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One thing I hear from homeschoolers often is that they’d like to engage in more child led learning – but they don’t know how to go about it. Let’s take a peek into a delight directed homeschool and see how one mom nurtures life long learning.
This special guest post is part of our homeschooling methods series of interviews.
I am so excited to share this interview with homeschool mom and coach, Sara J. Jordan.
Sara has built her homeschool around delight directed learning, a creative path that inspires confidence and nurtures a life-long love of learning.
This child led approach to learning differs from unschooling or lifeschooling with a more purposeful, supportive approach, using unit studies and literature as a way to dig deeper into your child’s interests while keeping long-term milestones in mind.
In the following interview, Sara shares her thoughts an advice on creating a delight directed education using child led learning.
What is delight directed learning?
I didn’t start out to be a delight-directed homeschooler, but I believe my daughters’ educational experience is richer for it. It is a wholehearted way of education that respects each child as an individual with unique gifts and passions, treating learning as a natural part of living.
Delight-directed learning is a purposeful way to encourage curiosity, creativity, character, and connection. It’s based on following your child’s interests and talents as a springboard for learning.
In our homeschool, we use living books and unit studies as a spine for our lessons, then branch off from there to take a living approach to education. It’s all about building a lifelong love of learning.
I have a free quick start guide to delight-directed learning here:
What does child led learning look like in your homeschool?
Our weeks vary, but we tend to follow a routine or rhythm to our days. We begin with our morning basket time together, then enjoy self-directed play and learning. We don’t have a set schedule. We like to take nature walks, do hands-on projects, and lots of reading.
How do you plan or organize your homeschool days?
I’m more about goal setting and vision casting than outright planning. I like to keep the big picture in mind. For smaller details that I need to remember and/or include in our homeschool portfolios, I keep a daily planner and a narrative journal that I created.
I also have Interest Inventory printables that I go over with my daughters to keep track of things they want to learn about or projects they want to do. I wrote more about my reverse planning style in this post.
I created this workbook (pictured) to help write a homeschool mission statement and guiding principles.
Sara’s Purposeful Homeschooling workbook can be purchased on her website.
What advice would you give to someone interested in implementing more child led learning?
If ditching the premade curriculum scares you, take baby steps. Find one topic that your child really loves and try making your own unit study (or buying one) on just that topic.
Set aside special time in your regular routine to pursue interests and encourage their curiosity and creativity. You might find that you’ll gain the confidence to approach delight-directed learning as a lifestyle!
Find out more…
Read more about Sara’s approach to child led learning and find a variety of excellent homeschool resources on her website, Heart and Soul Homeschooling.
Are you a new homeschooler? Find answers, advice, and support here.
Ashley helps parents who want to homeschool find the resources they need to successfully teach their children. Ashley is a former teacher, current homeschooler, published author, and designer behind Circle Time with Miss Fox printables as well as the creator of this website, The Homeschool Resource Room.