When Harry Potter first came out I was older than the target audience. I was in college when I first read Harry Potter, and I fell in love with the world. In short order I started looking into the lore and all I could find about Harry Potter. Fast forward twenty years or so, and I have kids old enough to read and enjoy Harry Potter. We have read or listened to the entire series and made big deal movie nights out of the entire series.The potential for homeschooling with Harry Potter is vast!
One thing we have not done is simulated a day in the life of Harry Potter at Hogwarts. This is on my list of things I desperately want to do, so I’m sharing my plan with you. If you have suggestions of other classes to add in, let me know in a comment below.
First off, you need your Hogwarts letter. Over at Milk and Cookies, Amy made a great example of a Hogwarts package for you to use for your letter. Then you need to head over to Ollivanders to get your wand.
Harry Potter Class Schedule
Each year Harry has different classes at Hogwarts, but there are quite a few fun overlaps from year to year.
1. Harry Potter Charms Lesson
Practice proper wand technique as you swish and flick your spelling words with this activity, you just need a small box of sand. If you don’t have sand, flour works quite well.
2. Harry Potter Transfiguration Lesson
Change your puzzle as you turn the cubes.
3. Harry Potter History of Magic Lesson
Write your own event in wizarding history, maybe write about the time Newt Scamander discovered an unknown magical creature, or the treatment of muggles under Grindelwald.
4. Harry Potter Astronomy Lesson
Learn more about the planet Jupiter with this art and science lesson.
5. Harry Potter Potions Lesson
We made slime at my daughter’s birthday party, and it was a huge hit. Everyone wanted to make several batches. This is different than the recipe we used, but this one intrigued me because it is taste-safe.
6. Harry Potter Care of Magical Creatures
This is another chance to pull in some writing and art as your kids create their own creature.
I’ll admit my kids have never shown any interest in learning more about the author. To their minds right now, authors are completely divorced from the books, so they don’t really care to learn more about them. If your kids are more interested in learning about J.K. Rowling, then you need to read Emily’s post over at Table Life Blog— J.K. Rowling unit.