Individual Learning Time: How to Teach Skill-based Subjects

Skill-based Subjects

My parents live in an area of the US that is experiencing extreme growth. So many people want to live there that houses are being built at unsustainable rates. Shortcuts are being taken to get them built quickly, not only to make money but to get the occupants in as soon as possible. One particular house was built on a poor foundation. The ground was not prepared properly, it wasn’t compacted and the surveying was sloppily done. It wasn’t long before the family noticed cracks in their walls, floor, and their doors weren’t shutting correctly on one side of the house. With some inspection they discovered their concrete foundation was sinking down into the ground, and the rest of their house was slumping to that sinking side, causing the rest of the problem. The only solution was to lift the house up and start all over again.

Some school subjects are like building a house, or any other building. It requires building one level at a time, and ensuring each level is solid before moving on to the next. If not, you’ll notice cracks and issues throughout the whole structure.

These skill-based subjects are known as the Three Rs – reading, writing and ‘rithmetic. These subjects require skills that are learned line upon line, precept upon precept. It’s extremely difficult for a child to spell or read “elephant” before they’ve learned basic phoneme sounds. And it’s difficult for a child to divide 144 by 12 if they haven’t learned multiplication yet.

But there are more skill-based subjects than just the Three R’s – there is music, drawing, and science as well. Although I enjoy making my own learning plans (i.e. curriculum) for content-based subjects, I prefer to buy a curriculum for these subjects as your child’s success really depends on skills being learned in the right order.

What do I look for in a skill-based subject?

What I Look For in Curriculum

Here are a few questions I ask and truths I ponder while looking at a curriculum:

Is it developmentally appropriate? The mind learns concepts first concretely, then mentally (imaginary), then abstractly. Concrete means hands-on, physically, through the senses. For example, a child learns what the number four means by counting four candies, rocks, siblings, toys, etc. They haven’t seen the number four on a piece of paper, but they know what four means. Once they understand a number in concrete ways, they can imagine those items in their mind. If I asked my son “if you have three cookies and you gave one to your sister, how many will you have left?” He can answer it because he can imagine the items in his mind. Finally, a child can understand the symbols on paper that represent the numbers they’re familiar with. They can use those symbols to solve problems. This is pure number, or abstract math. When a curriculum introduced concepts in that order, it is developmentally appropriate.

Is it based on cognitive science? I look for a curriculum where the lesson material is based on well-written books, not scripts or lectures written by someone who know little about what they’re talking about. I look for material that asks the student to retrieve past knowledge regularly through narration, and something that doesn’t try to cram information in and not asking for information to come out. I look for something that uses interleaving to help kids form relationships with the topic and develops their sense of observation. And I look for a curriculum that asks children to do the bulk of their learning – through writing, notebooking, and narrating – instead of the teacher doing the bulk of it for them.

Is it simple? I avoid curriculums that add a lot of unnecessary activities and fluff that detract from the main ideas of the lesson and cause a lot of work for me. If we are learning about the Vikings my son doesn’t need to make a viking ship out of popsicle sticks to understand the Vikings. Writing down two things he learned about the Vikings and drawing a diagram of the ship in his notebook is a much more simple and effective activity. I look for curriculums that 1) read a good book for lesson material (or use real things in the case of science and math), 2) ask my child to narrate afterwards (to explain what they learned in their own words), 3) retrieve past knowledge and relate it to what they learned today, and then 4) record what they learned in a blank notebook.

Individual Learning Time

After Family Gather time (usually around 10am) my boys take a 20-minute play break. This ins’t a time for Legos, make-believe play or board games. This is a time for movement and energy release. This is when I require my boys to do motor lab activities or recess games, like jumping rope or on the trampoline. This does two things: first, they refresh their brains and get some energy out. Second, movement is easy to interrupt to begin lessons again, and they’re usually tired and ready to sit down. If they are playing with toys they don’t want to stop.

After a movement break The boys separate and work on their skills based subjects. I have a basket for each boy with his school books and notebooks. I attach their daily logbook to the front so it’s easy to find. They work independently on their daily logbook assignments for the day. When they finish one they check it off and write beneath the subject what chapters or pages they read, or the lesson number. During individual time they grab their timer and work on that subject according to the time assigned in their logbook. The daily logbook has the following tasks:

Reading. Instead of me lecturing, they are “lectured” to by experts on the subject. They read books for history, science, literature and whatever else is assigned. Then they come to me and narrate, or narrate to themselves, if I’m busy with another boy.
Notebooks. They all record the date and weather in their daily calendars. Once they’ve narrated to me, they record what they learned in their notebooks. If we studied nature they draw/paint a picture of the specimen and their observations. If we did a science experiment the older kids record the process and results in the science notebook. They copy down quotes and poems they like in their commonplace and draw pictures of artifacts and record dates in their Book of Centuries (for middle and hs students). My oldest, who is in 6th grade, writes down or types his narration (a summary of what he read or learned) for one subject each day.
Copywork or Dictation. Besides phonics, this is the only language arts my 1-3 graders do. They simply copy down a sentence or two from a schoolbook. I usually pick one from our read-aloud, but it could be the poem or scripture we’re reciting. Before beginning I ask him to point out punctuation, capital letters, and any words they don’t know. We look up the words and then write down the difficult words on the chalkboard before copying down the sentence into their notebook. Dictation is for grades 4+ and is pretty much the same as copywork, except the child studies the sentence(s) before the parent takes it away and dictates while the child writes it down. This requires the child to remember where punctuation is and how to spell all the words.
Phonics/Reading. My boys in 1st-6th grade do word study, and need my help for the initial sort and lesson. I buy the guides for each stage and the lesson is outlined for me, so I just follow the instructions. We usually start a word sort on Monday and do the initial lesson, which takes more of my time, but the rest of the week is reviewing, resorting, and searching for words in their books and poetry, which they can do on their own. You can learn more about how I teach phonics and spelling through word study from THIS VIDEO.
Grammar. I don’t teach grammar until at least 4th grade, sometimes later, just depending on the child and their readiness. The grammar lessons I use don’t require very much teacher help, but I do ask my son to narrate what he learned the previous lesson (retrieve) and explain what he learned today.
Math. My boys pick up their math books from where they left off the previous day and begin working through problems. If it’s a new concept then I sit down with my younger ones and do a hands-on, concrete lesson according to the curriculum.

You probably noticed that I said “I help my boys with _______.” and are probably wondering how I manage to help them all at once, with a baby or toddler no less!

The secret to getting one-on-one time with each child is baby school.

Baby School

During our 2-hour individual time my boys do “baby school” with my toddler. They can take him outside to jump on the trampoline, swing him on the therapeutic swing, read books to him, watch him in the bath, or do any number of activities with him. Each boy gets to do 20 minutes of baby school while I work one-on-one with another boy. Sometimes I can stretch it out up to 30 minutes, if needed, but most days 20 minutes is enough to work on dictation, teach a math or phonics lesson, and listen to narrations.

Structure Time, Not Content

I used to bristle up at the idea of setting timers during school time. There shouldn’t be a time limit to learning! Children should be free to pursue topics as long as they want. To me, school time was a time for us to leisurely walk down the path of learning together, holding hands, smelling the flowers, and taking side trails whenever we pleased.

What actually happened was a lot of wasted time and very little learning.

There’s a principle in project management called “Parkinson’s Law.” Essentially, Parkinsons Law suggests that work expands to fill the time available for its completion. If you give yourself a time limit to accomplish a task you’ll get it done in the amount of time you set. I’ve found this law applies to homeschool just as much as business. Don’t be afraid to set timers for school lessons. I have my children write down questions or ideas for further learning during their narrations. They can pursue these, if they choose, during afternoon free time.

Next week I’ll go over all the supplies and materials I feel are essential for homeschool!

Homework Assignment

This week choose your skill-based subject curriculum, if you haven’t already. There are many to choose from, but I encourage you to look for one based on the criteria I mentioned above. You should have one for math, phonics, grammar (4th+), and science (4th+).