Kitchen Table Homeschool

"Today, we are going to talk about logistics. What do you need to buy for a complete English Language Arts homeschool course? We’ll go through a bunch of grade levels and the choices you have. Today--early elementary."

"Today, we are going to talk about logistics. What do you need to buy for a complete English Language Arts homeschool course? We’ll go through a bunch of grade levels and the choices you have. Not every year has to look the same; believe me, I was the Queen of the Curriculum Swap. I want to begin by talking to Drew about Exploring the World Through Story, which I wish had been around for my kids and I love enough to teach at Bookish. There seems to be confusion over what EWS does and doesn’t check off your ELA credit list. So, let’s go to the source."

"Today, let’s discuss how memory works, why it matters, and how to commit information to long-term memory. It’s hard work. This process doesn't always make your kid happy, and it may come packaged in a form that looks excruciatingly boring to you."

Jenn: "Today, we are returning to ELA with composition. Finally! Composition is a different beast than creative writing. While your students will apply the skills they learned in composition to creative writing, you can’t count that incredible story that your kid wrote and call it composition. Our recommendations for composition are going to seem familiar as it’s the same thing we always say:

Figure out your students' levels and move forward with daily incremental steps.

Courtney has some research to tell you about, and I’ll share what worked and didn’t work in my home. You can thank me later for having five kids because I tried out a ton of curricula! :) "

Listener Questions in this episode: 1) How did you stay the course when you felt unmotivated? 2) What curricula would you recommend for a severely delayed child?

Listener Questions in this episode:
1) "How do you think homeschoolers are perceived in college admissions?"
2) "accommodations for testing, how to go about applying and receiving them"
3) "What do you think are important reasons / circumstances when a child should Not be homeschooled?"
4) "How do I get my homeschooled tween to start working hard, now that I’ve let them unschool up to now?"

Feeling like a little retail therapy? We share our favorite non-curriculum items and purchases, including vendors. As always, we get zero kickbacks or freebies. We buy everything we recommend with our own money.

Books speak directly to us as readers, inviting us to talk back, which can change our lives. Literature, as the name of an academic subject, refers to the study of stories, novels, poems, plays, and creative nonfiction like essays or memoirs. Literature study involves reading, analyzing, discussing, and (importantly!) writing about the works students have read.

Today: How did you get started in your respective homeschool-related careers (Bookish, homeschool evaluation)? Someone asks: What homeschool products do you, in hindsight, cringe at having used? What products do you wish you had used that you never got around to using or they weren’t available at the time? What do you think is the future of homeschooling 5, 10, 20 years from now? What is one thing you wish non-homeschoolers knew about homeschooling?

(This pod was recorded in October of 2023)

Today, we’re going to talk about how our own homeschooling is going this year, as well as homeschooling, in the news. We’ll swing back around to finish the ELA series later.