No Hurry

• On one point almost all child development specialists--Maria Montessori, Rudolf Steiner, Jean Piaget, Lev Vygotsky and others--agree: there is no rush. Some go so far as to condemn the federally sponsored "Head Start" program for preschool, low-income children for what they consider prematurely hastening a formalized education process. Some kindergarten-aged children get homework and worksheets; this practice is nonsensical in the view of respected child development specialists like Dr. David Elkind, professor of child development at Tufts University.
  
  

Focus of Kindergarten Home School

• The most well-respected child development experts, Elkind among them, are in agreement that stimulating learning through fun activities is far more beneficial than formal instruction. Forget the alphabet and numbers when homeschooling kindergarten-age children. Instead, give them developmentally appropriate challenges such as taking care of plants and animals, drawing, painting, and listening to songs and stories. Let them play with sand, plastic shovels, buckets and water.
  
  

See, Touch, Feel

• Montessori and her peers agree that the most advantageous start for kindergarten-age children is exposure to the manipulative experiences of seeing, touching and handling things to experience new sensations. They're too young to understand symbolic learning. The emphasis should be on what they are developmentally able to process, which is hands-on instruction to explore and conceptualize, Elkind writes in several of his books.
  
  The capacity to differentiate precedes the capacity to label, and the understanding of quality precedes the understanding of quantity. One example at kindergarten age is a child's ability to discriminate among different colors before he can tell differences in shades.
  
  Finger-paint. Set up an easel and have the child draw with water colors. Blow bubbles.
  
  

Preschooling without Knowing

• If you have been raising a child, you have already begun homeschooling without even knowing it. Albert Einstein recognized that "imagination is more important than knowledge." Generally speaking, gently introduce your child to the wonders of the world and imagination even through ordinary activities at home.
  
  

Suggested Activities

• Experts who have adopted the theories of Montessori, Steiner and others advise that you tell stories to your children; expose them to picture books; keep encyclopedias handy; take walks; pay attention to the minutiae of birds calling, breezes and the sound they make through leaves; look for shapes in clouds.
  
  Guess with your children where birds are going when they fly away. Listen to sounds. (Which is farther, louder, quieter?) Look at things through a magnifying glass. Grow a plant. Draw with crayons.
  
  Stimulate your child's imagination. That is the curriculum.