How To Teach Homeschool Language Arts Without a Curriculum
Teaching reading can be challenging! The good news is that there are a lot of fun and exciting ways to help our kids fall in love with reading and writing without a boxed curriculum. In fact, I’m convinced we can teach our homeschoolers language arts without a curriculum.
Reading and writing are probably two of the most important skills we will ever teach in homeschool. Fortunately, we can totally teach these important subjects without a formal curriculum. Start by exposing your kids to reading and writing and surrounding them with real-world examples.
Ready to discover how you can successfully teach language arts without a curriculum?
Keep reading to learn how to teach reading, writing, spelling, and even grammar with a fun and engaging real-world approach.
Here’s How To Teach Real-World Language Arts Without a Curriculum
The key to teaching real-world language arts without a curriculum is focusing on exposure first. Exposing your homeschoolers to books, poetry, and practical applications for writing is a great first step. One successful method for increasing exposure to a variety of books and writing styles is strewing.
Strewing for Homeschool Language Arts
What is strewing? Strewing is all about exposing kids to a wide variety of items and resources. Strewing resources your kids can explore at their own pace in a hands-on way is a great first step. Check out some of our favorite tips for strewing success:
Some of our favorite items to strew for language arts include alphabet fridge magnets and magnetic poetry. Items like these encourage word play and expose kids to letters at an early age. It’s a great way for kids to begin recognizing letters, decoding words, learning phonics, and experimenting with reading and writing.
If you’d like to try strewing, but unsure where to begin, I’ve got just the thing to help you get started. I’ve put together a complete guide to strewing for you!
Learning To Read
Yes, your homeschoolers can learn to read without a specialized language arts curriculum. The most important first step to creating lifelong readers is reading aloud to them. Reading stories and poems aloud to kids of all ages is a huge benefit.
It’s important to remember that kids learn to read independently at a variety of ages and in all kinds of ways. There’s no one right way to learn to read that works for all kids. Instead, children can learn to read aloud in all kinds of ways!
Some children might not be ready to read at 5 or 6, but by 8 or 9 they are reading fluently. Other children might express a desire to read at an early age and master reading at 4 or 5. Follow your child’s lead and try not to stress too much if your homeschooler turns out to be a reluctant reader.
Writing Without Curriculum In Your Homeschool
You can also teach your homeschoolers to write without a formal curriculum. Young homeschoolers can learn to be successful with strong fine motor skills. Fine motor skills focus on helping kids master proper pencil grip and finger strength needed for handwriting as well as a variety of tasks like buttoning and tying shoes.
There are all kinds of fun ways to build fine motor skills with your homeschoolers. Sensory bins are a great multisensory hands-on learning experience you can use to build fine motor skills while teaching lots of other topics too.
I like to use quiet activities during read aloud time to help build fine motor skills for writing. Check out my favorite quiet activities for read aloud time for some fun ideas to get you started.
Sometimes writing is difficult for children, especially writing more than a few paragraphs by hand. When your homeschoolers begin to write longer essays, letters, and assignments, it can be helpful to teach typing skills.
In our homeschool we use something we call Mail Time Monday. Each Monday we sit down to read and write letters together. We make memories while also practicing handwriting, learning letter writing skills, and spreading kindness. Mail Time Monday has become one of our most treasured traditions in our homeschool.
Language Arts Books & Games for Your Homeschool
Exciting language arts toys picture books are a great way to begin introducing young children to language arts concepts in a fun and engaging way. Check out some of our favorite language arts picture books for your homeschool.
We are big fans of gameschooling here at the Waldock Way. Gameschooling is all about learning through gameplay. Playing language based games together is a great way to practice and reinforce language concepts we’re learning and have fun together too. Check out the best language arts games for your homeschool.
What If I Miss Something?
Remember, there’s no such thing as behind in homeschooling. One of the best things about homeschooling is that we can go at our child’s own pace. You have the freedom to speed ahead when they excel and spend extra time on concepts that might be more challenging or require extra practice.
You can use my free printable grade level checklists to help keep track of language arts goals you might want to cover with your homeschoolers this year. It’s a flexible checklist you can use for your own peace of mind as you pursue language arts this year.
What fun ideas do you have for teaching reading and writing without a curriculum this year? Share your favorite ideas in the comments. I can’t wait to read them and incorporate a few in our lessons and activities this year too.
