Am I Doing Enough at Home with My Children?

 

Here are some curriculum guides for you to see what professional educators demand from their students on an annual basis. You will probably find that even though you're not following a standardized curriculum, the unique curriculum you are making with your family actually covers much of the same material. Further, you may find your children are at the same level or ahead in some areas of the standard curriculum and behind in others—just like most children in school.

Not only do you have the ability to remediate those areas in the future (as in school), you can choose to address those areas later, ignore them if they are irrelevant to your children's needs, or approach them in an interdisciplinary fashion through projects. It is your home, your school, and you can co-create the curriculum with your children as your learn and grow together, so focus on what your children want to learn now, regardless of what the school curriculum says.

GWS has lots of stories about how families create their own curricula over time, but here are some standard curricula for you to check out and, hopefully, put your mind at ease that you and your children are "doing enough."

You can also find local charter and private schools that use different scopes and sequences for learning in their schools. Contact them and see if they'll provide a curriculum outline for your child's age to you or research their curricula online:

  • Montessori Schools

  • Steiner/Waldorf Schools

  • Independent/Alternative Schools

  • Christian/Jewish/Muslim Schools

  • Reggio Emilia Schools

Read More on This Topic by Pat Farenga

Less Play + Less Empathy + More Narcissism = Today’s Society

Deep and Personal: Two Parents Write about Becoming Unschoolers

Common Core Curriculum Doesn't Keep Up With the Real World

 
Previous
Previous

Unschooling Children: The Elementary Years

Next
Next

On Older Readers