This must sound hilarious to some of you experienced homeschool veterans who are expert at homeschooling 3, 4, 5 plus kiddos! I am new to homeschooling (is it obvious?) and I am LOVING homeschooling my DD in Grade One. Absolutely loving it. So many amazing moments. My little fella is definitely ready to begin a really fun Pre-K program I have had ready and waiting...but I don't know how to homeschool two kids at the same time. Any suggestions would be most welcome! Thank you!
This is also our first year (we have a 3rd grader, 1st grader, and a toddler at home) and I have to say it is a balance due to the learning differences with my 2 kiddos, although it has been a rewarding time! With my 2, who both require much one-on-one with me, I combine our social studies/history and science, and try to do as much religion as possible together with them as well. There are times now at this point in the year that each kiddos can do more independent work. For instance, while my son works on his grammar, I can spend time doing math with my little girl. While my daughter is completing her phonics, I can get my son's math started. I go back and forth, and so far it is the best way for me to be able to spend on-on-one time with each kiddo while allowing increasing time of independent work. When this is not working well, I adjust and will give one kiddo a break or reading to do while I have more one-on-one time with the other. I know some homeschooling mamas who will do one-on-one work in the evening once their spouse is home to keep the others occupied. Hope that helps a little!!
Congratulations! It's refreshing to hear new enthusiasm once in a while! I'm sure you will receive other advice, but at the age of your children I would not be too worried about the when/how. Unless you are trying to do "school at home", your little guy is already learning alongside his sister and doesn't need his own specific time frames laid out. Do read-alouds together, do coloring pages together, do music and science and art... Then, when it's time for DD to do her math pages, sit next to DS and work on numbers, patterns, sorting, etc. While she works on her language arts (reading, writing, etc), sit on the couch with DS and read to him. Or work on his letter recognition. Is that what you are looking for? Don't worry- it will start to feel like second nature with some practice. MT3
Alternate and combine where possible. Honestly, I would wait to start the younger on something formal until Kindergarten. Just let your little one join in anything of interest until then. My 3.5 year old joins in on several subjects. I caught her singing a song about helping verbs the other day - except she was singing it as "helping birds." But with my two boys I combine them mostly for content subjects (i.e. history, science). For other subjects I work with them individually and I alternate between them. Typically while I am working with one child the other works independently. I'll be adding my third child into the mix in 1.5 years and I'm not sure how that will work out. My older child is able to be pretty independent now, but we do quite a bit together because I like to use teacher-intensive resources for many subjects.
I can tell you what I did, but keep in mind that the beauty of homeschooling is being able to do what works best for YOU. My way is best for ME, but may be totally wrong for you. First of all, I don't believe in teaching "pre-k". It's mostly a way of making money out of parents who are afraid their kids will "fall behind" before they even start. I believe that some preschoolers are eager to learn more formally, while others are content learning experientially through play. So I usually let the preschooler take the lead. I would include my younger child(ren) with the older one(s) as much as possible. When I would read the history lesson, I would give my little one a coloring page, possibly on the history topic, to color while I read. He would also listen in to science. I would keep extra worksheets lying around and if the younger one wanted to "do school, too!", I'd give the same sheet the older one got. And if it was just scribbled all over, that was OK. This is especially good for phonic pages, where you color the pictures that start with a certain sound, or has the correct vowel sound, etc. Of course, you'll want to read picture books to the little one, but I was amazed at how well they learned to listen to the older one's chapter books I was reading aloud! Again, that's just me. But when my youngest was 3, we went to plant flowers for my mom for Mother's Day. Dad went to put fertilizer on the flowers. My son asked, "What's that, G'pa?" "Oh, it's just plant food." "No, G'pa, you don't understand! Plants make their own food from the sun!" Would you like to take one guess what my older two were studying in science? LOL!
I'm another mom who doesn't believe in pre-k. Kids learn so much just through everyday life that "school" can sometimes be overkill. When I first started, school only took about and hour and a half for a K-er and a 1st grader. I had a kid on each side of me and alternated my attention between the two as needed. We did alot of "couch school" as I call it. Each had a little whiteboard and we wrote letters and numbers and short sentences and did alot of read-alouds together. That was the extent of our curriculum for the first couple of years. Now they are 9yrs and 11yrs and working at the same grade level for everything but reading, so we work together. It does get easier once you find your groove. Just try different things until you find what works.
Like several others have said, we combine subjects as often as possible. Our science, history, character, etc. are all done together. Mine are using different math programs, so obviously they work separately there and in Language Arts as well. I love combining things though because they challenge each other to really out-do the other. My little guy hangs out and does his own thing most of the time, although he LOVES to do geography and science with us Pretty fun to see my 3 year old teach my 30 year old brother the continents!
I do not homeschool two as I have a 4 year old doing kindergarten work and a baby, but after homeschooling the 4 year old I feel guilty that the baby has been left out and has not been paid as much attention as I feel she should have got. What works for me is to do things with the baby that my eldest likes to do too - so I let her splash around in water, walk on the grass while my eldest plays games outside and so on, or I take the eldests learning outside and let the baby play along too. The reason I mentioned this is that a pre-K programme should be a lot of playing (fun hands on activities) and the activities are things your first grader might enjoy doing with your other child - so if you want to do a pre-K curriculum teach your eldest first and then let them play with the younger ones curriculum together - your eldest could always go off by herself and look at books or play her own games while you see to the youngest.
Hello, I am a single parent of three children. My oldest two are teenagers so they pretty much do their work together. My youngest does most of hers separately. When I first started, I work with one for an hour. Then, I worked with the other one for an hour. I alternated their times. Then after a few years, they worked together more. Of course, we always had learning times together, such as reading. Hope this helps you!
I have 4 kids-dd13, dd11, dd7, and ds6. The thing I've found works best for me is to keep the younger two very busy while I work with the older ones. I've been working on building up my supply of things the youngers can do independently-puzzles, file folder games, "memory" type matching games, etc. When I set out their work for the day, I alternate things that I need to help them with and things they can do alone. For example, today I will work with dd6 first thing on math. Then, I'll set him up with some pipe cleaners and fruit loops to practice his addition facts (stringing on 2 reds+2 blues, etc). While he's working on that, I can work with dd7 on math. When he's finished with that, he'll have a memory verse picture to color while I go over the older girls' math. Then, I'll work with him on reading and then give him some rhyming puzzle cards and penmanship to do while I work with the others on reading. We'll do some science and history all together. Once he's finished with everything, he can go outside and play if there weather's nice or play in his room. Dd7 usually finishes about the same time he does, so they can play together. If the older girls work is taking quite a while, I'll let him play on the computer or go into my room and watch tv.
