The homeschool movement is on the rise. More parents are aspiring to a lifestyle that maintains their relationship with their children and grandchildren, and it’s gaining popularity. Recent estimates claim that as many as 8% of United States school-aged children are homeschooling.
We are aware that there are different types of schools. We know that one methodology does not foster the best possible outcomes for every child, nor reflects the values of every family.
There are several distinct homeschooling approaches as well, each with its own philosophy, methods, world perspective, and techniques.
Often parents, in choosing what their homeschool life looks like, default to what they know best. And that is most commonly an adaptation of modern government-run schooling, or an abrupt departure from the very idea of school, known widely as “unschooling”.
You can search each style or philosophy to understand what features distinguish each one, but they all sound great and very much alike until you start to implement.
All the Ways to Homeschool
ChatGPT identifies the following styles:
TRADITIONAL
“Mimics a conventional school structure, using a set curriculum with scheduled subjects and assessments.”
As this is what most of us have experienced, it tends to be first impression of what a “proper” homeschool looks like.
I suppose if it happens at home, it qualifies, but my first reaction is: Why bother following the same model if you’re looking for a different outcome?
Doing more of what already “doesn’t work terribly well” takes time to recognize. We often have to get into the trenches to be able to identify our weak spots.
Stepping into acknowledgement of our personal responsibility requires a monumental shift in consciousness, which I wholeheartedly applaud.
ONLINE / VIRTUAL
“Utilizes online platforms and courses, allowing students to learn through digital resources while often still having flexibility in their schedules.”
This is a popular default for our screen-obsessed culture. It feels like cutting edge, as having so much information available in a moment certainly lends itself to the growing demand for options, which I appreciate.
It also, however, enables our habit to annihilate our human capacities in favor of expediency.
Screen-fatigue is a thing. Prolonged use of screens leads to exhaustion and burnout.
It makes us more self-conscious and dampens our capacity to read social cues with emotional intelligence. It restricts the body-sensation of being alive that comes from in-person interactions while feeding our habit of self-distracting from the monotony.
CLASSICAL
“Based on the trivium (grammar, logic, and rhetoric), this approach emphasizes rigorous academic study, critical thinking, and a strong foundation in the liberal arts.”
I’ve always been fascinated with the canon of knowledge that informs how we’ve gotten to where we are today. I appreciate the classics much like the arts for their ability to convey universal qualities.
In today’s global world, it’s easy to poo-poo our classics for their preponderance of all the things we don’t like anymore about “dead white guys”. But given it’s provided the foundation for our Western heritage, and you can’t understand anyone else without understanding yourself as well, we need to honor what’s come before.
I don’t, however, think today’s school-children need such a head-obsessed litany of Knowledge at the expense of all the richness in today’s world. I think it’s all good stuff, but there are more effective ways to foster love in our children for today’s world, than strictly old-skool style.
Let’s provide a foundation that nurtures love for all of it, but when their brain is ready.
MONTESSORI
“Encourages self-directed learning with hands-on materials and a focus on practical life skills. It promotes independence and respect for a child’s natural development.”
Montessori has become a gateway in normalizing small shifts in American perspective. It’s now widely recognized as holding space for childhood being uniquely different-sized than adulthood, which is reasonable but often ignored in practice.
After early childhood, it seems to merge into more traditional school practices.
I love the Montessori-developed market for child-size versions of adult tools, though it feeds our appetite for endless materialism.
CHARLOTTE MASON
“A rich, holistic approach that emphasizes a love for learning, nature, and the development of character.”
Charlotte Mason is my vibe. But I was an early reader and plan to retire to a bookstore cottage in my old age.
It’s all about using the gorgeous literature of “Living Books” to bring the world to the child, using narration to gauge retention and comprehension over time, embracing nature study up close and personally, using art and composers to illustrate and enliven the past, and never overdoing any of it.
WALDORF
“Focuses on holistic development, integrating arts, nature, and imaginative play. It follows a rhythmic structure and emphasizes learning in alignment with a child’s developmental stages.”
Well, yes … but there’s so much more to it that sings!
I’ll come back to what and how and why in another article: Why Homeschool the Waldorf Waldorf Way?
UNSCHOOLING
“Centers on child-led learning, where children pursue their interests and curiosities without a formal curriculum. Parents act as facilitators, providing resources and support.”
Unschooling assumes that children have an inborn drive to learn and master their world, and the less we interfere, the more adept they can become in navigating the world for their own purposes.
I agreed wholeheartedly when I was growing up in Alaska. But Alaskans who survive are those who recognize and respect that Mother Nature is a force to be reckoned with.
I find it hard to accept that children who have been insulated from the natural world, tied to screens since birth and raised in a thoroughly technological faux-world, have intrinsic abilities commensurate with a child who’s intimately familiar with seasonal weather changes, with real-world danger and risk, and the experience of being in a physical body in an all-embracing world.
Every family subjected to the artifices of our modern world, requires, at a minimum, a period of decompression made possible by embracing un-schooling tenets. But then let’s get on with it.
Adulthood requires a transition from childhood. Children raised by wolves are not the same as children raised with fully-formed human beings. Extreme comparison, but a tendency persists for negligence and laziness that can sweep us up in our own overwhelm.
ECLECTIC
“Combines elements from various educational philosophies to create a customized curriculum that meets the unique needs and interests of the child.”
Isn’t this the glory of opportunity in having OPTIONS?!
The beauty of the homeschooling lifestyle is learning to appreciate where you are and where you want to go. We are all operating in our own isolation chamber until we interface with someone different.
Parents need room to recognize the humanity intrinsic in learning. It is a process as much as a destination.
So what is Waldorf education about and why … ?
I grew up in south-central Alaska. I was a typical 1980s public school kid from Kindergarten through fourth grade. We lived in a walk-able distance from the local elementary school, rode our bikes for summer registration and relied on the school bus to get from home to school during the school year.
There was much I loved about my classroom, and there was much I loathed about it. Same with being homeschooled.
Then I found The Teenage Liberation Handbook: How to Quit School and Get a Real Life and Education by Grace Llewellyn.
The Teenage Liberation Handbook is (still) the only complete guide to unschooling written for youth. It tackles everything:
- why to consider self-directed education
- communicating with reluctant parents
- “getting a social life without proms”
- designing a “tailor-made intellectual extravaganza” and getting into college
- finding great mentors, apprenticeships, and volunteer positions
It changed everything for me.
And then I discovered Waldorf Education, Rudolf Steiner’s writings, and the study of Anthroposophy: “A study of the human on a spiritual path to freedom, … a path that can ‘lead the spiritual in the human being to the spiritual in the universe’ ”.
“Anthroposophy is a modern spiritual path that cherishes and respects the freedom of each individual. It recognises however, that real freedom is actually an inner capacity that can only be obtained by degrees according to the spiritual development of the individual. The striving for this capacity, and the corresponding spiritual development, can be greatly assisted through a scientific study of the spiritual nature of humanity and the universe. Such a study is available in the writings and lectures of Rudolf Steiner – an initiate of the twentieth century. Steiner called his study spiritual research or Anthroposophy.” – anthroposophy.org.uk
“Seek the truly practical life, but seek it in such a way that it does not blind you to the spirit working in it. Seek the spirit, but seek it not out of spiritual greed, but so that you may apply it in genuinely practical life.” – Rudolf Steiner
Continued with Why Homeschool the Waldorf Way?
Megan Mills Hoffman is a middle-aged mama homeschooling her child in western New York, in the small town her husband grew up in. Working remotely as a life insurance broker, she is thinking and writing her way to create something better, happier, healthier. To Bringing Forth is where she shares and connects all the dots with what matters in a free spiritual life. You can read more of her articles here:
