learned arts, literature, and other deeper subjects.
Through her training school and her books, she instructed parents how to become effective teachers of their children—homeschoolers, although that term wasn't used of course.
Charlotte Mason’s 3-Part Model of Education
Mason based much of her teaching on a model she created to describe what education should be: an atmosphere, a discipline, a life.
1. An Atmosphere
Mason believed that education at home begins with an educational atmosphere. Children should be surrounded by things that make them want to learn.
For example, she was an advocate of having children spend much time outside in nature, learning directly from nature itself. And she also believed in giving children high quality books. In addition, she knew that the attitudes of parents and tutors have a huge impact on how much children love learning.
How Sonlight Provides an Atmosphere
Sonlight curriculum provides a great atmosphere for learning by delivering a huge box of engaging books straight to your doorstep. The science programs bring nature indoors via the books and suggested activities. In addition, shorter lesson plans mean that children have more free time to spend outside enjoying and learning from nature. The lesson plans do much of the planning for you, so you also have time to get out and explore with your children. Finally, enjoying great books alongside your children with the Read-Alouds provides a home atmosphere of learning.
2. A Discipline
Part of Mason’s approach involved creating a discipline for your children. Usually when we think of discipline or habits, we think of chores and routines. Brushing teeth, making the bed in the morning, and getting ready for the day are all great areas of discipline to work on.
Another area of discipline most parents focus on is character training. Teaching children to obey and listen is sometimes a full-time job unto itself. But Mason took this approach one step further. She believed that discipline should be a series of habits. She taught parents to encourage in their children:
logical thinking
deductive reasoning skills
self-restraint
delayed gratification
How Sonlight Provides Discipline
Sonlight creates a spirit of discipline in your home by giving you organized guides that lay out a daily routine of work, step-by-step. Moral values and character training are built right into each day's lesson. Children learn from a young age to apply logic and deduction skills as they read stories with opposing viewpoints and then discuss those ideas with their parents.
3. A Life
Mason didn’t simply mean that education should be a lifestyle although she did believe that. But she also believed that education should be learning about life.
the lives of heroes who acted with bravery and self-sacrifice
the works of musicians and artists who gave the world beauty
the impact of inventors, politicians, and activists and what motivated them
But even more than that, she advocated for living books—books that brought the author’s passion for the subject to the forefront and made history come alive.
Sonlight also includes great electives such as classical music that helps bring composers to life, and over-sized picture books that help children see art up close. Missionary stories display the power of God, enabling your kids to feel both the hardships and the triumphs of the mission field.
Defining Characteristics of a Charlotte Mason Homeschool
Living books, habit building, art study, music study, and time in nature are large components of a Charlotte Mason homeschool, but here are a few more:
Short Lessons Sonlight breaks up large books into small amounts of daily reading, growing in length as your child grows in years. You’ll find in the lower levels, for which much of CM’s methods are written, each individual lesson is only a few minutes long. You can do a couple of short lessons together or take a quick break between them.
Narration Sonlight incorporates discussion questions with answers rather than a strict narration format. These discussion questions help students evaluate the book more deeply. As parents grow in confidence, they find a few key narration questions work for most any reading passage: "What did you learn from this story?” and "What would you do?"
Copywork and Dictation Sonlight Language Arts incorporates copywork and dictation at least once a week in the 4-day program and twice a week in the 5-day program, once the child is reading and writing. Younger students will practice copywork, and the ability to switch over to dictation is available when your child is ready.
Nature Studies While Sonlight can’t bring the great outdoors to your house, they do include numerous books which bring nature to your home. Books with full-color, close up photographs of nature and animals are available in the lower levels, and books in the natural sciences are included in higher levels.
Free Afternoons Many parents of younger children find they are often done by noon (providing they don’t start late in the day as we do), so they have their afternoons free to explore their world, whether from the inside of a museum, a grocery store, or the great outdoors.
If Charlotte Mason Lived Today...
Some think that if you brought Miss Mason into the modern world, her whole philosophy would no longer work. I don’t believe that.
I think if Miss Mason could magically be teleported into our time, she would strongly support using the vast new resources that are available in our modern day. She would in no way want us to adhere strictly only to the books and methods she used in her time. She would find high quality books among modern authors. She might even have favorite Twitter accounts and Facebook pages!
Charlotte Mason used what she had. Let's see what she had compared to what we have today.
Charlotte Mason Used Nature
All around her were untouched wild lands, fields ripe with life, and places to freely explore whenever she and her students had a desire.
Today with increasing urbanization, many wild areas are cordoned off, with special paths for walking and signs telling children not to touch the plants or play in the ponds. While there are still many farm families who have unlimited access to nature in their area, many urban and suburban children are limited in their experiences with nature. Modern day nature study needs to look different for the modern Sonlight homeschool family. And Charlotte Mason would absolutely approve of zoo trips counting as nature study!
Charlotte Mason Used Books
Charlotte Mason loved books, but the only books that made it on her approved list were ones published before and during her lifetime. She had books that were written mainly to adults and had very few pictures. (Children's literature wasn't really a thing in the late 1800s.) When she wanted a new book for her students, she had to travel by horse, look through the slim pickings, or rely on suggestions by friends and other educators.
She didn’t have curriculum shops with free shipping, loyalty programs, and a guarantee. In fact, she had to wait months for books to arrive with no sneak peek inside and no customer reviews to determine appropriateness for children. Her books came with black and white illustrations, rather than full-color, glossy photos. She did the best with what she had and constantly sourced new materials, but her books were much more limited than what we have available today.
Would Charlotte Mason forbid families use modern day books? Of course not! We can look at what she chose from what was available and made inferences about what modern books would also qualify as CM-worthy.
Charlotte Mason Used Paper and Slates
Children recorded what they saw and learned on paper and on slates. Those were the tools she had. Charlotte Mason didn’t have Netflix or Prime Video that brought far away ecosystems and historic locales right into the living room. She didn’t have internet search or Google maps for children who wanted to know more. She didn’t have access to information at her fingertips.
I think Miss Mason would have embraced nearly every form of modern learning that puts children in the presence of worthy ideas.
a natural museum full of mummies, dinosaur bones, and historical artifacts
a zoo webcam showing the birth of new baby giraffe
e-readers with the ability to store hundreds of books in an conveniently portable format
Can you imagine how she would have rejoiced with the wealth of great books of today? And how easily it is to access them either with inter-library loan or shopping online?!
Charlotte Mason would be absolutely giddy with all the information she could access online today for learning. She would still make everything pass the test of living (book/website/resource) vs. twaddle. If she were alive today, her curriculum would look very different from what she espoused in the late 1800s. In fact, I think a modern day CM curriculum would look an awful lot like Sonlight.
I’ll begin my eighth year teaching my children with Sonlight curriculum this fall, and while my children have enjoyed it thoroughly, I have to admit that I have more fun than anyone! Let’s just say that my kids never have to beg me very long to read “just one more chapter!”
Over the last seven years, we have been exposed to the best of the best in children’s literature. My kids and I have read across the world, living vicariously through the well-developed characters that star in the perfectly-spun stories. There is no lack of options, that’s for sure. In fact, I can’t think of a single Sonlight book that has fallen flat in our eyes. So, as you can imagine, choosing only ten books for the early years was a difficult task! I chose the books which left us changed somehow. Here is my list of books from Sonlight early years that you absolutely cannot miss.
This thoughtful book by Eleanor Estes tells the story of a group of girls who make fun of another little girl. It is a scene that you will surely find at least somewhat familiar.
We have read this book a total of three times because I feel we need a refresher every once in a while.
This book is unique in that it allows the reader to see themselves as both the protagonist and the antagonist figures. It is so relatable that you will surely find empathy for each character, leading to plenty of great discussions. It is written in a way that makes it clear how easy it can be to fall into the pattern of making fun of others without realizing the repercussions. This makes an excellent book for the beginning of the school year.
I think it is a rare gem to read a book that changes the course of your life, but this book was just that for our family. We were not the same people after reading about the life of George Muller. His testimony of following the will of God for his life and trusting Him for each and every need built our faith as a family, and we began to ask ourselves challenging questions. Before and throughout the reading of the book, we had been prayerfully considering adopting a child from foster care. By the end, there was no doubt in our minds that God was calling us to give our family to a child.
We have read the story of George Muller four times over the last seven years, and I have recommended it to multiple families. Contrary to what it may seem, we are not big fans of re-reading books. However, sometimes a book is worthy of reading over and over. This was one of those books, and I am sure that it won’t be our last reading of George Muller.
This is the precious story of the impact of one excellent teacher on a rural community. From a homeschool mom's perspective, this book reminded me of what I wanted to be for my kids. As we discussed this book, I kept noticing my kids bring up one thread which ran throughout the whole story:“She understands the kids.”
To understand someone else and to be understood is one of the great desires of humanity, and Miss Agnes absolutely understood her students. This book also reminds us of the change that one person can bring about. This is a pretty quick read, but the effects linger.
I am pretty sure that Janet and Geoff Benge are among my favorite authors. While they definitely have excellent material to write about, they really do have a way of telling the stories of these Heroes of the Faith in such a challenging way. Honestly, I could include several more of their books in this list, but I limited myself to two.
Gladys Aylward is the story of a missionary who went to China and cared for several hundred children during a war. She adopted several of the children and impacted her region forever.
This was not only a great biography, but it is also an exciting story. We stayed on the edge of our seats the whole time, anxiously anticipating the next chapter. We had many conversations about courage and God’s ability to do the impossible.
I know how controversial this pick is! Oh, the mothers who have found themselves scratching their heads on this book! At first glance, it is certainly an odd duck among the Sonlight treasury.
Many people can’t seem to derive the goodness from this collection of poetry. To appreciate it, you have to realize it isn’t typical poetry. For the most part, the poems aren’t rhyming, but they are amusing. The simple, everyday commentary that each poem provides on the most common subject matter is enough to make you think, “Hmm….”
I love brief, thought-provoking commentary on the most common subjects. That’s why this book contains several of my personal favorites. We have read this one almost every year!
This selection starts out slow, so slow that you may be tempted to abandon it. I implore you...don’t do it! You’ll regret it for the rest of your life.
This is one of only a handful of books that I absolutely bawled through. A sweet story of the journey of a young boy across the Southwest, this book has it all. Tackling difficult subjects such as hunger, honor, and slavery with grace is quite the balancing act, but Betty Baker does an excellent job. This story will no doubt leave you with much to ponder and discuss with your children.
In our family, we love a good, clean mystery, and that is exactly what this book provided. Set in Ancient Rome, this story is laced with great historical richness. A few students find their teacher injured and their classroom in disarray one day. To clear the name of their good friend, the children set out to find the culprit.
It is a fantastic story that will keep you wondering what will happen next. While it might seem serious, there is plenty of great humor woven within the plotline. It is a longer read with plenty of clues and characters to keep track of, but even my youngest children followed along well. Oh yes, and don’t forget to schedule a Toga Day during the reading of this book! It’s a must to get the full effect of the novel.
This is probably the most surprising selection, even to me! It seems that this book isn’t necessarily a stand-out in many lists, but it is so fun! A fantastical story, this will keep imaginations engaged. Also, with a great twist at the end, it’s sure to leave you highly interested. It was so much fun to speculate throughout the story about what would happen next.
A man plans to fly across the Pacific Ocean but somehow lands on the secret island of Krakatoa. And that's where the story really gets interesting.
This historical fiction has some sentimental value to me, as I read it when I was in grade school and loved it then. But it truly is a wonderful story of survival and friendship. A boy is left alone in the wilderness for a long while and forges an unlikely friendship with the Native Americans, who help him survive.
This story provides opportunities to discuss preconceived notions of others, independence, and perseverance in the face of hardship. It also gives the chance to ask the classic question, “What would you do?”
A more lovable character could never be found! Gooney Bird Greene is either who you were as a child or who you wanted to be friends with! This is a sweet story of a little girl who tries to find her place at school and learns plenty of good lessons along the way. Reminiscent of the Ramona books, Gooney Bird will definitely capture your heart.
One of the best features of this book has to be the lack of disrespectfulness that you might find in other books with a similar storyline. This is what makes her so captivating in my opinion: the spunk without the sass.
Like I said, we have been with Sonlight for eight years now and we’ve yet to find a book that we didn’t appreciate. It’s so nice to know that you are getting a year’s worth of fantastic literature when you decide to go with Sonlight.
With a world full of what Charlotte Mason appropriately labeled twaddle, it’s refreshing to read through the Sonlight booklist. It was a challenge to chose only ten books from the expansive Sonlight read-aloud booklist, so don't stop at these ten! Read more great Sonlight titles.
Request a catalog so you can see all the great books included in the original literature-based homeschool curriculum.
Great books do more than build comprehension skills, develop rich vocabularies, and lay the foundation of cultural literacy. Yes, they do all of that in the academic realm. But they do so much more in the aesthetic arena, too.
When you read aloud beautiful books, you give your children a love of beautiful writing.
Best of all... if kindness is high on your list of character traits to develop in your children, you'll be pleased to know that reading books can develop empathy. Yes! Something as simple, as easy, and as enjoyable as reading a lovely novel can actually impart emotional intelligence and godly character.
How? Well, the quality of the book matters. Reading twaddle will not have the same effect. That's why the Sonlight team spends thousands of hours a year previewing and culling hundreds of titles. We choose only the best to add to our curriculum packages and summer reader sets.
To build empathy in kids ages 6-8, you can't do better than these 12 carefully chosen titles. Each one uniquely provides your children with fresh perspectives. As they read or listen to you read aloud to them, they will see through the eyes of characters who feel a range of emotions: guilt, elation, sorrow, grief, affection, and excitement. (Be sure to see the list of books for ages 3-5 if you're raising younger children.)
If you are using these books as part of a homeschool curriculum, remember that your Instructor's Guide (IG) alerts you to vocabulary words, historical background, and any special notes of caution. And to help you make the most of the empathy-building potential in these books, your IG also outlines discussion questions for each day.
This heartwarming classic explores the friendship between a little girl, a selfless spider and "the world's greatest pig." Covering important and often difficult topics, this book will make you both laugh and cry. You and your children together will see how life can be full of joys and loss, victories and disappointments.
Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher is the insightful story of how an over-protected girl becomes a self-confident young woman. This book makes life over a hundred years ago tangible, personal, and real. Reading it lends naturally to discussions of important topics such as courage and care, good intentions, and personal responsibility.
A teacher from England connects with the hearts and minds of students in a one-room Athabascan school in Alaska in 1948.
We love this book, and we think you will as well. It offers so many insights into effective education and cross-cultural communication. Miss Agnes, a late middle-aged English woman, shows tremendous respect for the Athabascan children in her classroom, children who had never been respected by an "outsider" before. The effects are electric not only in the relationships that result between teacher and students, but also in the relationships that subsequently develop between Miss Agnes and her students' parents. These produce benefits that flow to the village as a whole.
The empathy-boosting themes in this title include cross-cultural insight, methods of learning, self-discovery, and personal growth.
A young farm boy and his sheep grow up together in this novel. It's touching, beautifully crafted, and thought-provoking. Yes, it's a more mature book because it deals with deep life issues: birth, death, real life farm activities, working hard, and living off the land.
The family never protects their young son from the realities of life but instead allows his experiences to mold him into a caring, competent and mature man. It's an outstanding model of parenting for us and fodder for empathy for our children.
Jordan Johnston is average. Not short, not tall. Not plump, not slim. Not gifted, not flunking out. Even her shoe size is average.
Feeling doomed to a life of wallowing in the soggy middle, she makes a goal: By the end of the year, she'll discover her great talent. She'll find a way to become extraordinary and everyone will know about it!
This compelling story explores the greatest achievement possible – personal acceptance. By reading Jordan's journey to learn to accept herself, your children will also learn to accept others.
Chester, a cricket from Connecticut, moves into the Bellinis' Newspaper Stand in New York City.
His escapades at first threaten to ruin the stand, but lead, ultimately, to the stand's greatest success. Fun! But also moving. Your children will learn to to say goodbye and how to accept loss by experiencing it through the eyes of the characters.
Newbery Medal-winning story of the crippled son of a medieval lord. Robin learns patience and strength from the friar who cares for him. The book's title comes from the friar's advice for overcoming a challenge: you must first find "the door in the wall."
Through Robin's persistence in the face of disappointments, your children see a constructive way to handle life's obstacles. And they learn compassion for those who are facing them.
Set in occupied Holland during World War II, this novel tells the story of Johanna and her grandparents. With the help of a friendly German soldier, they save the figurines of their town's church clock.
You and your children will be touched by the quiet strength and compassion in this story. It includes themes of risk, self-sacrifice, and doing the right thing in the face of danger.
The mountainous island of Capri has a mystery and it takes the innkeeper's son, Michele, and three foreigners to get to the bottom of it. There's witty humor; there's suspense. And woven throughout is a subtle thread of facing fears with the only thing that can ultimately triumph over them—truth
12-year-old Natalie Nelson writes a novel that her best friend, Zoe, thinks is good enough to be published. Natalie isn't so sure.
The two set out to achieve the impossible: get the book published by a major publisher. Fascinating and realistic glimpse into the world of book publishing.
Richly layered with mystery and intrigue, Sticks Across the Chimney tells a captivating story of two Danish children and their widowed mother, struggling to survive on a dilapidated farm.
The children's wit, compassion, and creativity influence events and touch everyone around them. It's an authentic look at rural Denmark in the 20th century.
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I see educators try to hide learning under layers of unrelated pulp and nonsense. It’s thought that if we smuggle math within a noisy, colourful computer game, we can bypass the child’s natural hatred for math. But children don’t hate math!
There are two common reasons for homeschool reluctance:
The lesson violates the child's natural rhythms.
The learning seems pointless to the child.
They don’t see why they should have to sit down to work out 47 – 3, or they don’t see why they should have to express it precisely so.
Often the way they see their work is affected by how we divide their time. Here are four tips for scheduling the homeschool day to fan the flame of meaningful discovery, so we don’t have to light match after match of pulp and nonsense.
1. Read as They’re Waking Up
Natural Learning
I’m sure you have noticed that your child
is much more willing to cozy up for a story after they’ve been exhausted by a
visit to the park. Having sprung and thrashed and romped, she is ready to
fine-tune herself to the particulars of a page. There is a rhythmical expansion
and contraction in her day.
Wake-up time is a seldom-recognized moment contracted to the slow and the small. We either try to skip that first languorous beat of their rhythm by banging pots and pans, or we just accept that homeschooling will have to wait, but have we tried playing to that first beat? Maybe the half-closed eyes see more of the far-reaching slowness of the read-aloud than in the expanded tumult of late-morning. Try scheduling Read-Alouds in those first moments.
2. Somersault the ABCs
Connected Learning
When I first started teaching my daughter to write, I simply sat her down at the table until she begrudgingly penned what I wanted to see. So excruciating was this process that I had to admit a failure of method.
My solution was to make the learning more physical. I arranged an ABCs gauntlet of zombies and spaghetti and swivel-chairs and sticks. When she managed to write cat using the chair and the spaghetti, we would play as cats on our way to the next station. Next we acted the letter o by somersaulting in the instructed direction between two strings laid on the floor.
Physicalizing both the symbols and the meaning was starting to make connections that were otherwise blocked. I stopped scheduling 15 minutes writing sentences and started scheduling 1 hour of ABCs gauntlet.
We’ve broken up and performed our homeschooling ever since. It’s not that she’s reluctant to learn when she’s sitting down, it’s that she’s reluctant to sit down when she’s learning.
3. Build in Education as Service
Purposeful Learning
To a child, learning is purposeful and experimental. It’s a process of investigation, directed ever outwards. He plays with LEGO, investigates physical rules, and retains the information. There’s plenty of input throughout the day that he does not retain, but he retains these rules because he has a sense that they are a part of a much bigger project.
Building a LEGO car, he creates a design that performs a real-world function. When he plays it, he has a burgeoning sense of influence on the shape of the world. As the scope of his sense of the real-world expands, so do his tools of learning.
That sense of influence on the world develops into a crucially social one.
With our instruction, he sees that his chief influence on the world is to make the Lord known though loving service. He starts to treasure the servant’s most effective tools. He becomes reluctant to go through drills simply for the sake of acquiring knowledge, and starts learning for the sake of love. This is why the most abiding antidote to reluctance is the experience of really shaping the world with his skills and actually helping people with his wisdom.
Schedule, for example, part of your Language Arts time specifically for the use of their knowledge to bless others.
Have an older child read a story to a younger sibling.
Have them count coins to buy a small gift for a play-date guest.
Have them write a letter to a pastor or missionary to encourage them in gospel ministry.
Don’t think of this as a fun extra; schedule it in as part of the lesson. I believe retention depends on this kind of purposefulness. When reluctance asks the question, "Why should I have to…?" empowered service answers, "Love."
4. Add Time with the Discovery Journal
Experimental Learning
There are more haters of Math than any other subject, and it’s no coincidence that there is no other subject where playful experimentation is so routinely disparaged. The student is treated as nothing more than a receptacle of information—a receptacle that keeps breaking and leaking. It’s no wonder that the student of Math is often reluctant.
I break many of our lessons into three:
experimentation
discovery
service
The second is the most personal and comes in the form of a journal. My daughter’s Discovery Journal is hers and only hers. I do not correct mistakes, nor mark it or test it.
Her entries run the gamut of profound and silly:
putting 10 of the blue bloks on the red one makes the same shape
a book sed evil bagets evil
I so so want chips.
Every time she opens that little journal, she is holding proof that she is a scientist, not a slave; a truth-teller, not just a receptacle—that she is becoming wise, not just performing drills.
I allow at least 5 minutes of any homeschool lesson for her personal wisdom-record when she can jot notes in her Discovery Journal.
So it seems learners are reluctant when learning is long and pointless. But there are ways to organize the day so that learning is natural, connected, purposeful, and experimental. Break up your lessons into smaller chunks and distribute it in ways that express learning physically and use the skills lovingly.
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Choose a curriculum that is both relevant and enjoyable, one that respects the mind of the child and gets the whole family eager to learn. Choose Sonlight.
