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3 Tips for Raising Homeschooled Middle School Book Lovers

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

With one foot in the elementary grades and high school on the horizon, homeschooling middle school is a challenge. Also, look at my page homeschool middle school for more fun tips.

Add in a struggling middle school reader and it seems it is almost impossible to prepare them for the reading load of the upper grades.

Today, I want to share 3 tips for raising homeschooled middle school book lovers that have worked for me.

3 Tips for Raising Homeschooled Middle School Book Lovers @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

I was sponsored by Read Brightly and Random House and I was paid for my time. However, paid for my time does not mean paid off.  ALL opinions are my own and for sure I will always tell you what is on my mind. And I have the choice of whom I partner with because I feel it may be beneficial to my followers. Read my full disclosure here.

Raising a Brood of Book Lovers – Not A Better Job Ever

Hopefully, one of these tips will click with your middleschooler.

Let them lounge in picture books.

There is no rush to get to greater and better novels that come in high school.

Picture books have a way of massaging the imagination. A reluctant reader may need more help visualizing the plot or characters. Associating a picture with a concept builds a love of reading.

Unexpected Benefits of Reading Aloud to Your Middleschooler

It is not only beneficial for your child to continue to hear you read aloud to them in the middle school years, but it can help to identify any potential problems.

I have one son that took me a while longer to figure out why he struggled with reading.

I noticed that when he read on his own he wasn’t that enthusiastic. I thought maybe it was his choices of books that didn’t motivate him and I gave him guidance on books that piqued his interest as boy.

However, each day as I got ready to read aloud to him, he just breathed in every word I was reading. He literally begged me to ready two or three more chapters.

Soon, I found out that he was a strong auditory learner.

Knowing this, I have been able to feed his love for reading by not only reading aloud to him but helping to him find suitable audio books.

By mixing in reading aloud, audio books and having him read on his own, I have been able to lead him down the road to a lifelong reader.

Create a Reading Routine – Don’t Crowd it Out with Boring Worksheets

Middle school kids have a new found taste for freedom and with that comes learning how to create a reading routine.

They don’t have it down yet, which means you have to help them. The way I help my sons find time for reading is by not demanding that each book have an overwhelming amount of activities, if any, to accompany it.

Reading is about – reading. It’s about finding time to dive into a book without worrying about reading comprehension, boring worksheets or book reports.

Though I am concerned with my boys analyzing what they read, dissecting every book they want to read reduces reading to one boring project after another. Then we wonder why kids don’t like to read.

Check out my article What Makes Reading Painful for Homeschooled Kids. Let Go of Busy Work to Raise Lifelong Readers.

Let middle school kids be kids a bit longer, but especially let them find their reading groove while they are still in middle school.

(post updated because the giveaway has closed)

Hugs and love ya,

Tina Signature 2015c

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Teach Your Homeschooled Child How to Read in 20 Easy Lessons

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.




Teach Your Homeschooled Child How to Read In 20 Easy Lessons @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

I was given a free copy of The Reading Lesson and I was paid for my time. However, paid for my time does not mean paid off.  ALL opinions are my own and for sure I will always tell you what is on my mind. Your experience may vary. When I do accept a review, it’s because I am excited to tell you about it. Read my full disclosure here.

Teaching all of my boys to read is one of the most memorable and rewarding parts about homeschooling. However, it was also one of the most intimidating aspects of homeschooling.

Through my experience in teaching my sons to read, I learned a lot about how to teach reading.

20 Easy Peazy Steps for Teaching Homeschooled Kids Reading

So I was stoked when I got The Reading Lesson to review because I believe you can teach your homeschooled child how to read in 20 easy lessons.

It’s all the extra fluff added to a reading program that makes teaching reading complicated. When a reading program is direct, consistent and simple it has far reaching effects.

What makes this process so mysterious for educators that have not embarked on the reading journey yet or that may be struggling in the middle of it is that fluff things like reading comprehension, teaching letter names and busy work are folded into a reading program.

What? You mean you don’t have to teach the letter names to teach reading. More on that in a minute.

What happens is that a new reading teacher thinks that reading has to be so much more complex than simply teaching a sound, showing how to blend each sound and then repeating the word.

However, that is just the beauty of a simple reading curriculum like The Reading Lesson.

Look at some of these features that you’ll love.

■Focus is on the sounds, not learning the ABCs.
■A picture is associated with sounds, which makes it’s easier to associate sounds with a word image.
■Words are part of each lessons.

Why is this important? Immediately, your child understands the value of reading because he is rewarded instantly for his efforts.

We don’t learn to read to learn sounds, which make no sense.  We learn to read for pleasure and to find out what we want to know and that means learning words.

Reading comprehension is naturally folded into learning to read instead of being taught as a separate subject that makes no sense to a bright child.

■Teacher assisted program.

Why do I list this as a key benefit? Because teaching reading is an interactive process and one where your child needs you to model reading attack skills.

In today’s world, many programs tout independent learning as if it’s the ultimate goal of our education. Independent learning is a valuable skill, but it is the parent who provides a rich learning environment.

■There is NO fluff.

The author’s words are more gracious than I would be especially after teaching my sons through various levels of reading.  She says, “Most learning is hard. The common hype that learning has to be fun is just that – hype. All real learning requires concentrated effort.”

This very insightful comment goes back to what I said earlier that there is no need to learn the ABCs before you teach your child to read.

Big Difference Between Teaching A  Child to Read and Comprehension Skills

Sure, your child eventually needs to know the names of the letters, but it’s the sound the letter stands for that advances them to reading earlier.

Too, all the overly abundant activities focusing on letter names of the week is fun and builds fine motor activities, but they are not needed for a child to associate a letter with a sound.

This kind of work can be fluff and very annoying to a first time teacher who thinks these activities are necessary to teach beginning reading.

Once I realized that my sons didn’t need to know the letter names, it had me rethinking my letter of the week activities, which is a really slow way to teach reading.

If your goal is letter recognition that is one thing. If your goal is to teach reading right away, there is no need to go that slow.

With my second son, I focused on letter activities, but taught reading much quicker realizing that I could teach him several consonants and a vowel at one time.

Too, I learned all those activities that we think needs to be associated with reading could have a negative effect on a lifelong reader.

Teach Your Homeschooled Child How to Read in 20 Easy Lessons

Worksheet activities, book reports and extracurricular activities can morph into busywork that chokes out straight reading time for pleasure. Look at my post What Makes Reading Painful for Homeschooled Kids.

I so appreciate that The Reading Lesson doesn’t add to the learning to read myth that coloring and worksheets are needed in order to learn how to read.

■ Interactive content through the CD.

Something else I learned that was valuable to encouraging a budding reader was allowing them to have more time to explore letter sounds.

With your guidance while your child uses the CD, letter sounds are reinforced.

Included with The Reading Lessonis a CD with simple but visually appealing letter cards to help your child remember the sound along with simple games.

The Reading Lesson is a great example of how simple teaching reading should be.

It not only has several pages of instruction to help you, the reading teacher, but it gives page after page of teaching tip to help you make the most of your time with your new reader.

I think you’ll love the simplicity of this program.

Product Facts a Glance 2

Product Name: The Reading Lesson
Company Name: Mountcastle Company
Grades: For ages 4 to 8 and struggling readers too.
Price: The Reading Lesson Book, CD, Plush Toy (plus bonus gift) $49.00
Format: Both a physical book and e-book are offered.

Hugs and love ya,

Tina Signature 2015c

All product information is correct and accurate as of the date of this review.SaveSave

Shocking Things that Homeschooled Boys Want to Write About. Should We Let Them?

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

It was a sweet little dream.

All my boys enthusiastically sitting around our red writing desks ready to brainstorm writing genre that was moral, upright and worthy.

Shocking Things that Homeschooled Boys Want to Write About.

Flashing back to my childhood of reading The Secret Garden, Heidi and then on to my favorite, mysteries like Nancy Drew, I just knew their choice of writing topics would mesh with my ideas.

Reality set in soon when my boys mentioned gore, violence and video games.

Wait! We aren’t those types of parents.

We were raising our boys to be peace loving Christian men. Screen time was censored and movies always had to be approved and besides we never allowed things like that in our home.

Writing about blood and guts aren’t topics that I thought were appropriate to write about. And no matter what we did by not allowing them to play with guns, they would still find some way to form a gun out of a peanut butter sandwich or in one case a picture stand.

As I have learned through the years, writing topics boys want to write about are immensely different than what interest girls, including me.

Shocking Things That Homeschooled Boys Want to Write About. Should we let them @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Understanding that boys are naturally curious about topics that are opposite my feminine personality took me a while to scrutinize.

Knowing too that what fills their minds when they take pen to paper is just as important as giving them free choice, I had to devise a plan or standard.

Six Useful Tips Teaching Homeschooled Boys to Write

I learned . .

  • That because of the fact they are boys, their minds go to different places. It means that I need to embrace the differences instead of being miffed over them;
  • I had to let go of the thinking that my feminine writing topics were superior,they are not;
  • That I can’t give them freedom of choice and then take it back the minute they exercise it;
  • That boys, like girls, do need a standard of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable;
  • That instead of writing about gore, I had to let go and let them write about games; and
  • That instead of writing about violence, write about the valor or find virtue in it.

Boys tend to hyper focus on details that are not important to me when I put on my teacher writing hat.

Instead of criticizing their details, I try to find the good in it because I know as boys they do think differently than I do.

Many times in my journey I have come across passages that my boys are suppose to focus on and model in their narratives.

For many years, I wondered why my boys just didn’t get it. I even switched writing curriculum before I could put my finger on what was the difficulty.

It wasn’t the genre they did not get, it was the undertone in the message that bored them, which was a lesson created by a woman teacher for girls.

No, not all of them were that way, but I knew my boys were just not engaged and that is a must.

To be fair, I had to think about this way.

Give a girl an assignment to write about football stats.

Do I hear shrieks of agony and moans of boring? But, that is just what I was doing with my boys. I can put myself in their boots.

Learning to take whatever elements a writing curriculum wanted my sons to write about and then giving them freedom to write what inspired them, I had more success.

No, I didn’t get why some of what they wrote and read to each other they found drop dead funny. I was the one then that felt out of place.

From that lesson, it helped me to change the way I approached writing.

I adjusted, but setting limits on some subjects. Look at some of these topics my boys find appealing and that I let them write about.

  • Video games;
  • Sports. All kinds of sports with football being my boys favorite;
  • Funny things that I don’t find particularly funny, but it’s also the topic they spend the most time on to get the details just right;
  • Describing weapons;
  • Science fiction; and yes
  • Graphic Novels too.

I have read many boy compositions and now find the humor in them because they are expressions of their inner voice.

Are you struggling with a boy writer who just does make a connection to what you want him to write about?

I hope some of these tips will help you to ditch the curriculum and teach the boy.

Boys will lead you to what topics captivate them. Will you embrace the differences?

Hugs and love ya,

 

What Makes Reading Painful for Homeschooled Kids. Let Go of Busywork to Raise Lifelong Readers.

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

When I started homeschooling, it was only natural to immerse myself in the how-to-teach-reading world.

What I didn’t realize then was that the greatest thing I could bring to the reading table was the fact that I was hooked on reading.

Of course it’s easier to know that now, but back then I thought I had to follow the method a lot of “professional” teachers used, which is to assign numerous crafts, activities and worksheets.

The way I started off teaching reading reminded me of a witty observation made by Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird when she said, “Indeed, they were an endless Project that slowly evolved into a Unit, in which miles of construction paper and wax crayon were expended by the State of Alabama in its well-meaning but fruitless efforts to teach me Group Dynamics.”

I find it funny that I too was following the same mindset of how to teach reading.

Though I wasn’t teaching a group, I used busywork activities instead of just allowing as much free reading time as possible.

What Makes Reading Painful For Homeschooled Kids and why you need to break the chains of how reading is traditionally taught @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool PlusQuickly, I learned that what makes reading painful for homeschooled kids is the massive amount of busy work that is associated with learning how to read.

Reading is not suppose to be painful, but pleasurable.

I do agree that it’s absolutely necessary to teach children reading skills by analyzing a book, however, worksheets or boring book reports never inspired my boys to love reading. Check out my article, Eliminating 3 Non-Essentials in Homeschooling.

Reading is NOT Schoolwork

Sharing a few thing that I did and did not do to fuel the reading fire early on in my children, I am hoping you will let go of some of the entrenched ways of teaching reading that makes it a painful process for homeschooled kids.

  • Say no to book reports.

When I assigned Mr. Senior 2013 a book report in 3rd grade, he read the book as fast as he could, did the book report and gave it to me so I could grade it.

I can’t blame him for my mistake of wanting something to grade to prove reading progress. Who was this book report for anyway?

Book reports are part of that group dynamics Scout so intuitively realized early in her school career. I am not teaching a group, I am just teaching one kid.

If it was handwriting I was teaching, then I needed to focus on that. But, I was not. I wanted a report from him or his review on the book. It didn’t have to be reduced to some boring formal writing lesson.

Too, wanting my son to use critical thinking skills was important to me.

That is when I switched to using narration because then I could truly evaluate what he learned from the book. Check out my tips at Narration – Telling Back or Testing.

From narration, I didn’t just want my boys to retell me the plot, but to comprehend the author’s message. Hands down, narration was the best choice when I needed feedback to gauge their understanding.

Did I mention this was the turning point to my boys liking books?

Book reports repelled, but narration renewed their loved for reading.

  • Say yes to choices always.

Another reason book reports didn’t work was because I assigned them. They had no choice. As a reader, I want a choice.

If I want to read something frivolous for pleasure, I want that choice.

Concerned that I introduce my boys to a variety of genre, I gave them choices within one type of genre so they didn’t feel trapped.

I could then guide them to reading material I wanted to fill their mind with and give them choices as a reader.

A choice to read what interested them also sparked a love for reading.

  • Say yes to a  Mom who models reading as pure pleasure.

Like I mentioned before, I could have taken it a little easier on the reading path if I had just not focused so much on how to teach them to read and just read to them more.

It seems almost bizarre now, but I didn’t want my kids to see me stick my nose in some frivolous book while we had a bit of time off from our homeschool schedule during the day. I guess I didn’t want them to think I was getting sidetracked.

I didn’t know then that readers model what they see. Crazy, I know.

I mean I knew that my kids modeled everything else they may see me or my husband do, but I didn’t associate that with reading.

It was my quest each day to steal time to read for the pure pleasure of it and that showed my boys that reading is not schoolwork.

  • Say no to crafts and busywork (unless of course they want to).

When the kids were little, crafts are part of making a book come alive and interacting with the story line.

And too if my sons want to go down other trails while we were reading, I am never opposed. I am all for hands-on activities and for creating unit studies.

However, that can never overshadow the pure delight of reading or turn delight into drudgery to amass a bunch of papers we can grade.

A reader can’t read just a few books a year and get hooked on reading. He has to be immersed in good books and that means other things have to be secondary.

Allowing busywork to choke the love of reading is a common mistake made even even by seasoned educators.

Hopefully, a few of these pointers will help you to avoid mistakes even seasoned educators make.

Do you have a kid who hates reading?

Hugs and love ya,

Tina Signature 2015c

Homeschool Tips for Teaching a Young Writer to Take his Ideas from a Trickle to a Waterfall

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

I have some homeschool tips for teaching a young writer. Look at this question.

Hi Tina, I really enjoy reading your emails. This is my first year home schooling and you’ve really helped a lot. My son is 9 & is now enjoying learning.

He loves being home schooled also. I do have a question tho and hope you can help me. When doing projects with my son. He has a lot of ideas. Or when he learns something & it gets his interest sparked.

We have really great discussions. But when asked to put those ideas on paper and summarize a paragraph, that’s where he has trouble. I’m finding that he knows the curriculum, but just can’t compute getting his thoughts down on paper. What can I do to help?? Any suggestions??

Homeschool Tips for Teaching a Young Writer to Take his Ideas from a Trickle to a Waterfall

Thanks for sending in your questions and I sure try to get to all of them.

This one really struck at my heart because part of my homeschooling journey has always been about helping others and it is part of who I am.

Too, writing can be a subject that strikes fear and makes a young writer’s hand go limp. As parents too we may have been taught that writing can be subjective so that adds to the mystery of this subject.

However, there are basics to writing and it does not have to be subjective to each person’s view.

Some helpful background information to remember is that writing is about many skills being used at the same time.

How to Conquer the Fear of Writing

There are two basic types of writers. You noticed I said writer, not writing. Big difference.

One type of writer is creative and the other type writes about facts. I think if you excel at one, you tend to struggle slightly with the other.

Knowing just that key fact can unravel a lot of the mystery with writing because you can help your child identify his writing self.

For example, does he like to write a lot of stories drawing on his imagination or does he prefer to write about things he already knows about? Identifying his strong points helps you to hone in on his weaknesses.

Creative writers crave to write and sometimes can’t wait to get other things out of the way so they can use the rest of the day to write.

Writing is an art to them and rightly so because they are talented. It has been my experience that talented writers emerge at an early age.

Factual writers are strong writers too because they can use direct and meaningful words to explain and teach points that can impact people’s lives.

A creative writer may struggle to get to the point he is attempting to make.

Giving our children both skill sets equips them for a lifelong love of writing and it does not have to be a woeful experience.

After identifying your child’s strong points, the next point to realize is that the physical act of writing can be painful too.

Homeschool Tips for Teaching a Young Writer to Take his Ideas from a Trickle to a Waterfall

Not only is writing about using mental skills, but it also is about the physical act of the process.

Looking at this from a new writer’s point of view, he has to use tools like grammar and spelling that you have been teaching him in addition to the physical act of pushing the pencil.

All of this can be enough to bring any writer to tears.  What is the solution?

Break down the process and do not hold him to all of these standards at one time. 

The writing process of draft, edit and publish is a long and tedious process for a new writer to understand.

Let him lounge in his thoughts and you do the actual writing of brainstorming ideas. This breaks the writing process down into smaller pieces.

Boys especially can lag behind girls in the physical process. Give love and praise for any effort that is put forth, but do a little each day.

Working a little each day on the process is key.

Do not work on all of these skills at the same time at this age either.

When he is writing, do not have a mini spelling lesson with him as well. Give him the correct spelling of the word and go on instead of quizzing him on that too.

Thoughts have to be put to paper while they have been ignited. Don’t make him suffer learning to spell alongside writing. Not just yet anyway.

As he gets older, your standards will get higher as you expect him to know how to spell as well.  The same rule of thumb applies to grammar. Give him an adverb without explaining that one ends in a -ly so that his focus remains on his noble and beautiful ideas.

Be sure he understands that writing is not a one day event. 

This will go a long way in him accepting this as a process. Unlike completing a math worksheet for the day, writing needs to be spread out over several days and even weeks. Make your expectations clear so he does not have a different standard for himself.

Look at these 4 ways to help with the physical part of writing.

  • If the struggle is with the actual physical process of writing, then introduce typing at an early age.

Teaching a Young Writer

Also, cut back the number of sentences to do for the day. Writing is about consistency and quality over quantity. One or two well written sentences are worth more than five sentences where you have not a clue what he is expressing.

  • Tiny uses the iPad and still does to this day to type his draft after he pencils an outline.

Typing his thoughts down on the iPad as he moves along keeps the focus on content. Part handwriting, part typing works.

Some children and writers are visual learners and we live in a visual world.

  • Visual graphics are sometimes key to helping children understand the process.

This age is not too young to delight in fun graphic organizers.

Houghton Mifflin has some graphics here.  Keep the writing varied by sometimes using just a fun graphic organizer like a sandwich organizer instead of always making paragraphs.

Even high school writers need graphic organizers to get a picture of the process, so keep using them.

  • Use a voice to type software like Dragon NaturallySpeaking to keep the initial draft at minimal penmanship skills so the focus remains on content.

Realize that sometimes everything doesn’t have to be reduced to writing. 

You are teaching a child not a curriculum so move away from the instructions of the curriculum when you need to.  For example, I have used a lot of Charlotte Mason tips on narration.

When a child can explain back what you are teaching, it is not always necessary to reduce that to writing.

The most grueling part of the writing process can be recalling information and brainstorming.  If your child is doing this well, then as time goes on he will learn to put those thoughts on paper.

Praise the effort and progress so far and employ the Charlotte Mason tips on narration. Click here to read about narration and use some of these ideas.

Though many teachers praise children that are creative writers, a lot of children are factual writers.  If your child is a factual writer, change the topic of the assignment.

For example if the topic of writing is about something abstract like emotions or personality flaws or strengths of a character change it to something concrete like how to ride a bike.

Riding a bike is something most boys can explain in multiple steps.

Look at topics that are how-to for him to write about.  How to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, how to play a sport, how to take care of a goldfish, and how to play mindcraft.

Teaching a Young Writer

If your child is a creative writer, get him to start using a key word outline.  This helps him to express his thoughts or words in a few key words.

This is hard to do for a word connoisseur and one who loves to write stories.  All words and details are important to them, but it is critical to bring those thoughts from broad to narrow so their art is recognized.

Materials matter for any writer.

Many fancy things come and go in the writing world but there are two basic items that are keepers for me.

One is a mechanical pencil and the other is a two toned notepad.  I find using a Mechanical Pencil where the lead is .9mm limits and almost erases (pun intended) pencil sharpening time.

There is always a fine point on the pencil and it helps the print to be more neat. Erasing should be omitted all together from a draft copy. Mark out and keep going.  This is hard to do for first time perfection seeking writer, but it emphasizes the point that writing is a process.

The second keeper throughout the years has been TOPS Stinger Writing Pads

skip line method

The writing pads have alternating colored lines that makes skipping lines easier.

From the beginning, teach your child to skip a line.

Errors and spelling can be corrected on the line below the writing and it helps them to visually see that writers take multiple steps before they show their final product.

My kids write on the white lines and save the colored line for rewriting and grammar mark ups.

On regular white paper, you can have them put an X on the next line so they know to skip it, but I find we prefer the notepad for our drafts.

The alternating color pad helps a child who struggles with being neat to stay in one area when writing as well. I have used them for final copies also when the older two boys were younger. So the pads have many uses and are keepers.

Writing is an Art and Should be Taught as an Art

Finding the gem in their writing, expression emotions or not and writing about topics that fire up our children are all ways to avoid tears and to help an aspiring writer.

Help them find their writing voice and the trickle of ideas will flow into a waterfall of graceful words.

I have to share this quote that I heart today since I got all giddy about sharing with you about how to teach writing.

“The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.”

~Mark Twain~

Homeschool Tips for Teaching a Young Writer to Take His Ideas from a Trickle to a Waterfall @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

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