How to Foster Independent Learning Skills

If you’ve been disillusioned by private schools and think that something in their design and mechanism just isn’t right, then you’re not the only one. The phenomenon behind Space X, Elon Musk, thought the same. And if you’re doing something that Elon Musk did, then you’re probably doing it right.

Home-schooling comes with its many obvious benefits, like having a teacher dedicate his time to your child, having someone to answer your child’s extra question, and having the child being taught right under your noses. It does come with one—wildly mistake—flaw and that is the belief that it discourages independence.

Many think that the domineering presence of a tutor forces the child to develop dependency upon them. While this shouldn’t ideally happen, perhaps it happens because people take the wrong approach to home-schooling. Parents might enlist the services of a learning centre but fail to honour its vision. Here’s what you can do to ensure that your child gets the best out of home-schooling.

Give Them Free Reign

The biggest benefit of home-schooling is letting your children feel that they have considerable freedom over their studies. Let them decide the timing for their classes and let them decide the time which they’ll accord to revising lessons. This enables the child to feel some degree of responsibility and makes them feel more invested in the whole process.

Don’t be a Hovercraft

No matter how great a tutor is hired, parents will always like to hover over their children like a shadow, trying to know all about their children’s learning arch at once. What it does is make the child feel claustrophobic and constantly under scrutiny, and these in turn make children less inclined to learn. Let them breathe and learn on their own before you begin questioning their progress.

Let Them Discover Their Own Learning Style

Home-schooling and independent learning is all about discovery and exploration. All children have different learning styles and being home-schooled allows them to discover their own and to run amok with it. If your child is trying something new and has a new approach to something, know that it’s a good thing.

If They Want to Run Wild, Let them be Wild!

The best bit about home-schooling and independent learning is letting your child be as curious as he pleases, children are by nature curious creatures and at times a restricting school environment may stop their curiosity in its tracks. You have the advantage here: let them be curious, and let them be wild. It makes them more independent and confident about their own learning styles.

But Don’t Let them Run Haywire!

While giving them a certain degree of freedom is a great idea, remember that absolute freedom is injurious. Here’s how you can keep them in check while allowing them to take key decisions themselves.

Set Milestones for Them

What do they want to learn? Let them decide which subject they’d like to take up first, and which next.

Plan the Process

Explain to them the resources they’d need to achieve their goal, and if necessary set them out in order.

Set a Deadline

While you’re giving them freedom and independence, letting them decide what time of the day they’ll devote to studies; it’s you who are deciding the timeline. You can ask them to suggest an estimate, yes, but ultimately the decision is yours.

Independent learning helps children grown on their own and nurtures their curious spirits. It allows children to embark upon a path of self-discovery and lets them feel a certain degree of responsibility. Register today for a free home-schooling trial with Witty Learning, a home-schooling agency in Dubai, and find out more about how independent learning can positively affect your child.