google.com, pub-8985115814551729, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0 Free Printable Lesson Plans: free lesson plans
Showing posts with label free lesson plans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label free lesson plans. Show all posts

Creating easy free homeschool lesson plans with toys around the house

 Hello friends of my Omschool blog. Omschool is lesson plans from Omi (grandma), a 40 year veteran teacher and homeschool parent. My focus is always on free, cheap and recycled so today, we're looking at free easy homeschool lesson plans with toys around the house. Here are ways to repurpose the play room as a homeschool and toys as lesson plans. 

First, select multipurpose, educational toys. Whenever you purchase a toy for a child, consider how to use it in lesson plans. When people ask what you'd like for the kids, give learning toy suggestions. You could even have a Target, Walmart or Amazon registry. Every toy should provide quality learning experiences. Otherwise it's just a waste of space. 

Now when you plan lessons, you can select from the toys and save money. Montessori says that quality educational activities should use materials found on hand. During the Covid 19 quarantine, I read on Facebook of so many parents looking for online learning activities for their kids. It made me sad because here was a chance for parents to homeschool their kids and all they wanted to do was stick them in front of yet another screen or buy an overpriced, unnecessary curriculum package. 

I get it though; a lot of folks are worried they don't have the skills to educate their children and let Omi just assure you...YOU DO! I was talking to a young mom whose daughter was just diagnosed with autism. She was convinced to enroll the little one in a very expensive program. Basically all the program had done so far was to tell her to engage her daughter in activities (wait for it) around the house. $6,000 to be told that? I'd have told her that for free. 

You don't have to pay for something to learn to do what you probably already do anyway. Trust yourself. There are many excellent schools and programs but ultimately you are the first and most crucial teacher. So give yourself permission to sit back and enjoy watching your children play (as you are able). Montessori also says "Play is a child's work." 

Stay tuned for my list of best educational


toys for children. 


Free lesson plans: how to homeschool for nothing (zip, zero, no cost)


 Hello my friends! Om-school Omi here with some good...nay great...news for homeschool families. You can literally homeschool your children for nothing, as in zip, nada, zero cost with these free lesson plans and a little know-how. I'm going to share easy, free ways to educate kids, gleaned from 43 years of teaching. 

I've been doing this education thing in one way or another since I was 15, at summer camps, VBS, Sunday school and then as a certified teacher in K-8, Montessori, adult, preschool, special needs, tutoring, homeschool and substitute teaching. And I can assure you that it's not really that difficult if you plan and prepare accordingly. 

If the Covid 19 pandemic taught us anything about homeschooling our children it's that we prefer to pay for things (or feel more comfortable with purchased curriculum, cyberschooling, apps, etc.) than we do trusting our own teaching skills and common sense. But happily, as quarantine wore on, I saw many parents begin to have aha moments as they realized, hey, this isn't so difficult. We can teach our kids! To quote my beloved Barack Obama, yes we can! Parents began to wean from purchased packaged and digital lesson plans and experiment with ideas of their own. 

So now that Covid 19 is winding down, you can also keep up that momentum with homeschooling if you want. You don't have to homeschool every day or keep them out of group education. The key is to remember that every moment we are with our children we are teaching, modeling, and communicating in every act we perform or word we say. Daunting? A little. But also exciting. So how do we teach, model and communicate positive healthy, proactive ideas to our kids? Here are some ideas, my "free lesson plans" if you will. 

1) Be authentic. Just because we are educating constantly, doesn't mean we have to adopt a fake "teacher voice." Educating doesn't mean pontificating, preaching or proselytizing. Speak to children respectfully, positively and gently. 

2) Build for natural learning. Teaching is more about doing and showing than talking. St. Francis of Assisi said of preaching (which in its truest form is teaching) "preach always. Occasionally, use words." Genuine learning takes place when teachers share, foster and facilitate experiences. 

3) Facilitate. Montessori identifies this as the teacher's main duty. Make natural learning experiences accessible to students. Create activities--a craft project, for example--and then step back and let children interact with materials. Or just point out learning experiences (a bird's nest on a nature walk). Don't hover, orchestrate or  manufacture results. Let kids take from experiences what they will. See my post on grandchildren Lucian and Ezra and their experiences with a sand mold project we did with them. 

4) Observe. I can't emphasize enough the importance of quiet observation and reflection in the classroom. In an upcoming post I'm going to cover observation journals. There's so much going on around us in our world. Children know this and are constantly making us adults aware of this, if we listen. Sometimes, we learn more from them than they learn from us and what a blessing that is. I guess that's why Montessori says to "follow  the child" and the Bible that "a child will lead them." 

5) Empower. Sadly some children have had their experiences, observations and ideas diminished and need an infusion of confidence. They have come to believe that they aren't good enough and require constant validation from someone they think is superior. This is where we educators can interrupt and redirect that cycle and validate them. When subbing in an alternative high school for troubled teens, students were reading "The Crucible" aloud as a play. I complimented one young man who was generally very angry and withdrawn, on his delivery as Judge Hawthorne. I said he should consider community theater. He literally blossomed and I heard him after class telling students that he was thinking of trying out for a play. 

Stay tuned for more ideas on how to educate children without spending a cent! Photo is eldest grandson Silas mucking about with his homemade slime, making a mess, having a blast, oh and btw, learning about polymers.