I have been looking at something called FIAR or Five in a Row. Its a laid back unschooling/homeschooling method that is suitable to young children. It seems like the basic principle is that you use a book–a good quality children’s book (already selected) and you read that book throughout the week, 5 days in a row, but each day you focus on learning something new from the weeks-book. The book is read or “rowed” 5 days to correspond with the days of the week, Mon-Friday.
The FIAR books, (manuals really) are lesson plans and you have to get the picture books separately from the library or buy them, you don’t have to go in any particular order, but its most beneficial to do the books 5 days in a row and each lesson. The subjects that you learn from each book are:
Social Science (a broad category!)
Language Arts
Art
Applied Math
Science
FIAR does not teach READING or MATH, you should get something else for a more structured method of teaching reading and mathematics, but I suspect that almost everyone on this site will have some regiment similar to Doman, Sichida, LR or whatever is working for them!
Anyway, FIAR comes in 3 basic levels.
Before 5 in a row. 2-4 years
Five in a Row. 4-8 years
Beyond 5 in a Row 8-12 years
Check it out, it seems really interesting and seems like the concept would supplement Doman-ians, just fine as we strive to make the world accessible in gentle, engaging and delightful ways for our children and instill a love of learning. The philosophy seems like it would be a good fit, especially for those of us who have been teaching our children to read from 0yrs on. Or those of us who started closer to 2 years, our children will get to experience how books can come alive and will (ideally) find a real purpose for actually reading.
I’m definitely going to keep this in mind for when I have children.
There is one more level in the series, Above and Beyond 5 in a Row is meant as an Independent Study for children around 12 and up.