If you’re new here, I’m a homeschooling mom to an 8-year-old daughter and a 16-year-old son. I shared a little bit about our homeschool journey in a brief post last week.

On Sunday I was going to the kitchen for some hot cocoa when I looked at a book on the table that Little Miss had picked up at the library sale on Friday. It was a level two chapter book.

“Ooh,” I thought to my homeschool mom-self. “I can use that for reading aloud this week during reading/English lessons.”

Immediately something Little Miss said to me the week before came to mind right after that thought. It was something she said when I asked her to read two poems out loud for me.

“Mom, you already know I know how to read. Why are you making me read this out loud?”

Ahem.

Well, she had a point.

Why was I making her read it out loud?

Practice, I suppose.

Because reading out loud helps to make sure you are saying words right, I guess.

Or is it really because the curriculum said to do it and I’m – as I told a friend this week – a rule follower.

Rules are good.

Rules are often necessary.

Rules aren’t always made to be broken.

Buuuut….

I am homeschooling for a reason and part of that reason is to allow my children to learn at their own pace – whether that is fast or slow.

If Little Miss or The Boy already have a concept down, then it really isn’t necessary or conducive to their learning to keep making them repeat that skill over and over. The exception to this is in math, of course. I think the repetition of math lessons is important to keeping facts straight and fresh in the mind and to build up to other concepts.

Now, I don’t mean that I shouldn’t keep repeating or showing her grammar rules and similar items, but, yeah, if she already knows how to read, I need to stop making her read out loud to prove that she can do what she can already do and has been doing for two years now.

And, yeah, she had a point.

What am I doing? She gets the concepts. She knows it. Review the spelling rules with her and .. yes… move on. We’re good.