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Homeschooling Books

 

The Three R's by Ruth Beechick, Published by Mott Media

    The Three R's is actually three short books in one great guide. They are: A Home Start in Reading, A Strong Start in Language, and An Easy Start in Arithmetic.

    I've read and started using the strategies outlined in The Three R's this year. It has almost completely removed the stress from our homeschool.

    This book gives you the permission you've been waiting for to simply teach your young children what you know without textbooks. Oh how simple and natural these methods are! You've already been teaching your children how to live naturally--why not teach them math, reading, and writing naturally too? 

    In the introduction to the reading section, Dr. Beechick says, "This is one of the easiest guides to reading instruction that you will ever find." I believe that's true of the writing and arithmetic sections as well.

    She explains the steps to teaching your child to read from prereading to fluency. For example Dr. Beechick states, "Prereading instruction is wider than the whole world." Just by living with them, answering questions, cooking, cleaning, figuring out their world together constitutes prereading. Letter sounds come next. It's all very relaxed. Pressure will not help you or your child.

    Dr. Beechick goes over the simple method of teaching writing and outlines the levels of difficulty through which your child needs to move during his entire education. She talks of the "proven track record" of the "powerful natural method" citing the fact that men like Benjamin Franklin used this same method by admiring great writing and putting himself to work imitating it until it became part of him.

    The arithmetic section explains modes of thinking and advises you on the approximate age progression of these modes. Dr. Beechick helps you understand that math is for real life, and what a relief that is. Your child can always be sure they have a reason for learning math concepts. There are also teaching suggestions and activities to get you started.

   In the reading section, Dr. Beechick lists activities you can use with each step. In the writing and arithmetic sections, she gives grade level guidelines up through third grade in case you want to know what schools teach at certain levels. The writing section also includes advice on spelling and sample lessons you could use with your children.

   This 120 page book relieved my mind so much when I found it. I can't help wishing all homeschooling parents (old and new) would read it and apply the method right away. I read it straight through the first time without stopping just to get a feel for the method. Then I went back and studied it to make sure I understood it, and I'm still studying it.

   Mark it up and use it as your teacher's guide. When you get some money saved up for schoolbooks, don't spend it on workbooks, textbooks or expensive phonics programs. Just buy great literature for your home library that the whole family can enjoy for years; and use those books, and any other books you get your hands on, with this very affordable but invaluable guide.

Can be purchased from Mott Media or from Christian Book Distributors for around $12.00. Also, check out other Ruth Beechick books at Mott Media.

 

Family Literature 

 

The Year of Miss Agnes by Kirkpatrick Hill,

Published by Simon & Schuster

    This is the story of how a teacher who is just right can affect young lives. The book takes place in a small Alaskan village in 1948.

    The children in a one room schoolhouse can't keep a teacher long, until Miss Agnes comes along. She puts away all the old textbooks, reads them stories, shows them places on the world map, and plays music on the record player. She even helps a deaf girl learn sign language.

    Miss Agnes respects her students. She loves them. She shows them there is a world out there, and they love her for it. She tells them each what they are good at, and she helps them see that learning is for a lifetime.

        "Miss Agnes didn't think school was just for kids."

        "'You have to keep learning all your life,' she said."

        "That was a good thing to think about, always learning      something new. It wasn't like you had to hurry up and         learn everything right away before the learning time was        over, it was like you could kind of relax and take your time    and enjoy it." 

 

    Can be purchased for about $5.00 from Sonlight Curriculum 

 

 

The Phantom Tollbooth
by Norton Juster

Published by Random House

    The Phantom Tollbooth written by Norton Juster in 1961, is about a boy named Milo that is never satisfied. He never wants to be doing what he's doing. He always hurries to get to the next thing, but doesn't know what to do when he gets there.

    One day after school, he finds a rather large package in his room. He opens it to discover directions and materials to make a tollbooth. He has "nothing better to do" so he decides to get his toy car and give it a try.

    He pays the toll and finds himself on a highway in the strange land of Expectations. This is where he meets the Whether Man who tells him "Expectations is the place you must always go to before you get to where you're going." He goes on his way and encounters all kinds of strange characters like Tock the talking watch dog with a giant clock in his side. Tock becomes his travel companion throughout many unbelievable adventures in this unknown land.

    Things are very unsettled there and Milo sets off on a journey to the Castle in the air to rescue the exiled princesses Rhyme and Reason in order to restore well . . . rhyme and reason to the land.

    This is a fun book with lost of great vocabulary and twisting of words. I read it to the whole family, but I probably would have a 9 or 10 year old read it on their own.

On sale at Random House for about $7.00 or can also be purchased at Christian Book Distributors.