Homeschool Choices 2024/2025
As I think back to our past year homeschooling, my heart is so full knowing Allah (swa) was there with me through each step, He answered every du’a, uplifted our family through every new turn and blessed us with beautiful friendships. I don’t take it for granted and I pray more families can experience the profound joys and lessons intertwined within the homeschool lifestyle.
I wanted to share a few resources I picked up for my kids and what we’re thinking of doing this year inshaAllah.
We have a general morning routine which includes self-care, Qur’an, and movement, and light morning chores followed by a few opening activities to get us going for the day. This could include books, nasheeds, songs, a game, activity, or a nature walk.
On Mondays, we’re doing a Country Spotlight where we pick a country and learn about it through stories, art, geography, wildlife, landmarks, vlogs by locals, and artwork. As I share about the country, my daughter takes notes and draws pictures to record what she’s understanding. My 2 yo son loves this time and picks up lots of fun vocabulary too!
Afterwards, she is off to a Learning Pod where she sees 10 of her best friends, does lots of science experiments, Islamically-integrated learning around science topics, Names of Allah (swa), read-alouds, discussion, and project work over the course of each term. This pod has been a huge gift and blessing, seeing how my daughter has bonded beautifully with her educator and her homeschooled friends. My dear friend Fatima shared it with me two years ago and we haven’t looked back.
When my daughter goes to her pod, my son and I play at the nearby park with lots of dramatic pretend play and talking about nature. We’ll then come home to bake bread or prepare a snack alongside chores, and practical life activities.
After picking up my daughter from her pod, she’ll have some down time followed by dinner, Salah, and Qaida with her dad.
Our Tuesdays start up with the same morning routine followed by our homeschool Jiu Jitsu classes. I’ve been thinking to try the homeschool swimming on Tuesdays as well but that would mean our curriculum time would either move to afternoon or early morning.
For Language Arts this year, we’re continuing with the Waldorf-inspired fables and stories in a 3-part learning cycle. I’ll share a fable, have her narrate it back the next day, and we’ll do an artistic element related to it such as a main lesson drawing, watercolour painting, chalk drawing, re-enactment, story sequencing and other literary branch-out activities.
For our curriculum we’re going with Logic of English which includes a full phonics-based reading program with elements of Grammar, Spelling, and Writing. I also supplement with library books for read-alouds and grammar resources as needed like this one by Usborne.
For Math, we’re continuing with level 2 for Math With Confidence. I’m also supplementing with financial literacy resources through the Bank of Canada and I want to create a few integrated lessons on understanding zakaat. My daughter’s been dreaming of a sticker shop so we’ll definitely set up shop at our local homeschool kidpreneur events peppered throughout the year inshaAllah.
For Arabic, I’m having my daughter take private virtual classes with Eastern Stars. Their communication, timeliness, services, and dedication to students is impeccable mashaAllah, which is hard to find in the online private learning world. She does Arabic stories, vocabulary, conversation, and comprehension work with her Arabic teacher on Saturdays. We do the (plentiful) homework throughout the week.
For Qur’an, we do our best to create a Qur’an-centric environment at home through listening daily, recitation, memorization and review of tafseer. We had a great start with some of the Alasna Institute homeschool units for surahs two years ago but have less time for these now. She also has a teacher through Eastern Stars for memorization review and Qaida practice to solidify everything. I also love that she gets to have relationships with teachers in Syria and learn from their etiquettes.
On Wednesdays, we cover one of the Muslim Heroes from our Muslim Heroes book 1/2, followed by Arabic copywork from our book of du’as. This has helped with reading Arabic letters, understanding their different forms and reading what she writes. For any du’a or ‘ibadah, my emphasis at this age is always on emphasizing virtues in connection with Allah’s attributes. The tafseer series by Ustadh Tim Humble has been excellent as well as all AMAU programs in this regard.
Thursdays are devoted to our fabulous local Muslim Nature School - Earthsteps!
Fridays is for our Jummu’ah routine, followed by Seerah study and a related activity (sword-making was a hit this month!) early morning Jiu Jitsu and a choice day for any projects, games, activities the kids want to do. This could include handwork like crochet (and hopefully knitting this year), building something (cardboard and glue guns are a staple in our homeschool), a family hike, pizza at the park with a friend or a few episodes of their favourite show.
For habit training, we’re using the Al-Ghazali series which I use as a read aloud and discussion. We’re focusing on the Mysteries of Prayer for Children.
While most of this is for my daughter, my son is usually exploring alongside our work with math pebbles, toy cars, train track set, lego, riding his balance bike around the house, “washing” dishes, water play, beeswax modeling, and just enjoying being a toddler!
We’ll likely have a few pivots and changes but inshaAllah all for the best! Feel free to use this planner to create your own schedule. You can play around with merging for boxes and colours and I’ve added a few of the tiny checkboxes if you want to use those to check off how many times you plan to do cover each item per month. I usually keep 4 or 5 to help me track the whole month for that section.
The greatest satisfaction as a parent is hearing my daughter say things like, “I love that my whole body is learning!”
Alhumdulillah, that’s exactly what we’re going for - educating the whole child .. heart, hands, and head.
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– Asma