The Joy of Discovery and Unit Studies
Are you searching for a way to teach that lets your kids look forward to school, but still makes sure they’re learning everything they need?
That’s what The Joy of Discovery is about. It’s about wondering about the colors of the rainbow, learning about light, and marveling at the mystery; it’s about turning things of interest into studies; it’s about having the courage to ask and the will to find out.
Turn those kids’ questions that drive you crazy into studies. Those questions are the stuff geniuses are made of--millions agree that the apple fell, but Newton was the one to ask why!
All the people we call geniuses are men and women who somehow escaped having to put that curious, wondering child within themselves to sleep.
Though he would someday be acclaimed as one of the supreme intellects of all time, young Albert Einstein was slow in learning to talk, he failed to play with friends, and he was a poor student. At age five, Albert’s father showed him a pocket compass, and watching its mysterious behavior brought the boy somewhat out of his shell. But his elementary and secondary teachers still thought him stupid; he could not grasp languages, and he was less than interested in rote memorization, which he deemed useless.
Then, at age twelve, the shy lad picked up a geometry textbook and read it cover to cover. After that, he read book after book on mathematics. He taught himself differential and integral calculus, and read a six-volume abridgement of all the scientific discoveries up to that period.
Young Thomas Edison, with only three months of formal education (the schoolmaster had actually considered his pervasive inquisitiveness as a mark of inattention and retardation), could scarcely have been envisioned by his family and friends as the world’s foremost inventor.
“Alva” constantly asked questions which his prosperous, shingle-making father and one-time schoolteacher mother could not answer. And so, his curious mind sought the answers through experimentation. His mother, far ahead of her time, made this learning fun, describing it as “exploring.” At nine years of age his course of study consisted of setting up experiments from a chemistry book--and proving them wrong.
A stocky lad with a mop of red hair, young Winston Churchill stuttered and lisped and did poorly in school. His stubbornness and high-spiritedness annoyed everyone, his parents included. Winston entered Harrow Secondary School at age twelve, the lowest boy in the lowest class. But about this time Winston began to experiment with the English language and loved it. “I got into my bones the essential structure of the ordinary English sentence . . .” This newfound faculty with language was largely responsible for his becoming “the greatest Englishman” of his time, and indeed one of the great men of all time. (COMPACT Classics, Volume 1, 1992)
These few examples shed light on the very idea behind The Joy of Discovery. Break free from popular tradition that makes everyone fit the public school mold. Let your kids reach their full potential.
Remember that every child is gifted when provided with an environment that lets him shine.
One might wonder, is the athlete or the math genius more gifted? Consider . . . a complex math problem can take ten minutes to solve; yet a baseball player makes those calculations in his head in a split second as the ball comes at him . . . The circumstances we are in determine who is considered more gifted at the time.
I3 Unit Study
The Joy of Discovery introduces I3 Unit Study, a teaching method that individualizes instruction, draws lessons from things your kids are interested in, employs thinking skills to nurture critical and creative thinking, and produces projects that transform learning into an interesting, exuberant adventure bridging the gap between students’ knowledge and their practice of it.
I3 (Pronounced “I three”) stands for Individual-Inquiry-Instruction, the technique that turns questions into studies. Basically, your child (I1ndividual) asks questions (I2nquiry) about a topic of interest and gets answers (I3nstruction) by doing a unit study. I1 and I2 identify what your child wants to study. I3 is the study.
The instruction part of the I3 methods produces assignments, using a visual aid call “Dial-A-Unit.” Kids have fun dialing their assignments, which promotes ownership in their education and makes them eager to do a good job.
Benjamin Bloom, the foremost authority on thinking skills, contends that you judge a child’s thinking ability by what he does. He groups learning behaviors into six categories from the most simple/concrete to the most complex/abstract. The taxonomy shows that “learning” follows certain steps--and that in order to build true “thinking skills” where we not only repeat information but truly understand it and use it--we need to follow those steps up the hierarchy. If we intend to help children to become better thinkers, we must, almost literally, set the stage for thinking; that is, we must create and maintain a “thinking environment” that feeds your child’s imagination and keep it growing.” (Learning Skills Program--Blooms Taxonomy)
Help your budding Edison be creative, be curious about life, ask questions and find answers. Get “outside the box” of your public-school textbook homeschooling--and see what a difference it can make in your elementary student’s attitude and education. Venture into unit studies and let your child’s interests be the driving force behind your curriculum.
Make learning exciting and joyful! The Joy of Discovery offers easy-to-follow directions and guidelines for using your child’s own interest and curiosity to develop unit studies. This innovative approach sets you free from the limitations of someone else’s idea of what you should study. At the same time, you are tethered to a scope and sequence so that you don’t miss important concepts along the way. Bloom’s thinking skills nurture critical and creative thinking, and understanding and utilizing learning styles lets you teach to your child’s strengths while strengthening his weaknesses.
This book tells you “How to Teach with Unit Studies.” The author gives first-hand experiences from teaching her own two boys at home. Mix her education background with twelve years of homeschooling. Add a cupful of life experiences as wife, mother, speaker, and writer. Stir in retail management skills. Then, polish this off with athletic skills in professional barrel racing and horse training, and you’ve got Barbara Wagner--a home-schooling advocate who encourages parents to establish a well-rounded education for their children.
I3 Unit Study is a curriculum that builds knowledge, insight, attitude, and skill into children’s lives and character. The Joy of Discovery is an environment that lets your kids look forward to school, but still makes sure they’re learning everything they need.
Sample I3 Unit Study
I1ndividual
Decide on a topic: Buffalo Bill Cody
I2nquiry
Define one question: What did he do that made him famous?
I3nstruction
Develop a study
Pick a thinking skill: illustrate
Choose a project: poem
State the assignment: In a poem, illustrate what Buffalo Bill did that made him famous
Make a plan: Read all about Buffalo Bill; study how to write a poem, using charcoal and an old board, write a poem that illustrate his life
Determine Learning Objectives: (Grade 3)
Social Studies Study: Great Americans
Language Arts Skills:
Handwriting: Use appropriate size, slant, shape, and spacing of letters and words; have good line quality
Capitalization: Proper nouns
Composition: Experience writing poetry; write stories telling who, what, where, when, why, and how
Literature: Recognize poetry as an avenue of seeing everyday things in a new way
Spelling: Correct misspelled words in written work and learn correct spelling
