When your kids are younger you can follow their lead in what they are interested in, but for the most part, you have been the one planning out the lessons. Now it is time for your older learners to take over and take control of their education a little more. Completely student-led classes can be hard, it can be scary, and it challenging in the beginning but it is rewarding.
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Letting Your Child Lead Their Studies
Why in the world would I let my kids plan out their own lessons? Aren’t they are going to take advantage and do the bare minimum of work? No, I really think that when your child has a plan for the future, their own plan that you haven’t forced on them, they are going to excel at this.
They are going to be invested in their lessons. They are going to be all in in their learning, in their future.
Completely Student-Led Classes
In the coming years, I will be allowing my kids to chart their own courses in the subjects they are most passionate about. We’ll be starting this in the coming year and with my oldest who has recently turned 12 years old, Austin will be focusing on Wildlife Conservation.
Below is our outline for planning and keeping on track with her studies. Just about any class could be developed using the following guidelines.
Her responsibilities:
- Create a list of potential wildlife conservation subjects to study
- Once approved, outline the subjects to be studied each month of the school year
- Each monthly subject will need to include a high school level informational book, notes taken from the book, a lab activity (in the field), and a project to show what you know
- Keep a weekly list of what’s been completed
- Meet weekly with mom for accountability
My responsibilities:
- Approve the subject list and order of study
- Approve the books before reading
- Meet weekly to look over notes, talk about projects and help tweak the learning path
- Provide opportunities for things she desires to do, go, and/or buy to make the course meet her expectations
Have you encouraged student-led courses for your homeschooling high school student? I’d love to hear about how they did and what they decided to study.
Interest-Led Learning for Older Children