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Each individual yourself included has a learning style uniquely their
own. As a homeschooling parent, you will find that your teaching
style tends to reflect your own learning style; after all, what makes
sense to you in learning also makes sense to you in teaching. Therein
lies a challenge for the homeschooling parent –exploring your child’s
unique learning style is in order to help them succeed with their
education. Successfully doing this is achieved by determining what your
child’s unique style is in order to prime them for optimal learning. |
Education styles generally fall under three main categories:
tactile (touching/doing), auditory (hearing), or visual (reading or
seeing). While everyone learns a little in each of these ways, most
people have a stronger tendency to learn better through one of those
styles over the other two. And, while teaching to a child’s strongest
learning style is most ideal, keep in mind that the majority of people
learn best by a combination of all three styles.
If your child is a tactile learner, you will know this because he or
she is often touching everything! Tactile learners seek input by
putting their hands on items, often wanting to hold and manipulate them
by turning them around, feeling the textures, the weight, etc. Some
great ways to teach a tactile learner include allowing them to use clay
or play dough to form their letters and/or numbers, to draw in sand, to
hold real money for coin and money lessons, etc. The more you can bring
your lessons off the page and into your child’s hands, the better they
will absorb what you are teaching.
Auditory learners really take information in best by hearing it,
sometimes repeatedly. These children will often thrive in having
facts put to music and listening to books on tape or CD. Any time you
can read aloud to them, the better their chance of retaining the
information you’re sharing. Another key for auditory learners is to not
only read to them, but to have them read aloud to you. You can also ask
that they restate or summarize what you’ve read to them back to you.
Basically, anything you can do to engage their ears – your voice, their
own voice, music, etc. – the more they will retain.
 Your visual learner loves to see what you are talking about.
Pictures, drawings, and any visual aids go a long way to reinforcing
lessons. Visual learns may learn from reading, but often benefit from
seeing (or drawing) images based on what they’ve read. The technique of
Lapbooking, sometimes referred to as journaling, can be of great
value to your visual learner. In Lapbooking, your child will summarize
each lesson by creating an image of what they have learned and/or
writing notes about the lesson.
Remember, a combination of all three styles is often the best way to
go, but once you’ve determined your child’s optimum learning style,
you can place extra emphasis on that in order to make your lessons
matter. There are a lot of great resources on the internet for crafts
and activities related to nearly any topic you can imagine, so if you
find yourself getting stuck for new ideas, you should be able to easily
find information to keep your own creativity flowing.
Here are some more great resources for you about Learning Styles.
Custom Homeschool Curriculum is the combination of years of learning
styles research and "in the trenches" homeschool experience. Here you
will find simple, practical solutions so you can skip singing the blues
and go straight to success!
Accelerated Learning with a chart for self examination to learn what
style you might be. |
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