I notice that a lot of homeschool families, including our own, will give themselves “credit” for outings and experiences as part of their schooling, but I began to wonder what the difference is with our outings vs. a family with public schoolers. Because when we go bowling or go the library or go on a trip, I do see it as part of our homeschool day and long-term learning. But, obviously, public school families do these outings too. So, should I not be giving myself as much of a pat on the back for these outings as I thought?
These are absolutely not blanket statements, as there are some homeschool families this doesn’t apply to as much, and there are definitely public school families who are able to take a more active approach than others, but I began to recognize some differences:
–One difference, for us, is that our family spends a good deal of our days together. So, when we’ve just been to an airport to drop someone off or we go see the bunnies at the feed store, or even when we go get an ice cream and the owner shares with us his journey of starting his business- well, all of those are a shared experience that we build on while we’re doing our learning. When I’m making an analogy or literature connection or a science observation later in the year, these out-of-the-house experiences pop up frequently. Just by the nature of having a public school classroom full of kids with different backgrounds and experiences, lots of the learning needs to take place from a shared text instead of a shared experience. And some kids will definitely connect it to their own life observations naturally or when prompted to do so by the teacher, but I love how effortless our family’s outings can become a part of our learning.
–That said, I do put effort in when I know we’re going to a new place. I have the time (sometimes) and ability to make these experiences part of our learning by preparing ahead of time and reflecting upon afterwards. So, apart from the shared experiences and long-term building I just talked about, I also usually go out of my way to make our outings purposeful. Obviously the core piece is enjoying the experience. But if I know we’re going to a new city or we’re going to an alpaca farm or we’re going to get to take a train ride, then you can bet our borrowed library books will be overflowing with that theme. We’ll center our writing around it or read a book that connects. We’ll watch YouTubes to learn more or take a virtual tour ahead of time. If we’re going to see extended family, we make family trees and pull out maps to find where everyone lives. I’m always working to create the balance between offering information to enrich an experience while still letting it unfold naturally.
–“Conversation schooling” and “in-the-moment schooling” are also just more natural for us. I absolutely understand the idea of letting a vacation or outing be just that, especially when a family is in the busy days of away-school and after-school activities. So I completely respect that. But just the nature of our daily lives is that our kids are more accustomed to learning taking place on the go. Questions and conversations and reflections are a big part of our learning at home and that carries over into all situations. It’s just a guess, but I think many (not all) public school children might feel a bit taken aback if their parents were trying to get a learning lesson in during their fun outing; they work hard in school and doing their homework, and they definitely deserve a rest from that. But for many homeschoolers, this ‘learning from every experience’ is part of their days and a big part of how they interact with their parents.
So, maybe public school families wouldn’t agree – I definitely doubt it myself sometimes – and maybe even other homeschool families wouldn’t agree, but do I think outings, whether they are to a student recital or to an amusement park or even to the store, count as part of our home learning? Absolutely, I do.