Essentially, the idea here is that you can turn anything into a pretending game. The example the author used was a marketplace:

Occasionally, in the elementary years, we turned our entire house into a miniature town. Each room in the house became a place of business, with signs, menus, goods, and services for sale. Each family member became a character with a name, a costume, and a history and started the day with a pre-determined amount of play money. We put things around the house up for sale with price tags. We offered services for a fee. Other family members would stop by the rooms to buy goods and services. Even the kitchen became a restaurant with a menu. Family members had to purchase their own food and beverages. Business owners were required to put reasonable prices on their “products” and to give correct change to customers. They were required to write proper signs, menus, and instructions for their businesses. It was amazing to see just how much math and writing my students ended up doing and how their enthusiasm for it never waned.

There are other examples within the post. It’s a great idea, after all kids naturally lean toward make believe, so why not use that to turn learning into something fun? While I think we can all agree that school isn’t always a piece of cake, this role playing sounds like something everyone can enjoy, even parents!

What are your thoughts on this topic? Do you use role playing in school?

1. How to research. It might be tempting to just tell your children what you know or look it up yourself and then recount it, but the ability to find out what you need to know is something that is invaluable at any age. Make sure your kids know how to use a dictionary, thesaurus and encyclopedia, as well as the internet.
2. How to speak in public. Just about everyone is called on to do a little public speaking from time to time, even if it is just in front of a small group. Unfortunately, this is an area that many homeschoolers miss out on. You can work on this skill by having your homeschool group do small public speaking events or look for other opportunities, such as through 4-H groups.
3. How to manage time. If you go to school, you learn to schedule things like homework so it all gets done on time, but this might not happen in homeschooling. You can build this skill by having your children work on the school schedule with you and by giving them tasks that they need to complete by a certain time or date and then let them figure out how to get it done in time.
4. How to get around. When you are studying at home and driving places with a parent, it`s easy to just never learn how to ride a bus or use other forms of transit. Yet nearly all of us are going to need to do this at some point in our lives. Kids should know how to read a bus schedule, take the subway, etc.
5. How to play sports. You might argue that this isn`t a required skill, but trust me, when you`re 14 and going to hang out with a youth group and discover that you have NO idea how to play basketball, it matters. While sports don`t need to be a major part of studies, it`s a good idea to learn the rules for the most common sports. This ensures that your kids won`t end up at a staff picnic 10 years from now, confused about how to play volleyball!

Do you have other essential skills that homeschoolers might miss out on but need to know? Let us know in the comments!

There are so many opportunities for family learning that I can`t possibly do them justice here. However, since spring has sprung, a good place to start might be your own backyard. Why not start a garden? It`s a great project that lets the entire family get involved and even if you`ve gardened for years, I guarantee you`ll learn new things by looking through your children`s eyes.

Taking up a new hobby like stargazing or geocaching as a family is a lot of fun, too. You can all learn as a group and your kids will be thrilled to teach you sometimes, too. There`s really nothing better for a child than to realize he knows something his parents don`t . . . it`s exhilarating!

Kids tend to learn a lot better if they realize that there is actually a good reason to learn something. An example: I did very poorly in my last few years of math. I didn`t understand the need to learn things like geometry and algebra and since it didn`t come easily, I really didn`t make much of an effort. Fast forward a few years and I had a job at a construction site where suddenly all those abstract concepts became concrete! Suddenly, I DID need to know how to calculate an angle . . . it was necessary to figure out the beam positioning for a roof. In a couple of months, I learned everything that I had neglected to study properly for the past three or four years! Showing your kids how their learning fits into every day life is a great motivator.

So, how can you turn every day tasks into learning experiences? Here are a few ideas to get you started:

Banking: Have your children open their own bank accounts, calculate interest on deposits, etc. Let older kids help you with balancing the checkbook and working out the family budget. They`ll gain a healthy respect for money and it`s a great way to reinforce math skills.

Cooking: Your kids can help you with everything from selecting the food in the supermarket (price comparison, reading ingredients, choosing quality over price, etc.) to cleaning, preparing and cooking the food. You can “teach” things like fractions, multiplication (measuring ingredients, doubling recipes, etc.) and nutrition to your children as you do this.

Mail: Whether posting or picking up the mail, this could be the perfect time to talk to your kids about how the postal system works, where the mail is coming from and maybe even bring up the history of mail . . . most kids find the idea of the Pony Express to be quite fascinating. It may even spark some research by curious young ones.

What other tasks do you do around the house or while running errands? What can your children learn from this?