Delight-Directed Teaching

Delight-directed teaching? What is it? To be honest, I hadn’t even heard of this term until I decided to participate in this 5 Days of Teaching Creatively Blog Hop! I figured I could guess what it meant based on definition. I thought it would be such a fun hop to participate in, and then when I saw the first topic I stopped dead in my tracks. What? I thought maybe I just shouldn’t participate. I mean if I don’t even know what the first topic means what can I possibly add to this Blog Hop? Well, how about a new perspective? Sometimes the “teacher” has to become the “student,” so with some help from the other awesome participating homeschool bloggers taking part in this Blog Hop I learned a little more about what delight-directed teaching is all about!
The first thing I learned is that although I had never heard of that term it is definitely something I have always incorporated in our homeschooling. Our first year I actually didn’t use a curriculum at all. We did do book work, though, but the day was often directed by their interests – what they wanted to learn about or explore that day.
Then you may remember I posted about my dilemma of feeling like I NEEDED to get a curriculum this year. It is First Grade, after all, no longer Kindergarten. Plus I am the type of person that loves direction and schedules. I often was finding, though, there were days where the kids would be having a hard Sensory day or we are sick, etc. then I would get REALLY stressed out because we were “falling behind.” Then there were also days that we just didn’t feel like doing that specific type of work. So, did I ditch the curriculum? No. Obviously we’ve obviously picked up some new curriculum as well for our Crew Reviews! We became more flexible, though, and started having days that were delighht-directed, and I didn’t even know it!
There are days that the kids enjoy and WANT to do a variety of curriculum, and then there are days where they just want to “play.” There is learning in play, though, and that is where the delight directed comes in! Aurora LOVES cats, so we can “play” veterinarian and talk about the different types of animals, what makes them different, what makes them the same, etc. We can talk about the difference between domesticated and wild animals. We can even go online and talk about animal anatomy and how they are different or similar to us. We just had an extremely full lesson, and it didn’t even feel like it!

Brayden loves games. Everything games. Not all games are bad. There are SO many learning games out there. In fact, two of the current curriculum we are reviewing have a computer “game” you can use. He asks to “play” these games. Now, if I were to say well, no, we have to stick to this curriculum today his motivation would go right out the window and chances are high he wouldn’t do much at all that day. So again, by responding to what he loves he is still learning and would actually be learning MORE for the day than if I stuck to a strict schedule!

So, I actually use delight directed learning often, and it works great for us! Not only do they enjoy learning, they actually learn better when it is enjoyable for them! Plus learning really is so much more than JUST reading, writing, and arithmetic. It’s about life, God’s creations, every day experiences. How better for them to enjoy and learn these experiences than when their learning is directed by the things they love?
Delight-Directed Teaching is the first day of the 5 Days of Teaching Creatively!
Don’t forget to enter the AMAZING 5 Days of Teaching Creatively giveaway! 3 winners and $1000 worth of prizes!!
Be sure to read the blogs below for more great Delight-Directed Teaching Posts!