Welcome to The Homeschool Village’s first ever Tour of Home{schools}! We are so excited that you stopped in. We hope that you will find encouragement and ideas for all types of spaces, styles and personalities.
We homeschool primarily because of my husband’s frequent travel schedule. He was on the road 160 days last year. The up side – we were blessed to join him many of those days. We have grown fond of our homeschool room – on the road!
Homeschooling on the road (or on a long vacation), is very easy if you prepare yourself and your students. You can not plan to hop in the car without supplies and think you’ll get a week’s worth of work completed.
Before You Go:
- print all curriculum you will need. do not rely on the idea of “access to a printer” or chance loosing a curriculum disk! fill pocket folders with printed curriculum worksheets, and maps. pack a mini stapler.
- buy sketch pads and pencil cases.
- pack your important books: field guides, resource books, etc. try to get by without planners or teacher guides. (I promise you’ll hate yourself if you stick to them – plan for flexibility).
- pack a journal to document your trip.
- bring a camera to remember things you’ve seen and can google/draw/discuss later.
- bring books, mad libs, and sticker books for car rides. print maps of local areas, local plants/animals you might see.
- google surrounding destination for: “things to do with kids”, “nature preserves”, “wild animal shelters”, “historical landmarks”, etc. (do not kill yourself if you can not make it to everything – you won’t).
My best advice and hardest thing to do is to turn off the electronics and look around. Naturally we want to turn on another dvd, let kids play electronic games, or whatever so you can have a few million quiet moments to enjoy your trip. This is a hard habit to break! We took our boys, niece, and nephew to Yellowstone National Park last fall. I was blown away by God’s amazing handiwork!!
You’d think my east coast flat lands living kids would be impressed? They kept asking to turn on the dvd player while we were spotting elk, coyotes, bears, and a moose. I was devastated, but it was what they had come to expect!
We have been on some amazing trips: Washington DC, Salt Lake City, Yellowstone, Yosemite, San Francisco, Hilton Head Island, Blue Ridge Mountains, Niagara Falls, and many more little trips to smaller towns. Take the time to help your children see God’s beauty and the world around them! Always be open to the next adventure.
We make the car rides fun. Play games together, read to one another, change the “seating assignment”, pick up your feet when you enter a new state – or sing a silly song. Stop at resturants you don’t have back home (I love you In & Out Burger).
Another bad habit I have learned to let die was trying to make better time. As in see how fast we can get to where we are going. It was my husband that kept encouraging me to pull over at every single look out and breathe! It’s been so worth it.
A special thank you to our series sponsor, See The Light.
Erin J says
I wish I had seen this article before we took are two cross country trips 4 months ago. We went all the way Southeast to the Southwest then from the Southwest to the Midwest then back down Southeast. We so thought we could just take a bin for each child with there workbooks in them and some brainquest cards. Nothing got done. They pretty much had paper and notebooks everywhere. But we did learn a lot when we stopped through Utah and got to visit a Pioneer fort. Or when we went through New Mexico. We learned a lot of about what major landforms where in certain states. But the planned assignments all fell to the wayside.