In the introduction to his book Teach Your Own, John Holt lays
out 7 rules which he suggests are fairly obvious to anyone who's
good at sharing their knowledge with others: (1) to help people
learn something, you must first understand what they already
know (2) showing people how to do something is better than
telling them, and letting them do it themselves is best of all
(3) you mustn't tell or show too much at once, since people
digest new ideas slowly and must feel secure with new skills or
knowledge before they are ready for more (4) you must give
people as much time as they want and need to absorb what you
have shown or told them (5) instead of testing their
understanding with questions you must let them show how much or
little they understand by the questions they ask you (6) you
must not get impatient or angry when people don't understand (7)
scaring people only blocks learning I think these are excellent
guidelines, and thought I'd comment on how they've worked for us
as homeschoolers. Regarding #2, l