How To Create a Dynamic Learning Environment in Your Home

by Susan Franklin
After nearly two years of reading, browsing through catalogs, cruising the web, and talking to many homeschoolers in search of the "right" curriculum, I have come to the conclusion that educating myself about teaching, the learning process, etc. is a higher priority than purchasing a curriculum package.
Why? Because only when you know how and what to teach and get a wide variety of input about what has worked best for others can you know which curriculum package, if any, you should decide upon. My degree in education has only given me a good foundation in this process. It has not eliminated the need for the process.

Learning at home is much different, but in my opinion, more effective, than learning in a traditional school setting. And so it takes time learning from others how to do it well, just as any other job requires training and continuously learning how to improve.

And in working at educating myself first, and my children next, I have discovered my second priority: transforming our home into a relaxed learning environment. Keeping the television off is the first step. You can read about how we rid our home of television in my article "Television: Do You Really Need It?"

Choosing to spend time and money to create a learning environment in the home should be a priority for homeschoolers as well as those who choose to educate their children in a traditional school. Most American children spend more time watching television than in school. If their home was a place where independent learning and curiosity was encouraged and television was not an option, we would all benefit as a society. I know what you’re thinking and all I can say is “I have a dream.”

All it takes is thinking hard about the choices we make.

For example, instead of spending $25 on the latest video, why not buy art supplies or an age-appropriate board game? Or, instead of spending $30 a month for cable or an expanded cable or satellite option, use that money to buy reference books, maps, legos, or biographies of people worth reading about. Christmas and birthday gifts can be deliberately chosen to fit into your learning environment.

The primary objective in creating this dynamic home learning environment is to make learning fun, natural, and to foster a healthy curiosity that should result in an independent learner.

The following is a collection of ideas I have gathered.

TOYS
The latest research about how the best learning occurs reveals that active and repetitive involvement, as opposed to passive watching or even reading, is when the most powerful learning takes place.

Purchase a few toys wisely. I avoid anything that merely entertains my children. Legos, building blocks of any kind, dress-up clothes and props acquired from yard sales or after-halloween sales, board games, large and small fabric remnants, a sand box, even a miniature indoor sand box made with cornmeal in a large plastic container are toys that encourage imaginative play.

BOXES
Give them a cardboard box and let them find ways to play with it. Save shoeboxes and bring the collection out occasionally to make a train for toys. Teach classifying and sorting by using boxes and other containers to organize toys when picking up for the day.

Box up toys that are not picked up at night and rotate toys every week or so. They will seem like new ones to your child.

Give children small boxes, paper, glue, scissors, stickers, markers or crayons and let them cover boxes and decorate them.

PUZZLES
Puzzles can be expensive. But they can also be purchased for pennies at yard sales and made from recyclable household items. Glue magazine pictures to posterboard or recycled cereal boxes.

For toddler puzzles, use the pictures in coloring books or picture books as examples to draw simple pictures to make your own puzzles. Use the puzzles to practice counting, understand spatial relationships, observation and problem solving skills.

GAMES
Introduce card games like "Go Fish" to teach colors, numbers, letters, and counting. Try Chess and Checkers to teach strategy and logic. Monopoly Jr. introduces a child to the world of investments and real estate.

Encourage children to make their own games with items on hand. Make your own flash cards using magazine pictures and play “Find It.” Hide several letter cards in a room and ask your child to find one letter.

ART JOURNAL
Buy a sketch book and write the day and date at the top of a page. Let your child create a picture of anything he chooses. Use questions occasionally to help him think of a project. This helps preschoolers understand the concept of time and the calendar and also teaches how to complete one picture on a page, instead of scrawling a line on each page.

COMPUTER/TV/VIDEOS
Limited video time can be used to teach character by choosing programs where the characters exemplify good behavior and the story line shows good winning over evil in the end(as it ultimately will in the real world). Look for educational videos to enhance unit studies or current fascinations. Educational computer games can provide motivation to learn phonics, math languages, and more while teaching basic computer skills at the same time.

ARTS AND CRAFTS
Teach your child to create something with his hands every day. I try to write every day and encourage my children to create a drawing or other project. In a few years, we will work on journals, correspendence and nature journals.

BOOKS
It goes without saying that reading aloud during the early years especially is critical and, for us, has been part of our daily routine. Children’s books can be purchased for ten cents each at yard sales. Stock up when you can. Also check out library sales and homeschool book fairs.

YOUR BACKYARD
Get out into the yard and take time to look at things and explore. Get binoculars, a magnifying glass. Make insect collection jars. Use leaves, dried weeds, etc. to create art projects.

WALLS
Yes, walls. Why not put up a beautiful map of the world in a family gathering place such as the family room or dining room? National Geographic has a beautiful one for $89.99. We are considering this for a family Christmas gift. Mount tables and charts appropriate for your child’s age but also introduce him the periodic table of elements and a chart of the planets or stars.

Paint a wall with chalkboard paint. Set up a dry-erase board on an easel. Make a felt board. See Lights, Camera Action! Felt Productions Dazzle Preschoolers for more ideas about using felt boards.

Assign a wall space in the house to display your children’s art projects.

LEARNING CENTERS
In my grand master plan for our homeschool environment I envision small reading areas assigned to related subjects. One could be for science, one for math, one for foreign languages, etc.

A small bookcase, reading chair, and cassette player with headphones could be a language arts listening and reading center.

Consider setting up a workshop if you don’t have one. Pick up tools and small appliances, as well as obsolete computers at yard sales. Let your children take them apart and learn how to put them back together.

CASSETTE TAPES
Listening to quality music tapes or language tapes during play time can be a non-threatening way to introduce classical and other quality music, as well as foreign languages.

Make original tapes with your own voice to teach Bible memory, poems, songs (if you dare), stories, child’s address and phone number, the multiplication table, etc. Especially at bedtime, a tape with mom’s voice reading a story can be a relaxing way for younger children to fall asleep happily in their own rooms.

CHORES
Sorting laundry, setting the table, working in the kitchen and other household tasks can be opportunities to learn about colors, shapes, counting, measuring, sorting. Just being open to using these times will unleash a new attitude toward those tasks for everyone involved.

Over time you can have puppets and a puppet theatre, a mounted dry-erase board, and easel, felt boards, maps, charts and reference books throughout the home.

Make books together related to what you are studying or your child's current interests. A simple alphabet book is a good start. Cut out pictures and letters together and glue them into a spiral notebook, using a page or two-page spread for each letter of the alphabet.

If your children still get bored, go to Family.com’s ActivitySearch . They have recently incorporated the entire book, 365 TV-Free Activities by Steve and Ruth Bennett into their database.

I have a long-term vision for my home. I want it to be a place where my children have fun, where they are busy learning and doing, and one that provides an inviting atmosphere for their friends.

Beyond the home your family can learn on the go. Talk about everything. Encourage questions and intellectual curiosity about the world. You can count to 100 or practice singing the vowel sounds while driving in the car, play “I Spy” while waiting in line.

Now, I will admit that this can get out control. My son gets upset when I try to teach sign language while driving the car. We now have rule prohibiting the teaching of sign language by any person operating a motor vehicle. ;-)