Determine Learning Styles

Day 16 Practical Tips for Learning Styles and New Homeschooler Free Bootcamp

September 26, 2022 | Leave a Comment
This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

Day 16 practical tips for learning styles is our next topic for the 31 Day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers.

What you come to appreciate more about homeschooling is that being a first-rate teacher is not as easy as it may seem and it requires work.

You’ll want tips for learning styles so you’re armed for the personality of your different children.

In the beginning, new homeschoolers spend more time choosing curriculum than they do improving their ability to teach.

Day 16 Practical Tips for Learning Styles and New Homeschooler Free Bootcamp

Remembering that you are teaching a child and not a curriculum should motivate you to want to understand more about the learning process.

Learning tips and tricks of the trade takes time, but you should begin reading about learning how to teach rather than focusing exclusively on choosing curriculum.

{My curriculum sale last year.}

Too, applying knowledge of what you know now about learning styles will help you to tame the curriculum colossus.

Instead of focusing on learning about ALL curriculum this year, you can focus on just what your children need.

There will be plenty of time to come up for air and survey other options as you plod along.

Tips for Learning Styles

Along with my next post Day 17: How To Choose Curriculum Other than the “Looks Good” Method, I want to put in a nutshell what I have learned in my 20+ years or so of homeschooling and in my 10 years of advising other new homeschoolers. Easy?

Absolutely not because each family has different circumstances, but you need a starting point that works.

Between aligning curriculum that fits your child’s learning style and arming yourself with the strengths and weakness of each curriculum, your first year will be less daunting.

Look at some tips below.

Determine what your children like and don’t like and then you can see ways to teach that fits their learning style.

For example, if you have a child that learns best by hands-on, should you waste your time looking JUST at workbooks?

Workbooks have their place, but you are not trying to follow pubic school thinking where some feel that finishing a workbook equals learning.

It does not. I finished many work books when I was in elementary public school, but it did not always equal to mastery of the concept because I was lousy in math though I was a good student.

Who is Tina Robertson

But before you can appreciate how I can help you here are are a few things about me. Sure, this free new homeschooler boot camp is all about you.

However, you need to know that I’m not new to the homeschool world.

It has been several years since I wrote this series and I want to update you on my successes. And I’ve helped HUNDREDS get on the road to homeschooling.

Too, I have 3 homeschooled grads. So I’m well past having my oldest kid being 10 years old.

But the best part is that what I have for you works.

Also, look at a few other things about me.

I am the author of the book Homeschooling 31 Day Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers: When You Don’t Know Where to Begin

And I have a detailed self-paced online homeschool Kickstarter course. It is a detailed comprehensive course for first time homeschoolers.

That is enough about me.

This new homeschoolers free boot camp is about you. I’ve not only been helping new homeschoolers in person, but here at my site for years.

Also, I have created an easy course where you don’t have to wait to learn about learning styles.

Here is another example if you have a child that is a Competent Carl.

If he already excels at math, does he really need a lot of your help? Will purchasing a drill and kill workbook and your over explanations make him enjoy the first years of homeschooling?

On the other hand, if you are busy helping other children and you know that your Sociable Sue prefers one on one time with you, have you allowed time in your schedule to give her or him your undivided attention?

Refer back to these tips on what each personality likes and dislikes.

Ask yourself: “Am I the kind of teacher that “I” would want to learn from?”. If not, make improvements. It is a hard pill to swallow to make honest assessments, but homeschooling is for the brave and the humble.

Preparation is key to making sure your children enjoy you as a teacher.

Do you see some teaching tips you can implement now?

New to Homeschooling Start with the Basics

1 – 7 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

8-14 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

15 – of the 31 Day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

15: Discovering Learning Styles

Day 15: Discovering Learning Styles and New Homeschooler Free Bootcamp

September 20, 2022 | Leave a Comment
This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

Discovering Learning Styles is our next topic. Today is day 15 discovering learning styles for the 31 Day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers.

You will find an overwhelming amount of information on learning styles that is free and there exist volumes and volumes of scientific research galore too.

My desire is to whittle down this information into terms that we all can understand.

First, it’s important to realize that unless you have tutored your child up to this time, you may not be fully aware of his abilities, strengths and weaknesses.

Day 15: Discovering Learning Styles and New Homeschooler Free Bootcamp

True, from helping your child with his homework, you have an idea of his weak subjects, but it is quite another thing to be the full time teacher now.

What is a Learning Styles

Many homeschoolers come home to school only to realize that their bright and gifted child struggles with some concepts they feel should have been mastered in the lower grades.

On the other hand you may sense frustration because your child may have mastered some previous concepts. So now he finds learning tedious and boring drills a time waster.

It takes time to get to know your child.

1:1 tutoring is so much more comprehensive because you are now discovering his learning style.

Again, MANY definitions exist on the internet, but a learning style is the way a child prefers to learn.

It is easy to understand and talk about them like personalities than it is to talk about learning modes. Most references refer to auditory, visual and kinesthetic learner.

While it’s important to understand modes because it goes along with learning personalities, it is easier and more practical to understand their learning styles or personalities.

Cathy Duffy is queen of understanding learning styles.

Prior to the time she wrote the 100, 101, and 102 Top Picks For Homeschool Curriculum, we identified learning styles by quirky names like Golden Retriever or Concrete – Sequential.

In her book she uses terms like Perfect Paul, Competent Carl, Sociable Sue and Wiggly Willy to help you identify certain traits or characteristics.

I prefer to leave labeling alone, but information and knowledge on personality quirks can help you make a better choice in curriculum and it also helps to promote closer relationships with your children.

Unlike adults, children cannot articulate why they prefer to move when they learn math.

But if you make them think that something is wrong with them because they need to move, you may be heading toward problems and burnout.

Flexibility is needed to avoid the we-have-to-be-in-strait-jackets-before-we-can-learn thinking.

Day 15: Discovering Learning Styles

Another example is if you are a mom that enjoys doing projects in your home and you do not mind a fair amount of clutter, but your daughter is wilting away because she does not have an organized place to do school, then your stress factors are multiplied.

Educating yourself now as to all of your children’s learning style and yours too can help you to bring peace and calm to your home.

Insight into their weaknesses in one or more subjects will help you not just teach with excellence in mind, but to nurture your children.

Also, I have created an easy course where you don’t have to wait to learn about learning styles.

As you homeschool longer, it will be to your advantage to embrace differences and to understand them.

For example, I think about all the beautiful women and mothers whose personalities are opposite of mine.

We complement each other and use that strength for the benefit of our children when we meet together for a co-op.

Overlooking faults is a beautiful thing and finding the good in each personality, even your children sets them up to be the best at whatever they are capable of doing.

There is no one better than the other. We all have strengths and weakness.

New to Homeschooling Start with the Basics

Days 1 – 7 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

Days 8-14 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

Discovering Learning Styles in Homeschool

How Understanding Homeschool Teaching Styles Makes You Successful

September 1, 2022 | Leave a Comment
This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

Homeschool teaching styles wasn’t something I understood when I wanted to know homeschool learning styles.

Too, after researching for years and even teaching a workshop about it, there is still much confusion about how to identify homeschool teaching styles.

In addition, terms like modalities, teaching styles, and learning styles are terms that need to be clarified.

How Understanding Homeschool Teaching Styles Makes You Successful

However, tapping into the way a child prefers to learn is essential to success

Do you wonder why it seems like one child understands exactly what you mean when the other one seems clueless?

You know it’s not because that child is not trying to understand you.

It can be frustrating and discouraging to feel like you’re not getting your point across.

Homeschool Styles

First, for years research has been based on 3 types of learners.

They are either visual, auditory, or tactile or a combination of them.

How Understanding Homeschool Teaching Styles Makes You Successful. Do you wonder why it seems like one child understands exactly what you mean when the other one seems clueless? You know it's not because that child is not trying to understand you. It can be frustrating and discouraging to feel like you're not getting your point across. So instead of focusing on trying to funnel all people to categories or labels, I focused on understanding learning personalities.

And some of the characteristics of visual learners are:

Normally they learn through their eyes.
These types of learners love photos, maps, visuals,
diagrams and maps.

Next, look at a few characteristics of auditory leaners:

They tend to be good listeners.
And they can learn better through music, discussions, and sounds.
In addition, they love to record discussions and topics to listen back to later.

Lastly, some of the characteristics of tactile learners are

that they learn best by doing.
Hands-on projects, acting out, and performing experiments.

However, a lot of research has been done since this.

And although the science is not conclusive about exactly how we learn, we can agree that both children and adults have preferred ways of learning.

So instead of focusing on trying to funnel all people to categories or labels, I focused on understanding learning personalities.

Identifying Homeschool Learning Personalities

When you understand the way your child prefers to learn then you can teach him in a way that he enjoys learning.

To learn about personalities means to understand your and your child’s strengths and weakness.

Additionally, a learning personality means the skills a person uses to gather and perceive information.

So, a learning personality will include learning styles like visual, auditory, or tactile but it also includes personal preferences. That is more unique to individuals.

Too, I feel like understanding a personality is easier to identify than a learning style since many do not agree even on how many learning styles there are.

4 Ways Understanding Homeschool Teaching Styles Makes You Successful

You can plan a successful course with your child’s strengths and weaknesses in mind;
Specific goals can be set and met because your leaner will know how to meet them;
There is individualized education; and
Your learner will be eager to learn lifelong instead of struggling with why he doesn’t understand some subjects as well as he does others.

Identifying Your Homeschooled Child’s Learning Personality

Finally, after years of putting the pieces together, I have created an online self-paced course on how to identify your homeschool child’s learning personality.

This course will give you solid beginning points and look what you will learn.

YOU WILL LEARN:

How to understand the way your child prefers to learn so that you can teach him in a way that he enjoys learning;
How to pinpoint your child’s learning personality;
A starting point in understanding (barring any special learning challenges or disabilities) and accepting your child’s preferred way of taking in information;
Understanding when the learning personality emerges; and
Teaching tips for each learning personality to stop the head-butting.

Tapping into the way a child prefers to learn is essential to success.

Other Learning Styles Resources:

35+ Best Homeschool Curriculum By Learning Style (free printable)

August 1, 2022 | Leave a Comment
This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

Today I’ve rounded up 35 best homeschool curriculum by learning style. Besides, homeschool learning styles is a continuing learning process as educators.

Especially when we try to sort out what are learning styles, we’re not sure what is really helpful.

Besides, when I chose curriculum I never thought about the homeschool approach or my child’s learning style.

However, I’ve learned homeschool curriculum is organized by homeschool approach.

35+ Best Homeschool Curriculum By Learning Style (free printable)

So, the key to making a better choice for curriculum and not wasting time or money is to understand your child’s learning style.

This doesn’t mean that you’re coddling your children when you try to meet their learning style.

Quite the opposite, we appreciate differences and realize that not all kids learn in the same way.

Isn’t this why most of us are homeschoolers? We’re trying to meet the unique needs of our children.

Styles of Homeschooling

Too, understanding the inextricable link between homeschool learning style with homeschool approach equals success.

Sure, we’re not guaranteed of being successful in homeschooling, but we can increase the odds of success when we dive into understanding learning styles.

In addition, it’s important to know that your learning style by default usually becomes your teaching style.

Then, we inflict our teaching style on our child thinking it’s the best one because we learn through it.

Next thing you know we have no success with our child.

Worst yet some public-school educators and home educators believe the problem with learning is entirely the child’s problem.

As you can see, the more you understand and dig deeper into how each of your children learn, the more success you’ll have choosing curriculum wisely.

Homeschool Approaches

Instead of having all this floating around in your mind and trying to make it connected, look below at how I explain each one.

What is a homeschool approach?
A homeschool approach is the way you’re presenting information to your child. It is the way you’re teaching your children.
It can be formal, informal, through life skills, using curriculum, using a few pieces of curriculum, using no curriculum at all or a mix.
And whether you intentionally chose it or chose it by default, you’re still following a method.

And the homeschool world and educational word creates curriculum based on teaching approaches.

Too, there are many teaching approaches, but these five are the most popular in the homeschool world. Too, I tend to focus on these when helping homeschoolers.

Learning Styles Characteristics Matched to Homeschool Approach

Here are the top five homeschool styles and some of the characteristics of learning styles.

1. Unit Study Approach

Unit Study Approach

Characteristics of Learning Style by Teacher or Student.
•Prefers a mastery approach
•Doesn’t always need detailed lesson plans
• Wants a research-based study on one topic
•Prefers to spend time on subjects which are of interest
•Will add in hands-on activities as needed and as many as needed or prefers to learn the whole topic through hands-on
•Will choose quality books or living books instead of using boring textbooks

2. Classical Approach

Classical Approach

Characteristics of Learning Style by Teacher or Student.
• Wants a heavy emphasis on classics like ancient languages
• Thrives with a heavy language arts emphasis
• Pursues a chronological approach to learning history
• Wants to spend time learning Latin
• Focuses on learning from Great Minds of the past
• Should learn from ancient books and quality classical literature
• Education should focus on the history of Western Civilization

3. Textbook/Workbook Approach

Textbook/Workbook Approach

Characteristics of Learning Style by Teacher or Student.
•This is the same approach used in public schools and the only approach most homeschoolers know.
• Instead of choosing an approach, some homeschoolers follow this one by default.
• Children who do well with drill and kill, love this approach.
• Parents and kids who don’t mind testing, deadlines, and don’t think textbooks are boring choose this.
• Families who want to mimic public school at home choose this.

4. Charlotte Mason Approach

Charlotte Mason Approach

Characteristics of Learning Style by Teacher or Student.
• A gentle approach to language arts.
• There is emphasis on the arts, music, and nature.
• Learning should include forming lifelong habits
• More time should be spent outdoors.
• Literature based learning is one foundation.
• Poetry is important.

5. Unschooling Approach

Unschooling Approach

Characteristics of Learning Style by Teacher or Student.
• Child led learning. This means if the child is moved to learn something he will.
• Unschoolers vary whether they will use curriculum or not. Some use very little, others use none.
• The fill their learning day with games, books, hands-on ideas, movies or any resource, place, person, or activity which fills their desire to learn whatever subject.
• The idea is that children will learn everything they need to know when they learn naturally and are not pushed.
•This approach recognizes that all kids are different and will learn at their pace meaning there are a variety of resources available.

Which approach do most of your choices in curriculum fall into?

Once you understand that, then you can see if it’s the right choices for your child.

Eventually you can teach your children through a variety of learning styles, but you set them up for success when a curriculum matches the homeschool approach.

Identifying Your Homeschooled Child’s Learning Personality

Finally, after years of putting the pieces together, I have created an online self-paced course on how to identify your homeschool child’s learning personality.

This course will give you solid beginning points and look what you will learn.

YOU WILL LEARN:

How to understand the way your child prefers to learn so that you can teach him in a way that he enjoys learning;
How to pinpoint your child’s learning personality;
A starting point in understanding (barring any special learning challenges or disabilities) and accepting your child’s preferred way of taking in information;
Understanding when the learning personality emerges; and
Teaching tips for each learning personality to stop the head-butting.

Tapping into the way a child prefers to learn is essential to success.

Printable for Curriculum Matched to Homeschool Approach

Finally, the printable for homeschool curriculum matched to homeschool approach will help you to see what homeschool approach you’re following.

More important, from the list above, you can have a starting point to see how your children and family learn best.

It’s almost impossible to list every curriculum, but I did list some of the major providers and resources homeschoolers are currently using.

This free printable for curriculum matched to homeschool approach is a subscriber freebie.

That means when you sign up to follow me, you get access to my Exclusive Subscriber’s Only Library and you get this freebie too.

This is how you get access quickly.
► 1) Sign up on my list.
► 2) Go to your inbox and confirm your email from the automatic reply I sent you.
►3) Look for the automatic reply giving you the password to the private subscriber’s area. You should have it soon.

Exploring Space and Astronomy Free Unit Study for Multiple Ages

IF you are already a follower/subscriber, find the MOST RECENT email from me and the password and link to the Subscribers Area are ALWAYS at the bottom of every email.

How Homeschool Learning Styles Helps You to Accept Each Child’s Differences

July 23, 2022 | Leave a Comment
This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

When I first heard about homeschool learning styles was when my first child was 5 years old. I wanted all the homeschool learning styles tips I could get.

And 20+ years later there is still mixed science about how much difference learning styles really makes.

Today, I’m sharing how understanding homeschool learning styles of not only my children, but myself was a positive experience.

Besides, the brain is such a fascinating machine and there is much to know about we learn.

How Homeschool Learning Styles Helps You to Accept Each Child's Differences

Nobody can really be labeled with one hundred percent accuracy. We’re always learning and changing.

So, I will share how learning styles helped me to accept differences in my children.

And now that my children are young adults, I’m glad I trusted what I know about my children and educated myself about learning styles.

Further, I will help you to sort out terms because it’s not necessary to speak educationalese to have a starting place.

Homeschool Style

First, this is the biggest point that helped me to understand learning styles.

And that is to move away from what a lot of educational institutions as well as universities identify as learning styles.

Without making this overly technical, a lot of professionals will write and speak about modalities.

It simply means how children or adults prefer to take in information.

Then, scientist and researchers have classified learners into kinesthetic (hands-on learner), auditory or visual.

Also, some of that long standing research has changed to include one more group which is reading/writing. It is called the VARK model.

It stands for Visual, Auditory, Reading/ Writing, and Kinesthetic modalities for learning by (Fleming and Mills, 1992).

However, the three major ones focused on for years are visual, auditory, and kinesthetic. As you can see right away this may or may not be helpful.

Because I was not a public-school educator prior to homeschooling, it was not helpful.

Beginning Point for Types of Homeschool Styles

Hence expanding on how these learning modalities help us teach at home is more important than understanding all the scientific in/outs.

So, instead of focusing on just the components of modalities, focus on your child’s learning personality. What is his learning personality?
This expanded view opened a whole another view of how to teach.
Switch from just learning style to learning personality. Again, this encompasses all the things that make your child unique.

In other words, look below on how I expanded the profile of each of my children to go beyond modality.

What is his interest?
Is he an introvert or extrovert?
Does he naturally flock toward others or prefer long periods alone?
Are interests nature based (not because you expose them to him), technologically oriented, or just prefers to read a book about all of it?
Does he prefer to just build instead of talk about it?
Is he competitive almost defiant?
How about inventing? Is that all that matters? His inventions?

These are a few of the questions I started asking myself about each of my children. I added these to their preferred way of taking in information or learning style.

In addition, I examined how I learned and taught my children. With my first child, I had no problem teaching him.

However, my second son came along and all that changed.

I wasn’t sure I was cut out to teach him because none of my tips with my first child seemed to work with him.

Then started my research to learn how to expand learning styles to learning personalities.

One of the best books to this day although it’s older is Discover Your Child’s Learning Style: Children Learn in Unique Ways – Here’s the Key to Every Child’s Learning Success.

And here is their free pdf for an assessment.

Identifying Your Homeschooled Child’s Learning Personality

Finally, after years of putting the pieces together, I have created an online self-paced course on how to identify your homeschool child’s learning personality.

This course will give you solid beginning points and look what you will learn.

YOU WILL LEARN:

How to understand the way your child prefers to learn so that you can teach him in a way that he enjoys learning;
How to pinpoint your child’s learning personality;
A starting point in understanding (barring any special learning challenges or disabilities) and accepting your child’s preferred way of taking in information;
Understanding when the learning personality emerges; and
Teaching tips for each learning personality to stop the head-butting.

I have my course on my sister site How to Homeschool EZ by Tina Robertson.

And look at these other resources about learning styles

Determine Learning Styles

Day 16 Practical Tips for Learning Styles and New Homeschooler Free Bootcamp

Tips for Learning Styles

Who is Tina Robertson

New to Homeschooling Start with the Basics

1 – 7 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

8-14 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

15 – of the 31 Day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

Day 15: Discovering Learning Styles and New Homeschooler Free Bootcamp

What is a Learning Styles

Day 15: Discovering Learning Styles

New to Homeschooling Start with the Basics

Days 1 – 7 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

Days 8-14 of the 31 day Free Boot Camp for New Homeschoolers

How Understanding Homeschool Teaching Styles Makes You Successful

Homeschool Styles

Identifying Homeschool Learning Personalities

4 Ways Understanding Homeschool Teaching Styles Makes You Successful

Identifying Your Homeschooled Child’s Learning Personality

YOU WILL LEARN:

Other Learning Styles Resources:

35+ Best Homeschool Curriculum By Learning Style (free printable)

Styles of Homeschooling

Homeschool Approaches