When we first decided to homeschool, I had visions in my head of my girls (then ages 5, 3, and a baby) around the table learning together through books and hands-on activities. I couldn't wait to get started!
Of course, since my oldest was the only school-aged child, she was my main focus the first two years. My other girls were around us when we were homeschooling, but they were not usually actively engaged in the learning since they were still little.
This year, however, with my middle daughter entering kindergarten and my youngest turning 3 right before the school year started, I was SOOOO excited to start to truly implement family-style learning. And, we have LOVED it! I can't imagine schooling any other way and I want to shout from the rooftops (or at least from the top of my blog here on the interwebs) why I love it so much!
I absolutely LOVE how family-style homeschooling allows us to gain different perspectives. I cannot tell you how many times I've read something and asked my children their thoughts on it, and each of my girls, despite being very young, have added so much insight to our learning far beyond what any single one of us would've come away with if just learning on our own. This style of learning also teaches children to be collaborative, the importance of others' views, and how we can learn so much from one another as independent thinkers. This both gives them empowerment to have confidence in their own thoughts but also humility in knowing their opinions are not the only opinions, and that other people's thoughts are valid as well.
Many people believe family-style learning is impossible with a wider age range, but it truly isn't! You can use a base curriculum or set of books for a certain subject to teach your entire family with but then for older children, you can give them additional readings, assignments, or activities to do to challenge them beyond the spine of the curriculum. As children get older, they can do more on their own, so you can save the extension activties and learning for your older children to do during their indpendent work time. This leaves them to do their independent work while you work one on one with your younger children during their independent work, but the spine of the curriculum you do together.
Even beyond adding extension learning for your older children, just learning family-style in and of itself can be challenging for ALL ages. Your younger children are learning higher-level material just above where they be currently be which challenges them. Your older children can probably grasp the topics more easily, but if you have them try to help the younger children understand and even take over some of the reading/teaching if they are able, this becomes a challenge for them as well! There is nothing wrong with having your older children help teach as you facilitate becuase teaching is a higher level form of learning and it's a wonderful tool for your older children to deepen their understanding on a topic!
