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Homeschooling the early years: how our toddler learned the alphabet and numerals through play

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This post is part of my series on homeschooling. Click here to read more.

Without much active instruction, our child could name all the letters and digits by age two, and at nearly three years old can recognize simple phonogram sounds and count to a hundred. This definitely wasn’t part of our early childhood homeschooling plan, as my husband and I are not fans of early academics. We firmly believe that play should be the focus of the early years.

We certainly didn’t drill this information into our toddler, but our toddler still learned them independently through playing a lot with a few particular toys, which are now quite well-worn. It really is true what they say about young kids being like sponges: they just can’t help but learn even when you’re not actively teaching them.

While we’re not in a rush to do academic stuff, this is still a welcome development. If you wish to have your toddler learn the alphabet and numerals in a fun and engaging way through play, I highly recommend the following toys, which have our child’s hearty stamps of approval:

Let’s Learn ABCs by Kidsbooks PublishingLet's Learn ABCs by Kidsbooks PublishingThis is a big alphabet board book with colorful pictures and sound buttons that play each letter and The ABC song.

Mr Pencil’s Scribble & Write by LeapFrogMr Pencil's Scribble & Write by LeapFrogThis is an interactive speaking toy that teaches letters and numbers, as well as common shapes and objects.

Learn Bath Letters & Numbers by MunchkinLearn Bath Letters & Numbers by MunchkinThese are foam letters and numbers that float in the water and stick to the walls when wet, making bath time more fun.

Sophie la girafe: Let’s get Counting! by DK PublishingSophie la girafe: Let's get Counting! by DK PublishingThis is a board book, but I’m including it here as it taught our toddler to count to 100. We didn’t do anything special; we just read it aloud to our child many times as it’s one of our child’s favorites.

Letter Factory by LeapFrogLetter Factory by LeapFrogThis is an animated movie, but I’m also including it here as it taught our toddler the simple letter sounds through their infectious phonics song. Our child watches this from time to time during our child’s allotted screen time.

New homeschooling parents in the Philippines, it’s ok not to enroll with a provider

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This post is part of my series on homeschooling. Click here to read more.

Homeschooling in the Philippines is generally classified into two modes:

  • Enrolling with a provider accredited with the Department of Education (DepEd)
  • Not doing the above — usually referred to as independent homeschooling

Enrolling with a homeschool provider never really appealed to us. This is probably an unpopular opinion, but it just feels like a cash grab. When it comes down to it, you’re really just paying them for DepEd accreditation. Some of the more expensive providers have advisors for portfolio reviews, but s/he will meet you probably only once per quarter, for just an hour or two each time. Ultimately, you’ll still be the primary facilitator of your child’s education — not the advisor, and certainly not anyone else from the provider.

I wouldn’t have such a dim view of homeschool providers if their tuition fees were commensurate with the minimal services they provide. However, some providers are surprisingly more expensive than traditional schools with actual face-to-face instruction. Besides, they really shouldn’t be calling it “tuition” — strictly speaking, tuition is defined as “the money paid for being taught”. In that case, the fees should be paid back to the parents!

Now, I don’t begrudge the existence of homeschool providers; it’s a free market after all. I do feel that new homeschooling parents should at least be made aware that enrolling with one is NOT the only way to homeschool, and that independent homeschooling is a totally viable option for Grades K to 10. Interest in homeschooling is at an all-time high during this COVID-19 pandemic, and many of these parents are simply advised to enroll with a provider.

For parents who do know about independent homeschooling but are nervous to take the plunge, don’t fret. Worried about DepEd accreditation? For Grades K to 10, your child can either take the Philippine Educational Placement Test (PEPT) or enroll in the Alternative Learning System (ALS) Program. Taking the PEPT during its regular annual schedule costs only PHP 50, while enrolling in the ALS Program is FREE. What about curriculum materials, you ask? You can easily buy local K-12 textbooks online straight from the publishers themselves or through third-party resellers. Want US-based materials instead? Many of them are available as PDF downloads, which you can have printed for cheap at your local print shop. Some are even available as online courses. As for homeschool support, there’s no need to pay for an advisor — there are TONS of homeschooling blogs and vlogs offering free advice (Google is your friend). You can also join local and international homeschool groups on Facebook.

Got more questions about independent homeschooling? Let me know in the comments section.

Homeschooling in the Philippines: our early childhood curriculum plan

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This post is part of my series on homeschooling. Click here to read more.

Kids grow up so fast, and before you know it, they’re school-ready. Our child is still a toddler, but I wanted to plan our independent homeschooling curriculum in advance so I don’t scramble at the eleventh hour.

I’m glad I started early, because there are a TON of programs out there. My husband and I want a secular curriculum; luckily someone already made a list of truly secular programs. From there, I picked the ones I like best after reading and watching reviews from other homeschooling parents.

It’s possible that our child won’t like a program or two, and that’s okay; this curriculum isn’t set in stone. The beauty of independent homeschooling is that if a certain material isn’t working for your child, you can modify it or use another, unlike traditional school where you basically have no other choice.

This plan is only for the early years, up to ages 7-8. Hopefully this would be helpful to other first-time indie homeschooling families in their curriculum shopping. Most of these programs, while US-based, are available as digital downloads, so shipping is not a problem.

Preschool

Blossom & Root Early Years Playing Preschool by Busy Toddler

I’m a fan of Finland’s early childhood education, which focuses on creative play and promotes a late start to formal schooling. Personally, we don’t plan to give formal instruction until after our child turns 5. Right now we simply do a lot of read-alouds and let our child play, play, play. It’s a lot of work to think up of new and creative activities to do every single day, though, so we plan to get the abovementioned play-based programs.

Kindergarten to Grade 2 (K-2)

We will take an eclectic approach of half formal, half unschooling:

Formal – English, Mathematics, and Science

I want our child to have a thorough grounding on these core domains. I believe that a strong foundation in these three is invaluable for everyday life and for learning all other subject areas. The programs I chose are all highly recommended by other secular homeschooling families, as they have proven to be very solid, interesting, and effective.

Unschooling – Everything else

All other subject areas, plus anything else our child wants to learn, will be through child-led, interest-inspired learning.

English

Logic of English Foundations

Logic of English (LoE) Foundations is a comprehensive, all-in-one program that uses the Orton-Gillingham approach to teach literacy. It covers phonics, reading, spelling, handwriting, vocabulary, composition, and grammar.

Mathematics

Essential Math by Singapore Math Primary Mathematics by Marshall Cavendish Education and Singapore Math

Singapore Math (SM) is a rigorous program that uses the Concrete-Pictorial-Abstract (CPA) approach to teach arithmetic. It can be suitable for all types of learners. There are many SM textbooks available, but I gravitate towards Primary Mathematics as it was the original program used in Singapore for 25 years, during which period they consistently topped the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS).

Science

Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding: A Science Curriculum for K-8 and Older Beginning Science Learners by Bernard J Nebel, PhD

Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding (BFSU) is a systematic and integrated approach to teaching the fundamentals of science to children. Its walls of text may seem daunting at first glance, but the book is actually an instruction manual for the teacher and not a textbook. The material itself is taught in a hands-on, experiential manner that stimulates critical thinking through observation and Socratic questioning.

Social Studies / Araling Panlipunan

  • DIY

We liked to travel before COVID-19, and we planned to do some worldschooling so our child can experience the Philippines and the world organically and in person. Obviously we are shelving this plan until a safe cure or vaccine is developed. In the meantime, we still plan to DIY this subject area, as it can be boring to just read a recitation of facts from a textbook.

Fine Arts, Health, and Physical Education

  • DIY

If our child shows a keen interest in sports or the arts, our plan pre-COVID-19 was to sign our child up for classes of our child’s own choice. Again, this plan is shelved indefinitely for lessons and activities (Charlotte Mason-inspired picture or music study, exercise, etc) we can do in the safety of our home.

Filipino

  • Undecided

There are many Filipino programs by local educational publishers, but it’s difficult to research about them online because there are almost no in-depth reviews available.

My husband and I are consciously raising our child to be multilingual, so we’re not worried that our child will be poor in Filipino, unlike so many kids these days who are English-only. I plan to borrow used Filipino textbooks from relatives and friends with older kids so I can review and compare them myself. If you have any recommendations for good Filipino programs, let me know in the comments section.

Update: I don’t know if it’s completely secular, but Wikahon by Adarna House looks promising. Will go with this program if I can’t find a better one.

Homeschooling in the Philippines: where to buy local K-12 textbooks online

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This post is part of my series on homeschooling. Click here to read more.

For first-time independent homeschooling families, choosing learning materials may seem like a daunting task. Some use foreign textbooks from the US and other countries. Others create their own curricula using mostly free resources online, while unschoolers often don’t follow any curricula at all.

If you prefer a more ready-made approach that adheres to the Department of Education’s K to 12 Basic Education Program, you can simply buy textbooks from local educational publishers. Most of these publishers cater only to institutional clients with large wholesale orders (i.e., schools), but a few sell to individual retail consumers. And in this time of COVID-19, it is best to order online. Only retail-friendly local publishers with online stores are listed here.

Update September 2020: Third-party online sellers who carry textbooks from other publishers are now listed at the end.
Update August 2020: AKLATAN, the first all-Filipino online book fair, is happening on Shopee later this month (16-18 August 2020). Over 40 local companies, including several educational publishers, will be offering their books on discount. Click here to read the official announcement from the Book Development Association of the Philippines (BDAP).
We haven’t personally purchased from any of these publishers, but they are well-known entities whose textbooks are used in schools nationwide.

Anvil Publishing

Anvil PublishingClick here to view their entire catalog. They also publish picture and fiction books for kids and teens.

Vibal Group

Vibal GroupVibal has been quick to adapt to the “new normal” by releasing a new line of textbooks designed for home-based learning called Learn at Home: Academic Books. They also have a Smart Homeschool Kit, and a line of children’s picture books called Chikiting Books. (Update: Vibal seems to have discontinued the former; instead they have the following new lines: Self-Learning Modules, Smart Class, and Smart Wizard).

St Mary’s Publishing

St Mary's PublishingThey don’t have their own online store, but they are officially on Lazada and Shopee.

REX Book Store

REX Book StoreOnly Senior High School textbooks are available on their online store, but I’m listing them here in case they decide to sell their elementary textbooks online. They also have a line of picture books for kids called Hello Animals!

Third-party sellers

Homeschooling in the Philippines: Q&A on the Alternative Learning System (ALS) Program

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This post is part of my series on homeschooling. Click here to read more.

In my previous post, I wrote a primer on independent homeschooling in the Philippines. If your child wants to go to college at the end of your indie journey, there are several ways to do that. The most popular method among indie families is to enroll in the Department of Education (DepEd)’s Alternative Learning System (ALS) Program and take the Accreditation and Equivalency (A&E) Test.

This Q&A is for indie families who are interested to choose this route.

Update: Many changes were made to the ALS Program in recent years due to the full implementation of the K to 12 Basic Education Program. And now with the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, our lawmakers are giving it special attention through Senate Bill No. 1365 (Alternative Learning System Act). The information here is still valid for now, but expect changes in the near future as the government figures out the “new normal”.
  • What is the ALS Program?

Basically, it’s a way for out-of-school youth and adult (OSYA) — DepEd’s official term for people who did not complete formal education — to earn the equivalent of a diploma. If you’re familiar with the US GED, it’s similar to that. The ALS Program is how People’s Champ Senator Manny Pacquiao got his diploma. Here’s a picture of an actual ALS Secondary Level diploma from 2013 (equivalent to a high school diploma):

As learners who are not in the formal education system, independent homeschoolers are technically viewed by DepEd as OSYA.

  • How much does it cost?

The ALS Program is FREE.

  • Wow! So how do we sign up?

You enroll at a Community Learning Center (CLC). There are several different levels; the ones relevant to homeschoolers are:

LevelDurationDescription
Advanced Elementary8 to 10 monthsFor those who want to stop homeschooling at Grade 6 level and go to JHS
Junior High School (JHS)2 yearsFor those who want to stop homeschooling at Grade 10 level and go to SHS
Senior High School (SHS)Not yet implementedFor those who want to stop homeschooling at Grade 12 level and go to college
Note that sessions aren’t everyday like in regular school; at most it’s only a couple of hours a week. According to DepEd Order (DO) 2019-013, “[t]he actual program duration will depend on the learner’s educational background or existing knowledge prior to enrolling in the ALS program.”

DepEd is still working on the SHS Level program. In the meantime, indie kids will have to actually attend a regular two-year SHS to be eligible for college.

  • Where can we find a CLC?

You may call or visit your nearest DepEd office. A popular CLC among indie families is MyHill ALS.

Some indie families have reported being turned away from their local CLCs because they are not the stereotypical OSYA. The reality is that many DepEd personnel are not familiar with independent homeschooling. Do not be deterred if this happens; go to another CLC or escalate the matter, because rejecting learners from ALS is antithetical to their mandate of “Education For All”.
  • What happens after we finish the program?

You take the corresponding A&E Test, which is administered once a year. Here are the age requirements as per DepEd Memorandum 2019-006:

LevelAge on Test Day
ElementaryAt least 12 years old
JHSAt least 16 years old
SHSNot yet implemented
  • What’s the test like?

DepEd is continuously tweaking the A&E Test, but as it stands right now, it’s a multiple-choice examination with a 60% passing rate. Here are the languages used in the A&E Test for each Learning Strand as per DO 2019-013:

Learning StrandLanguage
Communication SkillsFilipino and English
Scientific and Critical Thinking SkillsEnglish
Mathematical and Problem Solving SkillsEnglish
Life and Career SkillsFilipino or English
Understanding Self and SocietyFilipino or English
Digital CitizenshipEnglish
  • Is the test hard?

We spoke with an actual indie teen who passed the Secondary Level a few years ago, and the way she describes the program, it’s somewhat akin to going to a review center to prepare for a board exam. Mock exams similar to the actual A&E Test are given every so often to train you for the real thing. If you have a good foundation and study hard, it won’t be difficult to pass the test.

  • What happens after we pass the test?

As per DO 2019-013, learners will have to submit a “presentation portfolio” and a “learning project” in addition to passing the A&E Test in order to get their diplomas. However, this is not yet being implemented as of this writing. As it stands right now, you will get your diploma after passing the A&E Test.

Got more questions about ALS? Let me know in the comments section.

Homeschooling in the Philippines: Q&A on independent homeschooling

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This post is part of my series on homeschooling. Click here to read more.

Long before our child was born, my husband and I were already on the same page on homeschooling. Our “decision” to homeschool basically just went like this:

Me: If we have a kid, I want to homeschool him/her.
Him: Me too.

We didn’t belabor much on the whys and wherefores, as we both wanted the same thing. We were mostly concerned on the hows of homeschooling in the Philippines.

We knew we wanted the freedom and flexibility of independent homeschooling, but we had some concerns, knowing that it can be quite bureaucratic in our country — identification here, accreditation there, documentation everywhere. Will there be setbacks in the future if our kid has none of those? We briefly considered homeschooling with a provider because of this, but all our concerns were laid to rest with further research and meeting actual indie families.

With the world still in the thick of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, many parents are now choosing to homeschool their kids, especially since a serious condition linked to COVID-19 — Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS-C) — has emerged among the young.

This Q&A is for parents who want to go indie from the get-go but still have some reservations.

With COVID-19, the Department of Education (DepEd) is now paying special attention to independent homeschooling after being uninvolved for years. The information here is still valid for now, but expect changes in the near future as DepEd figures out the “new normal”.
  • What is independent homeschooling?

It is homeschooling without enrolling with a DepEd-accredited homeschool provider.

  • Is it legal?

Yes. According to The Constitution of the Republic of the Philippines, “The State shall protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality education at all levels and shall take appropriate steps to make such education accessible to all . . . Without limiting the natural right of parents to rear their children . . .” The bolded phrase is the legal basis of homeschooling in the Philippines.

  • That’s good to know. So we’re free to teach whatever we want?

The Constitution also states, “All educational institutions . . . shall inculcate patriotism and nationalism, foster love of humanity, respect for human rights, . . . teach the rights and duties of citizenship, strengthen ethical and spiritual values, develop moral character and personal discipline, encourage critical and creative thinking, broaden scientific and technological knowledge, and promote vocational efficiency.”

TL;DR: Yes, as long as you don’t teach your kid to be a subversive criminal anarchist. Just raise him/her to be a good person and law-abiding citizen, and the government is gonna be a-ok with you.

  • So how do we start?

The appeal of independent homeschooling is that families are free to design their own curricula and implement them at their own pace. You can even do unschooling if you want. For a guide on what the government expects your child to learn at a certain age, check out DepEd’s comprehensive K to 12 Basic Education Program Curriculum Guides. For example, at Kindergarten level (5 years old), your child is expected to know the following about plants and animals:

Standards and Competencies for Five-Year-Old Filipino Children

  • The curriculum guides are hundreds of pages long! Can we just buy textbooks that cover all this stuff?

You sure can. Click here for a list of local educational publishers who sell K-12 textbooks online. With independent homeschooling, you are free to choose your own learning materials, textbooks or otherwise. Want to follow a US-based curriculum instead? You can do that too.

Independent homeschooling can also be as cheap or expensive as you want it to be. If you want to be frugal, there are tons of FREE homeschool resources online (Google is your friend).

  • Do we need to document our indie journey?

According to The Constitution, “The State . . . shall exercise reasonable supervision and regulation of all educational institutions.” However, I have yet to hear of an indie family who has gotten a visit from DepEd for an evaluation of their homeschooling progress. We met an indie family whose eldest daughter is now in college; they barely kept any organized records for her.

Update: According to the grapevine, DepEd is now considering to exercise their right of oversight over independent homeschooling. Some parents welcome this, but personally we feel it diminishes the appeal of going indie, because well, it’s not really “independent” anymore. Here’s hoping the “improvements” they make will actually be for the better, and not merely add unnecessary layers of bureaucracy to an already working status quo.

TL;DR: No, but you can choose to compile a homeschool portfolio for your own records.

  • What if I want to open a bank account for my kid or something? S/he won’t have a school ID.

Get your child a passport. We easily applied for one when our kid was around four months old. Click here to read about our experience at the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA).

Some indie families have reported being given the runaround by the DFA when applying for passports for their school-age children, because they lack school IDs. What they did: they simply submitted an affidavit stating that they are homeschooling independently, hence no school ID.

With the upcoming rollout of the Philippine Identification System, the country’s compulsory national identity document, hopefully this ID problem will become a thing of the past.

  • What about socialization?

This oft-asked question by homeschooling naysayers has been rendered moot by COVID-19 — even they aren’t eager to send their kids back to regular school without a cure or vaccine. Anyway, this is where local homeschooling communities come in; you can find them on Facebook. There used to be lots of homeschool meetups pre-COVID-19, but these have transitioned to online ones through video conferencing apps.

  • I’m almost convinced. So how does my kid get to college?

By enrolling in the Alternative Learning System (ALS) Program and taking the Accreditation and Equivalency (A&E) Test. If you’re familiar with the US GED, it’s kinda like that. We met an indie teen who completed the program and passed the test a few years ago; she’s now in college.

There are other ways for indie children to get to college, but ALS is the most popular one among indie families. Click here to read my primer on ALS.

Update September 2020: Still nervous about going indie? Read my latest post: New homeschooling parents in the Philippines, it’s ok not to enroll with a provider