Homeschool FAQ: where to start with a five year old child?

At the age of five learning should be anchored in everyday living and play still. I think you will find that if you do this and introduce lots of board, card and dice games plus a range of different activities exploring the natural world, how things work, an excursion into the community talking about what you experience, you'll have a busy and full curriculum that will meet your five year old's educational needs in a stress free way. Most children this age love playing 'school' by doing a few pages of maths and spelling, writing a few words on pictures that create or labels to describe displays or things they've made, or doing educational computer programs or apps.

Home education is a lot easier than most of us think - we don't need to model what schools do in exactly the same way they do it - we can make it up as we go along to suit the needs of our individual children and our family circumstances. And once you get into the swing of learning at home it becomes easier to identify the maths happening in deciding what toy to buy at the shop, baking, building a tower with construction toys; or the science in making 'magic' potions from random ingredients from the pantry or garden; or the technology in building balsa wood models or dolls' furniture, etc. 

Beverley Paine
Homeschool Australia
Unschool Australia
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