You Really Only Need to Teach Two Things as a Homeschool Parent

Even if you’ve only just begun contemplating homeschooling you have probably noticed that there are a LOT of competing philosophies in the homeschool movement. From “child-led, wonder-based” unschoolers to the diligent workbook approach of the “school-at-home” movement, they all seem to have a different idea on what a child should know.

Then there’s the Australian Curriculum (or you state curriculum) quietly pressuring you to “cover it all.”

It’s enough to make even the most seasoned teacher’s head spin. So, what do our kids actually need to know? What is the real aim of education?

While the answers might look different on the surface, I believe every family is really wanting to develop the same three things in their children:

• Character that aligns with the parent’s worldview
• Skills that will allow their children to live fulfilling and productive lives
• Knowledge of the world around them

But here’s an uncomfortable truth: knowledge is highly volatile.

In a rapidly changing world, today’s vital knowledge is tomorrow’s abandoned nonsense.

The reality is that only character and skills are durable. Character will set the direction of your child’s life and skills will give them the tools to follow their convictions. With those two pillars in place, your child will have the resilliance and tools to acquire whatever knowledge they need to achieve their goals.

But character seems like such an ephemeral thing. Can it really be taught? I firmly believe it can, and it can be the foundation of every single homeschool lesson: both at the desk and at the dinner table.

Before you can teach it, however, you must decide what character qualities are important to you. And, most importantly, you must be sure that you are willing to embody these same qualities in your own life: one minute of observing you do something will undo hours of you telling your child to do the opposite.

For a concrete example, let’s say that you would like to teach your kids diligence.

To be diligent means we put our heart and soul into everything that we do.

You can teach your child this by giving them genuine responsibilities around the home and holding them accountable for them: the job should not only be done, it should be done to the best standard they are capable of. A job that isn’t done properly needs to be redone on their time, not yours.

Similarly with their “school” work. Sloppy handwriting or careless mistakes absolutely should have consequences. At the very least you can expect them to redo their work. You might also decide to remove a privilege, like screen time, for the day.

Teaching character gives your child purpose and direction in life. Giving them skills will enable them to follow through with the convictions.

When it comes to skills, there are two broad types: “vocational skills” and “foundational skills.”

Vocational skills qualify a person to do a particular job: computer programming, nursing, mechanics, woodwork, grapic design and many others fall into this category. These are often the “fun” skills that homeschoolers become passionate about and teach themselves.

Foundational skills are the engine that enable a student to acquire vocational skills and specialised knowledge in any field they choose. There are only a few of these skills and every one of them is equally important. Most of them have also been shown to be predictors of adult income. So, a person that is skilled in these areas is more likely to have a higher paid job than a person that isn’t. The predictions are not always perfect and correlation is not necessarily causation but the trends do exits and have been documented.

So what are the foundational skills?

• The ability to read
• The ability to write and communicate clearly and articulately
• Mathematical resoning
• Logical thinking
• The ability to learn independently

When people ask me what style of homeschooler I am, I like to answer something like, “I’m basically ‘school-at-home’ for maths and English and an unschooler for everything else.” That’s because if the maths and English are rigorous, a child can pretty much teach themselves anything.

To prove the point, my eldest boy taught himself several languages, classical guitar, 3-D graphics programming (at the age of 8!) and would take on a university professor in a debate about linguistics at the drop of a hat. My middle boy taught himself so much about airplanes and flying he was able to skip the first hour of flight training when he started lessons in a real plane.

Neither of my boys learned these things because I sat them down with a carefully designed curriculum and forced them through a sequence of lessons. They learned them because they were curious and had the foundational skills required to pursue that curiosity independently.

This is why I believe so many homeschool debates miss the point.

We argue about curricula, teaching methods, learning styles, educational philosophies, and whether children should study this topic or that one. But once character and foundational skills are firmly established, most of those questions become surprisingly unimportant.

A child who is diligent, resilient, self-disciplined, and can read, write, reason mathematically, think logically, and learn independently, is equipped for almost anything life throws at them.

The specific knowledge they need will change throughout their lives. The vocational skills they use may change several times. But character and foundational skills remain valuable no matter where life takes them.

So if you’re feeling overwhelmed by competing educational philosophies or worried that you’re not “covering enough,” perhaps the solution is to simplify.

Focus on character.

Focus on foundational skills.

Trust that the rest will follow.