Home Schooling

Reading and writing are the "bottom line" when it comes to education. If a person cannot read and write they cannot progress much in the 21st century.

So, this is the obvious place to start when you begin home schooling your child. However, there are other considerations that you will also have to take into account.

1. Set Goals

To begin with, decide what your final goals for your child's education are. For example, "I would like my child to go to University and earn a degree", or "I would like my child to finish school and be proficient in Math, Science and several foreign languages."

Each parent has their own ideas on how they would like their child to progress and their home schooling decisions must be based on these ideas. Of course you cannot know what your child will decide later on in life but you can begin to plan their education now and steer them in the "right" direction.

A good idea is to ensure that your child's education is as broad as possible giving them a wide range of choices later on.

Once you have sketched this goal outline for your child's education and you know why and what you want to teach your child in their home school environment, you are then ready to begin.

The first place to begin is to teach your child to read and write and progress naturally form there.

2. A System

The first thing you will have to do now is decide on the method you will be using to teach your child to read and write. Will you develop your own, or will you buy someone else's?

There are benefits to both choices; however, the danger of developing your own method is that you will be spending more time experimenting when in fact you could have spent that time reading.

I recently spoke with a father who is home schooling his five year old daughter, who had spent 8 months teaching her to read, without a method, and she still could only read a few words. He thought there something wrong with his daughter and had her checked out by psychologists; their conclusion was that she was fine. He then put the blame on himself. Well, the only thing "wrong" with him was that he didn't have a system.

By implementing a reliable, easy and proven system to your home school efforts you will be astounded by the progress your child can make in a very short period of time.

And seeing as your main objective here is to get your child reading and writing so that you canreally get on with their home school education, implementing a good system is of paramount importance.

3. Be Consistent

Once you have finalized all the details; you know what your goals are and what system you are going to use, you are ready to begin home schooling your child in earnest.

Bear in mind that children love routine. For this reason, ensure that all of their home schooling lessons are planned and timed, even if you are a relaxed, go-with-the-flow kind of parent, some kind of structure and "security" is always advisable.

Set a time for your child's reading and writing lesson every day. Make sure not to overload them so that they will always see their lessons as fun. This will keep your child interested and coming back for more.

As most parents begin home schooling their children quite early, usually when the child is only 3 or 4 years old, it is important to remember that initially your child's lessons should not be longer than 10 minutes as this will be the extent of their attention span. It will naturally increase later on as your child gets older.

Consistency is key. Set up an easy, comfortable routine and watch your child flower.

Home schooling your child can be daunting at times, but by following the three simple points above you will be able to undertake this challenge and flourish. With a little planning and effort on your part your child should be well on their way to a very successful home school education.