The Curriculum Comfort Zone

"I'm most comfortable when I'm following the curriculum," says one mom I recently worked with.  

Not an uncommon feeling with many homeschool parent-teachers. We trust the curriculum developers to have spent the time and money necessary to design a sequence of learning experiences that will lead children from A to Z in a specific subject area. 

And most are designed this way. BUT they are also designed for the MASSES and based on AVERAGES. 

When you are teaching a large group this is the best option a teacher has to help as many children as possible move from A to Z in understanding. 

But you are teaching 1. OK maybe more than one, but typically only one per grade level.  And this 1 is NOT AVERAGE.  Therefore the best option to lead this child from A to Z understanding is to PERSONALIZE the learning experience.

You don't have to throw out the curriculum, but you do need to consider if it's reaching your child as is... or needs some tweaking.  And if you are willing to step outside of the curriculum comfort zone for a short while, try a project that is focused on your child's specific interests and needs. 

Here's an example... 

The above mom, let's call her Sandra, was struggling to step out of the curriculum comfort zone. I encouraged her to consider gardening, one of her child's identified interests, and plan a project that would include a wide range of subject areas and learning strategies. Her first response was, "My husband does the projects. I do the curriculum." But with some encouragement, she decided to take the risk, for her daughter's sake. 

I asked her to identify all the reasons she was uncomfortable with a project like this... Putting those on the table up front allowed her the space to let me help her manage them.  

1. Don't know much about gardening
2. Don't know how to plan a project 
3. Don't know how to integrate subject areas 
4. This whole things scares me

I assured her that everyone was going to learn from this experience... ESPECIALLY if they made mistakes. She took a deep breath. 

Then we dug in and set up a general plan for the project. She felt comfortable enough to begin to execute it.  

At the end of the day the project opened up a great discussion between her and her daughter about being a learner.   They talked about...

1. The scariness of trying something you don't know
2. Stepping out of your comfort zone
3. Learning from mistakes
4. And most importantly how much fun it was to learn together. 

Sandra did NOT abandon her curriculum, but this experience made her more open to personalizing for her daughter.  

And by the way... her daughter thanked her for the gardening project. :)