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My name is Lennie Harrison. I have four children, now 40, 36, 26 and 19 years old. They were homeschooled right through pre-, primary- and secondary schools. My 8 grandchildren are being homeschooled. I help a little bit with the schooling of my grandchildren, which is very exciting and an amazing blessing 😊.
My approach started with ‘schooling at home’ for the first two years, when I suddenly realised I needed to change my whole idea of what education is and what it should look like.
Charlotte Mason gave me some really useful ideas, and because I’m not a particularly organised person (definitely somewhat hap-hazard) I used a large chunk of unschooling/teachable moment/relaxed approach. But at the same time I did (and still do) believe in discipline, (some) routine, character training, tools of learning, etc.
‘Dead Boring’ was my local homeschooling support group – that group is still going now (it was started as a writing group in 1996 by Jenny Barkley). I’ve served for many years by being part of Canterbury Home Educators, based in Christchurch, as Ministry of Education liaison and information evening helper. I have delivered a good amount of workshops in the early 2000’s (most often the ‘Beginner’s Guide to Home Education’) and helped a good amount of homeschoolers prepare for their ERO review (and sometimes a second review after they were ‘declined’).
Workshop outline:
Content:
Do you have a sneaky feeling you might not do enough? Or that you might be doing quite a lot and would like to be more relaxed? Do you not really have a plan but feel the need for one? Would you have trouble explaining your way of education, or justifying it?
We’ll talk about what ‘enough’ looks like. My aim is for you to gain more peace of mind through giving practical information and suggestions, and of course, to answer your questions!
Here I would like to tell you why I prefer to call it Social Studies (rather than sciences), why I love it, why I think social studies are really important in the upbringing of our children, and why my secondary school ‘curriculum’ was heavily weighted with social studies.
Penelope Foote lives on a farmlet in Northland with her husband, David. They have five adult children and twenty-one grandchildren, plus a first great-grandchild.
Penelope home-schooled her four oldest children for a few years before sending them back to school when she had her fifth child. This decision had ongoing repercussions which the family has had to deal with ever since. When her fifth child reached school age, she determined to never send her to school, no matter how poorly she felt she was doing with teaching her child.
Penelope is also one of the keynote speakers for HEART South 2024.
Penelope will share how to bring beauty into your home, which in turn brings visible, tangible evidence of hope into your family’s everyday life. What is hope, and how do we recognise and nurture it?
Have you ever felt your heart is threadbare?
Many ongoing situations, events, griefs, fears, pain and misguided beliefs can impact your life – with the end result being a heart that feels to be unravelling.
Penelope will share her experience and give you a chance to share yours, and then we will then work out how to address the damage our hearts have suffered.
This workshop is for those who have been, or still are, going through hard times.
Janice lives with her husband, Chris, on their small farm in Wairoa, Northern Hawkes Bay. They have been married for 42 years and have raised and homeschooled their eight children.
Janice is also one of the keynote speakers for HEART South 2024.
As Home-schooling Mamas, it is very easy to become consumed with the daily schedule of children and household needs, but our marriages need our time and attention also. In this workshop, we’ll talk about how our healthy relationship with our man greatly enhances our home-schooling journey.
Training our children to work is one of the fundamental things we can achieve as we Home-school our children. In this workshop we’ll talk about when and how to train them, what to train them to do and why we do that. We’ll also discuss the benefits of work and the joy that follows.