So one day when my oldest child was seven months old, my husband and I were asked to take in his young cousin. She was seven at the time and had been floated around to different relatives’ homes her entire life. After much consideration and prayer we agreed, BUT only if it was permanent. No more floating. So we adopted Ana.
Ana was a strange bunch of contradictions. She had been getting herself ready for school, making her own breakfast, etc. since kindergarten, and was fairly independent. Yet I had to teach her how to brush her teeth (and yes it was expected to be done twice a day), use soap, shampoo, conditioner, and actually BRUSH her hair. (That became so much of a fight that finally I let her do her own hair—meaning it wasn’t done—every day but Friday and Sunday for the first year.)
She had been raised watching TV every day, all day. I expected homework done and then I made her correct whatever problems she missed. I expected her to read. She had no interest in reading whatsoever. She had spoken Spanish till age four, but then learned English in school. By the time she came to live with us, she was terrible at Spanish and not much better in English. She was used to eating rice and junk food almost every day. She spent the first six months throwing up about three times a week or more because we made her eat everything I cooked. And I’m not talking liver or stuff like that. Cucumbers, pears, watermelon, and any meat with bones are just a few of the things that set her off. She still hates eating any meat with bones. It was hard. Not to mention my husband was working as a pilot and was only home eleven days out of the month on average.
Our counselor believes Ana is “delayed” especially when it comes to emotional IQ. I’m still having problems bonding with her. Things have definitely improved though. Most of my issues arise now from my husband’s extended family who act as if we’re simply babysitting and not her parents. That's cultural--I try not to be bitter.
So what about my big plans for homeschooling? Personally, I think if I homeschooled her, we’d kill each other. Literally, homework was a fight almost every night the first year. Yet, I worried about her and her slow start to an education. So that the first summer she lived with us I made her read every day, practice her multiplication tables, and complete one section out of a reading comprehension book my dad had given me (that turned into practice on following directions more than anything else—something she needed desperately), and finally, practicing some Spanish. It was supposed to take her about two hours in total time and days that she wanted to, she finished in that amount of time. Most days though, it took her up to six hours to finish. (We have a lot of time management issues to work through still.)
Once she was finished her schoolwork, she complained she was bored because she has no real hobbies or interests to keep herself busy. Mostly she wanted to watch TV, only we didn’t get any television channels and never will, which she thinks is rotten. Also, we lived in an apartment complex that was not the nicest, (police were there four or five times a month on average) and it bothered me when she played with the other girls there because in Hispanic culture (my mom once asked me if I was the only white person living there) girls watch and talk, while the boys play. Lame. It was a long, long summer.
So the next summer I rethought things a bit. My sister said I was practically homeschooling. That wasn’t my intention, I just wanted to keep her busy and help her catch up in school to her level. That summer she did her math worksheet, ones that I printed off from a website called MathStories. I liked it because I could tailor it to what she was having trouble with, like story problems and telling time. I had actually started her doing one every day that winter in addition to her homework. Then she did her reading time and a Spanish worksheet. Lastly, I had her make a notebook about countries. Depending on the day of the week, she had to write about a current event there, make a timeline about it’s history, color a picture of it’s flag, write down ten facts about it (we checked out books from the library), and on the last day she made a collage of pictures from my old National Geographics. She chose which countries she studied.
While she improved on using her time wisely, she took most of the day to finish, which was my intention. I gave her time to play outside while my other daughter was napping, since she didn’t want Elena tagging along. I would like to say it went more smoothly, but that wasn’t necessarily the case. She was doing more work and harder work and she knew it. And if you haven’t guessed I’m a bit of a perfectionist and I don’t let sloppy work slide. She did enjoy studying the countries though. I also read more about adoption and common tendencies among adopted and foster children. That helped me recognize that a lot of her behaviors were simply survival mechanisms and not necessarily “her.”
So, where are we now? This past year she was “stuck” in her native country for three months after a family vacation there—missing school the entire time, because our adoption wasn’t recognized. When she came home, things improved immensely. Partly because my husband is home every day now, partly because Ana herself is happier to be with us after her experience, and partly because of me and adjustments I’ve made. I believe that our family has been blessed since Ana was sealed in the temple to us as well. Things aren’t perfect, but then I know they won’t be perfect with my other children either.
Ana’s doing fabulous in school, despite missing so many months, and while reading comprehension and writing is still a problem (she’s not meeting year-end standards), she’s at the top of her class in math. This summer I want her outside playing. (We’ve moved to a much nicer area now—hurray!!) I know play is important and Ana has a pretty non-existent imagination that could use some exercise. I know I’ve been a bit draconian about her schoolwork, chores and piano practicing, and I really think I need to lay off a bit and let her enjoy her childhood more. I still make her read—she doesn’t read on her own, even though I pay her money as an incentive if she chooses books off a list I made. (That’s something I’ve done since she first came to us.) She does one worksheet from the “Spectrum 4th Grade Test Prep” book to review the things she’s learned this past year and again, practice reading comprehension, following directions and test taking strategies. She also does one lesson from “Language Lessons for the Elementary Child” which is a Charlotte Mason style homeschool workbook.
Her new school is bilingual and while her Spanish is much better after her three months in South America, her writing is understandably not good, so to practice I have her write one half-page in Spanish on anything she wants and one half-page in English. My aim was that she could finish it all in two hours (her forty minutes of reading included), but for instance, yesterday she spent an hour and forty-five minutes on the writing part alone. I honestly don’t think it’s because it’s a long assignment, (both the workbooks she can finish in 15 mins when she wants to), it’s more a matter of motivation and time management. Any ideas on this are welcome! I’m really excited that she’s in a bilingual school and hope my other children will have that same opportunity. (It's so sad, my three year old is already requesting, "No! In English-not Spanish!!")
However, I still have reservations about public school. Ana has always and remains very influenced by her peers, to the point where much of the time it’s seems as if she has no real sense of her own self and her own likes and dislikes. (That's part of the low emotional IQ.) That scares me. Really, truly scares me. I still don’t want to homeschool her in earnest because I think our relationship is simply too fragile to take that kind of stress. And with so many little kids at home, I doubt I could give her the one-on-one attention that she requires. Luckily, where we live there’s a very nice charter school that’s available through the middle school years. That’s what I intend to try to get her into once she’s done elementary. School uniforms alone sold me on it. But then, who knows what life will throw at us next and where we’ll end up by then.
Showing posts with label Guest Posts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Guest Posts. Show all posts
June 15, 2010
Guest Post--Kami on education with an older adopted child
This is the first in a two part series about education and an older adopted child. I asked my sister, Kami, to express some of her feelings about education and adoption as she adopted a 7 year old. Kami discovered she had a lot to say! We split her thoughts into two posts. Kami currently lives in Provo where her hsuband attends BYU.
I am not a trained educator and I do not homeschool. I’ll just say that up front. However, between my husband, my adopted daughter, and myself, I have been exposed to several different forms of education and non-education. For the sake of coherency, I’ll discuss my husband’s and my background in education first. Then in my next post, I’ll share my daughter’s background and what we’ve worked on with her.
Personally, I loved elementary school, hated middle school, and really loved high school. My family moved frequently so I attended schools in many different states—some year-round, most with the traditional summer off. In elementary school I started off slow, in fact I was in remedial reading for a year. I never thought much about it, in fact I felt pretty lucky because I was able to play a lot of games on the computer and paint in that class (what those had to do with reading, I really couldn’t say because I don’t remember, but I loved it). At another point in elementary school, I was in a work-at-your own-pace math class with several different grades all in it together. That didn’t work well for me; I remember goofing around a lot and very little classroom discipline. However, one of my friends, Nathan, finished our textbook and had started the next grade level up by the end of the year.
Middle school I detested for several reasons, mostly social, but frankly I don’t think they have enough advanced or honors classes at that level to keep it challenging either. Then I had one random year at a school with 300 pupils in grades 7-12, and absolutely no classes other than the basics. So basic in fact, that the principal agreed to let me be in the psychology class that had previously only been allowed to 11th and 12th graders (I was in 9th grade) because my mother and I were fairly disgusted with the class choices. I was offered money almost weekly to allow people to cheat off me in that class. I was also frequently asked if my younger sister was a genius (she was two grade levels ahead in math—but in our previous school that was fairly common). What was I supposed to say, “No, actually you guys are just a bunch of backward hicks?” That’s what I thought anyway.
The rest of high school I adored. We moved to a much larger town (in North Dakota standards), which was very conservative. It’s kind of like going back twenty years in time living there. My high school offered plenty of AP programs that made school more challenging, as well as a variety of other classes. I arranged my whole senior year schedule around my floral design class. When I went to university I had no difficulty whatsoever in adjusting and didn’t find it any harder than my difficult classes in high school.
After graduating, I attended a couple different community colleges just for fun (one is the largest in the country), and found them rather pathetic—generally big high schools that aren’t challenging at all. In all I attended five different elementary schools, one middle school, two high schools, three universities and two community colleges.
My husband, on the other hand, only experienced one year in our public school system. Not because he was homeschooled; he was a foreign exchange student to New Jersey. He managed to learn English (yes, he had rudimentary knowledge before coming here, but was far from fluent) and complete 9th and 10th grade requirements in that one year. He thought it was easy. Ridiculously easy. But then in his native country he had gone to a private Catholic school, with the uniforms, mandatory mass, etc. A school where most of the senators’ kids and the president’s kids attended. A bit elite and very demanding. He also had private tutors (for English) and said he spent almost every evening, all evening, doing homework.
Once he graduated from high school, he attended the top university in the country. (He’s from Bogotá, Colombia, which is known as the Athens of South America because of its well-respected schools.) He then went to a private Catholic university for a year and then finally spent a semester at a military university. Upon moving to the States, he went to a community college for a year where he brushed up on his English and did some generals not required in Colombia, and then finished his degree at ASU. He thought ASU was as challenging as the universities he attended in Colombia, and that the community college was a practical way to save money rather than paying the high university tuition for classes that transferred straight across anyway.
I wanted to share those backgrounds because our experiences shaped our expectations for our children and their schooling. Both my husband and I want our children to learn to work hard. That is our main goal. My husband is much better at this than I ever was. He works at school. His mentality is partly shaped by his country (as mine is). In Colombia there aren’t very many good jobs, many taxi drivers are engineers but lack the connections to be hired. You have to work hard to survive. I grew up believing that I could succeed easily at whatever field I chose, and so I kind of half-worked and complained if I actually struggled at something (AP Calculus comes to mind) and then I never really learned it, just managed to scrape by. In college when I was exploring careers, and computer systems was an area of interest to me, I found out how much calculus was required, and I thought, “Oh, well, I’ll do something else then.” Pathetic, really. I want my children to be like my husband. My father expressed once to me that he wished his kids had been a little dumber, because if something didn’t come easily to us like most things normally did, we generally gave up. We grew up lazy—at least academically speaking (with one notable exception).
So how does this tie into public education? Basically because we both agree that public schools, on average, are great and the curriculum can prepare a child well for college and careers. But the key is the desire to learn and work hard, which is taught by parents, not the school. I frequently told my daughter during her end of the year testing that I thought the testing was a joke and that I could care less how she did on it. I think more important than any test she ever takes or material on that test, is the lesson I teach her when I make her continue working on a homework problem till she gets it right. I hate the message, “Do your best, that’s all we can expect.” That “best” implies simply operating at their existing level of competence with no additional work to become better. Really, I expect more. I expect hard work, improvement and thoroughness.
My daughter recently moaned to me about a piano piece, “You can’t expect me to play it perfectly!” Well, actually, yes I can and do. The piece was at her level; all she needed was additional practice to make it perfect. It was certainly not impossible.
I do wonder about how to motivate learning without relying on grades as a benchmark. Sometimes in school it is easy to get that A grade without learning anything. And while you have some fabulous teachers, there are some horrid teachers too. Also, I think as far as public schools are concerned, middle school is the low point. There’s generally no advanced or honor classes yet, kids are mean, and peer pressure is at it’s height. If I did homeschool, I would do it during my children’s middle school years.
That actually had been my plan. By the time my first child hit junior high, I would be done having kids, all the rest of my kids would be in elementary school, and I would homeschool just for those few years of middle school. I could focus on that one child (or maybe two). She would be old enough for me to actually talk with about more advanced subjects without hesitation and analyze deeper issues. And then hopefully by the time that child returned to high school she would be mature enough and balanced enough (done with puberty) to be her own person and not as influenced by peer pressure. And prepared to work hard in high school.
Then life happened and Ana came home and plans changed.
I am not a trained educator and I do not homeschool. I’ll just say that up front. However, between my husband, my adopted daughter, and myself, I have been exposed to several different forms of education and non-education. For the sake of coherency, I’ll discuss my husband’s and my background in education first. Then in my next post, I’ll share my daughter’s background and what we’ve worked on with her.
Personally, I loved elementary school, hated middle school, and really loved high school. My family moved frequently so I attended schools in many different states—some year-round, most with the traditional summer off. In elementary school I started off slow, in fact I was in remedial reading for a year. I never thought much about it, in fact I felt pretty lucky because I was able to play a lot of games on the computer and paint in that class (what those had to do with reading, I really couldn’t say because I don’t remember, but I loved it). At another point in elementary school, I was in a work-at-your own-pace math class with several different grades all in it together. That didn’t work well for me; I remember goofing around a lot and very little classroom discipline. However, one of my friends, Nathan, finished our textbook and had started the next grade level up by the end of the year.
Middle school I detested for several reasons, mostly social, but frankly I don’t think they have enough advanced or honors classes at that level to keep it challenging either. Then I had one random year at a school with 300 pupils in grades 7-12, and absolutely no classes other than the basics. So basic in fact, that the principal agreed to let me be in the psychology class that had previously only been allowed to 11th and 12th graders (I was in 9th grade) because my mother and I were fairly disgusted with the class choices. I was offered money almost weekly to allow people to cheat off me in that class. I was also frequently asked if my younger sister was a genius (she was two grade levels ahead in math—but in our previous school that was fairly common). What was I supposed to say, “No, actually you guys are just a bunch of backward hicks?” That’s what I thought anyway.
The rest of high school I adored. We moved to a much larger town (in North Dakota standards), which was very conservative. It’s kind of like going back twenty years in time living there. My high school offered plenty of AP programs that made school more challenging, as well as a variety of other classes. I arranged my whole senior year schedule around my floral design class. When I went to university I had no difficulty whatsoever in adjusting and didn’t find it any harder than my difficult classes in high school.
After graduating, I attended a couple different community colleges just for fun (one is the largest in the country), and found them rather pathetic—generally big high schools that aren’t challenging at all. In all I attended five different elementary schools, one middle school, two high schools, three universities and two community colleges.
My husband, on the other hand, only experienced one year in our public school system. Not because he was homeschooled; he was a foreign exchange student to New Jersey. He managed to learn English (yes, he had rudimentary knowledge before coming here, but was far from fluent) and complete 9th and 10th grade requirements in that one year. He thought it was easy. Ridiculously easy. But then in his native country he had gone to a private Catholic school, with the uniforms, mandatory mass, etc. A school where most of the senators’ kids and the president’s kids attended. A bit elite and very demanding. He also had private tutors (for English) and said he spent almost every evening, all evening, doing homework.
Once he graduated from high school, he attended the top university in the country. (He’s from Bogotá, Colombia, which is known as the Athens of South America because of its well-respected schools.) He then went to a private Catholic university for a year and then finally spent a semester at a military university. Upon moving to the States, he went to a community college for a year where he brushed up on his English and did some generals not required in Colombia, and then finished his degree at ASU. He thought ASU was as challenging as the universities he attended in Colombia, and that the community college was a practical way to save money rather than paying the high university tuition for classes that transferred straight across anyway.
I wanted to share those backgrounds because our experiences shaped our expectations for our children and their schooling. Both my husband and I want our children to learn to work hard. That is our main goal. My husband is much better at this than I ever was. He works at school. His mentality is partly shaped by his country (as mine is). In Colombia there aren’t very many good jobs, many taxi drivers are engineers but lack the connections to be hired. You have to work hard to survive. I grew up believing that I could succeed easily at whatever field I chose, and so I kind of half-worked and complained if I actually struggled at something (AP Calculus comes to mind) and then I never really learned it, just managed to scrape by. In college when I was exploring careers, and computer systems was an area of interest to me, I found out how much calculus was required, and I thought, “Oh, well, I’ll do something else then.” Pathetic, really. I want my children to be like my husband. My father expressed once to me that he wished his kids had been a little dumber, because if something didn’t come easily to us like most things normally did, we generally gave up. We grew up lazy—at least academically speaking (with one notable exception).
So how does this tie into public education? Basically because we both agree that public schools, on average, are great and the curriculum can prepare a child well for college and careers. But the key is the desire to learn and work hard, which is taught by parents, not the school. I frequently told my daughter during her end of the year testing that I thought the testing was a joke and that I could care less how she did on it. I think more important than any test she ever takes or material on that test, is the lesson I teach her when I make her continue working on a homework problem till she gets it right. I hate the message, “Do your best, that’s all we can expect.” That “best” implies simply operating at their existing level of competence with no additional work to become better. Really, I expect more. I expect hard work, improvement and thoroughness.
My daughter recently moaned to me about a piano piece, “You can’t expect me to play it perfectly!” Well, actually, yes I can and do. The piece was at her level; all she needed was additional practice to make it perfect. It was certainly not impossible.
I do wonder about how to motivate learning without relying on grades as a benchmark. Sometimes in school it is easy to get that A grade without learning anything. And while you have some fabulous teachers, there are some horrid teachers too. Also, I think as far as public schools are concerned, middle school is the low point. There’s generally no advanced or honor classes yet, kids are mean, and peer pressure is at it’s height. If I did homeschool, I would do it during my children’s middle school years.
That actually had been my plan. By the time my first child hit junior high, I would be done having kids, all the rest of my kids would be in elementary school, and I would homeschool just for those few years of middle school. I could focus on that one child (or maybe two). She would be old enough for me to actually talk with about more advanced subjects without hesitation and analyze deeper issues. And then hopefully by the time that child returned to high school she would be mature enough and balanced enough (done with puberty) to be her own person and not as influenced by peer pressure. And prepared to work hard in high school.
Then life happened and Ana came home and plans changed.
June 14, 2010
Guest Post--Kayli Reviews a Nature Book
Kayli is my sister and writing buddy. She has four children--Jethro, Hazel, Ethne, and Talmage--and she currently lives in Switzerland. Her husband recently wrote a guest post for me about his views on education that you can read here. You can find out more about Kayli and the other Swiss Bells here. As a sidenote, Kayli isn't a homeschooler, but if she ever changed her mind she'd be a good one!
Book Review for The Kids' Nature Book – 365 Indoor/Outdoor Activities and Experiences (Revised Edition) by Susan Milord
(LINK to it on Amazon)
One early spring day, I was very excited because enough snow was gone and the air was just warm enough that the kids and I could go outside and play for a significant amount of time without frozen feet, hands, and noses. When we came back inside I was inspired to buy a book to keep us outdoors doing interesting things in nature all year. I read reviews for a few different books and ended up with The Kids' Nature Book. I bought a used copy of it through abebooks.com.
I think it is WONDERFUL. I very heartily recommend it. It says for children ages 4 – 10, and my children aged 1-7 have all participated in the activities in it to varying degrees. The book offers ideas of outings, things to observe outdoors, craft projects, simple experiments, games, and suggestions for stories and poems to read. I really can't begin to tell you all of the topics it explores – weather, habitats, flowers, animals, clouds, recycling, beaches, astronomy, insects, plants, adaptations, art supplies from nature, the ocean, pets, Indians, etc.
I really like how it is set up. It has an activity for every day of the year (tied to the seasonal happenings), and each week has a unifying theme like watching birds in flight or exploring in and around water. So I really like that you can pick up the book anytime and go to that day and have a topic offered. That being said, I don't usually follow the suggestions day by day, like a calendar. Usually when we get the urge to do something from the book, we do several of the activities on one day. Of course, you can do things more selectively-- skip around and find topics on whatever suits your fancy.
It has a ton of great ideas, and lots of great information. My son Jethro likes to pick it up and just read it (but then, he always has liked reading non-fiction type books. Weirdo.). Now I've TOLD you it's fun, let me SHOW you.
We gathered frog eggs from a pond to watch their development from eggs to tadpoles to frogs. We have two that are still alive and one of them recently sprouted his back legs. It's really exciting.
We did some activities about rainbows, like creating a rainbow by filling a glass full of water and placing it on a sunny windowsill.
Then we bought some colored paper and made a wreath using “Japanese folding techniques.”
Jethro found an experiment that he thought sounded cool, so he started setting it up (without asking for permission or help) and when Brett saw him getting stuff out and asked him what he was doing, he read about the experiment, also thought it was cool, and helped him finish setting it up. They created stalactites and stalagmites by filling small jars with water and baking soda and tying a weight to each end of a string and placing the ends in the jar. These are not the greatest pictures, but I think you can see that we did grow some stalactites.
One day without really intending to do an activity from the book, I happened to see a fiddlehead of a fern – something I had seen and read about in the book, so I took a picture of it. The same day, Jethro came home and showed me a fiddlehead he had picked. He told me, “The book says they're eatable, so should we eat it?”
I can't remember if the book suggested a nature notebook or not, but I decided to give the kids a notebook, and Jethro has done some recording in it. Hazel mainly draws pictures and says whether it's a sunny day or rainy day. (I love his picture of eggs, tadpole, developing tadpole, and frog at the bottom.)
We picked some flowers and dried them. Jethro really wanted Brett to build a plant press, which he probably would have if he had any tools or materials, but instead we just used a book.
So, five stars and all that. Go get it if you're interested in helping your kids- and yourself- learn about and enjoy nature.
Book Review for The Kids' Nature Book – 365 Indoor/Outdoor Activities and Experiences (Revised Edition) by Susan Milord
(LINK to it on Amazon)
One early spring day, I was very excited because enough snow was gone and the air was just warm enough that the kids and I could go outside and play for a significant amount of time without frozen feet, hands, and noses. When we came back inside I was inspired to buy a book to keep us outdoors doing interesting things in nature all year. I read reviews for a few different books and ended up with The Kids' Nature Book. I bought a used copy of it through abebooks.com.
I think it is WONDERFUL. I very heartily recommend it. It says for children ages 4 – 10, and my children aged 1-7 have all participated in the activities in it to varying degrees. The book offers ideas of outings, things to observe outdoors, craft projects, simple experiments, games, and suggestions for stories and poems to read. I really can't begin to tell you all of the topics it explores – weather, habitats, flowers, animals, clouds, recycling, beaches, astronomy, insects, plants, adaptations, art supplies from nature, the ocean, pets, Indians, etc.
I really like how it is set up. It has an activity for every day of the year (tied to the seasonal happenings), and each week has a unifying theme like watching birds in flight or exploring in and around water. So I really like that you can pick up the book anytime and go to that day and have a topic offered. That being said, I don't usually follow the suggestions day by day, like a calendar. Usually when we get the urge to do something from the book, we do several of the activities on one day. Of course, you can do things more selectively-- skip around and find topics on whatever suits your fancy.
It has a ton of great ideas, and lots of great information. My son Jethro likes to pick it up and just read it (but then, he always has liked reading non-fiction type books. Weirdo.). Now I've TOLD you it's fun, let me SHOW you.
We gathered frog eggs from a pond to watch their development from eggs to tadpoles to frogs. We have two that are still alive and one of them recently sprouted his back legs. It's really exciting.
We did some activities about rainbows, like creating a rainbow by filling a glass full of water and placing it on a sunny windowsill.
Then we bought some colored paper and made a wreath using “Japanese folding techniques.”
Jethro found an experiment that he thought sounded cool, so he started setting it up (without asking for permission or help) and when Brett saw him getting stuff out and asked him what he was doing, he read about the experiment, also thought it was cool, and helped him finish setting it up. They created stalactites and stalagmites by filling small jars with water and baking soda and tying a weight to each end of a string and placing the ends in the jar. These are not the greatest pictures, but I think you can see that we did grow some stalactites.
One day without really intending to do an activity from the book, I happened to see a fiddlehead of a fern – something I had seen and read about in the book, so I took a picture of it. The same day, Jethro came home and showed me a fiddlehead he had picked. He told me, “The book says they're eatable, so should we eat it?”
I can't remember if the book suggested a nature notebook or not, but I decided to give the kids a notebook, and Jethro has done some recording in it. Hazel mainly draws pictures and says whether it's a sunny day or rainy day. (I love his picture of eggs, tadpole, developing tadpole, and frog at the bottom.)
We picked some flowers and dried them. Jethro really wanted Brett to build a plant press, which he probably would have if he had any tools or materials, but instead we just used a book. 
So, five stars and all that. Go get it if you're interested in helping your kids- and yourself- learn about and enjoy nature.
June 4, 2010
MEN'S WEEK PERSPECTIVES
Our last guest blogger for Men's Week is my hubby, Timothy. He works as an accountant and studies computer programming. Since you already know all about my family, and that we've been homeschooling for two years, I won't go into it. Take it away, Timothy!
Some Pros of Homeschooling:
- The child isn’t subjected to the adverse social influences commonly found in public schools, such as:
Pressure to rebel against and/or express disrespect towards authority
Pressure to explore and express their sexuality in unhealthy ways
Pressure to experiment with substance abuse - Hypothetically speaking, the child receives more attention from his teacher, which has the potential, hypothetically speaking, to make the teacher more aware of the child’s needs as a student.
- Since the child spends more time in the home, with his parents, than he otherwise would if he were attending public school, this gives the parent more opportunities to bond with and nurture the child.
- Lower child-teacher ratio creates more opportunity for the teacher to tailor the curriculum and adjust the pace of teaching to the student’s needs.
Some Cons of Homeschooling:
The child isn’t subjected to the adverse social influences commonly found in public schools. (See above.) Lack of exposure to these influences may hinder the development of the child’s ability to resist them.- The care-taking parent doesn’t get as much alone time away from the child. This could create stress that might otherwise be avoided by sending the child away to school for a few hours each day.
- The child will not achieve the kind of understanding of social norms and mores that, as I see it, can only be gotten through interaction with his peers in an organic social setting.
- The homeschooling family becomes stigmatized and branded by others as weirdos.
- Sooner or later the child will need be capable of succeeding in a traditional educational atmosphere, for example, when he goes to college. The homeschooling environment might not adequately prepare him for this.
June 3, 2010
MEN'S WEEK PERSPECTIVES
Today's guest post was written by J. Hathaway, the husband of one of my dearest friends. They've been homeschooling for about five years now and in the beginning, J. wasn't sure about homeschooling. It has been interesting to see his ideas and feelings toward homeschool evolve. J. is a statistician with five children. I don't know all their ages but the oldest is 10 and the youngest is 2. Take it away, J.!
1) How have your views of education changed because of your wife's views of education?
I don't think I had any views of education before I met my wife, other than "understanding math is power." But the clearest viewpoint I have learned from her is that the love of reading is KEY to individuality in learning and understanding.
2) Do you think homeschoolers are quacks--or, in other words--what changed your mind about homeschooling and how do you feel about it now?
YES, I still think homeschoolers are quacks, in general. But I have found that the number of quacks among "normal" schoolers is also high. Meaning, all groups have quacks among them. What is typically implied with "quacky homeschoolers" is their poor social skills and I don't think that's a function of being homeschooled. It goes back to the relationship between causation and correlation. I don't think that homeschooling causes "quackiness," I think that quackiness in children is caused by their parents and quacky parents choose to homeschool at a higher rate. Therefore, quackiness is correlated with homeschooling but not caused by homeschooling. My views on homeschoolers changed when I realized that the rate of quackiness wasn't much different among homeschoolers as compared to public schooled children. This idea together with the fact that homeschoolers can choose who their kids interact with allows more ability to avoid quacky people. Another thing I like about homeschooling deals with the primary parent teacher. My wife is a stay-at-home mom, the primary parent teacher, and I have enjoyed watching her grow through being challenged socially, politically, scientifically, and mathematically herself (www.directionliving.blogspot.com).
3) What do you want for your children or, in other words, what do you think being an educated person entails?
First, I want my children to be able to read, understand, and present information clearly. Second, I want my children to not be afraid of math!!! Third, I want my children to be fascinated with current economic, political and scientific thought. These three ordered points assume a foundation in religious faith.
4) What positives have come for your family from the decision to homeschool?
In no specific order, here are some positives:
Positive #1: We can do whatever we want, whenever we want to . . . literally! We wake up when we want to. We go to bed when we want to. And we go on vacation when we want to.
Positive #2: My family depends on each other for activity and friendship. And we as parents are obviously more involved in the learning of our children.
Positive #3: Due to new public school programs here in WA, we get some tax dollars back. :-)
Positive #4: My children don't have potty mouths! Nor do they know how to make obscene gestures . . . except for those which I taught them myself! :-)
1) How have your views of education changed because of your wife's views of education?
I don't think I had any views of education before I met my wife, other than "understanding math is power." But the clearest viewpoint I have learned from her is that the love of reading is KEY to individuality in learning and understanding.
2) Do you think homeschoolers are quacks--or, in other words--what changed your mind about homeschooling and how do you feel about it now?
YES, I still think homeschoolers are quacks, in general. But I have found that the number of quacks among "normal" schoolers is also high. Meaning, all groups have quacks among them. What is typically implied with "quacky homeschoolers" is their poor social skills and I don't think that's a function of being homeschooled. It goes back to the relationship between causation and correlation. I don't think that homeschooling causes "quackiness," I think that quackiness in children is caused by their parents and quacky parents choose to homeschool at a higher rate. Therefore, quackiness is correlated with homeschooling but not caused by homeschooling. My views on homeschoolers changed when I realized that the rate of quackiness wasn't much different among homeschoolers as compared to public schooled children. This idea together with the fact that homeschoolers can choose who their kids interact with allows more ability to avoid quacky people. Another thing I like about homeschooling deals with the primary parent teacher. My wife is a stay-at-home mom, the primary parent teacher, and I have enjoyed watching her grow through being challenged socially, politically, scientifically, and mathematically herself (www.directionliving.blogspot.com).
3) What do you want for your children or, in other words, what do you think being an educated person entails?
First, I want my children to be able to read, understand, and present information clearly. Second, I want my children to not be afraid of math!!! Third, I want my children to be fascinated with current economic, political and scientific thought. These three ordered points assume a foundation in religious faith.
4) What positives have come for your family from the decision to homeschool?
In no specific order, here are some positives:
Positive #1: We can do whatever we want, whenever we want to . . . literally! We wake up when we want to. We go to bed when we want to. And we go on vacation when we want to.
Positive #2: My family depends on each other for activity and friendship. And we as parents are obviously more involved in the learning of our children.
Positive #3: Due to new public school programs here in WA, we get some tax dollars back. :-)
Positive #4: My children don't have potty mouths! Nor do they know how to make obscene gestures . . . except for those which I taught them myself! :-)
June 2, 2010
MEN'S WEEK PERSPECTIVES
Today's guest poster is Nick Brown, a resident and native of California who teaches history at a public high school. A public high school with a unique set of issues. Nick has two children, ages 5 and 3. He and his wife, Becky (yes, she's guest posted here before), are jumping into homeschooling next year. Here are some of his thoughts on why they are headed in that direction. Take it away, Nick! Okay, take it away Becky--she wanted her own preface included.
I need to preface: my husband is a pretty quiet, pretty mellow type of guy. And other than a few instances where he said he felt really strongly about me homeschooling the kids, he’s pretty much left the decision up to me and what I’m willing and able to do. All of this being said, when I read the following, I was a bit shocked by the vehemence. And then I realized he had just been through some very tense negotiations with his administration and had lost – to the ultimate benefit of a superintendent’s resume and the detriment of the students’ educations, so he’s a little disillusioned a the moment. Also, he had just finished reading around a thousand pages of Ayn Rand – which can be a bit overwhelming as well. So, here’s a peek inside my husband’s head. It’s surprising to say the least.
Earlier this year I came across the following passage as I was reading one of the great novels of the twentieth century: Atlas Shrugged.
“He thought of all the living species that train their young in the art of survival, the cats who teach their kittens to hunt, the birds who spend such strident efforts on teaching their fledglings to fly - yet man, whose tool of survival is the mind, does not merely fail to teach a child to think, but devotes the child's education to the purpose of destroying his brain, of convincing him that thought is futile and evil, before he has started to think ... Men would shudder, he thought, if they saw a mother bird plucking the feathers from the wings of her young, then pushing him out of the nest to struggle for survival - yet that was what they did to their children.”
"Somewhere, he thought, there was this boy’s mother, who had trembled with protective concern over his groping steps, while teaching him to walk, who had measured his baby formulas with a jeweler’s caution, who had obeyed with a zealot’s fervor the latest words of science on his diet and hygiene, protecting his unhardened body from germs – then had sent him to be turned into a tortured neurotic by the men who taught him that he had no mind and must never attempt to think."
I need to preface: my husband is a pretty quiet, pretty mellow type of guy. And other than a few instances where he said he felt really strongly about me homeschooling the kids, he’s pretty much left the decision up to me and what I’m willing and able to do. All of this being said, when I read the following, I was a bit shocked by the vehemence. And then I realized he had just been through some very tense negotiations with his administration and had lost – to the ultimate benefit of a superintendent’s resume and the detriment of the students’ educations, so he’s a little disillusioned a the moment. Also, he had just finished reading around a thousand pages of Ayn Rand – which can be a bit overwhelming as well. So, here’s a peek inside my husband’s head. It’s surprising to say the least.
Earlier this year I came across the following passage as I was reading one of the great novels of the twentieth century: Atlas Shrugged.
“He thought of all the living species that train their young in the art of survival, the cats who teach their kittens to hunt, the birds who spend such strident efforts on teaching their fledglings to fly - yet man, whose tool of survival is the mind, does not merely fail to teach a child to think, but devotes the child's education to the purpose of destroying his brain, of convincing him that thought is futile and evil, before he has started to think ... Men would shudder, he thought, if they saw a mother bird plucking the feathers from the wings of her young, then pushing him out of the nest to struggle for survival - yet that was what they did to their children.”
I immediately thought of my own children and couldn’t stomach the thought of these two little shining stars, sitting in a classroom filled with kids whose parents have not one single moral in common with me. How can I justify sending my kids to a place where they will waste 75% of their time, be exposed to wrong ideas and profanity, risk political indoctrination, and possibly violence?
I work in a public school, so I know that there is a dumbing-down that occurs; the CST has become so important that it drives curriculum, to the exclusion of other important materials. Those tests were written by bureaucrats with a certain political agenda that I don’t necessarily agree with. I know how much time is wasted on classroom management, mandated programs with little to no efficacy, waiting for the SDC, RSP, ELD students to catch up to the rest of the class, girls putting on makeup, boys posturing for attention, texting.
I want more for mine and I expect more for mine. Everyone should, but everyone doesn’t, so we’re left with the current failing system. And I don’t want to participate in it. Another of Rand’s paragraphs kind of sums it up for me:
I work in a public school, so I know that there is a dumbing-down that occurs; the CST has become so important that it drives curriculum, to the exclusion of other important materials. Those tests were written by bureaucrats with a certain political agenda that I don’t necessarily agree with. I know how much time is wasted on classroom management, mandated programs with little to no efficacy, waiting for the SDC, RSP, ELD students to catch up to the rest of the class, girls putting on makeup, boys posturing for attention, texting.
I want more for mine and I expect more for mine. Everyone should, but everyone doesn’t, so we’re left with the current failing system. And I don’t want to participate in it. Another of Rand’s paragraphs kind of sums it up for me:
"Somewhere, he thought, there was this boy’s mother, who had trembled with protective concern over his groping steps, while teaching him to walk, who had measured his baby formulas with a jeweler’s caution, who had obeyed with a zealot’s fervor the latest words of science on his diet and hygiene, protecting his unhardened body from germs – then had sent him to be turned into a tortured neurotic by the men who taught him that he had no mind and must never attempt to think."
June 1, 2010
MEN'S WEEK PERSPECTIVES
Today's guest poster is my brother-in-law, Brett Bell. I asked Brett to participate because he just moved his family to Switzerland and I wanted to see how he felt about the disparity between our school system and the Swiss school system. Brett has four children ages 7, 5, 3, and 1. Brett is currently working on a post-doc at the University of Bern in something to do with biomedical engineering. I think in robotics, but don't quote me. This particular post is in question/answer format. Take it away, Brett!
1) How have your views of education changed because of your wife's views of education?
I have learned a love of reading from my wife. Before marriage, I read for leisure, but only seldom. Her love of reading rubbed off on me and I immediately began reading many classic works by Dumas and Dickens and so forth. I really felt like I had been missing out on some great knowledge and I needed to catch up.
2) Do you feel your children are getting a quality education in public school?
Being in Switzerland has definitely opened my eyes on this subject. I can only speak on the merits/demerits of primary school as that has been our experience. There are several aspects of secondary school which do not appeal to me (from what I’ve heard).
Anyhow, in Switzerland, 1st grade does not begin until 7 years of age, and then they still only go half a day. I guess they think that kids should spend more time at home with their mothers. This has positive and negative effects. If the weather is nice, Kayli might take the kids out in the afternoon to the frog pond or a walk in the woods or such. But, if the weather is poor and they are stuck indoors, they get restless and you can tell that they aren’t the angels that they normally are.
The second point is that they focus much more on hand work here than in the States. Printing, cursive, artwork, crafts, etc. are very much the focus. They also talk a lot about the environment and our role in it. Jethro has even had woodworking. They go on field trips to the farm, to the woods on a biweekly basis. The point is, they do a lot of hands on things.
Finally, the main point- they are every bit as smart as Americans and do well in academics in spite of not working like slaves as primary schoolers. Again, I don’t know if they have to work extra hard later to catch up, but I doubt it. This has made me realize that learning outside of the classroom is just as important for kids as what is taught inside the classroom.
3) Do you think homeschoolers are quacks?
I think homeschoolers, baseball dads, and musicians are all quacks. No, seriously, anything can get out of hand if it is not done in moderation and with the right attitude/goals. Homeschooling can be fine and I’m sure that kids learn a lot of what you think is important. The trouble with that however, is that what one homeschooler thinks is important may be and probably is skewed. At least in public school you get exposed to many different things and not just the pet projects of a parent.
4) What do you want for your children or, in other words, what do you think being an educated person entails?
I think educated means being open to new information. No one is ever fully educated, therefore it is a process. I must admit, it is very frustrating for me to encounter and work with people who do not want to learn. Maybe that is because learning has never been difficult for me. In spite of that, I feel that whether someone learns quickly or slowly, we can all learn. It’s the willingness and effort that counts.
So, in short, I want my children to try new things and try to do things that are difficult.
1) How have your views of education changed because of your wife's views of education?
I have learned a love of reading from my wife. Before marriage, I read for leisure, but only seldom. Her love of reading rubbed off on me and I immediately began reading many classic works by Dumas and Dickens and so forth. I really felt like I had been missing out on some great knowledge and I needed to catch up.
2) Do you feel your children are getting a quality education in public school?
Being in Switzerland has definitely opened my eyes on this subject. I can only speak on the merits/demerits of primary school as that has been our experience. There are several aspects of secondary school which do not appeal to me (from what I’ve heard).
Anyhow, in Switzerland, 1st grade does not begin until 7 years of age, and then they still only go half a day. I guess they think that kids should spend more time at home with their mothers. This has positive and negative effects. If the weather is nice, Kayli might take the kids out in the afternoon to the frog pond or a walk in the woods or such. But, if the weather is poor and they are stuck indoors, they get restless and you can tell that they aren’t the angels that they normally are.
The second point is that they focus much more on hand work here than in the States. Printing, cursive, artwork, crafts, etc. are very much the focus. They also talk a lot about the environment and our role in it. Jethro has even had woodworking. They go on field trips to the farm, to the woods on a biweekly basis. The point is, they do a lot of hands on things.
Finally, the main point- they are every bit as smart as Americans and do well in academics in spite of not working like slaves as primary schoolers. Again, I don’t know if they have to work extra hard later to catch up, but I doubt it. This has made me realize that learning outside of the classroom is just as important for kids as what is taught inside the classroom.
3) Do you think homeschoolers are quacks?
I think homeschoolers, baseball dads, and musicians are all quacks. No, seriously, anything can get out of hand if it is not done in moderation and with the right attitude/goals. Homeschooling can be fine and I’m sure that kids learn a lot of what you think is important. The trouble with that however, is that what one homeschooler thinks is important may be and probably is skewed. At least in public school you get exposed to many different things and not just the pet projects of a parent.
4) What do you want for your children or, in other words, what do you think being an educated person entails?
I think educated means being open to new information. No one is ever fully educated, therefore it is a process. I must admit, it is very frustrating for me to encounter and work with people who do not want to learn. Maybe that is because learning has never been difficult for me. In spite of that, I feel that whether someone learns quickly or slowly, we can all learn. It’s the willingness and effort that counts.
So, in short, I want my children to try new things and try to do things that are difficult.
May 31, 2010
MEN'S WEEK PERSPECTIVES
Welcome to Men's Week! Our first guest post was written by Jack Rasmussen, my dad and the dean of the College of Education at Weber State University. I come from a long line of educators. I asked my dad to discuss the new "parental involvement in the schools" movement and what he thinks is necessary for a student to be successful regardless of where the child is educated. Among dad's nine children there are three master's degree, one MD, one CRNA, one dental hygienist, one studying to be an audiologist, and one who is just starting the MD journey. We were taught to believe in education. Take it away, Dad.
For what its worth, here's my take on the value (to the student) of parental involvement in the K-12 education system. Please note that I am defining parental involvement as a parent, or parents spending a significant amount of time volunteering at their child's school, helping their child with school work at home or at school, or being extensively involved with co or extra-curricular activities sponsored by their child's school.
First, however, I want three points to be clear: 1) If a parent gets a lot of personal gratification/satisfaction out of being involved at their child/children's school as a volunteer, as long as they are willing to operate within the parameters that the teacher sets, then I think that is wonderful. Wonderful of course for the parent, but not necessarily of any added value to their own child that is in the school. 2) If a parent is willing to help at their children's school, and again carefully follow the protocols set down by the classroom teacher, then they can be a great help to overworked teachers who often have difficulty giving personal attention to all the students in the class. Again, often helpful to some student in the class but probably not to their own child. 3) All bets are off in this discussion if we are talking about a parent volunteering to help their own child who has a handicap or exceptionality where additional individual attention increases the chance of the student being successful.
In the main, I feel that parental involvement is highly overrated in terms of its impact on the academic performance of the child of the involved parent. Most research in the area suggests a high correlation between involved parents and the academic success of their children, but in fact, very little research that I have seen shows any significant cause and effect. In other words, involved parents and successful kids are just common characteristics of a very easily identified population--the population where parents value and stress education, and where kids grow up with the same values and are motivated to be successful at whatever education entails. In my words, kids of good parents are usually successful in school and would be whether or not their parents were heavily involved in the schooling process.
Parental involvement, at the level we are talking about, is not necessary for the success of kids from educationally sound homes for just the same reasons that early childhood programs are not necessary for those same children. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with these kids going to early childhood programs or with their parents being involved as volunteers at the school, it just isn't necessary for their kids' success. Even mediocre teachers will have little or no problem getting these students to meet and exceed the outlined learning outcomes of the school and can accomplish those goals without help or interference from the students parent/s.
Unfortunately, there are many students who do not come from educationally sound homes and what society and the K-12 system really needs is for these parents to be better parents at home, rather than be volunteers at school. I think that the parental involvement movement is all about trying to get these parents to school to provide training and modeling about both education and parenting, so as to develop better parents, which will in turn lead to more success with those students with which our schools currently struggle. Unfortunately, the parents that could benefit the most by being in the school are not the ones likely to be there.
To sum up this lengthy treatise, parents need to provide an educationally rich home environment, instill in their children a belief in the importance of learning and the value of an education, and to teach their children to take responsibility for their own learning. If parents do/did this, they would really have no need to be overtly involved in their child's institutional (at school) education because the kid & the teachers could easily accomplish the task without them.
I am certainly not saying that a parent can't or shouldn't talk to their child about what they are studying at school or shouldn't know about their child's grades, etc. Simply that they wouldn't need to be at school beyond parent teacher conference and should rarely if ever have to help with homework or other school assignments. This would be great because the K-12 curriculum is a very small part of what a child should be learning, and, in fact, aside from basic literacy skills, it is probably less important than many other things that parents could and should be teaching their children if they had the time.
For what its worth, here's my take on the value (to the student) of parental involvement in the K-12 education system. Please note that I am defining parental involvement as a parent, or parents spending a significant amount of time volunteering at their child's school, helping their child with school work at home or at school, or being extensively involved with co or extra-curricular activities sponsored by their child's school.
First, however, I want three points to be clear: 1) If a parent gets a lot of personal gratification/satisfaction out of being involved at their child/children's school as a volunteer, as long as they are willing to operate within the parameters that the teacher sets, then I think that is wonderful. Wonderful of course for the parent, but not necessarily of any added value to their own child that is in the school. 2) If a parent is willing to help at their children's school, and again carefully follow the protocols set down by the classroom teacher, then they can be a great help to overworked teachers who often have difficulty giving personal attention to all the students in the class. Again, often helpful to some student in the class but probably not to their own child. 3) All bets are off in this discussion if we are talking about a parent volunteering to help their own child who has a handicap or exceptionality where additional individual attention increases the chance of the student being successful.
In the main, I feel that parental involvement is highly overrated in terms of its impact on the academic performance of the child of the involved parent. Most research in the area suggests a high correlation between involved parents and the academic success of their children, but in fact, very little research that I have seen shows any significant cause and effect. In other words, involved parents and successful kids are just common characteristics of a very easily identified population--the population where parents value and stress education, and where kids grow up with the same values and are motivated to be successful at whatever education entails. In my words, kids of good parents are usually successful in school and would be whether or not their parents were heavily involved in the schooling process.
Parental involvement, at the level we are talking about, is not necessary for the success of kids from educationally sound homes for just the same reasons that early childhood programs are not necessary for those same children. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with these kids going to early childhood programs or with their parents being involved as volunteers at the school, it just isn't necessary for their kids' success. Even mediocre teachers will have little or no problem getting these students to meet and exceed the outlined learning outcomes of the school and can accomplish those goals without help or interference from the students parent/s.
Unfortunately, there are many students who do not come from educationally sound homes and what society and the K-12 system really needs is for these parents to be better parents at home, rather than be volunteers at school. I think that the parental involvement movement is all about trying to get these parents to school to provide training and modeling about both education and parenting, so as to develop better parents, which will in turn lead to more success with those students with which our schools currently struggle. Unfortunately, the parents that could benefit the most by being in the school are not the ones likely to be there.
To sum up this lengthy treatise, parents need to provide an educationally rich home environment, instill in their children a belief in the importance of learning and the value of an education, and to teach their children to take responsibility for their own learning. If parents do/did this, they would really have no need to be overtly involved in their child's institutional (at school) education because the kid & the teachers could easily accomplish the task without them.
I am certainly not saying that a parent can't or shouldn't talk to their child about what they are studying at school or shouldn't know about their child's grades, etc. Simply that they wouldn't need to be at school beyond parent teacher conference and should rarely if ever have to help with homework or other school assignments. This would be great because the K-12 curriculum is a very small part of what a child should be learning, and, in fact, aside from basic literacy skills, it is probably less important than many other things that parents could and should be teaching their children if they had the time.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
