Montessori

Fun-Schooling + The Montessori Method

/ Sarah Janisse Brown / Leave a comment

How Does Montessori work with Fun-Schooling?

  • Montessori is hands-on and self-directed
    • Goes along perfectly with Fun-Schooling baskets!
    • Include natural material learning toys and games in your basket – there are lots on Etsy
    • Could easily set-up different Montessori-inspired Fun-Schooling stations
    • Give kids control to choose what they want to do and when they want to do it
      • Montessori students know what needs to be accomplished in a designated amount of time and are given the freedom to complete their tasks in any order they choose
  • Montessori classrooms rotate out activities/works
    • Can rotate single-subject journals and complementary materials
    • Store them on a low shelf/table for easy access
  • Nature study, Life Skills, character development, and the arts are a big part of Montessori
    • We have journals for all of those!
    • Pair them with hands-on life experience
  • Use Montessori materials like sandpaper letters, Montessori math manipulatives, and motor skills frames/toys alongside the journals
  • Wooden puzzles!
    • Popular in Montessori and go great in a Fun-Schooling basket
  • Nomenclature cards/ 3-part cards
    • These are used to introduce new words and teach different subjects
    • Would work great along with journals, especially with vocabulary building pages
  • Fun-Schooling journals can be used by a wide range of ages and Montessori classrooms are multi-age classrooms
    • Put together a multi-age group of other homeschoolers to go through a journal together
  • Montessori teens choose an area of focus and engage in hands-on in-the-field study on that area of focus
    • Just like choosing a major!
  • Montessori values teaching independence and equipping kids with skills to thrive on their own
    • Our research method and journals are set up with this same goal in mind

Watch a flip-through of some of our Montessori-friendly journals here:

The Montessori Method

/ Sarah Janisse Brown / Leave a comment

The Montessori Method was founded by Maria Montessori

  • An Italian educator in the late 1800s/early 1900s
  • She was the first female Italian doctor
  • Advocated for women’s rights and child labor laws
  • Studied child development and learning before opening her own school
  • She researched educational approaches and philosophies throughout the ages and studied children in-person to create her approach
  • Pulled heavily from the work of Jean-Marc Itard and Edouard Séguin

Main Focuses of a Montessori education

  • Very hands-on and sensory focused
    • The Montessori schoolroom engages all the senses
    • Activities are referred to as “works”
    • These works will engage multiple senses at a time
    • The environment itself is kept low-sensory and very tidy- everything has a place and is always put back in that place. Only one work out per child at a time. Known as a “prepared environment”
    • Lessons are incredibly tactile with things like sandpaper letters, counting beads, building blocks, and lots of manipulatives
    • Play is work- and children should not be interrupted while working or playing. A big focus is on letting them do things at their own pace with full concentration
  • Everything is adapted to be child-size and child-friendly
    • Works will be put out on low shelves, kid-size tools are made readily available and presented to the child from a young age, kid-size chairs, tables, etc.
    • In the kitchen, kids will have their own set of kid-size cooking items and a special stool to be able to stand up at the counter
    • Kids are given real glasses instead of plastic and “real” tools that are simply child size
    • Taught to work with careful consideration and attention to detail
  • Big focus on Life Skills
    • Taught from a very early age and children are encouraged to be independent from toddlerhood
    • Excellence in completion and attention to detail is a bit part of learning Life Skills
    • Self-care, cleaning, cooking, sewing, and other basic Life Skills are taught beginning in toddlerhood
    • Gardening and farm work are often a part of the daily school tasks
  • Natural materials
    • Plastic is almost never found in a Montessori setting
    • Wood, fabric, and glass are the primary materials found
  • The main core educational subjects are taught along with a big focus on art, citizenship, independence, nature, and engaging in the community

Other tidbits

  • In a school, children are grouped with a wide age range- usually 2-4 grades all together
  • Self-directed learning lets children progress at their own pace
    • Still guided by an adult with each work very carefully introduced in a methodical way
    • Children then can work through things at their own pace and based on their own interests
    • There’s not usually a strict schedule of X subject at X time
    • Instead, children will know what they are expected to accomplish in a day and be given the freedom to complete their tasks in the order they desire
  • No screens until at least 4th grade
  • Age 0-6 is a key age for introducing concepts, life skills, and development
  • Some similar components to Waldorf and Charlotte Mason but starts academic instruction at a much younger age and is much more methodical

Stay tuned for our next post where we will talk about integrating the Montessori Method into your Fun-Schooling!

Why We Love Fun-Schooling

/ Sarah Janisse Brown / Leave a comment

I thought I just chime in and share why I love fun-schooling so much.

When my kids were little, I was trying to do a lot of Charlotte Mason learning, some Montessori schooling at home, classical learning and a lot of Unschooling. It was exhausting! Our whole life style revolved around me being a worn out teacher-mom.

I have so many children with such diverse needs and passions, I wanted to give each one their own path. I gathered tons of different curriculum from conventions and it was overwhelming to create all these custom plans for each child!

And so I had the idea to make the Fun-Schooling journals when my oldest child was 16. I created ONE do-it-yourself homeschooling journal that guides each unique child through the experience of studying their passion, their hobby or their career goals – while still focusing on all the required subjects!

The first DIY journal could be adapted to any child age 7-17. I created a different cover for each child and put the first Journal on Amazon with a bunch of different covers, and bought them from Amazon for my own kids. I was just using Amazon for print-on-demand book making for my own kids. But I had the books up for sale just in case other families wanted a copy.

So when I created the first DIY homeschool journal I was expecting my 10th child and I really just wanted to take a break for six weeks so I could focus on the new baby.

So I thought I’d make a six week curriculum where the kids use 10 pages a day, without much help from me. I would build myself into the book!

The idea is that they would get a stack of library books and a bunch of documentaries about anything they were interested in, and they were to use those resources along with the journal while getting in all those academics.

My idea was that they could do everything independently with one journal and I would just have to add a math curriculum.

It worked great! After the kids finish their first DIY journal they asked for themed journals. One wanted to study horses. One wanted to focus on travel and fashion. One wanted Minecraft theme. One wanted to focus on dogs. Another was really into nature. My son Joe was crazy about space. I said yes to my kids and we started collaborating on making Fun-Schooling journals together- based on each of my kids’ passions.

The whole idea was an amazing success. My kids started earning royalties and were doing their homeschooling independently!

One thing I really love about Fun-Schooling is that it frees me up to be mom, and it gave me time to enjoy my preschooler and baby.

So instead of spending my day struggling over their schoolwork and trying to make sure that everything is organized in a really boring way… I started focusing more on pursuing my passions and reading to my kids more.

I thought it would be great to be an example to my kids of the learning I want to see in them. Down the rabbit trail I go… I started making Mom-School journals that look a lot like their DIY Fun-Schooling journals!

Not only did the kids love Fun-Schooling – I do too.

When we first started Fun-Schooling, I had 10 kids. Before Fun-Schooling, our homeschooling days were really stressful and I always felt like I wasn’t doing enough, yet I was going non-stop.

Our home just became so much more peaceful, full of wonder, and just more harmonious with Fun-Schooling. Best of all – lots of other families started discovering Fun-Schooling too!

Within two years of making the first DIY journal we sold so many Fun-Schooling books that we were able to do things we never thought possible.

We were able to support ourselves as volunteers in Ukraine, and eventually we were able to adopt five more kids because we had the extra income and I didn’t feel like I was overwhelmed by the ten kids I already had.

As more of my kids became teenagers, we helped them to focus on pursuing their careers, instead of focusing on high school credits, and now five of our kids are adults and have started their own successful businesses and are able to be independent.

Fun-Schooling made such a huge difference in our every day life and empowered us to really become who we were meant to be!

It wasn’t just the kids pursuing their passions.

I also was able to pursue mine, and somehow I found time in the past 8 years to create, collaborate and publish over 400 books!

Fun-Schooling Pep Talk! (Part 2)

/ Sarah Janisse Brown / Leave a comment

I ended my last blog post telling you that after 16 years of motherhood and trying lots of different homeschool methodologies, I quit.

What did I quit?

I quit dipping my toes in the shallow water while my children called to me from the deep end where they knew best what made them sink or float and I learned to trust.

I had tried a little bit of so many different things and nothing added up, it was all too hard, too much, too soon, and I tried. I thought I had failed and yet they thrived because everything I thought would never be enough added up to so much more that I could ever understand. And they were brave, and they were curious, and they were hungry to learn about this planet we call home, and I never thought I could ever give enough, but all I have is all God gave me… And it’s plenty.

But what about the mess, the stress, the fears, the changes that I struggled with in the dark, while my children were playing in the light? I was trying so hard to do it all, and so many voices from the outside spat out worries, saying I’m not enough. But I was enough.

These are the children entrusted to me, and this is the place we are in, and these are the tools, the ideas and the passions we share. And my children will not be like any others, they are not even a bit like each other, but they are the ones that I have been given to love.

So after 16 years of struggle, of reading mountains of books on dyslexia, Unschooling, Charlotte Mason, Classical Education, Autism, Delight-Directed learning, Montessori, Free Schools, conventional education, one room school house models, entrepreneur-based learning, passion driven learning, element, flow, talent and disability… I tried to put it all together, and glean the best of every world, and customize every child’s education based on their learning style, love language, career goals and special needs. And I wore myself out. Until I gave up trying to do it all, and created the first Do-it-Yourself Homeschooling Journal, just in time for the birth of my 10th baby.

I created the journal from a place of pain, discouragement, need, and hope. I had given up the idea that I could custom design each child’s curriculum and decided to find a way to set them free to “Do-it-Yourself” within the boundaries of all the wisdom I had embraced over the years. When I created the first DIY Fun-Schooling Journal I thought I was cheating my kids, because my whole plan was to make a curriculum that set ME FREE from having to homeschool! I was going to put my entire philosophy of how children learn into a journal that would keep them busy learning for 4 hours a day for 60 days… So I could take a break for 6 weeks with my new baby. It worked.

They used my system to study their passions and cover all the basics while I took care of my baby and enjoyed her to the fullest. The DIY system worked so well I was able to focus more and more on being mommy and less on stressing over Homeschooling. So when the 6 weeks were over, we didn’t stop Fun-Schooling. My children wanted more DIY Homeschooling Journals, but they wanted to help design them, and so we did.

And now we are overwhelming YOU, with so many options for homeschooling that maybe you are smiling through your tears cause you have no clue what to do, and you want to dive in deep but it’s still scary. So you wonder how to start, and you haven’t read the 200 books I read that inspired me to design this system of learning, and you wonder if you should trust, try it or keep experimenting. Something in you says go all the way, and other voices say it isn’t safe, so what are you gonna do?

Is there a way to homeschool without fear? No. I don’t think so. It’s the fear that motivates us to be brave. It’s not the kind of fear that hurts us and binds up and traps us. It’s a feeling of greatness, wonder, power and depth that makes each of us feel so small…

Let that kind of fear stir up courage to do what you need to do, to be who you need to be, to dive in completely, and trust. It’s more fun in the deep end anyway. Just ask your kids.

Want to take it to the next level? Start your own Fun-Schooling co-op! Here’s the perfect book for you!

Fun-Schooling Lifestyle, Practical Tips & Reality (Part 1 of 3)

/ Sarah Janisse Brown / 2 Comments

(Transcribed from a Q & A Facebook Live video with Sarah, dated 2/2/22)

My homeschooling adventure began when I was 14 years old, and really struggling in the public school that I was going to, back in 1991. And we didn’t know anybody else who was homeschooling and hadn’t really heard of anybody else who was homeschooling. My parents actually looked into homeschooling because of some health issues my little sister had.  I wonder how many of you started homeschooling because of sickness going around and you weren’t even planning on it? Let me know in the comments!

So, my sister had health problems that couldn’t be handled well in school, and so my mom brought her home, and I was then going to school all alone. It was boring. There was a lot of bullying. I was kind of small for my age and kind of awkward. I only wanted to do art and hated math. So many things I didn’t like about school.

I saw my sister staying home and getting her work done so fast and then getting to do all the things that kids like to do. She got to be with my mom and dad all day. I’d come home from being at school all day long and have to do all the super boring homework that took me as long to get done as my sister’s entire school day.  So I started asking my parents to please let me homeschool. They said we’d have to wait until we got our tax return because they had spent a lot of money on my sister’s curriculum. My reply to that was, “Who needs a tax return and who needs curriculum? Aren’t there enough books at the library?”

We had a library just a couple blocks away and what I said made sense to my parents, so after Christmas I got a library card and didn’t go back to school. It was the best thing that ever happened to me.  My mom got me 5 or 6 composition journals from the store, and I wrote on the cover of every one of those the subjects I was interested in, and took them to the library with me. I asked the librarian to help me find books on each subject. I had my journals, colored pencils and a giant stack of library books—it looked nothing like a standardized education. 

I actually thought I was kind of a dumb, hopeless kid.  I failed third grade, I often got Cs and Ds in school. I was so proud of my A in art, and that’s what mattered to me.  That first year I got to study what I wanted to study, and that’s the heart of Fun-Schooling. That is what inspired me to create journals specifically for our kids to study their passions.

That first year I studied Ancient Egypt for History and designed my own mummy cases. My parents took me to a couple museums that had displays on Ancient Egypt and I got books on hieroglyphics—I was a super happy kid! But I discovered that I wanted to do much more. I was really interested in the history of fashion and I loved fashion design. So I got a big pile of books on that topic. All of that also qualified for Geography because I was interested in fashion around the world. There was a lot of Social Studies involved in fashion and fashion design as well. I also joined 4H and learned about photography and sewing. I had an interest in genetics. I wanted to learn about what makes us who we are. As part of that I got a bunch of mice from the pet store and started breeding them for my 4H project, and that was my Science. At that point I also fell in love with poetry and I started writing my own poems and copying poetry into my journals, and that was my Language Arts.

The only thing my parents ended up buying curriculum for was some Math stuff, and it was super boring and they didn’t really notice that I didn’t do it that year. My little sister needed a lot of attention, and they’d see me sitting there with my big pile of books and journals.  There was a different way I was going to learn Math. (click Page 2 to continue reading)

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