How homeschoolers study

A question that I have often been asked during the four and a half years since we started homeschooling is about how we manage to study at home. ‘Do your parents teach you?’ People ask. ‘Does your father teach you? Or does your mother teach you?’ They ask with curiosity. ‘No one teaches us.’ I always answer truthfully. ‘We study by ourselves.’

While this fact is hard for many people to accept, I don’t see why this is impossible. With amazing textbooks for each subject, plenty of reference material and resources, access to libraries and bookstores, and limitless help from the internet, it is very feasible for a student to study on his\her own. In this article, I intend to give an insight into how I – and several other homeschoolers – take charge of their studies.

Taking charge of your studies:

The first thing that I realized as a homeschooler was that I am responsible for my studies. Unlike at school, where someone teaches you something and then gives you questions and worksheets related to it. In homeschooling, you have to do all that by yourself. You have to responsibly take charge of your learning and make your own timetables, and daily, monthly, and even yearly targets. Because no one will tell you what you have to do. You have to decide what you have to study, by yourself, as you are the one in charge.

Making targets:

In order to organize our studies, it is essential to make our own study targets. I have seen children as young as in second or third grade making their own study targets. We homeschoolers usually have our own monthly plans about what we would like to study that month. The plans include the chapters of certain books that we’d like to study, books which we intend to read, places we’d like to visit, people\ scholars we would like to meet and interview, activities we would like to carry out, experiments we would like to conduct, and events we plan to attend or organize. The targets and plans, though organized and well-planned, are extremely flexible, so that we are able to achieve most of what we want to, and don’t miss out on anything else if it is not in our plan. And the targets are always practical and achievable. While keeping high expectations and positive hopes, we would never expect anything impossible from ourselves or each other.

Having a proper study space:

In order to be productive in our studies, it is essential to have an organized studying environment, with minimal distractions, so that you can stay focused on your task. There must be sufficient light, preferably sunlight in the daytime, and ventilation in order to make the place comfortable and airy. There should be a white board, stationary materials, and books for studying and referencing. Having a proper environment contributes greatly to our studies, as we can work more easily in there rather than any other part of the house that isn’t designed as a study space.

Love of books and balanced reading:

Ever since our early childhood, we have loved books, which hold a special place in our house and hearts. This immense love for books has led us to buying and collecting huge amounts of books. Our house itself is a small library, as it has thousands of books on a variety of topics and genres. We also enjoy visiting bookstores and libraries, and reading new books.

However, you may wonder what kind of books one should read. It is ideal to adopt a balanced reading approach. Balanced reading has various meanings: It means balancing fiction and non-fiction choices in buying and reading. It means balancing studies on subjects like pure sciences and social sciences. It also means balancing your readings in your mother tongue and other languages.

Self-tests:

Sometimes, we like to create our own tests for ourselves and solve them. They are not to measure our intelligence or creativity; rather, they are a tool to check how much we have learnt about a certain subject or topic. When preparing for board exams, we also solved past examination papers and then checked our answers from the marking schemes provided. Marking our own papers was a great experience as we learnt a lot from our mistakes.

Blogging:

A big part of our homeschooling circles around our blogs. Many homeschoolers have their own blogs and they post regularly on them. Our blogs are basically our portfolios, where we post our writings, artwork, and descriptions of our regular activities. Through blogging, we also connect to other young people online from different parts of the world, and comment on their blogs as well. Getting feedback and comments on our posts is an important feature of blogging, which also helps us improve our work. Blogs are also very useful as they store all our work in one place, which we can easily access whenever we want to.

Mentors:

Homeschooling does not mean that we do not have any teachers at all. We do have teachers, but they are in fact, much more thanordinary teachers. They are mentors. Mentors do not have to be outsiders, and they need not act like a teacher at all. A mentor can be a parent, a grandparent, an aunt, an uncle, or even a friend. Basically, a mentor is a person who guides a less experienced person through building trust and modelling exemplary life. Mentors are wise people who guide you through your life.

Attending meaningful programs:

As homeschoolers don’t have to go to school and tuitions, they have a lot of time to engage in meaningful activities. Among those activities is attending workshops, talks, literary events, and other programs of their interest. During our homeschooling, we got opportunities to attend workshops on study skills, developing a career vision, art and design, goal setting, photography, woodwork, healthy eating, and several other topics. Since we had ample of time after our studies, we could pursue the skills we learnt in those workshops as our hobbies.

Below is a table that suggests how homeschoolers can benefit from meeting people, visiting places, reading books, using the internet and other materials, and having regular and 

occasional activities.

Suggested options for homeschoolers that can support them in studies:
People	Places	Books	Internet	Other material	Regular activities	Occasional activities
Parents & grandparents	Museums	Biographies	Khan Academy	Collection of maps	Reading	Exhibitions
Scholars	Libraries	Language dictionaries	YouTube	Globe and compass	Discussions	Drama/ role plays
Writers	Exhibitions	Subject dictionaries	Google	Tools for experimentation	Book reviews	Preparing test papers
Teachers	Historical sites	Thesaurus	Coursera	Big writing board & markers	Recitals of poetry, stories & other texts	Wood work/ gardening
Senior students	Farms and nurseries	Various textbooks	TED talks	Art material	Self-test	Volunteer work
Other professionals	Offices	Reference books	Blogger	Measuring instruments	Making presentations	Travelling

Overcoming obstacles:

While studying, it is quite natural to get stuck in any concept and not fully understand it. School going children always have teachers to help them go through the difficult stuff, but how do homeschoolers manage it? Different homeschoolers have different ways to tackle the challenges they encounter, and I can tell you how I handle the difficulties I find. For example, if I come across any concept in Maths that I do not understand, I go back a few pages and study the things that came before it. Sometimes, that is enough for me to understand it, and I can continue with my work. Sometimes, I consult other textbooks and reference material on that subject and resolve my confusions through getting exposed to another style of explanation on the topic. But at times, I still don’t understand it. In those cases, I open my laptop and go to Khan Academy (an amazing website that I visit when I need help in Math). Watching a couple of tutorials and doing a few practice questions on Khan Academy is usually more than enough to understand any concept. Similarly, if I am stuck in any other subject, I can Google it up and understand it from various websites. You can also find amazing tutorials on YouTube for about everything; whether you want to learn calligraphy or understand a science concept. If you would like someone to explain a certain concept to you, you can always take help from your parents. I take help from them occasionally, when I need it, and they are always willing to help me out. Parents should also encourage children in their work and keep positive expectations from them.

However, not all homeschoolers study that way. Some prefer to attend classes and get help from qualified teachers of certain subjects. Some homeschoolers find a few subjects too difficult to be studied on their own, and so they attend tuitions for them. Others accept the challenge and study them on their own. I can assure that homeschoolers, who study by themselves and \ or take some extra help, are very much successful and happier than those who study under pressure in schools.