Spring is the season of awakenings and fresh starts. It’s the perfect time to inspire, refresh, and re-energize homeschool lessons for your kindergarten through sixth graders, and now is the time to start planning.
Sunshine fuels enthusiasm
Almost everyone feels happier when the days grow longer and brighter. Adapting lessons to reflect the vibrancy of the season helps create fun and engaging lessons. Seasonal shifts in curriculum have all kinds of benefits for you and your kiddos (aka students):
- Inspire renewed enthusiasm in students. A mid- or late-school year slump, during which students experience a drop in motivation, energy, and productivity, is pretty common. Changing things up and injecting the unexpected can boost attention and motivation.
- Bring opportunities for outdoor and nature-based learning. After cold and/or inclement weather in many parts of the country, spring literally brings a breath of fresh air. Kids can get outside to explore and be active and hands-on with their learning.
- Avoid homeschool burnout as a parent. Same as for kids, without a kickstart, homeschool parents can flatline a bit as winter grays and routine days stretch on. Wearing lots of hats can sometimes feel overwhelming. Instead of being “just one more thing,” a spring curriculum change can also change our mindset.
Spring brings unique things!
Incorporate spring into core subjects
It’s pretty easy to add a spring theme to core subjects. Making lessons relevant and connected to everyday life can increase both enthusiasm and comprehension. As part of the homeschool curriculum for spring, consider using:
- Spring themes in math – When working on graphs, tables, and charts, plug in the heights of flowers. Count the numbers of leaves or petals. Measure and compare the day-to-day growth of plants. Put out a rain gauge.
- Spring-focused writing prompts and poetry activities – A field of daffodils inspired William Wordsworth to pen “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud,” including the lines “Beside the lake, beneath the trees, fluttering and dancing in the breeze.” Spring is a sensory buffet with buds bursting and bugs and spiders emerging. What does your child see? Hear? Feel? Encourage your students to write about it!
- Seasonal reading lists – A book like Good-bye Winter, Hello Spring by Kenard Pak, a pair of books by Dianna Aston and Sylvia Long, An Egg Is Quiet, and A Nest Is Noisy, all for ages 2-5, and The Big Book of Bugs by Yuval Zommer are all ideal for spring reading. The latter is often listed for that 2-5 age group, but it would also interest many older kids. Get kids reading these on their own or as part of lessons on the changing seasons, bird life cycles, or insects in their many creepy-crawly forms.
The 3 Rs shine brighter with a spring theme rolled in.
Plan spring-themed learning activities
Once spring really starts popping, the season offers plenty of “ingredients” for hands-on learning for homeschool students. Here are a few ideas and resources:
- Nature-inspired science lessons and experiments - ‘Tis the season for planting seeds, studying insects, and learning about bird migration. Retailer Birdie Bean last spring posted “Fun Facts & Science Experiments to Teach Your Kids About Weather,” including “Storms, Rainbows, and Wind Experiments.” Or check out this KinderCare article, “Six-Legged Creatures Make Great Teachers! 8 Ideas for Buggy Fun.”
- Creative art projects using spring motifs (flowers, rainbows, etc.) - The Teach Me. I’m Yours. Homeschooling blog offers “25+ Homeschooling Resources for Spring.” The projects include pressed flower bookmarks, hammered flower greeting cards and butterfly and ladybug life cycle crafts. Also take a look at Learning Resources® (U.K.) “10 Nature Crafts and Activities to Try Indoors,” that include wind chimes made of sticks, leaf rubbings, and nest building.
Whether creating a rainy day filler or as part of a larger unit, science experiments and arts & crafts project using elements from nature create fun and engaging homeschool activities that stretch kids’ imagination and build skills.
Organize outdoor learning adventures
Of course, getting out in nature can be even more fun! Time in the great outdoors is important, too. Multiple sources suggest kids today spend on average only several minutes a day in unstructured outdoor play--less than half of 20 years ago. Yet they spend several hours a day on screen time
- Nature walks, scavenger hunts, or outdoor storytelling sessions. Nature walks can take many forms, as can scavenger hunts. Google “nature scavenger hunt” and discover lots of time-saving, pre-made lists of objects for kids to find. And the Edmonton Public Library published “Seven Ways to Play Outside with Story” by Miriam Mahaffy, which suggests fun outdoor storytelling activities such as the basic “Read outside, together! to the more expansive “Let the land be your stage!”
- Educational garden activities (planting seeds, measuring growth, measuring rainfall). HGTV’s “30 Gardening Projects + Activities for Kids,” geared from preschoolers through teens, includes ideas like a ladybug hotel, newspaper seed-starter pots, stone garden markers, and an eco-friendly bird feeder. And Canada’s BrightPath childcare website published “Gardening for Kids: Activities, Ideas, and More!” with helpful information such as “Easy Plants for Kids to Grow” and how to plant a pollinator garden or make a butterfly puddle.
Audrey Hepburn said, “To plant a garden is to dream of tomorrow,” and what could be more fun and fitting than doing that alongside your kids?
Get the whole family involved
On a similar note, family-centered homeschool plans, including those keyed around the season, offer lots of benefits, but the biggest is just being together. In "The Top Ten Benefits of Spending Time with Family," Highland Springs™ Specialty Clinic, with multiple sites in Utah and Idaho, says that “Spending time with family is key to a person’s development as it promotes adaptability and resilience. Such key lessons can only be taught by family members coaching each other regarding life’s ups and downs.” Ideas for integrating family time with seasonally-themed homeschool lessons include:
- Spring-inspired recipes to explore measurements and nutrition. Take a look at “36 Family-Friendly Dinners You'll Want to Make This Spring,” by Leah Goggins, for EatingWell. Maybe continue or start back up a springtime family food tradition. Visit a sugar shack to see how maple syrup is made? Harvest wild leeks from the woods? Find a U-pick farm for rhubarb, asparagus, or strawberries? Then, make something fabulous together.
- Family history projects tied to spring traditions. Did Mom and Dad or Grandpa and Grandma have spring traditions? Maybe crop or garden planting? Spring cleaning? Finding the first ____ in the woods? (You choose what to search for!) Recording the date the first robin or red-winged blackbird returned from the south? If there aren’t these kinds of traditions, start them!
Nothing makes memories—and teaches important math and life skills—like time together in the kitchen, around the table, or in the yard or garden.
In so many ways, spring offers the perfect chance to refresh and re-inspire homeschool planning. Engaging homeschool lessons with a seasonal theme can be an easy way to reinvigorate an existing curriculum. And for positive and productive screen time, School Zone’s Anywhere Teacher app for kids 2-8 includes activities that fit right in with spring-themed learning activities. From a catchy song titled “You Just Gotta’ Know,” about picking the right clothes for the weather, to weather flash cards that present fun facts about natural phenomena, to a video that explores and explains the water cycle, kids will be excited to learn with Anywhere Teacher.
Homeschool families can also explore School Zone Publishing’s full line of educational resources.
Bring the season to life in your child’s learning!
Let us know how you are refreshing your homeschool learning program this spring in the comments!
