One of the key concepts behind the Homeschool Smarter approach is that home learning is easier when you’re learning things you are interested in. We’ve established that real learning happens when children are interested and engaged in what they’re learning, and that as homeschoolers we have the opportunity to tailor-fit our child’s education to their unique personality, learning styles, and interests. Bur practically speaking, how do we do that. What does it look like to encourage your child’s interests?
1. Start simple
The first place to start is with the things your child is already interested in. What do they like? Once you know what they like, start simple. There is no need to turn your entire house into a live-action version of Minecraft, and an interest in Ocean life doesn’t necessitate an investment in a massive home aquarium. In her article for the website Simple Homeschool Cait Curley describes how to embrace your child’s interests with what she calls “lazy unit studies”. The idea behind “lazy unit studies” is that instead of our natural inclination to jump head first into our child’s latest interest (some of which will end up being fleeting and may not actually last long enough for all the specialized resources we ordered to actually arrive), we should start with the simplest thing. An internet search leading to some YouTube videos or a website and a few articles, stream a documentary (curiosity stream makes this really easy), or grab a few books at the library. For the fleeting interests this will be plenty, they will learn something and then move on. If we start simple and invest more as we go along, then if the interest lasts we will still have the opportunity to fully support those interests that evolve into passions.
2. Share in their interests
We need to show genuine interest in the topics that have captivated them. Yes, this might mean listening to endless amounts of information about dinosaurs when you’ve previously never cared enough to be able to tell a T-Rex from a Brontosaurus. It might mean that despite never once caring about anything having to do with space you now know more about Neil Armstrong than you do about your own cousins. We don’t have to actually be interested in the things are children are interested in, we just have to care about our children and the fact that they’re interested in it. We need to listen and actively participate in the conversation as they share their interests.
Our children’s passions don’t need to be our passions, in fact adopting their passions as our own can easily lead to “helicopter parenting”. We don’t want to take over their interest, we just need to show them we care. We need to listen for endless hours while they tell us everything they know about the Great Barrier Reef. When we’re too busy to listen to their research on horses, we show them that their interests aren’t important, and we also miss just how much learning is happening in the course of their everyday lives. We can help them solve problems or help them access the information they need to solve their problem or answer their questions for themselves. We can help them learn. We can choose to see their interests as learning in progress rather than a kid who talks too much. We can be on the lookout for information or resources related to their current obsession. We can plan a zoo trip or bring home a book about mammals for our animal loving child, but oftentimes simply sharing a fact or a piece of information about a topic they care about is enough to show support.
3. Let them be the teacher
One of the best ways to support our children’s interests and encourage them to take what they’re learning and put it to use is to give them the opportunity to be the teacher. If you have one child who is excited about biology, ask them to put together a lesson for their younger (or possibly even older!) siblings. Or ask them to create a presentation or a book or some form of information for the family and to teach you about what they’re learning. In places of tests, which can evaluate specific learning objectives but not the breadth of information that a child may have learned about a particular topic, have them share what they’re learning. When you listen to their presentations you can ask questions, not to “quiz” them on their knowledge but so that you can genuinely learn from them. In most cases, when the child has the opportunity to teach you, if they don’t know an answer to a question you ask with genuine interest they will be eager to look it up and get back to you with an answer. Children can teach grandparents or share what they’re learning with their friends. The same way kids line up to play their latest piano piece for guests, they will likely find a willing audience for other types of interests as well.
4. Play matchmaker
Sometimes the best way to support a child’s interest is to play matchmaker. Keep an eye out for other people that share your child’s interests. They may be able to find peers with similar interests but you can give them a hand in seeking out adults that share their passions, either as a career or a hobby, and make introductions. Most people are excited to talk about the things that interest them, and when you connect two people with the same or similar interests age won’t matter quite so much. My young, emerging chess player challenged everyone he could find to a game. He carried a chessboard with him and if he discovered that someone played the game age didn’t matter. The majority of opponents were decades older than him, but he would observe their play and discuss strategy, putting to use the skills he had learned on his own and from each of the previous opponents, to develop his own game.
5. Realize interests are often cyclical
A child’s interests are often a bit fickle. They only have so much attention to go around and interests will fade in and out of their current focus. Some children take on one or two interests and explore then with gusto, diving in deep to study every aspect of it before it is abruptly left behind for the next interesting thing. Some kids have a variety of interests, enjoying each one more broadly and with less depth. But over the longer term you’ll find that a handful of those interests don’t fade out with the others and remain, slowly adding depth to their knowledge and understanding over a long period of time. Most kids have some of each. You’ll find that interests are often cyclical, often they’ll show an interest in something and then eventually moving on to the next project until something reminds them of their first interest and they cycle back around to it. This is completely normal, and I suspect if we are honest with ourselves we will notice that we do the same thing as well with our own interests and hobbies. None of this is concerning and while we want to teach our children commitment and follow through, we want to be careful that we don’t destroy their love for a particular activity, topic or subject in the process.
6. Focus on progress not performance
The problem with growth is that it is often made up of an endless series of imperceptible changes that only add up over the course of time. Its easy to see how much the niece or nephew we only see during the holidays has grown, but the changes in our own child’s development catch us by surprise, despite spending ever day with them. Academic growth works the same way, and we need to focus on seeing the progress unfolding in front of us, rather than focusing on arbitrary performance metrics
. Julie Bogart of Brave Writer explains in her book the Writer’s Jungle, that “…any mistake that goes uncorrected today will magically reappear in another paper; you can fix it then.” Julie is referring specifically to correcting and editing writing mistakes, but this truism has far greater reach than just grammatical errors. When we want a perfect performance, when we give into that desire to “fix” all the mistakes at once, we risk killing our child’s joy and interest in learning.
In the book French Kids Eat Everything, Karen Le Billon discusses reframing foods our child doesn’t like as foods they don’t like yet. That “yet” makes all the difference in my attitude and my child’s. It removes the pressure that comes with the more definitive like/dislike but more importantly it reminds us both that there is still room and time to grow. A lot of anxiety can be relieved when we remember that our (and our child’s) current state isn’t permanent. Focusing on progress rather than performance grants us the freedom to focus on what our child is learning and has learned rather than on what they haven’t learned yet.
7. Give Them the Gift of Time
Following interests, and developing new interests requires time. Preferably large blocks of uninterrupted time to read, experiment, create, and explore. There are things you are going to want to insist that your child learns. There are so many good resources out there and it is so easy to fall into the trap of wanting to “do it all.” But “doing it all” comes with a cost- the cost of the free time required for your child to delve deeply into their own interests and set their own priorities. When I’m selecting resources for my children’s school, I make a point to measure the value of that resource, book or curriculum of my choice against the value of the time my children need to fully explore their own interests. I want my children to take ownership of their own learning and that is something that can’t be squeezed into a half hour block on the schedule. Plan your day in a way that maximizes the time they have to peruse their own learning and carefully weigh the benefits of parent chosen curriculum against the benefits of time for your child to learn and explore.