This week we will be exploring what our family considers homeschooling essentials – essentials to make our homeschool successful. For our first day, I am going to talk about the library.
I’m sure many homeschoolers feel the same way about their library but we just couldn’t imagine our homeschool without it. There are so many great resources at the library and so many extras that we truly love that it is hard to image being without our library while homeschooling.
In addition to the great books that obviously a literature-based homeschool, such as ours, needs, there are so many other resources that the library offers.
Here are some of the extras that we take part in at our library that make it such a wonderful resource for us:
Preschool Storytime – Since we have a preschooler in our midst, we find that attending preschool story time each week is an excellent way for our 4 year old to get some time with peers at the library and have some structured time with another teacher. During story-time there is a theme and our son has the opportunity to work on letters, numbers, colors, shapes, patterns, and motor skills. It’s a mini preschool class for free at the library. In addition to having some great books read to him, he gets to dance, have fun and do a craft with his friends.
Homeschool Book Club – Our library also offers a homeschool book club once a month. This has been something that we added this year to our schedule. This has been great fun for our 3rd grader. Each month the librarian provides a book for our daughter to read and then she has four weeks to read it and at the next meeting the group meets and discusses the books. The library provides the room, worksheets, and discussion aids as well as follow up activities to be done at home and then the next book is provided. The group is varied from 1st through 6th grade and the discussions are broken up appropriately. This has been an excellent time for our daughter and she thoroughly enjoys it. During Book Club, the younger children and I use some of the other great library resources while our 3rd grader is at the book club.
Extra Fun Times – The library offers several other times throughout the year for various ages to get together and do crafts, read stories, build legos, wear costumes, do puppet shows or discuss various time periods. In the summer, they offer a summer camp with age appropriates books and crafts. We have thoroughly enjoyed various extra fun times at the library. The summer reading program is great too.
Computers and computer games – The computer available in the kids section are great and gives the kids an opportunity to try different educations games as well as my preschooler to work on preschool sized computer with appropriate keyboards and mice. This has been a nice way for the kids to get some computer time and try out new learning games.
Variety of Books and Movies – And of course, the selection of books and movies are great. My daughter has done a great job at learning how to use the computer to search and ask the librarians for help in finding resources. Both children love picking out books to read, reading them at the library, and checking out new books for home. The library movie section is a great resource for both the kids and my husband and I. Since we can check out new releases as well as older movies, we have enjoyed the movie section just as much as the kids in getting videos to view on the weekends or learning videos that coincide with what we are studying.
Our library is one resources that I don’t think we would like to have to go without for our homeschool. Of course we could do it without, but having an accessible library with so many great resources and extras makes homeschooling that much easier and that much more fun!
Do you love your library? What is your favorite library resource?
Check out what other TOS Crew Members consider their homeschooling essentials and be sure to read the rest of the series of our 5 Homeschooling Essentials.
Mary @ Winecup Christian Homeschool
Jenni @ Conversaving
Meghan @ Quiet in the Chaos
Karen @ Tots and Me
Beth @ Weavings
Karen @ My Harbor Lights
Amy @ Wildflower Ramblings
Kristi @ The Potter’s Hand Academy
Tara @ This Sweet Life
Stopping by from the Crew. We LOVE the library and have found that inter-library loan has been a huge plus for us. We were regulars at storytime until our local library stopped it for awhile. I am going to try to work it in again soon as they have started it back. Thanks for sharing. You encouraged me to get back there and take advantage of the free resources.
Great to hear that it was encouraging. We love storytime. Sorry to hear that yours was stopped. The free resources are so great. Thanks for stopping by.
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