Most children love recording their lives with a camera, and you can use this to their advantage to make lessons more connected to their lives.
Digital cameras are especially useful, since they are easy to handle, inexpensive, and there is no film or developing to pay for. The photos can be cropped, enlarged, or otherwise modified using free programs such a Google's Picasa. Some young people may even become quite proficient with Photoshop or another professional-level photo-enhancement program. Here are a few ideas for using digital cameras in your homeschool.
Photography Projects
- Take cameras on field trips. To remember the trip, write photo essays afterward. This is especially good for children who dislike writing, since the subject is already decided and the progress of the narration is obvious. Post the essays on a blog, or email them to family members and friends.
- Send the kids on a backyard scavenger hunt. Have them photograph signs of the season, insects, dicots, types of clouds, etc.
- Document how things happen, such as the progress of a science experiment, how bread is made, or how to clean a bathroom.
- Write a family newsletter, illustrate it with photos, and send it to relatives and friends.
- Make a yearbook of the school year. This could be an actual book, or it might be a website.
- Make a seek-and-find photo. Hide various objects in plain sight, take the photo, then give another person a list of things to find in the picture.
Photography Projects for Writing
- Re-enact scenes from a book and record them in a series of photographs. This could progress to making short videos.
- Use photos to illustrate an autobiography or private blog.
- Make an ABC or numbers book for a smaller sibling or friend.
- Write a story and take photos to illustrate it.
Photography Projects for Science
- After a trip to the zoo, use pictures of an animal on your Treehouse of Life page.
- Use a camera to take photos on your next trip to the park or wilderness. Picking flowers is often forbidden, but it's still possible to take the flowers home in a picture!
- Take pictures of caterpillars, chicks, puppies and other animals in various stages of development. Looking back at the photos can really make it all connect.
- Likewise, take photos of seedlings or a young sapling as they grow.
- Take pictures of the same tree for a year. This will vividly illustrate the changes that a tree goes through.
- Create your own field guide to the flora and fauna of your neighborhood or local park.
Photography Projects for Social Studies
- Re-enact a historical event and photograph or video it.
- Make a website or photoessay about your town. Show local landmarks, geographical features, important people, etc. Show where various historical events occurred.
- Document the building of a new house or the creation of a new park.
Photography Projects for Math
- Have a scavenger hunt for triangles, dodecahedrons, acute angles, etc.
- Make a time-telling book, with pictures of family activities at every hour of the day.
The photos that you and your children take will also serve as documentation of your school year, and can be a useful addition to your yearly portfolio, if you need to turn one in. It also makes a nice way to look back at the changes and growth of your homeschool.
The copyright of the article Homeschooling and Photography in Homeschooling is owned by Patti Miller. Permission to republish Homeschooling and Photography in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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