Sunday night, the children and I sat down to watch a movie on Hulu since we have no television (and no real interest in football, anyway.)  On the lineup?  Princess, because I’ve had about all the Flipper and Fudge I can take.  The plot doesn’t really matter.  Suffice it to say, she doesn’t get out much, having spent almost her entire life in this castle.  And it doesn’t take long for the writers to invoke our culture’s one great symbol of isolation:

Rumor has it, she was homeschooled.

Being a princess, you sort of automatically think of governesses and tutors, for what sort of princess is properly homeschooled?  But nothing says locked-away-in-a-tower quite like homeschooled, so homeschooled she was.  And seriously, how else would lines like “I don’t socialize much,” and “Can you tell I’m not used to this?” (referring to, uh, having a conversation) make any sense?

Now we homeschool.  Locked away in the west tower, looking out over the kingdom and unable to have any part in it.  I asked my children what they thought about the comment, but the negative undertone passed by them unnoticed.

Of course she was homeschooled, mom.  She doesn’t have time for school with all those mythological monsters to take care of.

So I don’t have to worry about what subliminal messages they are being fed, just yet.  It all makes sense within the context of their own experience and beliefs about what homeschooling is and is not.

But the stereotypes are heavy on my mind as I look around at nearby churches.  It is a long drive in to Lincoln for worship, long enough to negate any real participation in the church community there.  When our commitments are through, I hope to move to a local church where we can be part of an active community.

I’d never really thought about it before.  I know people who have had difficulty in their home churches due to homeschooling, but Lincoln is big enough that it just isn’t that hard to move to another church.  The pickings are slim, out here, and somehow, we’re going to just have to make things work if we want to worship in our own community.

I like the idea of that, but I guess we shall see how it plays out once we begin actually visiting churches.

homeschooling home education socialization

We now have a homeschool room.  Something I never particularly wanted to have, and a concept I have at times resisted.  But then we bought this house and with it came this little, boxy room with no purpose in all our other plans for the house.

Wouldn’t it be nice to put the bookshelves in there?

We thought, mindful of the overflowing bookshelves crowding the front room and children’s room of our old house.

We could keep all my homeschool supplies in that closet.

We thought, remembering the manipulatives stored under the bed, in the laundry room and in the attic.

Ooh…and a place to keep projects.

We thought, remembering the work laid out on the kitchen table that became a centerpiece for meals.  Because the kitchen table as homeschool classroom doesn’t work so well if the lessons don’t end by dinner time.

And the homeschool room was born.  It is overflowing with books, and the manipulatives are stacked helter skelter in the closet.  Posters are lying on the floor, and my whiteboard is tucked behind a shelf that doesn’t belong in there.  Pull out shelving is planned for the closet to keep my things neat and accessible, but there are many projects in line before that one so the room will have to wait.

As I sort through boxes and try to figure out how to make a temporary home for all this stuff that is not going to be a continual source of frustration until the time and budget allow for the light remodeling, I come to terms with a simple fact.

I never wanted a homeschool room.  In fact, I rather liked our boundary-less homeschool space.  Calling it a homeschool room brings to mind images of lined up desks and children facing forward, though the room would never fit five desks and there’s little chance of them all facing forward at once, anyway.  But all I need is an old analog clock that buzzes hanging on the wall, some fluorescent lighting and the classroom image would be complete.

Oh, and maybe a modern playground just out the window that they never actually get to play on.  That brings back memories.

So I think, “What’s in a word?”  Why does “a place for all my stuff” have to be a “homeschool room” and why does that have to remind me so strongly of a school room?

And I  look at the bookshelves, double stacked with books, thinking of all those boxes still in the garage with books to be unpacked and shelved.  I’m running out of room.  And it dawns on me.  This isn’t a homeschool room.  It’s a library.  A place to go to choose a book, start a project or just stare out a window.  A place for a quiet game, a quick lesson or a needed escape.  A small, homeschool library.

Now I just need to teach the kids to whisper.

homeschool homeschooling home education

The science behind learning styles

According to Learning Styles, Concepts and Evicence, a study [pdf] published in the journal Psychological Science in the Public Interest, that whole learning styles thing may not be all we think it is.  Sure, it seems to form the basis for many a text both for public school teachers and homeschoolers, but what is the basis for it?

Although the literature on learning styles is enormous, very few studies have even used an experimental methodology capable of testing the validity of learning styles applied to education.  Moreover, of those that did use an appropriate method, several found results that flatly contradict the popular meshing hypothesis.  Learning Styles, Concepts and Evidence

Rather than hard science, the movement has its origins in the more touchy-feely self-esteem movement of the 70s. And while their study in no way disproves that learning styles exist nor even that teaching in a child’s preferred modality may be beneficial, they argue rather strongly that we are spending a lot of time and money on something with very little scientific evidence behind it.

If education is to be transformed into an evidence-based field, it is important not only to identify teaching techniques that have experimental support but also to identify widely held beliefs that affect the choices made by educational practitioners but that lack empirical support.  Ibid.

Transforming education into an evidence-based field

And that’s where the researchers begin to lose me.  I am all for effective classrooms, but I’m not so sure we want education to become an evidence-based field.  I’m not sure we want to view teaching as data delivery, learning as data acquisition and testing as the measurable difference between the two.

I’m not sure we want education reduced to what can be tested in a multiple-choice format.

There is so much more to education.  It is about the whole child and how he is to be brought up.  It is about “enlightening the understanding, correcting the temper, forming the manners and habits of youth and fitting him for usefulness in his future station.”  Direct instruction and other behavior based programs may be empirically proven to improve math scores, but do they improve children?

How a child is taught is important, and not just for its ability to transfer the largest amount of data for the least amount of resources.  I may be going out on a limb here, but I’m guessing JJRoss’ decision to unschool, the Headmistress’ decision to use Charlotte Mason, Renae’s decision to use the Principle Approach, and The Mama’s decision to use a classical approach had little to do with which methodology would most efficiently lead to proficiency in any given subject.  Their decisions were based in what they believe about the nature of teaching and learning, and the role of the teacher and student.  As such, how we teach our children invariably communicates our beliefs about teaching and learning and the roles of teachers and students to our children.

How we learn affects how we think.  It affects our attitudes and beliefs about the very nature of human learning and the role we play in the construction of our own knowledge.

And this is why we must be careful of the so-called research-based classroom.  It carries with it its own definition of education that has been somewhat narrowly interpreted as high test scores.  I am all for assessing what we are doing in our classrooms and in our homes, but before we do this, we need to carefully define what we are looking for.  As The Core Knowledge Blog points out,

If we begin instead with a definition of education, then a curious thing may happen. The results will likely be better, yet they will not rule what we do. We will recognize that learning is for the long term as well as for the next day. We will recognize that some of the most difficult concepts and works last the longest in the mind. They may not translate immediately into results, yet they are unlikely to vanish. We will expect short-term results but teach beyond them.  There’s No Such Thing As Teaching

Discussing education as an evidence-based field restricts it to what is observable, measurable and testable.  It tells us what teaching methodologies produce good results on standardized tests such as the CAT or I-STEP.  It does not, however, tell us which methodologies produce thinkers, problem-solvers, artists, book-lovers, and teachers.  It does not tell us which methodologies support the child in setting and achieving their own goals, nor which help them to take responsibility for their own learning.

Are we really willing to let go of all that in the name of higher test scores?  Or do we want to hold on to the belief that education means just a little bit more than that?

Still, children need to learn to read, but I will continue with that thought in a future posting.

homeschool homeschooling education learning styles research based classroom

For some reason, my children do not like playing in the snow.  They ignore me when I suggest they go outside and play.  They whine when the suggestions become stronger.  They grumble as they put on their snowsuits, and they do so only after being bribed with hot cocoa.  I think the problem is that our yard here in town just isn’t very interesting.  Uninterested in either snowmen or snow angels, mostly all they can do is trudge about, climb the drifts and try to toboggan down a drift with the bottom of an old guinea pig cage.

This has put a serious damper on my goal of raising all-weather children.  I don’t need a general practitioner to tell me that playing in the snow is good for you and getting a broken bone or two is all part of the fun of childhood. Apparently, I just needed five acres out in the country.

Before I even have the house unlocked, they have dragged out the toboggan and begun working on making a trail down the hill.  Mouse challenges herself by standing up and they keep a running tally of who has gone the furthest.  Impatient for a turn at the hill, one of them commandeers a carton from the bottled water and uses the plastic wrapped cardboard as a secondary toboggan.

I go in to paint, listening to the noises of them coming in and out of the basement.  They come in just long enough to defrost their fingers and toes before the call of the great outdoors lures them out once again.  I smile as I listen to their screams of delight and think this is what childhood should be.

I finish my painting and grab the camera to take a picture of their rosy faces lit up by the thrill of play.  But this is all I find.

They’ve hiked down to their fort to see how it has stood up to the snow storms and escape the wind themselves.  I go back to my painting until the sun hangs low on the horizon.  They come in for a snack and are upset to find me getting ready to leave.

“Ten more minutes,” I tell them.

And they race outside.  Apparently, jumping off hills trumps dinner any day.

In the morning, in our little house in town, I suggest they go out and play in the snow.

“Do we have to?” they complain.

No, my children do not like to play in the snow.  Such a shame.

Seated around our table with five of her friends, Mouse celebrated her eleventh birthday.

• One is two years younger than she. One is three years older. The other three are her age.
• All five are Christian. Only three attend our church.
• Three are homeschooled. Two attend public school.
• One lives down the street. Four live thirty minutes or more away.
• One is Hispanic. One has enough Native American in her that you can tell. The other three are white.

And this in an area that is 91.4% white.

And I wonder, for all the concern about how homeschooled children will learn to appreciate diversity when raised in the bubble we have supposedly manufactured for them, how many children truly select friends who are so diverse?

We note how many opportunities homeschooled children have to play with others. We note that children do not learn to value others by sitting quietly next to them. We note that the playground is little more than a miniature stage for all our social ills.

We don’t like to talk so much about the challenges of giving our children the opportunity to develop friendships. Real, close, lasting friendships as opposed to numerous polite interactions with other children in an ever-rotating cycle of activities. Maybe that is because it isn’t a problem for many, but a number of homeschoolers I have talked to have sympathized readily with the need to be intentional in this area.

As I passed out scones, I thought that maybe that isn’t all bad. In school, you are surrounded by children. You have the option of forming bonds with others like you and building distinct barriers to keep those who are different away. With scarcity, however, comes a willingness to set aside superficial barriers such as race, income, location, etc., in favor of fulfilling the social needs every human being has.

When your class is 90% white, you notice the one Hispanic girl. Outside of that context, however, when you just want someone to play with, you are much more likely to notice that she is nice.

homeschool homeschooling home education socialization

In his book New Pioneers, Jeffrey Jacob quotes a homesteader from Idaho’s description of the joy she has in the way of life her family has chosen:

There is so much more to say, and all I can start with is–this is a most beautiful way to live.  We feel joy in just watching a gate we built open and close. New Pioneers, The Back-to-the-Land Movement and the Search for a Sustainable Future, p. 84

With this, he introduces the concept of mindfulness, a “calm, yet focused, engagement with the present.”  (Ibid.)  He goes on to discuss the concept more in light of its Buddhist origins, but my thoughts focused on the satisfaction derived from accomplishment.  To set a goal, to invest yourself in realizing that goal and to sit back and appreciate the fruits of your labor.

In our culture today, we tend to undervalue manual labor.  Everyone knows you have to go to college to get a “good” job and if your job does not require a degree, it must not be all that good.  Sure, there are those few who drop out, buck the system and go on to do amazing things.  We like to tell their stories because it fits well with the story of ourselves, the one in which our hero picks himself up by his bootstraps and succeeds outside the confines of convention.

But we aren’t about to risk such things on our own children.  And our hero is only a hero if he succeeds according to that convention.  We don’t hold manual laborers in high regard.  Nor do we particularly esteem those who “throw away” their higher education and pursue other lines of work, or worse, voluntarily stay home to care for children.

Yet there is satisfaction in just watching a gate open and close, a gate you built, a gate that stands as a visual reminder of a need met, a challenge overcome, a goal accomplished.

It is a peculiar sense of satisfaction I want my children to know as well.  It is why I leave them time to build their fort in the windbreak while I’m working in the house.  But it is also tied in to some of our goals for homeschooling.  I want my children to be personally invested in their education.  I want them to see their progress as their accomplishment.  When they pull out a lapbook they’ve worked on, a story they’ve written or a model they’ve constructed, I want it to stand there like that swinging gate.

I want them to own their own efforts, and take the time to be satisfied with the result.  It takes effort, discipline and the ability to step back to let my children struggle with a task and perhaps even fail at it.  It means being careful with how I praise them, lest I rob them of their accomplishment by making it about external recognition.

Most of all, it means giving them time to pursue something with all their energy over the course of days and even weeks.

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Don’t forget to vote in the Homeschool Blog Awards! Principled Discovery was nominated for Best Current Events, Opinion or Politics Blog!  If you are new to this blog, here’s a little tour which will help you get to know me a little better.

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Hey, did you know we’re Mexican?

says the little girl at craft table at the library.  She couldn’t have been older than six.  Her little friend across from her dropped her scissors, mouth agape.

Don’t you call me that!

She was clearly insulted and the table fell silent, all eyes on the offender.  She averted her eyes, but there was no place to go.  She and her two friends had been told to stay there and color and stay she did.  Just before hurling this horrendous insult, she had been happily counting and singing . . . in Spanish.  Clearly, neither she nor anyone at the table had any particular issue with the country of their obvious heritage until it was named.

Mexican.

After a long moment of silence, the third girl leaned in and whispered, “It’s called Hispanic.  We’re Hispanic.”  With that, the tension eased and they went back to their playful chatter about school and television and friends.  They forgot about that dirty word.

Mexican.

She may as well have said, “Hey, did you know we were spics?”  Or niggers.  Or chinks.  Or any number of racial slurs.  I can’t help but wonder how a child growing up Hispanic in an Hispanic home with Hispanic friends, watching Dora the Explorer, who happily sings songs in Spanish in the library learns that Mexican is a dirty word.

This is socialization.  Learning what is “other,” labeling it and trying to make it conform.  This is the “leavening effect of democracy” which compulsory schooling offers.  It does not teach us to value difference, but to conform.  It does not teach us to handle conflict, but to submit to the capricious and cruel tendencies of small children with inadequate supervision.

Humans are fundamentally social creatures, and I would be the last to argue against teaching our children how to function within our social groups.  Socialization is a natural part of being human.  But how do we best teach this to our children?  Seated in neat rows while the teacher talks?  Or perhaps better seated in circles?  On the playground while an adult with a whistles chats with an aid and watches for any grievous rule breaks?  Or within the context of the family where true, selfless love can be experienced alongside daily modeling and guidance specific to each child’s needs?

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Uppercase Woman’s daughter, too, is learning her place in her social world (language warning) at the tender age of three.  Fortunately, she has a loving mother to help guide her through it as she wrestles with the question of how to educate her daughter.

Also, we’re still sorting out this whole moving blog thing.  Posting may be erratic and the blog may go down when we finally get that far.  Sleeping for hours in a row is doing me wonders, however, and I am brimming with things to write about once I have my blog back!

socialization homeschool home education

Like I mentioned yesterday, I will be watching President Obama’s speech to America’s school children with my children later today.  We have little ones around here, so we’ll be using the elementary lesson plans, legal or not. Actually, we’ll be focusing specifically on this question, because it fits perfectly with some ongoing conversations we have been having around here:

Why is it important that we listen to the president and other elected officials, like the mayor, senators, members of congress, or the governor? Why is what they say important?  Classroom Activities, Pre-K-6 (pdf)

I’ll let you know my children’s answers to that later, after I ask them, but here are mine:

I.  I’m Christian, and the bible is pretty clear:

Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake:  whether it be to the king, as supreme; or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well.  For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men:  As free, and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness, but as the servants of God.  –1Peter 2:13-16 (KJV)

I consider myself blessed to live in a nation whose ordinances allow me considerable liberty to express my disagreement with established authority, but I try very hard to apply this verse especially to my discussions:  “For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men…” By well doing hearts and minds are changed, not by inflammatory rhetoric.

II.  These are our elected leaders, and our responsibility as citizens is pretty clear.

The Salvation of the state is watchfulness in the citizen.  –Hartley Burr Alexander, inscribed on the Nebraska State Capitol Building

If we do not listen, we cannot know, and if we do not know, we cannot act.  Listening precedes all useful action, something I fear some may be forgetting.

Please share your thoughts on the prepared speech, the speech as it is delivered and the accompanying lesson plans.  If you had the stage, what would you tell America’s youth?  And what have you told your own children?

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A week and a half away from our formal start to the homeschool year and I’m feeling excited and apprehensive.  Excited because I’ve found some really good resources, the kind I’ve been lamenting the seeming non-existence of for four years.  Excited because who wouldn’t be excited at the door of a great adventure, especially one starting with an overnight trip to see a King Tut exhibit?  Excited because I think I am as eager to learn about what we’ll be studying as my children are.

And that is perhaps at the core of my satisfaction with homeschooling.  I homeschool for many and varied reasons, but I love it for who I am becoming as a result.  The idea of the teacher as a living text book, a model of the virtues and character traits we wish to instill in our children rather than simply a dictator of them, has inspired me to be more and do less.

While homeschooling, I am more intentional in my parenting, more inspired in my reading.  I am more consistent in studying scripture and reflect on it more deeply.  My days are more productive and my mind is more focused.

But I am also apprehensive, this year more than most.  At first, I wasn’t really sure why.  Last year was a tough year with the birth of a baby and a hospitalization with a long recovery.  Mouse is beginning the fifth grade, which is a pretty important year in my mind.  A transition year.  All things which work together to make me feel a little stressed.  I want my children to “be ready.”  For what is sort of ill-defined.

There is more to my apprehension, however.  We have been sort of playing at school while I read The Hobbit with the children and something is becoming readily apparent.  My daughter likes textbooks and workbooks.  She likes well-defined assignments, with clear direction as to the expected result.  Clear as in “fill in the blank” or “multiple choice.”  She doesn’t like open-ended assignments.  Opposite to me, she looks at the world from part to whole.

There is a lot of talk in homeschooling circles about learning styles.  One thing we don’t talk about that much (at least that I have seen) is teaching styles.  We all have one, and it is related closely to our own learning style. Mine doesn’t match my daughter’s.  We actually stand on opposite sides of the learning/teaching spectrum.

For me, that is a challenge.

homeschool homeschooling teaching+styles learning+styles

I’m totally reposting an old post for My 3 Boybarians’ Blog Hop.  Not all that much has changed since the last time I posted on the topic, except that I have a fifth child now. And a kitchen table which is currently buried under their latest project.

First, we have the independent learning center.  This is where children may come to select activities and interact with one another during self-directed, exploratory activities.  Note the purple curtain in the background.  This is actually a sunroom-turned-bedroom and thus has three walls of windows, covered here for intimacy, but opened in the daytime to allow minds to range freely even while bodies are trapped indoors.  Going with the Bringing-the Outdoors-in theme, my children are preparing for a camp out.  Or is it a camp in?

With only 900 square feet, finding a place to get away is sometimes a challenge.  Here, my daughter has solved the problem beautifully by retreating to the top of her bunk bed.  And pulling up the ladder, which you cannot see in this picture.  She has taken a quiet moment to read a book…at 11 PM!  I think she may be a bit like me.

Many homeschoolers do the bulk of their teaching at the kitchen table.  We did away with that nuisance long ago and no longer own a kitchen table.  Instead, we use TV trays for just about everything that might pass as school.  Here, the children are playing a nice game of chess.  I love this picture because….well…it just looks so homeschoolerish.  Nevermind that neither of them knew how to play when this picture was taken.  It is all about the image discovery.

With limited space comes creativity, and every room and every piece of furniture does double duty.  Here is an impromptu tea party on my old bed.  And what tea party is complete without a baby dressed as a…actually, I’m not sure what they were thinking.  Their living doll is pretty patient, however.

Last, but not least, is the center of our homeschooling: the sofa.  And here you can see a little of my philosophy of how to keep toddlers under control while teaching: just give them the same tools and let them play along.  Note the ubiquitous TV tray.  Can’t do school without it.

As you can see, our school room covers pretty much the entire house.  Nine hundred square feet may be small for a house, but it isn’t bad for a school room.  All that aren’t pictured here are the laundry room because they aren’t allowed in there.  Just LOOK AT WHAT THEY ARE CAPABLE OF and I think you will understand why.  And the kitchen.  For some reason, young children near open flame requires a level of atttention I do not have behind a camera, but if you follow that link, you will see my three year old in her chosen profession which definitely involves the kitchen.

And it is the school room of my dreams because here is where my children are now, building something for their futures that we cannot yet even guess at.

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