Home School Heartbeat Radio Program

This week on Home School Heartbeat, host Mike Smith has been talking with Pamela Hall, homeschooling mom and member of the 2004 All-USA Teacher Team, about helping our children enjoy learning.

Mike Smith:


Pamela, how is homeschooling uniquely suited to the kind of education we've been talking about this week—education that turns students' interests into learning opportunities?


Pamela Hall:


Parents know their children best and can tap into their special interests by shaping programs just for them. In the regular classroom, I kept notes on each child and tried to do this, but there were 20 or more of them and just one of me, so there were times in their day that their needs did not get met. By shaping a program, you'll be able to adapt instantaneously when a problem arises, and re-teach or go more in-depth into their interests. Homeschool meets the needs of the children 100% of the time.


Mike:


But Pamela, how do you meet the needs of these different ages and interests of children?


Pamela:


I create a chart with all the children to find out what they want to learn. Through themes, I can make the skills multi-level. I can pair children up. If they're pretty close in skills, they can work together. Older children can tutor younger children. For instance, older children can read about a topic to the younger children. The older children are gaining speaking, fluency, vocabulary, content knowledge. The younger children are just learning how the language works. So everybody gets input, and their ideas will get used at some point in time. So they're excited about learning.


Mike:


Thank you, Pamela. Until next time, I'm Mike Smith.