Homeschool Tidbits: How to Integrate Lit Bites into Your Homeschool
October 28, 2022
Welcome to Build Your Library’s Homeschool Tidbits: Episode 34 – How to Integrate Lite Bites in Your Homeschool. In this weekly video series, I will delve briefly into a topic related to homeschooling and will share some of my knowledge and expertise as a long-time homeschooling mother of 4 children. Three of whom have graduated high school and one who is a college graduate!
Today I wanted to chat a bit about Build Your Library’s Lit Bites. I’m really excited about these products and I wanted to give you some ideas about how to implement them in your homeschool.
Family read-aloud time is something that I’m very passionate about. I wanted to create a product to help you to build that activity into your homeschool day even if you don’t use our full-year level products.
What is a Lit Bite?
Lit Bites are bite-sized unit studies that revolve around just one book. These short units include everything you need to teach a piece of literature to your child. Lit Bites include vocabulary, discussion questions, copywork, dictation passages, activities, and project ideas to help you get the most from the selected book.
As you read captivating living books with your children, they will learn about historical events, science, storytelling, and critical thinking. Lit Bites will help you to foster lively discussions as you read together. Each of these units takes anywhere from 2 – 4 weeks to complete and can work with a wide range of ages.
We currently have 7 Lit Bites available. These include:
- Willodeen by Katherine Applegate (ages 7 – 10)
- Towers Falling by Jewell Parker Rhodes (ages 7 – 10)
- A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L’Engle (ages 8 – 12)
- Ophie’s Ghosts by Justine Ireland (ages 8 – 12)
- Yonder by Ali Standish (ages 8 – 12)
- Maus Books I and II by Art Spiegelman (ages 14+)
- Dry by Neal and Jarrod Shusterman (ages 14+)
I plan on adding new Lit Bites each month. I have stacks upon stacks of great children’s literature to get to, so there are many more new titles to come!
Today I wanted to share three ways to implement Lit Bites into your homeschool.
Idea 1:
If you are a brand-new homeschooler, or perhaps just new to literature-based learning, Lit Bites can be a great way to test the waters. Lit Bites give you a way to explore literature with your child without having to fully invest in a literature-based curriculum. It’s the perfect way to see if this style of learning will work for your family.
Choose a book to read with your child and follow the lesson plans. I have made it super simple to study a living book with your child. Everything you need (except the book) is included. I have laid out an easy-to-use guide that tells you what to read and what activities to do each day. Because you only need one book, you can easily use your local library to access the literature component. At just $5.95 each, Lit Bites are very budget-friendly!
Idea 2:
If you have been homeschooling for a while, or you are already using Build Your Library, you can still make room for Lit Bites! Maybe you are using a full-year level and there is a book scheduled your child has already read? Perhaps you have come across a book that isn’t working for your child. Or an increasingly common problem, a required book has gone out of print and you are unable to access it. Simply substitute a Lit Bite. Now you have a ready-to-go literature unit that you can weave right into your homeschool schedule.
If you are a Build Your Library user already, Lit Bites can be seamlessly integrated. It’s the same format as the literature studies included in our full-year curriculum! Just choose a Lit Bite at your child’s age level and you can replace any title that is scheduled during your school year.
Another option is to use Lit Bites when you need to take a break from your regularly scheduled programming. Maybe you are on the verge of burnout and just need a break from the usual grind, or maybe you just like to keep things fresh and change up your routine occasionally. Lit Bites only use one book and typically only take a few weeks to complete making them a great choice for a fun homeschool switch-up!
Idea 3:
Are you the kind of homeschool parent who loves to take something and add their own flair to it? Do you love the idea of creating your own curriculum, but you just don’t have the time to devote to it? Lit Bites are the perfect way to stretch your creativity without having to reinvent the wheel. Homeschooling is all about flexibility, right?
Since Lit Bites focus on a single book, they offer a great opportunity for you to build outward. For example, if you use the Yonder Lit Bite, you’re going to be learning about World War II, particularly life on the US home front, as well as topics like segregation, racism, and patriotism. You could expand this unit to study those topics more deeply as they come up in the lesson plans. I offer many project ideas, and you can add more books and activities to turn a 3-week Lit Bite into a 6-week unit study. Just by following all those rabbit trails! Each Bite includes a list of activities for your child to choose from and you can easily work more of them in to stretch the unit further!
Bonus Idea:
Lit Bites would make a perfect opportunity to get a working spouse involved in your homeschool. If one parent stays home all day running the normal day-to-day homeschooling activities, sometimes the other parent, often the father, may feel left out. Since Lit Bites are standalone and concise units, it makes for a great after-dinner activity that your children and the non-homeschooling parent can tackle together. Just one book, a flexible reading schedule, and activities already laid out! It is a perfect way to keep dad involved without a huge time investment. Even a frequently visiting grandparent could do it!
Lit Bites are for Everyone!
There are so many other ways to use Lit Bites in your homeschool!
- Morning Baskets
- Summer Schooling
- Substitutions in Literature-Based Curricula
- Afterschooling
- Roadschooling
With new titles being released each month, there is or will be a Lit Bite for everyone!
Coming up next…
I hope you found this Tidbit helpful! Come back next week for more homeschooling inspiration!
Until then, happy reading!
See Other Related Articles:
- The Importance of Reading Aloud
- The Benefits of Reading Aloud to Teens
- Read Aloud Sabotage
- A Literary Education book
- About Build Your Library
- Homeschool Tidbits: Build Your Library’s Weekly Video Blog Series
.
Emily Cook is the author and creator of the secular homeschool curriculum Build Your Library, a literature-based K-12 program infused with the teachings of Charlotte Mason. She writes full-year lesson plans as well as shorter topical unit studies. Emily has been homeschooling her four children in Southern NH for 21 years. She is passionate about reading aloud to children of all ages and loves to share her love of literature with others. She and her family also make incredibly dorky videos about homeschooling, books, and more on Youtube at ARRRGH! Schooling. You can follow her on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. You can also check out her author page on Amazon.
