Save Over Half of  Your Preparation and Teaching Time!

Unit studies are especially beneficial if you are teaching more then one child. If you are teaching three children each seven different subjects using textbooks and workbooks – that’s a WHOPPING twenty one subjects to prepare and teach.

A family with three children using textbook methods might have one child study the Civil War another learning about Ancient Rome while another is studying the American Revolution in history. In Science one child may be studying plants, another the planets and another reptiles.

In Bible, one child may be studying Moses, another studying Joseph and another studying Paul. With unit studies, history, geography, art, music, science and Bible can all be taught together to all ages. Each child studies the topic at his level.

All children can go on field trips together, many projects can be done together, writing assignments vocabulary words will be about the same topic, just on different levels.

For example, while studying animals a younger child may be able to classify birds, mammals and insects. While an older child would classify animals in much more detail such as: Arachnids, crustaceans, etc. The older learns and helps to teach the younger while the younger learns from the older child.

Delight Directed: Planning

Delight-directed learning, with a set plan like Heart of Wisdom unit studies, begins by allowing children to be a part of the planning process. During the planning phase, allow the student to participate in choosing the resources for that unit (fiction novel, colorful reference book, video, Internet site, interactive multimedia, etc.). It’s very possible that a child might balk at the unit as a whole but later find a spark in one of the individual lessons.

To continue with the food analogy, a child might, say, groan over something he sees cooking, but after a taste, finds it pleasing to his palate.

Teaching Multi-Ages:  Sample Day

Mother is teaching Jenny (fifteen), John (thirteen), and Joseph (ten) a unit on the Middle Ages.

During the unit planning the three decide together on the resources. They look through the resources at Homeschool-Books.com or in the back of The Heart of Wisdom Teaching Approach book at the Middle Ages Resources. The three choose Kingfisher Illustrated Encyclopedia, and Eyewitness Medieval Life from their home library. Mother orders a novel,The Door in the Wall (from the library or a vendor) to read aloud during the unit.

While reviewing the lessons the children show the most interest in knights, castles, and medieval feasts. Before the unit begins they will pick up books on these topics from the library. Several opportunities will occur during the steps in each lesson to bring into play the delight-directed methods. Let’s look at an example of how each of the three children might discover their own level of interest in the lesson on knights.

The sample below is a lesson based on Heart of Wisdom teaching methods (combination of organized 4-Step unit study, Charlotte Mason approach, teaching to all learning styles).

Unit: Middle Ages. Lesson: Knights

In Step One (Excite), Mother is watching each student for a spark.  Step One activities evoke feedback which shows how interested each child is in the topic and suggests the possible duration of the lesson. As they brainstorm to make lists,John and Joshua both show an intense interest in this topic.

In Step Two, Mother reads the provided text in the unit, and then turns to the resources chosen during the unit planning phase. She reads aloud from the suggested pages in the Kingfisher Illustrated Encyclopedia and Eyewitness Medieval Life. John and Joseph spend time reading through the suggested web sites and library resources,and print out several illustrations of a knight’s armor and weapons.  Jenny also browses the Internet sites and chooses an image of a knight to add to her portfolio,but she leaves the boys to explore the sites as she moves on to Step Three assignments.

In Step Three, Mother allows each child to choose an activity:

• John (13) chooses to complete a writing assignment. Mother encourages this assignment because he needs more writing practice and he enjoys this topic. John writes a separate draft paragraph for each of several topics: tournaments, jousting, suits of armor, crossbows, and the Crusades. He searches or uses the Internet to find illustrations for each summary.

• Joseph (10) chooses to create a shield with a coat of arms. He uses colored pencils to design a coat of arms similar to those he viewed from the resources. He the makes the shield from cardboard and pastes or glues the coat of arms onto the shield.

• Jenny is not as interested in this topic so she copies a paragraph from Eyewitness Medieval Life and moves on to a math lesson (more about Jenny later).

In Step Four, the students choose how they will share their work.

• During this step,Mother and John are busy revising and correcting John’s drafts .After the corrections John glues illustrations to the summary pages and includes them in his portfolio. He chooses to add more on this topic to his portfolio and shares it with his grandparents.
• Joseph shows his shield to his father and explains his coat of arms.
• Jenny adds her writing and illustrations to her portfolio and shares the work with her brothers.

In this example, all three children have learned about knights. John has obviously learned the most. We know all three have learned significantly more than they would in a typical school where the children would read perhaps one boring paragraph about knights.

John and Joseph will continue on this topic in the coming weeks by choosing a novel and/or illustrated reference books from the library on knights ,or by learning more from the Internet. Their wise mother will continue to fan the flame as long as the fire burns (weeks or months). If no spark had appeared during this lesson, the amount of time spent on this lesson would have been dramatically different.

Jenny did not do a lot with the lesson on knights because she did not have a spark of interest. Later, however, Jenny’s spark shows up in the “Food in the Middle Ages” lesson. She ends up spending several hours researching and planning an authentic medieval feast for her family. She designs an elaborate menu for her portfolio and reads the library book Medieval Feasts to Joshua.

Four-Steps Summary

1. During Step One, look for the spark.
2. In Step Two, the spark will be your signal to encourage your student(s) to go on to more resources. If the lesson ignites a spark for one child and not another (which will probably be the case) don’t force all the students into spending time on further study. Take a trip to the library, or order books, or allow computer time for Internet search.
3. In Step Three, allow each child to choose the activity in which to do something with what he or she just learned. This could be anything from simple copy work or an involved project.
4. In Step Four, allow each child to choose how to share the material.

Teaching is much more than providing facts — real teaching means causing to learn. The delight-directed methods work when we provide opportunities for meaningful experiences,and then wait and watch for moments when children’s eyes light up. Then they’re off and running, determined and motivated to learn!

Many homeschoolers enjoy the benefits of using dynamic unit studies to maintain a high interest level in their course of study.   Here are the common types of unit studies you may wish to consider.

Integrated Unit Studies

Integrated unit studies organize the content of multiple subjects (such as English, Science, Social Studies) around one theme.  For instance, if the unit was “Russia”, the study might include stories from Russia (Reading), Animals in Siberia (science), Geography of Russia, history of the Cold War (Social Studies).  Multiple academic subjects can be pursued with this type of study: art, music, dance, theology, philosophy, poetry, etc.   It takes multiple resources and either a lot of planning or the purchase of a curriculum that includes the different resources.

Literature Based Unit Studies

This type of homeschool unit study is great for children and families who love books.  Often the unit is developed around a historical period or around a theme.  Quality books and classical literature are read throughout the unit.  Families using this type of unit study often construct time lines to display the big picture.

Hands-On Unit Studies

Hands on unit studies provide students with plenty of hands on projects.  This is great the kinesthetic learners or young learners particularly.  They can build models, write poems, create posters, and develop games and puzzles to reflect what they have learned.  The completion of their unit study often includes a scrap book or unit study book which reflects their projects.

Learning Tree Unit Studies

This unit study uses a tree as its model.  The student diagrams a tree with its roots as the resources used to study the topic (the trunk of the tree).  The branches are the main objectives to be accomplished.  The leaves are the books read; and the fruit are projects completed.  Before the unit starts, parents set a minimum number of resources and projects that the student must complete.  They are rewarded for doing more work than the minimum.

Interest Focused Unit Studies

This is a method of motivating a particular student in their study of difficult subjects by allowing them to focus on a favorite topic.  For example, you have a student who struggles with reading and writing but is fascinated by dinosaurs.  What kind of books do you want to get from the library?  As you introduce any topic: geography, writing, science – tie it to dinosaurs.  Students will be more interested in completing the writing assignments, learning geography, or studying the digestive system if it is tied to their interest.  A topic of interest is often studied anywhere between 3 and 9 months.

Advanced Unit Studies

The advanced unit study takes the interest focused unit study to a deeper level.  If a student has a long term interest in a particular topic, they can combine that topic with another topic to produce an in-depth study.  For instance, a student who continued a fascination of ballet for years, might do a study on dance during the Renaissance, including costumes and music for different periods and nations.  This type of unit study takes a lot of time and energy to pursue, but is a great way to culminate a long-term interest.

Interdisciplinary teaching may sound like a elaborate concept, but it is really a great way to save time and combine resources.  The word interdisciplinary refers to the use of two or more subjects (disciplines).  So, basically, interdisciplinary teaching is about showing relationships between subject with one given topic.  Showing relationships between subjects helps children connect their “homework” to real life.  Kids get excited when they can connect a topic from one subject to the next.  It keeps them interested in learning more.  So, how does one get started planning something like this?  I often find that starting with a book helps.

One of my favorite interdisciplinary units focuses on the children’s  historical fiction novel, The Watsons Go to Birmingham:  1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis.  In short, this is a story about an African American family that lives in Flint, Michigan in the year 1963.  They story takes them through the winter in Flint and then on to Birmingham, Alabama in the summer.  I use the book to come up with activities for many subjects.  Of course, reading is covered by reading the novel.  Language arts is covered through vocabulary words and discussion of slang. I bring social studies in with civil rights and history lessons about what it was like in Birmingham in 1963 and by mapping the family took to get to Birmingham.  Math is connected to real life by calculating the distance from Flint to Birmingham, comparing how much gas would have cost them in 1963 as compared to today, and figuring out how long it would take the Watsons to make their trip traveling at 1963′s highways speeds.  Science can be covered by comparing the climate of Flint to the climate of Birmingham.  These are just a sampling of the many activities you can get from just one book.

It is so much fun to make interdisciplinary connections between core subjects and the arts. For example, teaching an interdisciplinary unit connecting chemistry with art may help to reach a student who doesn’t have a lot of interest in science, but is a lover of art.  Creating connections between math and music will not only make math fun, but may foster a love for music in your logical-mathematical child.  In turn, it could open up an interest in math for your aspiring musician.