Keeping the Home by Lori Seaborg

Saturday, November 17, 2007

A Practical Way to Teach a Love of Learning

Teaching a love of learning along with how to learn can be a lot of fun!

On Mondays, our children (ages 12, 10, and 7 - our 4yo doesn't yet participate) choose a subject to study for the week. They choose a subject of their choice, anything under the sun.

Some recent subjects: Time, Chickens, Video Game Designing, Horses, Baking.

On Friday, I want to receive from each person a paper or "notebooking" page or lapbook on the subject chosen. I don't have a lot of rules about this, but just want something to save for their notebooks (binders, with page protectors), and proof that they did indeed research.

During the week, ample time and resources are at their disposal for research: books, the internet, a library day, a camera, science supplies and anything else they need.

At our house, we always leave available many types of scissors, all of the writing implements you can imagine, paper of many types, etc. The children can use whatever they need for their research.

This doesn't take much time for me to plan. Maybe a trip to the library, or help searching on the Internet.

Any time it does take is well worth it, because it's rewarding to see the children happily learning about a subject that has caught their interest.

by Lori Seaborg 2007