The Guilt-Free Homeschooling gals also do workshops! Contact guiltfreehomeschooling@gmail.com if you would like more details on hosting Carolyn Morrison and her daughter, Jennifer Leonhard, at your conference. Here are the currently available Guilt-Free Homeschooling Workshops:
1) Taking the Mystery Out of Learning Styles
This incredibly informative workshop will show you how to use your students’ strengths to improve their weaknesses. Identify your children’s learning styles (visual, auditory, tactile, kinesthetic) to grab and hold their attention; identify your teaching style to spot tendencies to present every lesson in the same way. Learn how easily you can adapt any lesson to any learning style for any age! Your students can and will learn better and faster using these simple tips!
2) Tactile: The Socially Unacceptable Learning Style
If your child is constantly grabbing, touching, feeling, and holding the things around him, he/she is probably a Tactile Learner, a taboo in “polite” society. This workshop will not only make you feel better about your child, it will also show you new ways to help your student break through to better learning.
3) Running & Jumping IS How Johnny Learns: Exploring Alternate Teaching Methods for Kinesthetic Students
Are you constantly reminding your Tigger to stop bouncing and sit down to do schoolwork? Is your child a never-ending ball of energy who tires you out before breakfast? Kinesthetic learners NEED to move and bounce and run and jump in order to learn. This workshop will give you practical teaching tips for your kinesthetic student for instant, positive results that will harness that energy and improve your student’s ability to learn.
4) Teaching Math Using All Learning Styles
Are your students struggling with math? Teaching the concepts with all learning styles (visual, auditory, tactile, kinesthetic) will bring deeper understanding, improved recognition, and higher scores. Let us show you how in this idea-packed workshop!
5) Teaching Spelling Using All Learning Styles
Are your students struggling with spelling? Let us show you tips for teaching with all learning styles (visual, auditory, tactile, kinesthetic) to give your students a better all-around understanding and improved recall. Get ready for revolutionary techniques that WORK!
6) Teaching Language Arts with All Learning Styles
Are your students struggling with spelling, phonics, or other language skills? Let us show you tips for teaching with all learning styles (visual, auditory, tactile, kinesthetic) to give your students a better all-around understanding and improved recall. Get ready for revolutionary techniques that WORK! (covers teaching handwriting, spelling, phonics, vocabulary, writing/composition, & general language skills)
7) Teaching Science Using All Learning Styles
Are you struggling to teach science? Science isn’t scary; science is just asking “Why?” and “How?” You will be encouraged by this non-threatening, idea-packed workshop filled with simple, fun activities using ordinary household materials and utensils. Teaching the concepts with all learning styles (visual, auditory, tactile, kinesthetic) will remove your worries about how to keep your students’ attention! You will be energized with confidence, and your students will beg you for more science!
8) Using Learning Styles to Develop Excellent Study Skills!
Using these learning style techniques will strengthen areas of weakness in your current curriculum and establish effective, individual study skills for high school, college, and beyond. Your teens are not too old for these practical, proven ideas that will challenge everything you’ve ever been told about studying!
9) What Type of Homeschooler Are You?
Are you struggling with homeschooling and feel like you’re working against yourself? You may be! Identifying your own characteristic homeschooling style can make each day go more smoothly and free you from the guilt of thinking you don’t “measure up” to other families. Learn what simple mistakes could be responsible for many of the problems you encounter each day.
10) Conquering the Tricky Transition from Public School to Homeschool
We did it, we survived, we thrived, and we can help you do the same! Switching to homeschooling after a time in public/private school can be difficult, but it is not impossible. Common obstacles, stumbling blocks, and potholes will be discussed, plus strategies for overcoming them in Guilt-Free Homeschooling style! Plenty of Q&A time will include an opportunity to “Ask the Homeschool Graduate.”
11) Discover Your Family’s Homeschooling Style and Your Children’s Learning Styles
Do your children read incessantly, or do they prefer hands-on, real-life experiences? Is one student detail-oriented and likes to fill in worksheets, while another can’t sit down long enough to sign his name? Your children’s learning styles will also be identified, along with teaching tips for capturing and holding their attention while strengthening their weaker areas. Is your house kept in perfect order, or is it more like controlled chaos? Do you start supper as soon as breakfast is done, or does the fast food drive-thru know you by your first name? This workshop will help you pinpoint the style of homeschooling that will best fit your family’s lifestyle and keep you from working against yourselves with every step. No family fits one perfect method of homeschooling, just as no one person learns with only one learning style. Adaptability is key, and we can show you how to blend styles to fit individual needs while maintaining the method of homeschooling that matches your family’s values. First-time homeschoolers will especially benefit from this information-packed session!
12) Overcoming Your Biggest Fears in Teaching: Math, Science, & Spelling
If you find any of these subjects to be intimidating, join us for tips and tricks to make these subjects come alive for your students. Having found troublesome spots in these subjects ourselves, we have found many ways to overcome them for our own family, as well as others. We bring our passion for life-long learning to the table as we help you find the best way to teach your students and give you helpful study tips for the future.
13) Preschool Is Not Brain Surgery
Preschoolers do not need to learn how to accurately perform life-saving surgeries, spend 7 hours a day contemplating Socrates, or writing influential commentary on political policy, but there are some simple, practical ways to introduce younger children to more advanced levels of thinking without straining their brains, taxing their patience, or letting them realize they are doing anything other than playing. While you do not yet need to be developing a transcript to send off to the Ivy Leagues, you will learn a few ways to take everyday activities and give your child familiarity with advanced concepts that will make future learning less imposing and early college a breeze. Set your child’s imagination on fire and put him on the life-long path of discovery and curiosity.
14) Simplified Planning & Record-Keeping for Hopelessly Disorganized Homeschoolers
If you’re not into lesson planning, but you know you need to keep on track somehow, we can help. Let us show you a simple, logical, no-frills way to know where you are and where you’re going without endless advance planning or detailed journals. Best of all, when you need to make your student’s transcript for college admission, you will have all the needed info at your fingertips!
15) Teaching the Unteachables: Tactile and Kinesthetic Learners
Your child is not “broken,” he just learns in a different way. Students who are full of energy, active, or who consistently have their fingers busy are often thought to be distracted or not learning properly. Their actions or comfort objects can actually be the key to unlocking the learning center of their brains. Join us to learn why these students learn the way they do and how you can use their habits to your advantage. We will help you discover ways to keep them learning without wearing Mom out!
16) Supplementing Your Homeschooling with Online Exploration
Jennifer of Guilt-Free Homeschooling will show you how to use the unexpected to explore the unknown, with much more than just another list of links. Known for her knack of looking at learning from a different angle, she will show you how the internet can be extremely useful and surprisingly educational if you know where to look and how to utilize it. You will walk away with ideas and excitement for every subject and every age.
17) Who Wrote This “Rule Book,” and Why Do I Think I Have to Follow It?
Feeling trapped by schoolish methods that serve no real purpose at home? Homeschooling is infinitely adaptable and should look different in every home. If you’ve found yourself stuck in a meaningless routine, this workshop will help you burn that “Rule Book” and show you how to get down to some real learning that you and your students will enjoy!
18) Unusual Methods for Teaching Math
The Guilt-Free Homeschooling gals are at it again–bringing their brand of crazy fun to liven up your lessons. From “Ducktric Units of Measurement” to a “Mathobstacle Course,” Jen and Carolyn will show you how a little absurdity can keep kids interested and ensure they’ll never forget the concepts!
19) What Made This a “Bad” Homeschool Day, and What Can I Do to Prevent It from Happening Again?
Admit it: You had a bad day. We had them, too. If you feel you are having too many bad days, we can help. Join us as we analyze the most frequent causes of bad days and explore practical techniques for improving lessons and increasing your students’ interest. Success and good days begin with this workshop!
What workshop attendees have said:
“This makes so much sense — no one has ever explained it this way before!!”
“It was like explosions going off inside my head from all the connections I was making: this child is this style, and my other child is that style!”
“How did you know my friend’s learning style so quickly? You had only talked to us for 10 seconds, and you got her exactly right!”
“I have learned more about how to teach my children in the past hour with you than in all the other workshops I’ve ever attended!”
From a Conference Coordinator:
Hi Carolyn & Jennifer!
It was wonderful having you, once again, at the HECF InHome Homeschoolers’ Conference in Illinois.
It’s been 4 years in a row & you still always manage to amaze! Our Conference is extremely diverse and jam packed with sessions, 63 adult workshops in all, 9 going on at one time & you still fill a room.
I love working with you. You are easy to book, very flexible. If I have an extra spot to fill & an idea, you can put it together in a flash. Furthermore, your ideas really help our attendees. This year, you rated a 9.8 out of 10! Amazing!
Thanks again! Already looking forward to the next time.
Yvonnie DuBose
Adult Workshop Coordinator 2009-2011
Illinois InHome Homeschoolers’ Conference
Guilt-Free Homeschooling is the creation of Carolyn Morrison and her daughter, Jennifer Leonhard. After serious disappointments with public school, Carolyn spent the next 11 years homeschooling her two children, from elementary to high school graduation and college admission. Refusing to force new homeschooling families to re-invent the wheel, Carolyn and Jennifer now share their encouragement, support, tips, and tricks, filling their blog with "all the answers we were looking for as a new-to-homeschooling family" and making this website a valuable resource for parents, not just a daily journal. Guilt-Free Homeschooling -- Equipping Parents for Homeschooling Success!
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