I'm frequently asked this question by parents interested in homeschooling, but afraid to try. Here's my sarcastic response: That never stopped teachers in school!
Now for my real response: As a parent I can teach my children subjects I don't know by educating myself and seeking out mentors.
For example, one skill I want to teach my children is how to crochet. My grandmother crocheted. I, however, never learned. I can do the basic chain stitch and a single stitch, but that was it. My 11 year old daughter could do a chain stitch, but didn't seem interested in learning more.
A few weeks ago, my daughter and I attended a women's activity at church. The women were meeting to work on quilts for a local hospital's neonatal unit. As I was walking out the door to go, I felt inspired to ask my 11 year old daughter if she wanted to come along. When we arrived, we found the women gathered together in small groups working on different types of quilts. One group was crocheting. A woman was demonstrating different stitches. She graciously offered some yarn and a hook to my daughter who eagerly joined in. By the end of the evening, my 11 year old daughter was comfortably crocheting a variety of simple stitches. I also learned enough to do a simple baby blanket.
In the next few days, my 11 year old daughter completed a doll blanket. Her younger sisters were also eager to learn. We visited a local sewing shop and bought yarn and hooks. I decided to let them crochet sometimes while we have family scripture study as long as they took part in the discussion. Now when we finish a chapter, one of them will yell out, "Let's do another chapter." I never would have guessed that the key to more involvement in family scripture study was crocheting.
My 11 year old decided to crochet a hat. She even made up her own pattern. It turned out surprisingly well. I'm shocked. It looks like a hat.
So my advice to parents worried about teaching subjects they don't know is this: Don't worry. Amazing things can happen as long as you are willing to try.
8 comments:
When I got my "educaion" degree, one of the things they told us was "The best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else." This was supposed to apply to the kids teaching each other, but I know it applies more broadly than that.
And then I misspelled "education!"
Yea, I wish they had spell check on comments. I hate it when I do that.
I have found that I learn what my children are learning right along with them. I am deficient in history, but I found that as I read the books they read we both learn together. Usually with my kids teaching me.
Spunky, I sure can relate to that. I knew almost nothing about history when we started homeschooling. I couldn't identify a single country in Europe. I've sure learned a lot since then. Also, the internet makes it so easy to do research.
I, too, have to agree with Spunky. I think I have learned more homeschooling my children than all of them combined!
I agree on the learning along with idea. But I wanted to comment on the crochet and concentration. A knitting list I am on had a discussion about knitting in meetings the other day. someone went and looked up some research and found that working on something like knitting or crochet can actually increase concentration for some people (especially ADHD folks but also others). Also folks who are kinesthetic learners may benefit from doing something with their hands will listening.
That makes me feel better. I admitted to someone recently that I'm getting so much more out of church meetings now that I crochet during them.
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