Most homechool parents tend to agonise over how to teach their homeschool students in the most efficient and effective manner. They teach a lesson and wonder if the child truly understood what was said in class. Sure they nodded their heads and gave back the requisite responses to the pop quiz in class, but did they find it interesting? Did they learn something new? Did they find it challenging?
Making the Student Set the Pace
In order to make things more interesting in the homeschool classroom, a number of parents allow the child to set the pace of learning. If something specific interests them in a lesson that they just studied, the parent and child go on to find out more about that topic. When looking for a way to engage students in the classroom, one of the easiest things to do is follow their interest train. In this way the student is able to hop from topic to topic following what truly interests him and he learns new things all along the way.
Advantages of Following Your Student’s Interest
Interest based learning is not just followed by homeschool students. It has proponents in the corporate world as well. Many companies allow their employees to learn what interests them in terms of skills that can help improve their performance. What little research has been done also supports the fact that a student who is interested in learning something will do a better job of remembering and using what he has learnt. He is more likely to follow through difficult exercises and be a much more involved and active learner.
The Teacher Never Gets Bored Either
When using interest based learning in the homeschool classroom not only will the homeschool student have fun learning what they want to learn about, but the teacher will also have new things to do. They won’t think that they are stuck in a rut doing the same old thing every time. It is a constant challenge to find new resources to help your student learn the next thing that captures his interest. Skills that are learnt in one subject can be transferred to understand another subject better. It helps out all around.
