Homeschooling Kindergarten Without a Curriculum

Shalom,
 I hope this day is well and prosperous for you. Today I want to discuss how I homeschool kindergarten without a curriculum. About 7 years ago we embarked on our homeschooling journey. We didn't have much money or space. Matter of fact we were a traveling family of 6, with 5 kids 5 and under. I dove into our homeschooling with excitement and rigor. It was awesome. We used different resources: games, flashcards, manipulatives, and one of those small dry erase boards from Walmart. Our learning environment was based on action We moved, we sang, we played. Matthew (oldest) learned so much that year without curriculum and he was his most happiest with education then too. We started using curriculum the next year and almost every year after which led us to unhappiness. Matthew started to fall behind and everyone else (including me) were bored and frustrating. This year I decided to do something different, we went back to the way it was that first year. We are homeschooling without curriculum!



We have done really well this year and I am super excited to tell you how it has gone. Every morning after breakfast and bible study I start school with my kinder boys. The older kids can do independent work at this time but they can not interrupt us so normally they choose to read a book or play. I just don't think its fair to stop their learning, to teach someone else. This time is theirs.  It normally takes only an hour or an hour and half and we go as fast or slow as they need to. I have two kinder kiddos, Aman (5) and Stephen (6). I call this the question age. Using their imagination is crucial to our success.  Here is a typical day for us.

• Phonics and Reading:We listen to our favorite ABC song on YouTube (below). After that we use dry erase boards that I found at Dollar Tree to practice our letters and sounds. We have a group of letters every week and we do plenty review with flashcards, letter tiles. We do not go in ABC order. Once we learned our first group of letters we were able to start blending words like at, mat, sat, am, etc. Finally we go over our sight words, we only learn about one or two every week at this time. I don't want to bombard them with too much. 

• Math: We learn numbers and their amounts first. You can say I drill them, but here is the catch they don't know it! We count all the time and they love using their math manipulatives (treats are their favorite!). One of our favorite games is matching number tiles with counter amounts. We learned numbers in increments of five until we got to twenty then it was increments of ten until we got to one hundred. We also do little five minute dry erase board work on number sequencing and greater than/less than. I introduce adding and taking away around the time we learn our numbers to ten.  They learn math facts without cards and without facts sheets, yaay! 
• Colors, Shapes. and Patterns:  My kiddos learn colors naturally before any formal schooling. Since they already knew colors we focus on recognizing the color word and sorting and grouping into color groups i.e. blues with blues, reds with reds. Shapes were already known too so we use geometry manipulatives to play around. I ask questions like what shape is this? How many sides? How many corners? 
• Science: Reading , Reading, Experiment, Question, and Reading lol. Seriously we all know the importance of reading to our children. Science is one of those subjects that reading provides a wealth of information. Picture books and science encyclopedias work best for us. They are able to observe when the older kiddos do experiments or I may do a simple one with them such as water in the three states of matter. Questions are important! They ask tons in science and we always stop and explore the question. NO question is insignificant. They also love the nature series on Netflix like BBC Earth. 
• History and Geography: Again reading and questions. This is another subject where reading is crucial. Picture books or looking in history encyclopedias and allowing them to ask questions about the pictures and passages can give them a solid understanding of these subjects. Geography is fun atlases, maps, globes all incite questions and learning. We travel the world through these methods.

When we are done they go do what they do best play. Sometimes I can hear them adding what we learned into their play which of course solidifies the fact that they are learning and without a curriculum. All in all it is an enriching rewarding experience and I am so glad that we turned back to this tried and true method!

List of  some of our resources: 
Have Fun Teaching (used for phonics and math)
Kidzone (phonics and math)

First Human Body Encyclopedia (DK First Reference Series)

First Science Encyclopedia (DK)
Kingfisher First Encyclopedia of Animals
Christian Liberty Nature Readers
Usborne Encyclopedia of World History

    There are many more, but hey that could take a whole other post to create ;)



Shalom, 
Tanisha
Mom of the Great Eight