The Arizona Advocate

10/19/2026

10/08/2026

WHAT KIND OF LEARNER IS YOUR CHILD?

1. How does your child remember instructions best?
🔵 By seeing it (charts, diagrams, demonstrations)
🟢 By hearing it (listening to explanations, stories, discussions)
🔴 By doing it (hands-on activities, moving, building)
🟡 By writing it down (taking notes, making lists, reading)

2. When learning a new skill, what helps your child most?
🔵 Watching someone else do it first
🟢 Listening to someone explain it step by step
🔴 Trying it themselves immediately
🟡 Reading instructions or writing steps down

3. How does your child prefer to study or practice?
🔵 Using visual aids like charts, pictures, or color-coded notes
🟢 Discussing the topic or repeating it out loud
🔴 Moving around, using manipulatives, or acting it out
🟡 Reading, writing summaries, or doing worksheets

4. When solving problems, your child usually…
🔵 Draws diagrams, charts, or pictures
🟢 Talks through the solution out loud
🔴 Uses hands-on methods or experiments
🟡 Writes out steps or works from notes

5. How does your child prefer to remember information?
🔵 By seeing it or visual cues
🟢 By listening or repeating it
🔴 By doing or practicing it physically
🟡 By writing or reading it

6. What type of homework or project does your child enjoy most?
🔵 Creating posters, drawings, or diagrams
🟢 Recording a podcast, giving a presentation, or discussing
🔴 Building a model, performing an experiment, or role-playing
🟡 Writing a report, journaling, or reading/studying text

7. What tends to frustrate your child most when learning?
🔵 Tasks with no visual cues or diagrams
🟢 Silent reading or independent work without discussion
🔴 Sitting still for long periods without moving
🟡 Tasks that require mostly hands-on activity without writing

How to Score:
Count how many answers you chose for each symbol:
🔵 = Visual
🟢 = Auditory
🔴 = Kinesthetic / Hands-On
🟡 = Reading/Writing

Highest count = your child’s primary learning style

10/08/2026

📣 Tired and struggling to make homeschooling work?
Before the next ESA disbursement hits and you waste funds… read this!

📣 Did you know you do NOT have to purchase a curriculum at all? You Can Teach the Core Subjects Through Activities, Projects, and Toys

According to Arizona ESA rules, yes — you have to teach the five core subjects. That doesn't mean it has to be through a curriculum or book!

Many parents assume they need to buy what looks most like public school materials… what has the best reviews… or what their mom friends recommend. But that’s not always the best fit — or necessary.

You can teach every core subject using real-life experiences, hands-on learning, and child-led interests.

Here are examples:
📚 Language Arts (Reading, Writing, Communication)
✔️ Writing letters or emails to family and friends
✔️ Making comic books, storyboards, or journals
✔️ Reading museum exhibit signs and descriptions
✔️ Watching documentaries and discussing them
✔️ Reading menus, signs, and maps on field trips
✔️ Listening to and analyzing song lyrics
✔️ Writing travel journals after field trips or vacations

➕ Math
✔️ Cooking and baking (measurements, fractions, conversions)
✔️ Board games like Monopoly, Yahtzee, or Uno
✔️ Playing music (rhythm, counting beats, fractions, timing)
✔️ Building LEGO models (geometry, spatial awareness)
✔️ Budgeting for field trips or spending at gift shops
✔️ Measuring distance or time during road trips
✔️ Calculating scores during sports or games

🔬 Science
✔️ Visiting aquariums (marine biology, ecosystems)
✔️ Visiting science museums or planetariums
✔️ Gardening and nature walks (photosynthesis, weather, biology)
✔️ YouTube experiments or educational science channels
✔️ Observing animals at the zoo (classification, habitats)
✔️ Learning how musical instruments produce sound (acoustics)
✔️ Understanding body systems through sports and movement

🌍 Social Studies / History
✔️ Visiting historical landmarks or reenactments
✔️ Going to local museums focused on culture or heritage
✔️ Reading signs, plaques, and stories during field trips
✔️ Learning about instruments or music from other cultures
✔️ National Geographic Kids or world maps + geography games
✔️ Family ancestry and genealogy projects
✔️ Watching documentaries on historical events

🎨 Art / Creative Development
✔️ Drawing what they see at a museum
✔️ Creating postcards or souvenirs after trips
✔️ Building cardboard replicas of landmarks
✔️ Taking photos and editing them from trips
✔️ Songwriting, playing an instrument, or choreographing a dance
✔️ Visiting art museums or sculpture parks
✔️ Acting out historical or fictional stories

🎶 Music = Multisubject Learning
Learning music covers much more than just “art”:
Math – rhythm, time signatures, counting beats
Language Arts – lyrics, comprehension, phonics
History – genres and movements tied to historical events
Science – acoustics, sound waves, anatomy of the ear
SEL – discipline, focus, confidence
Cultural Studies – exploring music from around the world

🏀 Sports = Learning, Too
Math – scores, stats, averages, percentages
Science – anatomy, physics of movement, nutrition
Language Arts – learning plays, terminology, writing reflections
Health – physical education, safety, wellness
SEL – perseverance, teamwork, emotional regulation

🎒 Field Trips Count as Education!
Here are just a few ESA-approved real-world educational activities that apply to multiple subjects:
🧠 Museums – History, science, language arts, art
🐠 Aquariums – Science (ecosystems, biology), reading
🏛️ Historical Sites – History, social studies, geography
🌲 Nature Walks – Science, journaling, mindfulness
🗺️ Travel Planning – Math, geography, budgeting, writing
🎭 Cultural Events – Language, history, arts

🔑 Bottom line:
Don’t get tricked into thinking bookwork curriculum is required.
Don’t waste your ESA funds before understanding your full range of options.

✅ Real learning doesn’t always look like public school.
✅ Experiences matter.
✅ Kids thrive when education is built around them.

📌 Save this post, share it with another parent, and keep ESA flexible and fun — the way it was intended.

~The Arizona Advocate

10/08/2026

If education truly focused on the diverse ways people learn and process information, we’d see higher graduation rates, better problem-solving, stronger work ethics, and fewer adults feeling trapped or incapable.

Studies show that traditional “sit, listen, and memorize” teaching only truly benefits a small portion of students — roughly 20–30% who naturally learn best through auditory or visual methods.

Research on learning retention shows lecture-style instruction has success rates and retention as low as 5–10%, while hands-on and interactive approaches reach 50–75%.

So we’re funneling every child through a model that only works well for about a quarter of them — and then wondering why we have low scores, high dropout rates, and adults struggling with real-world skills.

We don’t need more money poured into the same broken method — we need a new design that reflects how humans actually learn.

10/08/2026

Homeschooling with ESA Does Not Have to Look Like School at Home

Every year, there are new parents coming into the homeschooling community.
They are easy to spot because the conversations focus on curriculum.
“Which curriculum are you using?”
“Which curriculum do you recommend?”
“I'm really stressed out trying to find a curriculum for my kids.”

Most of us grew up going to traditional school, so it's only natural that when we start homeschooling, we assume that it means bringing school home. A curriculum, textbooks, workbooks, lessons, assignments, a schedule, and hours of sitting down completing work.

But I wish more people knew from the beginning that homeschooling does not have to look like school at home. In fact, for many of us, that's what we're trying to get away from.

Arizona ESA requires instruction in five core subjects:
reading, grammar, math, social studies, and science, but that doesn't mean you have to purchase a formal curriculum to teach them.

The goal is to educate our children, but there are so many amazing ways to do that.

It breaks my heart every fall to see so much of the ESA funding spent on curriculum when there are so many other wonderful possibilities. Parents often think curriculum is the foundation of homeschooling, when in reality, it's only one possibility out of many.

It usually takes the first year of trial and error for parents to find out that there are other options, and become open to them.
I know I spent close to a year looking into unschooling before I decided to embrace some of those tactics. What really convinced me to jump in was reading through the testimonials of success. They were astounding.

Many if not most first year parents start with curriculum/traditional methods.
Then 3 to 6 months down the road you'll start seeing posts of how they're ready to throw in the towel and put their child back in public school. It's not that homeschooling is a problem it's the method. It's not a fit for their child.

See, there are roughly 17 different methods or styles of homeschooling, depending on how the different approaches are categorized. Traditional is only one.

Some of the most popular are Unschooling, Eclectic, Project-Based Learning, Unit Studies, Montessori, Charlotte Mason, and Classical.

Eclectic and unschooling are very popular. There are Facebook groups you can join to learn more. Most of the old school homeschooling parents use a mixture of the different methods.

DON'T START WITH THE CURRICULUM, START WITH THE CHILD
Personally, I'm a firm believer that instead of starting with a curriculum, we should look at our child's learning style, personality, interests, strengths, and passions before deciding what their homeschool needs look like.

Ask yourself: How does my child learn best? What makes them excited to learn? What are they naturally curious about? Do they learn through movement and hands-on experiences? Do they love reading and researching?

Then look up which of the different methods of homeschooling might be the best fit for your child's learning style.

HARDER DOES NOT MEAN BETTER
Something else to consider is that harder work doesn't mean better. I see parents quite proud that they have chosen an extremely advanced or rigorous curriculum believing if they push their children harder, give them more work, and spend more hours on academics, that will equate to the child being smarter and more successful.

But a curriculum can be academically impressive and be completely wrong for a child. More worksheets doesn't automatically = more learning. More hours sitting at the table doesn't = to a better education.
A rigorous education doesn't = a more successful adult.

I see it every year, kids that struggle with hours of intense school work often become anxious, start having meltdowns, become extremely resistant to doing their work, and absolutely hate learning.
When the whole goal for the best success is that your child loves learning. They don't need more work, that they need a completely different approach.

This is why homeschooling can be so freeing. Your child doesn't have to spend six hours sitting at a desk learning through books. They can learn through documentaries, LEGOs, gardening, bird watching, cooking, shopping, nature, museums, experiments, games, projects, hobbies, conversations, field trips, classes, and countless real-world experiences.

Learning can happen all day long without looking like a public school classroom.

You're allowed to make learning fit your child instead of making your child fit the learning.

So before you spend a huge portion of your funds on curriculum, I encourage you to stop and ask yourself:
Am I buying this because it's right for my child, or because I think this is what we're supposed to do?

Give yourself permission to explore. Learn about the different homeschooling methods and your child's learning style. Join the Facebook groups for those methods to learn more. Listen to other families' experiences and testimonials, and then build an education for your child around what works for them.

I just want homeschooling parents to know that they have options.

One of the biggest mistakes new homeschooling parents make is recreating a public school classroom in their living room or kitchen.

Don't have to spend thousands of dollars on curriculum before you even discovered how your child learns best.

Your ESA money doesn't have to disappear into curriculum before you've figured out what works for your child.

~The Arizona Advocate