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Age 6 to 8

Homeschooling in the early elementary age gets more and more exciting! From feeling like you know everything, you begin to re-learn along side your child subject matter that you have long since stored away in the lost recesses of your mind.

I will be the first to admit that I have forgotten 80% of what I learned during my schooling years (yes, even if I was homeschooled for part of it). Most of the knowledge I retained as an adult had to do with the practical side of things. So, when I began to teach Elijah his elementary subjects, I was like, “This is great! I’m learning all of this stuff all over again.” And believe me, you will enjoy the teaching experience more if you don’t pressure yourself to be an expert at all the subject matter. Even school teachers specialize in just one or two areas of learning, so don’t feel discouraged that you don’t know EVERY SINGLE THING that you are teaching.

You can either learn it ahead of time (ex. Filipino subject) or learn it together with your child (ex. Science, History and Social Studies subjects). During the early elementary years, the math and language arts will still be easy enough to guide your child through them without referring much to teacher’s guides. Honestly, I am very bad at following teacher’s guides! Eventually, you may have to do more preparation time as the skill levels in these subjects, especially math, escalates.

I’ve given an overview of what homeschooling my eldest son, Elijah, is like so you can have an idea of what to expect.

In the early elementary years (Grade 1 to Grade 3), the Department of Education requires that you cover the following subject matter:

  • Character and Bible (more commonly known as Good Morals and Right Conduct or GMRC)
  • Math
  • Language Arts or English
  • Civics or Sibika (for my son, Elijah, I include World History)
  • Filipino
  • Science
  • Music, Art, and PE or MAPE

Schedule

A typical schedule for my son on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday COULD look like this:

7:00 AM – Wake up / Prayer time
7:30 – Breakfast as a family
8:00 – Violin and piano practice
9:00 – Independent Bible
reading/discussion time
with mom about character
and the Bible
9:45 – Science or History
10:15 – Language Arts and Math
11:00 – Break
11:30 – Filipino or Civics
12:00 – Projects or clean-up time
12:30 – Lunch
1:30 – One-on-one time with
Elijah if needed to
accomplish extra work or
projects
2:30 – Take a nap or attend
playgroup on Wednesdays
4:00 – Play (outdoors, ideally)
7:00 – Dinner
8:00 – Family time (with the exception of Monday night, which is my date night with Edric)

On Tuesday and Thursday, Elijah attends violin and Taekwondo classes. It is also his day to see his homeschool friends and have “boy’s time” with my husband, Edric, and his younger brother, Edan.

I emphasize COULD in all caps on my schedule because I’m not very militant about my homeschooling schedule. What I do follow is starting at 9am and finishing by noon or a little bit after. On some days when it takes us the whole morning to do a project, I will forgo the other subjects. Or, if we have an activity to attend, we won’t get to do subject studies. To stay “on track”, I identify how many chapters or pages we should be accomplishing by the end of each quarter and adjust the daily amount of work accordingly.

Homescholing the early elementary years starts to get a little more serious but that shouldn’t remove the fun. I maintain the same perspective that I do about teaching any other level — prioritize and preserve my child ‘s love for learning and customize it for his needs. And, have lots of time for free play! Play is an important part of the kids’ homeschool day!

8 thoughts on “Age 6 to 8

  1. Hi. what grade does Elijah start studying world history? is it too early for grade 1?

    Can I homeschool my daughter even if i am not good in grammar?

    1. Hi esjay, yes you can still homeschool but get the help of an online program like time4learning which can supplement areas of weakness that you feel you might have as a teacher. Also, Elijah started learning about world history in preschool. But grade 1 is a better age to start. It really depends on the material you will use. We used Linda Hobar’s Mystery of History. By August 2012, it should be available through Homeschool Solutions which is opening at fun ranch in tiendesitas. It’s not super cheap but we use one book for two years and several kids.

  2. Hello,

    I just want to ask because my daughter is nine years old, in 3rd grade. Im thinking of homeschooling her, it is not too late for her already? She loves her ‘green’ school but I could see the enormous amount of time she spends preparing for school, her being tired whenshe comes home at 5pm…

    1. Hi, it must be hard to see your daughter so tired all the time. It really is kind of crazy how school monopolizes the lives of our children. Homeschooling is a whole lot more “child-friendly” in the sense that kids get to really enjoy their childhood and still have lots of time to play. But it requires commitment from parents because you become responsible for the teaching. However, if you can come into it with the mindset that learning is a lifestyle, that it doesn’t have to happen in blocks of 30 to 45 minute periods per subject matter, and that focusing on character is foundational to making them responsive and easy to teach, then you will find that homeschooling is really a better option for educating your daughter. It is a customized education and she is still young so she will be able to adjust. But she may miss her friends so find time for them to get together and get her connected with other homeschoolers if you plan to homeschool her.:)

  3. My child is 6 and is currently enrolled in a conventional school and I’m thinking of trying to home school him after this school year. I’m wondering if he can still go back to conventional school after? For instance I home school him for 3 years then go back to conventional school. Or does he have to repeat everything from the year we stopped sending him to conv school all over again? Or is there a governing body that we can go to assess which level he is already? Thanks.

    1. Hi Anna, if your child is enrolled with an accredited homeschool program then you can transfer into the conventional school without difficulty. This means that the years that you have homeschooled for will be credited and acknowledged, and you will have necessary documents to support their years of schooling — report cards, form 137. You can check out this post https://teachwithjoy.com/2012/03/where-do-i-start/

      It should help you to get started. 🙂 God bless you!

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