The first step to choosing a curriculum is understanding your family’s individual needs and considerations. One of the most helpful places to start is by determining your children’s learning styles.
You could have the “best” curriculum on the market with all the bells and whistles… but what good will that curriculum be to you and your family if your children don’t understand a thing about what’s going on and why?
Teaching According to Learning Style
Some parents swear by teaching according to your child’s learning style; others simply try to use a variety of learning styles or fall back on each child’s learning styles only when they are struggling with understanding a new concept.
Either way, it’s important to have a general idea of how your children learn so that you have a technique to fall back on if one of them is struggling.
I, personally, do not teach everything according to their learning styles, but I do take into consideration that there are some ways of learning that they all do well in when I am choosing activities and curricula.
I want to make sure that I am teaching in ways that will enable my children to understand, even if I don’t cater to their styles constantly.
I feel it’s important to stretch them so that they aren’t limited to only learning new information in those ways. Because of this, we do choose a variety of teaching styles – the world won’t cater to them, so I don’t either.
Instead, I try to find a happy-medium common ground to balance teaching according to their collective learning styles and teaching according to my own educational philosophies so that we can all be happy and healthy as a homeschool family.
When they are struggling to understand, however, I am willing to do whatever is necessary to help each one succeed. Knowing how each child learns best is extremely helpful to me as their teacher; it helps me to overcome obstacles and learning barriers when we run into a bump in the road.
The Learning Styles Quiz
It used to be accepted that there were 3 main learning types. There are now considered to be 7 different learning styles. Not everyone acknowledges all of these learning styles – in fact, some people do not acknowledge learning styles at all.
Without getting into theories, below is a list of the 7 different learning styles, along with a short explanation of each one. You can take the Learning Styles Quiz for each child to determine what each of their learning styles is.
Tracking Each Child’s Learning Style
I made a little template on Google Docs for each child and put it in a binder of homeschool information for me to reference. It’s like my own little reference book for my own family as homeschoolers. My “Learning Style” pages look like this:
I would recommend using the template below I created for you so you can just copy and paste the results from the quiz, which will hopefully make it much faster. You can do it yourself, if you prefer, by using Google Docs to copy and paste the info into.
This template is a PDF that I added fields you can type in. It’s identical to the ones I have the pictures of above that I have in my folder for my own children. It’s just a blank version with added fields for you to type into so that you can use it, too!
Learning Styles Blank Editable PDF Download
Learning Styles: Explained
Here is a brief overview of each of the learning styles, along with examples of which kinds of activities help that child learn best. I recommend opening the Learning Styles download worksheet from above and copying and pasting this information into a new copy of that worksheet for each child.
Doing it this way will give you a hard copy resource to look back on to get a brief overview of what your family’s learning styles look like. You can see the examples of how I use this worksheet in the pictures above, earlier in this post.
1. Visual –
learning through seeing information to help process.
Examples: graphs, charts, maps, diagrams, and other forms of visual stimulation, using graphic organizers to help with reading comprehension, using graphs to organize thoughts. (wikipedia.org)
2. Kinesthetic –
aka “tactile learning” – learning takes place through doing physical activities, instead of watching or listening to lessons. Learners require whole-body movement to process new & difficult information.
Examples: role plays, drama, dancing, races and competitions, field trips, projects, games that require movement (hop scotch, physical tic-tac-toe), floor and/or wall games, crafts, expressing ideas through creative movements/dance, laboratory demonstrations, sports, gymnastics, & charades. (wikipedia.org)
3. Auditory –
learn through listening, depends on listening and speaking as main ways of learning. Learners use listening and repeating skills to help sort through information.
Examples: verbal direction, group discussions, verbal reinforcement, group activities, reading aloud, putting information into rhythmic patterns such as raps, poems, or songs. Will say things out loud and remember how it sounds to help remember things, cannot comprehend when reading without background sounds (music, TV, etc), often read out loud to help with understanding, often move lips & talk to self to help accomplish tasks. (wikipedia.org)
4. Read/Write –
learns by reading and/or writing information to learn information, enjoys reading and taking notes.
Examples: remembers information by reading and writing it down, write detailed notes, prefer writing essays vs oral narration/presentations, articulate themselves better through writing instead of speaking, re-write/re-read notes to help with memorization, keep handouts to read over again later, translate visual aids & charts into written words, rewriting information in their own words will help to remember concepts. (learningstyles101.com.wordpress.com/blog/read-write-learner)
5. Interpersonal –
aka “social learning style” – learning through communication, groups, sharing of ideas.
Examples: group activities, group discussions, study groups, role playing, instead of reciting information to self, recite to others, sharing reviews, review checklists, & performance scripts with others for feedback, work on maps, charts, etc as a group, discussions with others, esp peers. (learning-styles-online.com)
6. Creative –
learning through creating theories, tests, stories, solutions, analysis and designs instead of memorization of facts.
Examples: asking to guess at missing information, forming theories to explain observations, asking hypothetical questions, asking open-ended questions, working with ideas that are different than realities to help explain things, analyzing & breaking things down into parts, games & exercises that help improvisation, explaining things using analogies, having them come up with their own analogies, considering how changes to historical facts would have changes the future, forming hypotheses and doing tests & experiments (simplicable.com)
7. Logical –
aka “mathematical learning style” – scientific approach to learning, learns in a systematic, logical way through facts, statistics, etc.
Examples: learns better once understanding “why” instead of fact memorization, learning details behind explanations helps with memorization, enjoys links and connections of how things work together, statistics & analyzing information helpful, make illogical associations to help with recalling information, understanding the “bigger picture” helps with understanding, watch out for over-analyzing (needs reminded to act on plans made), use lists to help organize thoughts. (learning-styles-online.com)
Global vs Sequential Learner
In addition to those 7 learning styles, people can also be categorized as either “global” learners or “sequential” learners.
Global learners are big picture thinkers. They do better with ideas than details. Learning may not follow a linear path. Some “easier” things may be harder to grasp than a difficult concept. This child typically understands the details after the big picture is understood.
Sequential learners learn concepts in a logical order. New concepts build upon former concepts. This child typically understands the whole picture after the steps are mastered. Most classrooms and curriculum cater to this learning style.
(http://eclectic-homeschool.com/what-is-my-childs-learning-style/)
Applying Learning Styles in Your Homeschool
Discovering how your children learn best is the first piece of the puzzle of things to consider when choosing curriculum options.
Let’s say that most of your students learn visually. Finding a curriculum that is visually appealing, contains a lot of reading or videos, or is great at including pictures, charts, or graphs in its explanations could be a great thing to look for in curricula. You might choose to assign them the task of creating a chart or graph to help them internalize information.
If all of your children are kinesthetic learners, you will probably want to look for curricula options that talk about having a lot of projects or hands-on activities. You may want to choose to do a field trip or project day to focus on applying what you learned each week.
If most of your children learn in an auditory way, you might want to choose curricula options with lots of audiobooks, stories, or music. Maybe you’ll choose to have them read along while someone else reads to help with retention, or maybe you’ll always have music quietly playing the in background. Retelling stories orally could help them organize all the information in their head.
Children who learn best with a “Read/Write” learning style might benefit best from a literature-based curriculum, or a curriculum that is heavy in reading. It might benefit them to do a lot of copywork and re-writing information for help with retention. You may give assignments like taking notes when reading or listening to new information.
My middle son is an interpersonal learner – he learns best in a social setting. I remember he used to follow me around the house with his workbooks in our early homeschooling years. It used to drive me absolutely crazy! After realizing that he is an interpersonal learner, I was able to understand him a little better. He needed discussion and feedback to talk about new ideas – without it, he just didn’t understand as well as he could have. Now I know that doing things together in a family style, one-room-schoolhouse type setting is one of the best things I can do for him. Doing projects together as a family, having him orally re-tell information he’s learning, and working on things together is how he is going to learn best.
My oldest son is a creative learner. When I need to find a solution to a problem, he’s the one I go to! He thrives in situations where he gets to come up with his own theories and analogies to explain how and why things happen and test them. He learns best from his own experiences, rather than being taught how to do things. I facilitate this in our homeschool by giving him projects where I detail a problem for him, give him parameters of things that need to be included in the solution, and let him loose. He never disappoints! I often let him veer off of our homeschool lesson for the day by giving him a project to complete instead.
The logical learner learns best when he/she understands why something is the way it is. Instead of just giving a step-by-step of what to do, this child is going to learn best by explaining how the detail they’re learning relates to the big picture. Giving assignments to make lists, categorize information, and create charts of the data will be beneficial to helping them retain information.
Knowing which ways your children learn best will help you capitalize on that information to create the optimal learning environment for your family, your children, and their specific learning styles.
Other Resources
While learning styles is one of the quickest and easiest ways to learn more about how each child learns, there are also two other resources worth noting, in case you’d like to do a deeper study on your children and how they learn.
One Christian doctor, Kathy Koch, specializes in helping parents understand more about how God created their children to learn and process information according to their individual calling and who He created them to be. Her mantra is that every child is smart in exactly the ways God intended them to be. You can read more about her philosophy in her book, 8 Great Smarts: Discover and Nurture Your Child’s Intelligences.
Another homeschooling mom has taken Dr. Koch’s theories and outlined them even further as a useful guide for homeschooling parents who would like to homeschool based on their children’s strengths. Tina Hollenbeck’s book, 8 Great Smarts for Homeschoolers: A Guide to Teaching Based on Your Child’s Unique Strengths, helps homeschooling parents do exactly that.
If teaching based on your children’s learning styles is something you would like to dive more into, these are two resources I would consider.
Choosing Curriculum Does Not Have to Be Overwhelming
To wrap it up, I would just like to say that choosing curriculum does not have to be overwhelming. If you will walk with me through this 4 part series, I will lead you down a very logical path to helping you narrow down which curriculum options might be best for your family.
Don’t stress out or allow yourself to be overwhelmed. Hold on to God’s peace and prayerfully consider the new pieces of information as you take this week’s information and start this week’s journey of learning about your children.
Remember that you don’t have to have all of the answers today – homeschooling is a marathon, not a sprint. Most of what you’ll find works for you and your family will be found through trial and error.
If you find yourself getting overwhelmed, surrender it back to God – put it in His hands and trust that He will lead you in the direction that’s right for you and your family. Proverbs 3:5-7 says that if you acknowledge Him in all of your ways, He will be faithful to direct your path.
This is the first post in the, “How to Choose the Best Christian Curriculum” Series. Next in this series, we will be talking about different homeschool styles and teaching philosophies. I look forward to seeing you there!
Other Posts in This Series
#1 – How to Determine Your Child’s Learning Style (this post)
#2 – How to Determine Your Homeschool Style
#3 – How to Narrow Down Your Homeschool Curriculum Choices
#4 – How to Choose the Best Christian Curriculum
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