Category Archives: unschooling

January 24, 2011 · 9:31 PM

Technology

Last week, we were over at some friends’ house, and I was watching as my friend helped an older relative send an email on her computer. My friend got her to the correct screen, typed in the subject line for her,  then clicked in the body of the email so she could begin typing her message. Barely a minute later, she needed assistance again, as she’d accidentally scrolled the screen down and lost what she’d already typed. My friend helped her retrieve her message, and sent it for her once she was done typing.
I say this not to pick on her. My dad is the same way. Lots of people’s dads (and moms and sisters and brothers and friends) are the same way. Not everyone is computer literate, and I understand that.  Except… 
I kind of don’t understand that. For better or worse, technology plays a huge role in our daily lives.  From using the internet to find information, or make connections, or be entertained… to communicating through emails, texts, and videos… to using Google maps, online calendars, and GPS units.  
I blog,
pay my bills online,
use social networking,
read the news,
digitally edit pictures,
and otherwise gather, share and store information…. from words to pictures to everything in between.
The vast amount of information and ability that’s at my, and my children’s, fingertips, is staggering.  I couldn’t imagine not utilizing it just because it’s intimidating, or new, or different.  I couldn’t imagine not learning how to use it, and in fact embracing it, for everything it has to offer.  
It’s finicky at times, to be sure. It’s frustrating. It sometimes gives us too much information, and it’s sometimes arguably one fine double-edged sword.  But I could never deny how much the internet, and technology in general, has enriched our lives.
My boys are all extremely competent on a computer.  Tegan – one month away from turning three – has recently learned how to work a mouse, and is loving the whole new world that’s been opened up to her:  playing games, coloring pictures, learning about shapes and colors and letters.  She learns about all those things off the computer as well, but she’s also learning and practicing a skill that she will use all her life, in a myriad of ways.  Probably in ways that you and I can’t even imagine now.
Look at that concentration.
I’m sure like the rest of us she will learn to love it, and at times hate it, 
but she will never be afraid of it.

2 Comments

Filed under technology, Tegan, unschooling

January 18, 2011 · 9:02 PM

Why My Kids Will Never Be Socialized





“My only problem with homeschooling/unschooling is that the kids may not get out to socialize.”

I read this objection yesterday, but of course it was not the first time I heard it (nor will it be the last.) As any homeschooler will tell you, it is something we hear ad nauseum. ALL. THE. TIME.  It is hands down, without a doubt, case-closed, fat-lady-singing, the most common comment, question, and misconception I ever hear about homeschooling. Most days I can hear it and just let it go.  Most days I can keep myself from groaning and saying, “Really? Just…. really?” Most days I can reconcile myself with the fact that most people are ignorant towards what both the word socialization means, and to what homeschooling means, and that they truly don’t realize what it is they’re saying.

Some days though  ….  Holy moly.

And I get it.  I do.  No matter how unfounded the concern is to those of us who do actually homeschool, it is a concern that is shared by many, many people. So I’d be doing myself, my kids, and the homeschooling community at large a disservice if I didn’t address it, at least once.

Here then, is my response to the “socialization” question, once and for all.

I have not socialized my kids, and this is why:

Spencer was still an infant when we first decided we’d homeschool, so I figured I’d have a few years to get a head start on that socialization.  I would not be the parent that dropped the ball.  I would not let the detractors be right.  I would socialize my child if it was the last thing I did. But alas, somehow life got away from me.  We were busy with church. We were busy visiting with grandparents, and with his aunts and uncles.We’d made some good friends during story time at the local bookstore, and we were having too much fun with our twice a week play dates. We took a mom and baby exercise class, and a swim class, and we took long, leisurely strolls through the neighborhood.

By the time he was “school age” I still hadn’t worked socialization time into our schedule.  But it was okay!  He was still young!

We’d moved by then, and were in a new state.  We were learning the area, and meeting new people, and discovering new things.  We’d found a new church, and made new friends.  Plus, we’d had Paxton by then, and were busy with everything that comes with a new baby.  Surely we’d be back out there ready to get started on some socialization soon.

But then we got busy again.  We’d joined a local homeschool group, and the boys were making friends… which I’m afraid led to more play dates. Around the same time, Spencer joined cub scouts, which meant at least a night or two out of the house every single week, plus events and dinners and pinewood derbies and award nights.   And while we lived in a tiny town, we had neighbors just across the street.  Their daughter came over to play nearly every day after school.  I didn’t want to be unwelcoming, so how could I say no?  How could they know that she was cutting into our socialization time?

By the time Everett came along, Spencer was seven, and Paxton was only three and a half.  I still had time.  But we were still busy with scouts, and the homeschool group, and just life with three kids.  Weekends were out, because we spent them visiting with my parents – and all their friends – up at their seasonal camp in Maine.  Or traveling to Massachusetts to visit the family there.  Or hanging out with my sister’s family.  Or running any number of errands around town.  Or chatting with the people at the dump. Or the library. Or the pizza place.  Or the post office.

And then we got crazy.  Then we decided to move clear across the country. For the first year we rented.   But even renting requires an awful lot of set-up, an awful lot of comings and goings and people and places.  There was the guy who set up our satellite. And the ones who delivered our furniture. There were shopping trips to appliance stores and furniture stores, and trips to check out the library.  There was hanging out at the community pool. There was the bug guy (which was new;  hadn’t had to have a bug guy in New Hampshire!) who learned all the boys’ names and always brought them lollipops.  There was another homeschool group.  There was a street full of kids that always wanted to start a game of soccer in the road, and next door neighbors who were constantly ringing our doorbell asking if the boys could come out and play.   There was a constant whirlwind of activity. Surely, I couldn’t have been expected to socialize them then.

When we bought a house, I thought life would slow down.  Spencer was ten by then, but maybe it wasn’t too late for the others.  At first things were crazy, what with the contractors to talk to, and the renovations to watch, and the next door neighbors to barbeque with.  But things would settle down.  Things would HAVE to settle down.  And then… then, I could finally start on some socialization.

But it wasn’t to be.

I was pregnant again, which meant lots of trips (with all the boys) to my OB.  After Tegan was born, we joined another homeschool group, and we started going on field trips.  All three boys took swimming lessons.  Spencer and Paxton joined scouts again.  Paxton also joined a little league team, and when he was old enough Everett followed suit.  Everett started a gymnastics class, and made a new best friend… which led to new friends for all six of us.  Mike got us involved with some off-roading groups, who we frequently joined for both 4-wheeling and organized clean-up days in the desert.  We started geocaching, both by ourselves and with others.  We found out I had a cousin I never met who lives in the area, and we’re now babysitting her sweet six month old daughter at least a couple of times a week.  We got involved with – and made friends at – a democratic free school; and we started attending a twice a month homeschool group at a local church.

And this year, we definitely won’t get to any socializing, because in addition to all of the above, we’re planning a month long trip across the country… to see the sights, to visit old and new friends, to catch up with relatives, and to attend a 4-day unschooling conference.

I give up.

My children will never be socialized.  I don’t have the time.  I thought I would get to it, really wanted to get to it, but they’ve just been too busy.

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Filed under socialization, unschooling

January 17, 2011 · 12:11 PM

What Are You Passionate About?

Last week, a friend and I were having some drinks at a Mexican restaurant. We were seated outside – just a few feet from the host – and were chatting, like we usually do, about kids and education, learning and unschooling. Shortly before we left, the host (a kid I’m guessing in his early twenties) turned to us and asked,

“Are you two teachers?” Then he laughed a little and said, “Not that I was eavesdropping.”

We told him what we were: moms who are just really passionate about our kids, and about alternative forms of education. We introduced him to unschooling when he showed an interest, and told him a little bit about ourselves and our kids. When I mentioned that I wrote, this already animated guy’s face completely lit up.

“I’m a writer!” He told us how much he loved writing, and how he’s written plays and poems, books and short stories. He was beaming.

As the conversation progressed, it gradually wove itself back around to the subject of school. When it did, this kid’s whole demeanor changed with it. His shoulders slumped, his tone softened, and he visibly just… deflated… when he said, “I go back to school next week. Twelve. Hours. A. Day. All science.”

I was actually rendered a little speechless by the fact that he was going to school for something in a science related field, when he clearly had such a passion for the arts. Thankfully, my friend still had control of her voice, because she asked all the questions that were on my tongue. He was a biology major. He was studying to become a nurse.

He said he loved it. Only….

his FACE didn’t say he loved it. His face had said he loved writing. And when she asked him about it again, he dismissed it out-of-hand.

“Oh, writing’s just my hobby.”

I live in the real world – most of the time – and I know that marrying dreams with necessity can be a complicated thing. I know that people have all kinds of reasons for choosing the fields that they choose, and I know that a five minute conversation with a stranger does not make me an expert on his vocational desires. Maybe he is just as passionate about nursing as he is about writing. Maybe I read him wrong.

I hope I was wrong.

And I hope that my own kids do the thing that they’re passionate about, the thing that makes their eyes light up, the thing that they know, deep down, that they were created to do.

College is great if it’s used to further an interest or lay a foundation for an inspired career.  But is it necessary for greatness?  Necessary for success?

No!

And I’ll put myself out there and say that in a huge percentage of cases, it turns into nothing more than a hugely expensive waste of time and money, especially if you don’t yet know what you want to be “when you grow up.” Will college tell you?  What on earth is to be gained from a college experience that you couldn’t get ten times over by traveling, by taking advantage of your public (and free!) library, by researching how to start your own business, by exploring what it is you’re truly passionate about?

I don’t care if my kids make tons of money.  I don’t care if they go to college, or earn lots of titles after their names, or work in a corner office with a view.  What I care about is their happiness.  What I care about is whether or not they are following their own passions.

If you’re following someone else’s path, someone else’s idea of achievement, how successful can you ever really be?  Giving up your own sense of self for the high paying job or the white picket fence is not success.

When I talk to my kids about their future, and about jobs, I am ever thankful for the people in their lives who are clearly doing what they love to do…people from all walks who are doing all different kinds of things; people who are living, breathing, inspiring examples of following your passion:

The friend who took a huge pay cut to follow his dream of becoming a cop, who didn’t give up during the years that he struggled with only being able to find part-time work, and who is now a full-time bona fide police officer.

The cousin who loves music so much that he found a way to make it a career, and works as a sound technician for a big theater downtown.

The uncle who works out of his house as a computer programmer, often in his pajamas, and who loves what he’s doing so much that there is almost no distinction between his computer work and his computer play.

The friend who became a video game designer, who worked his way up from company to company, and who was a lead designer on some hugely well-known and well-liked games.

And the list goes on.

When people ask about why I homeschool, this answer is always there, always on the forefront.  I want my kids to be able to follow their passions.  Not that it’s not possible when you’re in school…But how much easier it is when you’re given freedom, when you’re not tempted to let yourself be herded into the masses, be talked into following someone else’s plan, be persuaded to take someone else’s path.   Maybe the person who loves math isn’t meant to be an accountant, but a forest ranger.  Maybe the person who loves to write isn’t meant to be a journalist, but something else entirely.  Maybe when we’re young and impressionable, it’s all too confusing, and maybe well-meaning adults and schools just muddy the issue.   Maybe we need to get the heck out of the way, and let the kids be.

I’ve spent way too much time wondering where I’d be today if I hadn’t gone to school, if I hadn’t spent twelve years being told to put my pen and notebook away and pay attention.  To stop writing, and doodling, and dreaming, and do what I was supposed to be doing.  I can’t do anything to change my own past, but what I can do is to live my life in such a way that my kids can learn from it.

I can trust my own passions, and follow them.  I can live authentically and joyfully, and in the manner that I was individually created.  I can show them that life’s not about having a certain amount of money, or a certain kind of job, or a certain kind of house.  It’s about being who you are.

It’s about finding what you love to do, what you were meant to do…

and doing it.

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Filed under passions, unschooling

January 14, 2011 · 10:22 PM

Everett, Reading, and Cheerios

I had a slow start to the day today. I was puttering around, cleaning the bathrooms, and making the bed. When I first heard Tegan and Everett fighting, I thought they’d work it out, but it quickly escalated.

Everett: Tegan, STOP!

Tegan: Nooooooooo!!!!

Everett: TEEEE-GAN!!

Tegan: Stop grabbing me!!

At that point, I intervened. I was finishing up in my bedroom, so I called Everett and asked him to come talk to me. I could tell he was on the verge of tears when he called back, “I can’t! She’ll wreck my cheerios!”

I went out to investigate, thinking he was eating breakfast. Instead I found him on a chair in the living room, trying desperately to defend the integrity of his name, carefully constructed in Cheerios, from Tegan, who wanted nothing more than to scatter them all over the floor. I picked up Tegan (while trying to corral the dog – also pretty bent on destroying, ie: eating -his creation), asked him if he wanted to take a picture of it, and went off to get my phone when he answered in the affirmative.

I snapped the picture and made sure he was satisfied with it. After I got his go-ahead, I let the girl and dog do their thing, and everyone was happy once again.

Everett is 6 1/2 at the time of this writing, and he will tell you that he’s not reading yet. He is reading though, as recognizing letters is reading. Putting letters together into a word that has meaning to you is reading. He spells his name (with pen and paper too, not just Cheerios), he picks simple words and names out of signs, he’s able to find all his shows on the DirecTv queue. He’s playing with, and appreciating, and learning about letters and words, and I love watching it.

Just like his brothers before him, he is taking his own unique path to learning how to read and write. He has his own time table, his own method, and his own motivation. And because he’s not having to perform according to anyone’s specifications but his own, he is loving every minute of it. No one instructed him to make his name out of cereal. He did it because he had a big box of Cheerios and he thought it’d be a fun thing to do. He did it because he’s a kid. He did it because that’s what kids do.

One of the most basic and early questions that people have about unschooling (second only to those about the “S” word) is “But how will he learn to read??”

And the answer is no more complicated than this:

He’ll learn to read like he learned to walk. He’ll learn to read because the people around him read… beside him, and TO him. He’ll learn to read because we live in an environment surrounded with the written word. He’ll learn to read because we are there to involve him in our own experiences, to show him when he’s curious, and to answer his questions when he asks them.

Learning to read is in board games. On TV. On street signs. It’s on cereal boxes, and letter magnets, and computer programs. It’s in sidewalk chalk and hopscotch games. It’s on the emblem on Daddy’s t-shirt, and on the bumper sticker in front of us on the highway. Learning to read is everywhere.

Even, sometimes, in Cheerios.

3 Comments

Filed under Everett, reading, unschooling

January 13, 2011 · 12:26 PM

Appreciating History

I had one teacher in junior high and high school who made studying history interesting. He was what you’d consider a “tough” teacher – you definitely couldn’t get away with anything under his watch – but he was good, and he was the only teacher I ever had that shared history in such a way that I actually enjoyed it.  Other than the classes I had with that one particular teacher, there are not words enough to describe just how bored I was with history.  It was truly not my “thing.”  All those dates and names and wars and treaties and memorization……
Yes, I struggled with history.  As an adult, I appreciate its significance on the world and the country we live in today (though I still couldn’t recount 90% of the details that I had to memorize for my tests in school), but it’s surely taken me awhile to get here.
The kind of history that I do love, and have always loved, is the kind that I can touch.  The kind that isn’t in a book but is right in front of me.  The kind that I can see, and feel, and close my eyes and imagine that I was there, as a participant and not just an observer.  I’ve taken some neat field trips with the kids, to places like the Pioneer Living History Museum, and Sahuaro Ranch, but they still weren’t as meaningful to me personally as a piece of history that has not been restored or re-created, turned into something that’s specifically meant to be educational, or designed to be a must-see attraction.  It’s still not the same as something that just is.
Last weekend, we joined a few other vehicles on a way-too-fun off-roading trip.  We crossed rivers,
Drove down cliffs,
enjoyed the desert scenery,
stopped to appreciate an old foundation,
and met Miner Bob.
Miner Bob lives in a cabin that’s been standing since the late 1800’s.  He graciously talked to us, showed us around, and let us wander in and out of his cabin.  I loved how sturdy it still was, how simply but beautifully made.  I loved knowing that it’s been there, out in the middle of the desert, for over a hundred years.  I loved imagining the people who once stayed there, using the fireplace, walking the land, and just living their lives.  It made me think of Thoreau, and Walden, and “living deep and sucking the marrow out of life.”
Now that’s history.  And as a side note, I loved our old home in New Hampshire for all the same reasons.  Unfortunately, two of the boys missed the little impromptu visit to the past because they were off playing in this:
And getting an education of an entirely different sort 🙂
We caught up with everyone when we reached our destination – the teeny little old town of Cleator – where we stopped for a bite, and a beer, at the bar.
A bar that no doubt had a lot of interesting history of its own.

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Filed under about me, adventures, off-roading, unschooling

January 5, 2011 · 5:32 PM

Real Life

I have a couple of specific memories from my home-ec class in Junior High.  I remember making spaghetti:  We took it out too soon, and it was crunchy.  I remember making chocolate chip cookies, and I remember that my friend got reprimanded because it was her idea to add twice as much flour than the recipe called for, hoping to make twice as many cookies.

I remember a little bit more from my shop class, but it was mainly because the teacher was the cool kind of teacher that chatted with us about non-school related things.  I remember he told me once that I was “introspective,” and I had to go home and look it up.  He was right.


I remember that I complained about getting smoke in my eyes once when I was using a word burner, and he immediately burst into song, 
“They said someday you’ll find

All who love are blind
Oh, when your heart’s on fire
You must realize
Smoke gets in your eyes”

(a band called The Platters, sometime in the ’50s.  In case you were wondering)
I did some cooking projects, and some sewing.  I built a birdhouse and made a leather belt.  I was shown how to do a budget and balance a checkbook.  Yes, I was introduced to some “life skills” – albeit in an artificial environment – in school.   But did I learn them?  
I learned to cook and bake from my mother, who made at least a dozen kinds of cookies at Christmas, and patiently explained the intricacies of making homemade bread or pasta or when I asked.
I learned about building things and fixing things and creating things from my father, who has the mind of both an engineer and an artist.
I learned about money and checkbooks and debt when I was a 19 year old newlywed making minimum wage.
I learned about parenting when I had my first child (NOT, shockingly, from the week of carrying around a 5 lb bag of flour “baby” in my high school sociology class)
Okay, you’re saying, those things can be learned at home, but things like math and reading need to be taught in school, or at least with a structured curriculum.

Really?
My earliest memories of reading involve being read to, again by my mother, who read aloud to me long after I could read on my own.  She involved me, and I learned.  My earliest memories of learning to really appreciate reading came not from school but from my own devouring of Beverly Cleary, Carolyn Keene, and Judy Blume.  Later on I would graduate to Emerson, Thoreau, and Shakespeare, not because I had to but because I wanted to.   Because reading is like breathing… if it hasn’t become a chore, and if it isn’t forced against someone’s will.
Paxton, who learned to read at 5 without a single lesson – and without ever setting foot in a classroom – has read two Boxcar Kids books in the past 5 days.  Spencer, who learned to read even younger –  also without a single lesson – is frequently found on the computer, reading about medical cases he learned about on Dr G;  or researching about what kind of training he needs to operate a construction business;  or gathering information to build his case about the next pet he wants to get.  
And math?  Few things fill me with such dread and anxiety as remembering some of my upper-level math classes.  My history with high school math ended very, very badly… with confusion, humiliation, and tears… visits to the guidance counselor, a class dropped mid-semester, and a teacher telling me that I was shutting doors for myself.  And that I would never live up to my full potential.  And that I would ultimately be a colossal failure at life.  
All because I dropped pre-calculus.  
This was in 1991.   And yes, I’m still bitter.  (Okay, okay, she didn’t use the words “colossal failure,” but the rest was verbatim.)
And I can’t help but wonder:  WHY was that class so important exactly?  What did I gain besides greater fear, a blow to my self-esteem, and a really unpleasant memory?  20 years later, I still don’t have an answer.  I don’t use advanced level math.  I use basic math.  I add and subtract.  I do simple multiplication (most of the time on a calculator)  I figure out percentages and basic fractions.  And I still, to this day, no matter how many times I do it, have to ask my husband the amount I need for 3/4 cup when I’m doubling a recipe.   My brain is wired for words, not numbers, and isn’t helped by the math phobia I acquired from my years in public school.  
For my children, that is not an issue.  They won’t have those phobias, or hang-ups, or bad experiences.  They’re learning math like everything else:  naturally, from the real world.  Basic math is everywhere.  If they’re like me, they’ll likely never need more than that.  If they WANT to go into a math-related field, they’ll seek more, and learn it, and enjoy it.  Otherwise, they’ll learn to appreciate math in the same way that I’ve finally come to appreciate it:  not as something to dread and fear, but something that’s a useful and necessary tool, something to aid in their shopping, and building, and baking, and budgeting.
Real life (and real learning) cannot be duplicated in a classroom.  It just can’t.  
Real life is at home.  It’s in the backyard: taking care of the chickens, pruning the trees, and putting together a swingset.  It’s in the kitchen: baking, and cooking, and experimenting.  It’s on the couch: curled up with a good book or an interesting movie or a sewing project.  It’s in the office: paying the bills, scheduling the dentist appointments, and responding to emails. It’s in the driveway: changing the oil, checking the tire pressure, or creating a chalk mural on the pavement.
Real life is out on the town.  It’s shopping.  It’s libraries.  It’s parks.  It’s museums.  It’s zoos.  It’s restaurants.  It’s post offices, banks, and dry cleaners.
Real life is out in the world.  It’s traveling.  It’s exploring.  It’s discovering.  It’s giving.  It’s learning. It’s sharing.  
My parents were wonderful, and taught me many things, but I was still in school for 8 hours a day, every day, until I was 18.  I didn’t get to experience the real world until I was an adult.  My kids are living it, and enjoying it, and learning from it, right now.

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October 3, 2010 · 9:11 AM

My Childhood, My Kids

I never want to be that parent who pushes her own childhood likes, hobbies, dreams, and pasttimes onto her children. I would never force any of them to play an instrument just because I enjoyed it. I would never make Tegan take gymnastics lessons against her will to make up for my own failure to realize my Olympic dreams. Some of the beauty of unschooling is recognizing that your children are their own people, with their own interests, their own passions, and their own dreams. I introduce them to as many opportunities as I can, but in the end it’s their decision: whether they want to dabble, to try it once and never again, to explore it every day for the rest of their lives, or to never explore it at all. They may share some of my loves…. and they may share none of them. They may introduce me to things I never knew I’d love as well. Either way, I will be their facilitator, their cheerleader, and their biggest supporter.

One of the great things about being their parent though is that I do get to introduce them to things I once enjoyed myself. What they do with it is up to them, but if they enjoy it too…. well, any time you can share joy with your child is a good thing indeed. Yesterday I had an opportunity to share with them one of my greatest childhood joys:

Spencer loves horses and was happy to go, but didn’t want to ride. Paxton decided to join us on the trail ride, and was really looking forward to it.

At six, Everett just made the age cut-off for the trail ride, but chose to start off with something a little less intimidating than an hour long trek through the desert.

And Tegan was thrilled with the chance to ride a horse, and didn’t even have an objection to the required helmet (she’d really been hoping to wear a cowboy hat)

Horseback riding played such a huge role in my childhood, and re-living it caused such a heady rush of emotions that I could have wept right there in the middle of the desert. The smell of the leather, the creak of the saddle, the little grunty noises the horse made when it went up hills. The swish of the tail, the clop-clop-clop of the feet picking their way around the rocks. Bliss.

Paxton’s horse was two ahead of mine, and I couldn’t really tell by the back of his head if he was enjoying himself or not. So I was glad when my sister relayed his first comment to me: “The only way today could get any better was if we got to take the horse home with us at the end.”

🙂

All four truly enjoyed themselves, and it made my heart happy to see it. I’m glad I got to share such a wonderful memory with them, even if just for a day. Will any of them become future full-time equestrians because of it? Probably not. And that’s ok.

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Filed under about me, adventures, unschooling

August 11, 2010 · 4:28 PM

It’s that time of year again, folks

Nothing reminds me how different our lives are from most of the world than back to school season.  August comes and people who were previously enjoying trips and camping and playing with their kids suddenly turn their attention to school.  Lives are taken over by shopping and school supplies and teachers and schedules and school buses.  Even among my friends who homeschool, I’m often the odd man out as talk begins to take a rapid turn to curriculum and lesson plans and co-ops.

Summer’s over, time to start learning!

The whole wave of back-to-school mania that is engulfing most of the country  makes me feel a lot of different emotions, not the least of which is gratitude.

Gratitude that we have the freedom to opt out
Gratitude that we chose something else
Gratitude that the kids are happy and learning and loving the life they lead

Along with that gratitude though comes…. confusion.  I’m perplexed.  Maybe it’s because we’ve been living without school for so long,  or maybe it’s just the way I’m wired, but I honestly have a hard time understanding the concept of learning as something that is done at a certain time in a certain place.  Just as John Holt says, “It’s a nutty notion that we can have a place where nothing but learning happens, cut off from the rest of life.”

This is what I remember about going back to school every fall:  I remember being excited about getting new clothes.  I remember the painstaking process of picking out the right Trapper Keeper (note to self:  see if they still sell Trapper Keepers).  I remember the anxious curiosity that came with checking out how much kids had changed – or not – over the summer.  I remember stressing out over which teachers I would get, who I’d end up sitting next to in home room, and whether or not I’d have friends to eat with at lunch.  I remember being bummed that I’d have less time to read, to write stories, to draw pictures, to daydream.

Not once, in all my years of going back to school, do I remember ever thinking, “I wonder what cool things I’m going to learn this year.” **

**I did, in all fairness, have a few excellent teachers who taught outside the box, helped me to learn some interesting things, and to whom I’ll forever be grateful.  But what does it say about my schooling experience that I can count on one hand the number of teachers – in TWELVE years – that made a difference in my life? And, what does it say about the way school is structured that in the vast majority of cases, the real lessons I learned from those particular teachers were not generally lessons that pertained to the subjects they were teaching?**

In our family, fall means baseball starts up again.  Fall means it starts to cool off and we can venture outside more often.  Fall means most of the world is back in school so we have our playgrounds, libraries and museums back to ourselves again.  Fall does not mean it’s time to start learning, because we never stopped.

I remember several years ago an extended family member asked me if we followed the school year or if we schooled year round.  I tried to explain to her that we don’t separate learning from living.  I tried to tell her that we answer questions and provide support and materials and interesting things to do and places to go and people to meet, but that the learning is up to the kids.  I told her that we believe in honoring them as individuals, and trusting that they are the best ones to know what they need to learn when.  And how. And why.  I thought I was so eloquent.  Feeling proud of myself and quite certain that I’d gotten my point across, I paused.  She just looked at me and said, “But do you do it year round?”

She truly did not understand.  As bizarre as the notion of school is to me, so was the notion of life learning to her.  And that just makes me sad.  Sad because it’s the way most people think:  school is for learning; summer vacation is a break from learning.  And the truth is, forced “learning” isn’t really learning at all.   Memorizing facts long enough to repeat them back for a test is not learning.  Albert Einstein once said, “Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school.”

So many people talk about school as something that prepares kids for “real life.”  But guess what?  Real life is not separated into subjects.  Real life does not require that you spend 7 hours a day in a classroom segregated by age or ability, and real life does not dictate what you can and cannot learn, study, or explore in your own time.

We live our lives.  And we learn.  And yes, we do it year-round.

“True learning-learning that is permanent and useful,that leads to intelligent action and further learning, can arise only out of the experience, interest, and concerns of the learner” ~John Holt

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June 9, 2010 · 2:50 PM

Harry Potter, Hiking Shoes, and Vacations

Daniel Radcliffe, the actor who played Harry Potter, has apraxia. I know very little else about Daniel Radcliffe. I don’t know how old he is, I don’t know what other acting he’s done, I don’t know his favorite ice cream flavor. I read a little interview with him once though, and I will always remember the apraxia, because that is the one diagnosis we received for Spencer… a whole decade ago, back when we were still in “the system.” I think it’s cool that he decided to speak out about it, and Spencer thinks it’s cool that it’s something he shares with a celebrity.

In short, apraxia is a motor-planning disorder. With Spencer, it is most noticeable in his speech (verbal apraxia), but it can also affect other motor skills to varying degrees. Things like tying shoes and handwriting (two things that Daniel Radcliffe specifically mentioned) can be difficult.

The first couple of years, I researched until I could research no more. I’m truly glad that I learned what I did about apraxia, because it helped me to understand, and understanding is always a positive thing. But just as positive – if not more so – is the fact that I no longer spend my time thinking about it. Some of the beauty of homeschooling is that your kids are not bound by labels. There’s no one trying to “fix” them, no one trying to make them fit their octagon shapes into round holes, no one trying to get them “caught up” to the herd. Spencer, like the rest of my children, can BE. His not being able to tie well or write neatly are not an issue unless he decides they’re an issue.

A couple of weeks ago, we returned home from a week-long trip to Colorado. It was an odd trip… a frustrating trip… a fun trip… a sad trip. A stomach bug took down three of the kids, and teased the adults as well. I recognize that as stressful as it was at the time that it’s just an unfortunate part of life. Lousy timing to be sure, but we didn’t let it ruin the vacation. We hiked, we went on a mountain drive, we enjoyed the hot springs, and we toured a wildlife sanctuary. We actually had a few days of good health in between sick days, and did not take the beauty of the area for granted.


The whole album is here.

When we returned back home (yes, I’m still on the subject of Harry Potter and apraxia. Stick with me), we desperately needed to go sneaker shopping. The younger boys’ were getting too small, Spencer’s were falling apart, and my trusty old Skechers that I’ve had for around 6 years had finally decided to give up the ghost and left their soles on a mountain somewhere. They never even made it home, deposited in the trash bin before we left the resort.

Just like Daniel Radcliffe, Spencer usually chooses non-tie shoes. He seemed to hesitate this time though,and browsed through some of the lace-ups as well. We told him that if he wanted to get shoes with laces that we could help him practice some more, or we could get those things that go on the ends so you don’t have to tie, and can just slip them on and off. We talked about Harry Potter again. He asked me, “Can Harry Potter do the first part? Because I can.” I told him I didn’t know. Still undecided about the shoes, he decided to take a day to think about it, and we’d go back when he made up his mind.

That night, I was laying in bed thinking about Spencer and shoes and Harry Potter.

This is what moms do…. we lay in bed when we can’t sleep and think about our kids, and how we can help them solve problems. I thought about the question he’d asked me, and it suddenly occurred to me that if he could do the first part (the part where you cross the laces) that he could just do it again with the “rabbit ears” method, instead of struggling with the “loop, swoop, and pull.” I was so excited that I had to force myself to stay in bed instead of getting up then and there in the middle of the night.

The next morning I told him what I’d realized, and showed him what I meant on my own shoes. He sat with my shoes for just a few minutes, and ultimately showed me this:


He was more excited than I’ve seen him in a long time, and told me that now he could choose any kind of shoes he wanted, without worrying about it. I loved for him that he found a way that was easier for him, but more than that I loved that it all happened when he decided it was important to him. I loved that it was never a battle, never an issue… that it happened like everything else should happen: naturally, in its own time, in its own way.

That is why I do what I do.

That weekend, he requested a smoothie to celebrate (Strawberry Surf Rider, thank you very much), and we took him back on that shoe-shopping trip. I don’t think he really did want a pair of tying shoes after all, because he ended up choosing – and was very happy with – another pair of slip-ons. I suspect that he just wanted to know that he could tie if he wanted to. And he can.

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March 26, 2010 · 12:18 PM

The History of Compulsory Schooling

Six Minutes. Watch.

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