Top 7 Activities for Homeschooling Kids and Parents

One of the marvelous benefits of homeschooling is that a love for creative learning cannot be dampened by the constraints of a traditional classroom. First, we’ll begin with a very simple equation that won’t leave you stumped: CREATIVITY = FUN. Next, we’ve come up with some fab-u-lous activities for you to experience right from your living room, and they are chock full of A-rated learning potential.

The Super Seven

Start A Blog. The art of blogging isn’t going anywhere soon, and is a great way to teach a teen the advantages to online marketing through social networking. Pick a topic that interests your student and get to work. Make it a goal to stick with it on a monthly basis. Creating your own blog is actually quite easy because there are Web-based toolsets that make the management of your blog incredibly simple – Blogger are just a few of the services available.

Play With Paper Airplanes. Really? Oh yes, and even catch up on some serious physics lessons in the process: Archimedes and Bernoulli’s Principles, and effect of wind resistance on your aero-design. Build several models with different variables, predict outcomes, and have a contest. See if your predictions hit the mark! It’s a wonderful way to spend an hour or two.

Plan a Garage Sale. Hand all the planning, processing, price determination, layout, and marketing/advertising directly to your student. Hold several boardroom negotiations on cost analysis and the percentage distribution of profits among family members. Business Finance 101 with some serious motivation! And you get your closets or attic cleaned out in the process.

Write Poetry With Math. What??? Yes – it can be done! Not only will it enrich your vocabulary, it’s a creatively fun way to write. Oulipo (pronounced oo-lee-po), uses math and patterns in writing. These constraints can create silly, even provocative creative works. Nothing is better than learning with laughter.

Role Play – Historically. Take the game of Who Am I? a bit further with this creatively versatile activity. Have your student select a historical figure of interest to them. Research the time period and significant events, and then put on a show. Dress up to the hilt, speak in-period, and drop small clues all day long – until the parents or siblings “get it.” Don’t make the answer too obvious right off the bat.

Create A Homeschool Yearbook. Think it through carefully, and make it as official as possible. Hit all the major areas that traditional school yearbooks do. With today’s desktop publishing and scrapbooking supplies, you may be able to come up with some very creative stuff. It will become a bit of history and special memories to tuck away forever.

Fake a Job Interview. There is NOTHING that will help interviewing skills for a future job or college admission like practice – and don’t forget to add as much formal pressure as you can on this endeavor! Research typical questions and answers online, prepare vigorously, dress the part, and conduct a formal interview. Don’t forget to throw in some really tough or unexpected questions as well. On the spot thinking is an excellent skill to possess. No giggling allowed!

Opportunity abounds for some fun and creative learning within the homeschool classroom. Add a dose of laughter and you have the recipe for some lifetime character-building memories in the making – all of which will only serve to strengthen family bonds  and prepare students for an experience in the outside world that will be either good OR bad – depending on what THEY choose to make of it.