Sometimes it's just so hard to fit it all in! Math, science, religious studies, handwriting, history, geography, foreign language, art, music, writing, poetry, non-fiction, fiction, health, PE . . . the list goes on for miles! Lately I've felt like there may be some gaps in my kids' learning. Not huge unfathomable canyons, but just some little things that we might be missing out on. After trying out many different approaches with not much luck, I finally came up with an idea that seems to be working.
It's not one of those amazing, "wow!" kind of ideas, but it is one of those ideas that made me go, "Why didn't I think of that years ago?"
We go to the library about once a week, or at a minimum, once every two weeks. Usually I just let the kids get stuff for them and I get stuff for me, and we go on our merry way. A couple of weeks ago, though, I got an idea. I would let the kids pick out their own books but I would also pick out some things for them. I browsed the non-fiction section for things I thought they might be interested in and took home a huge stack.
When I got home, I found an old plastic milk crate that was empty and decided it would be a great container for these books. I plopped them in, then hit the shelves at our house for even more books and filled it up. Then I implemented a new policy. On school days, the kids MUST read from the "Red Box" for at least 30 minutes each day.
Right now, there are books on Greek mythology, classical art, a road atlas, karate for kids, the Negro baseball league, Samurai, WWII, the Constitution, Christmas, dragons, the Underground Railroad, the Avengers and more. There are some easy readers and even some old Kids Discover magazines. Some of them are read every single day (mostly the mythology and Avengers right now) and others haven't been touched yet.
On Monday, we'll head to the library, return most of these and pick up some new ones. Some will stay for weeks and others will never be seen again. Some will go away for a while and come back in a month or two. There are books on different reading levels and different subjects. They can easily be traded out.
The best part of this is that my kids are LOVING the big red box. They haven't fought me on this even once. The big ones read to the little ones and they are picking up books they may have never given a second glance to on their own. I'm calling that a homeschool win!
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