Some of the things I was anxious to teach my daughter about was History, Geography, Social Studies, and Culture. For one, I wasn't that good on those subjects back in my schooldays. I hated Social Studies. I just relied on memorization and just focused on the goal of achieving just the right grades enough to keep me in the star section and keep my scholarships. But if you ask me anything about Social Studies now, we won't have that much of a conversation (except for Rizal studies, which piqued my interest so much.)
My challenge last year was How to make a toddler interested in Philippine History. I remember when I was a kid, I was full of questions even from the very beginning. We were given terminologies before about datus, alipins, barangays, but really never a story I could connect with. After those sea of words I had to memorize, we were then taught about the Spanish colonization. Most probably that was what made me disinterested with Philippine History.
Start from the very beginning
I had in my mind that if I am to teach Philippine History to my daughter, we should start from the very start. Around March this year, I asked around if anyone of my professor and teacher friends have any book recommendations for Philippine History from before we the 300++ years of Spanish occupation. Unfortunately, we all just have no reference whatsoever about the time when Philippines still has her freedom.
Around that time, I have already found the homeschool provider we have right now. It so happened that time that they have a free downloadable list of book recommendations for kindergarten to Year 10 students.
One of the books that caught my eyes was the book A Lolong Time Ago. It was perfect for kids, I read it to my daughter when she was 5 years old, and we practiced oral narration with it. The book discussed how exactly the migration of our great great great ancestors happened, it happened all because of the search for food. It even has the Earth's geography from a long long time ago.
This book is great for children because although most of the pictures are black and white, most of them are cartoonish and has a lot of comedic approach very much suitable for kids and kids at heart. It was a great starter for our homeschooling journey towards Philippine Studies.
Introduce Great Filipinos one by one
As our studies progress, we move on to the great Filipinos that lived before. Our first brush at this is the book First Around the Globe. Yes, the first person to travel the entire world was a Filipino slave bought by Magellan. Though he was not aware of it at the time because all he wanted to do back then was to get back his home to the Philippines. Because back in those days, what's not to love about our dear country?
We then moved to the next book collection I stumbled upon. The Great Lives Series. We started off with Gabriela Silang which actually was about her and her husband Diego Silang. Gabriela further inspired my daughter's feminism. She has always believed that girls can also do stuff that most people think are for boys. While I encourage her, Gabriela empowered her.
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We are now reading about Jose Rizal. She was so delighted because she found out that someone can indeed be a lot of things when they grow up. (When we ask her what she wants to be when she grows up, she always says she wants to be a doctor, a teacher, a builder, a mom, a cook, an astronaught, and so on and so forth.) While reading about the life of Jose Rizal, not only does she discover so much about the Spanish occupation, she also learns so much about the different countries that Rizal travelled to.
We have a couple of Biographies lined up already, some of them I've bought, some of them waiting on my cart. I just have to pre-read everything because evidently, I wasn't taught this way when I was young, so I also have to teach myself about these great lives before I pass on the book to my little one.
Geography
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For our Geography lessons, we used the book My First Atlas of the Philippines. So far, the little one has enjoyed every single bit of lessons we had in Philippine Geography. I printed out a blank Philippine map where she would color each region we studied. And while she's at it, she would write down or draw what she remember about any of those provinces. It has been such an amazing activity for her.
Recently, our country was hit by strong typhoons. My daughter has always been afraid of storms, we even had lessons on what she should do in case of calamity. I have discussed our go to bag with her along the way. I used these typhoons not only for our calamity preparedness lesson, but also in our Philippine studies. She learned about the mountain ranges in Region 3, making her appreciate nature even more. She is very much thankful for Sierra Madre for blocking out that storm last September. I also used it as an opportunity to discuss the purpose and importance of each land formations. When typhoon Paeng made landfall from one province after another last October, my daughter was introduced to more regions as we watch the news updates.
Baybayin
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My daughter's first language is English. She doesn't understand Tagalog before. But now, while she is learning to speak tagalog, she is also learning our Baybayin. She got interested when she sa how to write Baybayin. Now she knows and appreciates reading and writing baybayin. It also helps that she learned about how the Filipinos lived from A Lolong Time Ago. We used the Baybayin book I bought from Shopee for this lesson.
Culture
We make it a point that we go to parks as often as we can. We do nature studies whenever we can. We so happened to go to Paco Park in Manila and there was an event they were preparing for. When I found out that it was a cultural dance presentation, I insisted that we wait to for it to start so that my daughter would be introduced to the cultural dances of the Philippines. It was a very happy coincidence that we visited that park that day.
Everyday, during our study time, I often play music while my daughter does her copywork or sketch narrations. Most of the time, we have Vivaldi or Mozart in the background but I also make it a point that we learn filipino songs. I choose Lea Salonga's collection of Filipino folk songs in youtube.
It's More Fun in the Philippines!
There is so much to love about the Philippines. Hindi mahirap mahalin ang Pilipinas. Whenever we finish our Philippine studies, be it Geography, Biographies, Music, or anything related to the Philippines, my daughter would say "Wow! That was so interesting! or "I really love this book! or When I grow up, I want to be like...." I feel a sense of fulfillment seeing that she is learning to love our country not because she was told that she must. Her patriotism roots from her knowledge of the beautiful past our country has before all of the ugly things that happened here.
Our Philippine studies curriculum may seem to have too much information, too many books, and too many activities. It is, and it has. But my daughter is enjoying this feast of knowledge that I am serving her. Patriotism isn't something that should be imposed. Just like when we love someone, we should get to know her, learn about her past, admire her beautiful landscapes, be in awe at her rich culture, understand what she went through right from the very beginning.
I hope your kids enjoy learning about the Philippines through the books I shared in this post. There are still a lot of books lined up for our homeschooling journey but those are going to wait until her older years.
If you would like to introduce Philippine studies to your little one, start with one book. Once you catch their interest, add another, and another. Just make sure to take your time in reading through all the books. You don't have to finish them all up right away. Let your kid fall in love. Let yourself feel that love. And enjoy your learning!
Mabuhay!
Ai Ang galing mo naman @romeskie. Parang nahiya na ako sa aking pagkaguro nang nabasa ko ito...hehehe
You're such a resourceful teacher to your daughter. Ang very good din ni baby.
Oh no, please don't feel bad or something. I have friends who teach in traditional schools at kitang kita ko rin ang effort at pagmamahal na ibinibigay ng mga guro sa bawat estudyante nila. At sobrang bilib ako sa level ng dedication ng mga teachers sa dami ng tinuturuan nila. Kaya salute pa rin to all teachers who give it their all just to provide education to everyone they teach. Hugs and kisses. 🥰🥰
🥰❤️🥰
I've tried to learn more about the PH story from a different perspective. I am an old Canadian, looking someplace warm - a tropical respite - for my last adventures. As I read your educational journey with your daughter, I thought I might describe how things used to be in Canada.
From my recollection the first process in education is motivation. The background that you are giving will motivate your daughter greatly. There is a second process that should inspire your daughter too. When you teach your daughter subjects, do you just dictate to her on how to do it, or do you show her how to do it? Have you taught your daughter to crochet yet? If not will you just hand her the needles and yarn and tell her to go and do it or will you show her how to do it (Modelling)?
When I look at my mother and grandmothers, who lived in the Golden Age of Canadian Society, they had two institutions they attended: The Women's Institute and the Canadian Girls in Training. The Women's Institute was a way that socially isolated women could come together, interact, learn, be societally productive. I recently saw a video, of a PH vlogger taking her girls to clean trash from a beach. She was being an excellent model for her children. Having an organization of women coming together is an important thing for girls to see. Are there similar institutions in present day PH? Is it something that your daughter can see you doing. How aware is your daughter of the blogging that you do on Hive? Modelling is such an important aspect of learning.
Once you explain the importance of a topic (Motivation), and demonstrated the topic (Modelling), the next step is exercises or practice. In the case of Canada, the girls attended the Canadian Girls in Training. In my case, I attended Cub Scouts, 4-H (an agriculture based group), and the Key Club (a volunteer group in Secondary School). Regardless of the organization, it allowed the children to practice the skills that made for better people.
What I see is that you are doing more than teaching your daughter history or social studies. You are immersing her in these subjects so they will start to form part of her personality. I look forward for continuing posts on your adventures.
I think we have here what we call the Girl Scouts of the Philippines. I joined that org when I was a kid mainlh because it was a requirement at our school.
We do go for internal motivation when it comes to our study time. And I totally agree with modelling because basically kids learn through what they see. But a main consideration in my teaching method is my kid's personality. It's not I teach, I show, you do. Our study time mostly comprises of me reading aloud to her, then her narrating back what she understood, that leads to a conversation rich in ideas and her thoughts and input. It could be considered child led, being that we base everything on her personality, but we do to lay down the rails so to say through mindful and intentional habits training.
yeahh history is not easy for kids, but if we make a game of it, or a nice adventure to the past it will very inspiring, I think❤️
your approach is very cool!
Mamsh! May shoppe links ba sa mga books na Yan? Hehe. I've been reading lots of great feedbacks about A Lolong Time Ago sa mga homeschool groups. I'd love to add that to our curriculum as well. I'm sending links to my sister para makapag pabili ako at padala ko dito pagbalik ng tita ko naman from vacay. Lol.
Yeys! PM ko sayo mga links. Lakas makapagpa curious netong A Lolong Time Ago. Gusto magpunta ng Ayala museum tong isa dahil gusto makita yung mga na-hukay na mga ornaments noong unang unang panahon pa. Haha.
Hi @romeskie,I enjoyed reading your post, teaching the history of the country to children is very important for them to know the origins and relevant events of the nation as well as its outstanding characters who fought for the independence of the country the nation and learn to love it.
As you point out, before presenting these topics to children you should read and analyze the book, because after you read with them comes the round of questions for which you have to be prepared, they ask so many that do not give you much time to organize the ideas and respond according to their demands, with my son it happened to me that I answered a question as simple as I considered and this led him to ask other questions, from there I try to respond in such a way that he understands the topic and is satisfied with the explanation.
Greetings!
Yes, pre-reading the books is very important. It makes for a rich conversation during study time. It also gives me a chance to search for words which my daughter hasn't encountered yet.
At first, I didn't like history but when I entered high school, I found history class amusing. It's quite weird to be obssess about history especially around 1700-1900s. Plenty of good discoveries and inventions are made. I hope your daughter would love our history even more.
She's becoming very much opinionated with all the books we're reading right now. She's starting to question the things that happened and she's starting to feel a lot of emotions about them too. Haha.
I don't know why my History is not on my interest talaga. But there are times that it becomes interesting, well, at some topic haha.
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Me either. May mga topics lang talaga na nakuha ang atensyon ko. Tapos pagdating sa geography, naku, talong talo na. Haha
I didn't realise the Philippines was occupied by the Spanish at one time. Moving to Australia has really opened my eyes to a lot of history in the eastern world that was never mentioned in the UK. It was only recently I learnt that Vietnam was occupied by France at one point.
There is so much to learn when it comes to world history. Through one of the books we're reading right now, we are about to open the gates towards world history. I am both excited and nervous for what we are about to discuss.
How interesting these books are, how illustrated they are, they really capture attention and lead to good learning in children due to their striking images.
Cheers
Yee The baybayin was so cool at a very young age she knows how to read and write surely a big advantage even the ages that were more high up than her yieee, so bright small historian already hehe.
Na-curious kasi sya nung nakita nya ako nag aaral ng Baybayin. We tried lang just a little at first. Mukhang na-enjoy nya naman so ngayon, pati calendar namin (na fini-fill out nya every month) baybayin na rin ang mga months. hehe
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