Homeschool Mentors to Follow
There are so many great homeschool bloggers and speakers out there, but over the past decade, I have found that most of the advice I have implemented comes from these trusted sources.
Susan Wise Bauer, author of The Well-Trained Mind and Rethinking School. Most of the curriculum we use for language arts and history is created by Susan Wise Bauer, and I appreciate that she gives a straightforward model for classical homeschooling while being quite realistic about the challenges and emphasizing the need for personalized education for each individual kid. Rethinking School is a great read for public school parents who want to adjust their mindset about education. She recently launched a podcast that I have found so helpful to new and seasoned homeschoolers.
Colene Lewis and Heather Haupt at Cultivated Learning have been my role models and mentors for the past decade, and while we probably don’t have any curriculum overlap, they emphasize delight-filled learning and have so many creative ideas. Many homeschool speakers publish lists of books that they clearly haven't fully read, and the quality and content isn't always the best. Colene will never recommend a book she hasn't read and vetted for her own grandkids (some of whom are my kids' best friends), so the titles on her book lists are among the few that I don't have to pre-read first. Besides the Go Global geography curriculum that they've written together, Heather is also the author of Knights in Training and The Ultimate Guide to Brain Breaks, which you may hear me refer to elsewhere.
And a couple Instagram accounts that always inspire me:
Education With the End in Mind is where my mentor and friend Loretta shares quality books that she reads with her children and grandchildren. When I was a young mom preparing to start homeschooling for the first time, she told me I could never read too many books aloud to my kids. Since her daughter excelled in the high school English literature class I was teaching at the time, I could see the fruit of this mindset and have adopted it myself, as well. Anything she loves is an insta-buy for me!
hamilton_homeschool features Charlotte Mason-flavored inspiration from my friend Catherine. My favorite memory with her crew is all our girls skipping around the Huntington Botanical Gardens in a bunch, holding hands and reciting Robert Lewis Stevenson poetry together. As we like to say in our house, their family reads “the right sort of books,” books that cultivate creativity and wonder. Her suggestions always delight and inspire.
