Today, we are going to be exploring the six styles of homeschooling and I’m so excited to share this with you. I’m also going to share some different curriculums that line up with each of those six styles.
First off, though, I have to ask, did you even know that there are different styles of homeschooling? It really doesn’t look the same for all families and I think that that’s one of the many beautiful benefits of homeschooling is that you can actually tailor the style to your family and even to your kids’ individual needs. So the six main styles of homeschooling in a nutshell are traditional, classical, Charlotte Mason, unschooling, unit studies, and eclectic. Now maybe you’ve heard of these before, or maybe you have absolutely no clue what I’m talking about. I know when I was researching homeschool before we jumped in, I was on the edge of my seat and just really wanting to hear more about these different options and methods and of course, the curriculum. So let’s jump into it.
Traditional Homeschooling
Traditional homeschooling looks the most like public school at home, although I never want to paint the picture that they’re the same thing because they are not. Homeschool is not traditional public school at home and even traditional homeschooling is not public school at home, they are not the same thing. It just looks a little bit more like public school than some of the other methods, because it actually has a pretty structured approach with textbook-based learning. Traditional homeschooling does cover the core subjects very thoroughly like math, science, language arts and social studies which is what I call the core four. And then I always want to add Bible to that so really, it’s the core five for us over here. In this style, everything is very scheduled. The kids have assignments that they do, they turn them in, there are quizzes and there are tests. And traditional homeschooling follows a set academic calendar. There are also clearly defined goals and objectives for each grade level. So if you are a checklist-style mom, then traditional homeschooling might be the approach that you would jive the best with. The parents take on the role of the primary teacher, which is pretty much the case across the board for the most part when it comes to homeschool. But traditional homeschooling is pretty cut and dry. The kids go through the textbooks, they read the pages, they take the quizzes and the test, and they follow a pretty steady routine sort of like public school.
There are a lot of things that I like about traditional homeschool, especially because it feels the most familiar to me since I actually grew up in public school and my kids were in public school for quite a few years before we jumped into homeschool. But that doesn’t necessarily make it the best style though. Comfort can sometimes be the enemy of progress according to P.T. Barnum in my all time favorite movie, “The Greatest Showman”. Just because it feels familiar and comfortable to me, and maybe even to you, it doesn’t necessarily mean or make it the very best style of homeschooling. It just is a great option and it can feel familiar and comfortable. Traditional homeschooling is easy to use and easy to teach because you’ve got that structured, open and go curriculum. And it is ideal for families who prefer a familiar school-like structure, and who really value the use of textbooks and standardized assessments in their children’s education.
So let’s talk for just a minute about choosing curriculum that is for traditional homeschooling, if that’s what you want to use. You’ll want to look for something that is textbook-based and worksheet heavy. Abeka is a curriculum that I’ve not personally used, but I hear that it falls mostly into this category. And then I feel like Master Books, which is one of my absolutely favorite curriculum companies, falls somewhat into this category. It leaves a lot of room for some of the other homeschooling methods to be infiltrated into the curriculum as well if that makes sense. There’s also BJU Press which I have not used but I have heard of and from what I have seen and looked through at the homeschool conventions is that it is pretty traditional with those textbooks, those worksheets, those quizzes and those tests.
Classical Homeschooling
The style of classical homeschooling is less about what to learn and what to think, and it’s more about how to learn and how to think, which I kind of love honestly. So with classical homeschooling, it’s an education approach that places a strong emphasis on the classics of literature and history and philosophy. So think great books and deep articulate thinking and speaking. Language learning is a big part of classical homeschooling as well. Oftentimes, Latin and sometimes Greek are taught to improve vocabulary and grammar and an understanding of those root words, which I think is great. Kids who are classically homeschooled are taken through a model known as the trivium, and the trivium incorporates three stages of learning, which I think is kind of cool. But in total transparency, this is the part of classical homeschooling that I don’t feel like was a great fit for my family and this style is not our number one method that we use, however, we do definitely incorporate some parts of classical homeschooling.
They take the kids through the grammar stage in the early years, where the focus is on acquiring foundational knowledge and language skills. And then they go through something called the logic stage, which is during the middle school years, and it’s where students learn critical thinking, and reasoning. And then there is the rhetoric stage. So this is the high school age students where they take them through developing effective communication skills, which actually does sound pretty great; it just sounds a little bit more structured than I think we were looking for straight out of the gate. But classical homeschooling can be a great option. It’s well-suited for families who appreciate a rigorous, time-tested approach to education, and for families who value the study of classical literature and languages and critical thinking skills in their child’s development.
When it comes to classical curriculum, two things really come to mind for me; one is something called IEW or Institute for Excellence in Writing. That comes to mind for me, because it is a curriculum that we use and love. It’s a very in-depth vigorous language arts program. And that is what my kids are using for language arts, for grammar, for writing, and for spelling, and I just can’t say enough good things about it. My kids have grown so much in the area of language arts. The other thing that comes to mind for me is something called Classical Conversations. Now, Classical Conversations is somewhat a group or a curriculum, and it offers a community-based classical homeschooling program with a strong emphasis on those three stages that I talked about. And then when they are at mastery level, they move on. And so Classical Conversations provides the curriculum, the resources and support for homeschooling parents. I know they have a lot of different chapters and groups around and if you’re in a bigger city, it’s something that may very well be accessible to you. I do know families who are utilizing it and who absolutely love it.
Charlotte Mason Method of Homeschooling
Charlotte Mason was a real person. She lived from 1842 to 1923, and she was a British educator and reformer known for her influential work in the field of education. She came up with what we call today, the Charlotte Mason method or style of homeschooling. Charlotte Mason believed that the child should be educated wholly and fully, not just their mind. In her words, she said education is an atmosphere, a discipline, a life. So she believed that children are able to deal deeply with ideas and knowledge and that they’re not just at the surface level of learning, that they’re not just blank slates or empty sacks to be filled with information, but rather to live it, to feel it, to see it, and to experience education fully. I just love that. Charlotte Mason advocated for what she referred to as living books or living literature which is high-quality literature with lots of illustrations or other types of rich media like artwork, basically books that would provoke engagement and imagination and that feel like you’re in the story and like the words are flying off the page.
In short, the Charlotte Mason method is full of wonderful literature. And it incorporates narration or retelling, where you’ll read something and then you’ll have your kids retell it back to you what they’ve learned or what they heard or what they took away from it. The Charlotte Mason method incorporates short lessons, good habits, good character, and instills a love of nature. It is this beautiful, full picture of a whole education and I just love this method so very much. When we first got started with homeschool, my three goals for our family were to one, grow closer to God and closer as a family, two, to foster a love of reading and learning, and three, to get out in and spend time in and foster a love of nature and to do all these things together. And so the Charlotte Mason method of homeschooling totally fit all of those things that I desired for my kids. Plus, to me, it felt really gentle, which is exactly how I wanted to step into homeschool as a family because, frankly, I felt like I had no idea what I was doing in the beginning. And so I needed a very gentle, wholesome approach that would incorporate reading great books, good literature, and nature and family time. And so for me, Charlotte Mason method really fit the bill and everything that I was looking for. And I remember that early on, I found a company called Queen Homeschool, and they made a curriculum called Language Lessons for the Elementary Child, and that was exactly what I was looking for starting out. It was so gentle, that’s really the best way I can describe it. And I felt like it was understandable, great literature and with the narration and the retelling, it was something that my kids and I could step into very gently together when it came to homeschool. And then later in the year, we did move to IEW or the Institute for Excellence in Writing for language arts, but Queen Homeschool offered the most gentle starting point for what we needed. And I would highly recommend it to anybody starting out with elementary kids.
And then the Simply Charlotte Mason curriculum by Sonya Schaefer is another wonderful curriculum company. I actually got to meet her and hear her speak and take a look through her curriculum at the last convention that I was at and it’s just beautiful and wonderful and very wholesome. Sonlight is another great curriculum company that is almost completely literature-based based and it uses the Charlotte Mason method. I feel like Sonlight is especially great for really young kids to upper elementary-aged kids
Unschooling
The best way that I can describe unschooling, and I mean this in a very loving way, is unstructured. It's child- led, and it's interest-driven. So there's not necessarily any formal curriculum, it's all about real life experiences and self-directed activities. Unschooling utilizes a lot of local resources like libraries and museums and community activities, co-op activities, things like that, to facilitate the child's interest. Unschoolers have really flexible schedules, but I find that to be the case with pretty much all types of homeschooling.
Unschooling is a homeschooling style for families who really believe that children learn best when they're motivated by their own curiosity and interest. So it emphasizes freedom, self-direction, and a personalized approach to education. So unschooling, personally is not for me; it's not the approach that I would take full-time. Although we do love to travel with our kids, and we love to give them awesome hands-on experiences, I just simply personally feel like we need and want a little bit more structure when it comes to the curriculum part than what unschooling full-time has to offer.
Unit Studies
I kind of love this style because it's immersive and experiential. It offers a little bit of that flavor of unschooling, but maybe just a little bit more structured. With unit studies, you'll take a topic and you'll just deep dive into it. It incorporates all the core subjects, and then there's hands-on activities and field trips, things like that. For example, if you were going to do a unit on pumpkins, you would be fully immersed in that topic. So you would read books about pumpkins, maybe have the kids research and write a report about pumpkins, you would learn about the history of pumpkins, you'd plant a pumpkin, and then study the lifecycle and maybe sketch it out. You might even dissect a pumpkin and touch and feel and then label all the parts of it. You might take a trip to the pumpkin patch, you might go to the grocery store and buy so many pounds of pumpkins, and then do the math with the receipt that you got from that field trip to the grocery store. And then you might finish the unit by doing something like baking a pumpkin pie.
So in short, unit studies are really comprehensive learning. They provide a deep understanding of a single topic, or kind of a range of topics, as students explore that from all the various angles. So unit studies encourages a lot of critical thinking, and problem-solving, which is really cool. The kids get to deep dive and just study a topic from every single angle. Homeschooling using unit studies is really a great choice for families who want a multi-level approach to education, and who appreciate the flexibility to really explore topics in-depth and who value hands-on experiential learning. Unit studies are totally customizable, and honestly, they're really fun, especially when you incorporate the different seasons. We did several unit studies last year on a smaller scale by incorporating them into our morning time together. And then we took some fun field trips to go along with them. A great unit studies curriculum that I recently found out about that I'm actually excited to learn more about is a company called, Gather Round, so you might check into that one if you're interested in unit studies.
Eclectic Homeschooling
Eclectic homeschooling is what probably describes my family best because it's actually a combination of the other styles. It combines elements from all the other various homeschooling philosophies and methods and I love it because it's highly flexible, and it allows parents to kind of pick and choose what works best for their child or for each of their individual children. There's just freedom to customize and to mix and match and freedom to adapt. Eclectic homeschoolers typically, don't stick with just one curriculum company for all the subjects. So you can buy what we call the box curriculum, you can go to just about any curriculum company, and buy the box for whatever grade level you need. So if I bought the box for grade level five from any curriculum company, when that box shipped to my house, and I opened it up, I've got all the core subjects.
I know a lot of people just starting out with homeschooling do choose to buy the box because it's simple, they don't have to think a lot about it, they find a great curriculum company, and they've got everything they need to get started. Eclectic homeschoolers typically don't do that. But rather, we will pick and choose and build our own different set of curriculum, using several of the different types of homeschooling and, and curriculum. We don't buy the box, we build our own box. Essentially, it's the freedom to create custom curriculum and custom courses of study for the family. Like I said, even for the different individual kids, you can choose different styles and different curriculum for your different kiddos. However, they learn best, you've got that freedom to choose. It really is the power to help your kids learn the way that they learn best, which I think is so great.
Important elements for eclectic homeschoolers include real world learning, so things like field trips and community activities and life skills, social skills, communication skills, those are really important to eclectic homeschoolers. So in other words, a combination of those other methods, and then a variety of sources and curriculum. Last year, I set up and brought in 10 or 12 different guest speakers to share about what we were learning, whether it was unit studies, or if we were studying something in science or Bible, whatever it would be, I brought in these different guest speakers to talk about the topics that we were learning at the time, and the kids absolutely loved that. Eclectic homeschooling really is a versatile option for families who appreciate the freedom to mix and match educational resources and methods, and even philosophies to create this personalized learning experience tailored to each child's unique needs and interest. So with eclectic homeschool curriculum, you can really pick and choose from the other curriculums. But if I had to give you a company, I would say Master Books, which as you know by now, is one of my absolute favorite curriculum companies. A lot of other different books and resources actually incorporate the different styles of homeschooling and right within the curriculum itself. That's the best way I can think of to explain it, but you've got great literature and beautiful pictures, and you've got the capability to do quizzes and tests. It's all right there in Master Books, kind of like the best of every world, I feel like. If you are interested in eclectic homeschooling and you want a recommendation for a curriculum company, that's where I would tell you to start is to go check out Master Books. I also love it because they have curriculum for kids of all ages, where as some like Sunlight, for example, I feel like really is more for younger kids. And then you've got IEW and their writing courses, I feel like are better suited for a little bit older kids. So Master Books really runs the range of all of your kids, all the students that you're going to be working with.
We have covered a lot today, and as you can see, there are pros and cons of all styles. There are things that I love about each one of these styles and there are things that just don't totally jive with me about each one as well. But the beauty of homeschooling is that you get to choose. You really get to pick and choose what works for you and you get to pick the best parts of whatever style or styles you choose. And I think there's so much freedom and beauty in that. As homeschooling parents, we get to pick what works best for our kids and we get to help them learn in the way that they learn best. Isn't that beautiful?
I hope you found this episode really helpful today, or at the very least a starting point where you can then take what you've learned today and go do some research on your own. That Google search bar? it will do wonders. That's exactly where I started when I was homeschooling. If you don't want to go searching for all the things and all the places then I want you to head over to teachmetohomeschool.com and I will be happy to help you out on your homeschool journey.
