Introducing the World

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"A baby needs not to be taught a trade, but to be introduced to the world." - G. K. Chesterton


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Curious George and Puppets, 2

I made good on my promise to make up puppet shapes while the ducklings were at Grandma's house this Tuesday. On Wednesday when they came home I told them everything was ready and they immediately abandoned all thoughts of whining for printed-out coloring papers (something I'd like to get away from) and headed downstairs.

I had hunted through the craft boxes my sister made for us and found feathers, pom-poms, scraps of fabric, felt, ribbons, lace, bits of fake fur, googly eyes, buttons. Having it all waiting on the table was definitely better than hunting it out on the spot; having a table where we could spread things out and leave it during meals really made the whole thing possible. I'm still working on the balance of collaborating with them (rather than either directing or just leaving them alone.) I did keep charge of the glue (was not satisfied with how either glue I used worked) and encouraged them to wait and try out what they wanted with everything rather than gluing one thing on immediately and then discovering later they wanted something else in that spot.

D2 came up with the idea of making fuzzy eyebrows by trimming fuzz off the pom-poms. He imitated D1 a lot but also had some of his own ideas. I really love the way D1 did hair on her puppets; I helped her make the braid for the red-haired one.

We worked for about an hour on Wednesday and another hour on Thursday. After we had made the first two puppets on the first day, I realized D2 still had no idea what they were for. I put my hand inside and had it say a few words, and he instantly lit up and they began taking the puppets around, naming them and talking with them. D1 had hers nod and shake its head rather than talk for it for awhile.

Next up: tonight we hope to do a puppet show.

Posted: 8:19 AM, Nov. 14, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

Curious George and Puppets

D1 has mentioned Curious George's puppet show several times since we got the book Curious George Goes to the Hospital. On Saturday morning, while we were out shopping, they apparently improvised puppets from socks and did a puppet show with the baby sitter. They kept talking about them.

I asked D1 if she would like to make puppets, and she agreed. I suggested she could draw what she wanted her puppets to look like. She got several small stuffed animals and traced around their shapes, then adding details for the kind of puppets she wanted.

Then I was searching online for ideas on making puppets (it was clear that she expected her hand to go inside, so stick puppets were out) and came across a very simple outline for a puppet shape. She immediately wanted it printed out and colored. About this point D2 woke up from his nap and wanted one, too, although he flipped out at even the slightest hint of suggestion as to what he could do with it. ("I will not make it look like ANY ANIMAL!!!!!")

D1 colored hers an assortment of colors and added a mane, saying it was a lion. D2 of course then wound up coloring a lion, too. I said while they were gone on Tuesday I would try to sew up some puppet shapes that they can then decorate (it's gotten cold and we will probably be inside a lot more this week.) We'll see how this goes--I'm still not sure how well I'm going to be able to extend a project long-term. I'm too eager to move on to new things.

We keep coming around to lions, too. Not only did they both color lion puppets, but they watched the lion videos again while D2 was having his hair cut and then played lions drinking from the water hole outside. Their desire to be lion hunters has been stymied by a lack of volunteering giraffes.

Posted: 5:29 AM, Nov. 11, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

Curious George and African Animals

So I'm playing with what we can do to expand interest in African animals sparked by Curious George.

We started last week with looking through some pictures on Earth Album. We decided to look for a monkey and found a picture that reminded us of Curious George, so we made a powerpoint page with him on it. D1 typed in "Curious George" and D2 typed the species name. (Actually I looked it up later and it was a chimpanzee. But it did look curious.)

Yesterday (Wednesday) I let them watch some footage from Africam. It was dark at the time so there wasn't much to watch on the live cams. Instead we watched some saved footage of a lion taking a drink. They noted the way it licked its lips as it drank. They then wanted to watch lions eating. I warned them that lions ate other animals, like giraffes, but they were still interested. They enjoyed it thoroughly. (Not bloodthirsty, exactly, but they're certainly not overly sensitive.)

I have a couple of books on hold about African animals and about the zoo--not sure which way those will go or if they will intersect. Their cousins did a fun project of making their own zoo; or of course making a model jungle would be fun, too. I think we have some pictures of animals they could use. The question is how to make them aware of the possibilities without taking over. I think first I'll help them compile a "building box" and then we'll talk about different things people have done so they can make their own plans.

Posted: 5:13 AM, Nov. 6, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

Cognitive Functions in the Learner/Teacher Interaction

Now that sounds like a dissertation title. Maybe it could be work for a dissertation, but I have no aspirations to a PhD, so I'll just blog about it.

We have long been familiar with the Myers-Briggs personality type system, but only recently have DOB and I begun to really comprehend the underlying cognitive functions originally defined by Jung. Here is a helpful website if you're not familiar with the terms.

For purposes of this post I'll just point out that there are two ways of perceiving information: intuition and sensing; and two ways of judging information: thinking and feeling. Each of those ways can then be expressed in a more introverted or extraverted manner, thus making eight possible functions. Everyone has a primary and a secondary function, one of which is a perceiving function and the other of which is a judging function, one of which is extraverted and one of which is introverted. (Everyone uses all the rest of the functions, too, but that's the important part for this discussion.)

Now, typing preschoolers is probably a bit iffy, but we know our children quite well and it seems pretty clear to us that D2's dominant function is introverted intuition (or Ni)--he's always off in his own little world, from which he returns with out-of-the-blue flashes of insight. It's harder to be sure what his secondary function is, but we think it's probably extraverted Thinking (Te), the ability to organize and marshall resources. D1's dominant function is clearly extraverted Feeling (Fe), the ability to interact and seek harmony with others; it seems likely her secondary function is Ni, as she also is prone to those sudden insights and not that responsive to step-by-step demonstrations (which would be more in line with an introverted sensing outlook, the other possibility).

That means I have two kids (and a husband) whose primary way of taking in data is through introverted intuition, a process that is utterly mysterious to an outsider. These are the kids who you show them a thing five thousand times--because they seem smart and you thought they were ready for it--and they DON'T GET IT. You give up. Then a month later you happen to pass them using that information or skill flawlessly. They do not respond well to external motivation. They don't like to be shown how to do things (though they do like to watch).

My primary function is extraverted intuition--I'm always bubbling over with new ideas for how we can do things. These ideas, I have observed, do not usually catch on very well right away. In fact, usually when I come up with something new I want to do right now! Come on! It's fun! I'm greeted with blank stares or wails of dismay. Plus I haven't yet thought through whatever it is, so things are not prepared and it doesn't work anyway.

This, I realize, is why the classic preschool activities do not work at all for us. They are dependent on Mother being able to carefully prepare and set out what is to be done, and they are dependent on children who are easily stimulated by what is set out in front of them.  Here is an extract of a day last week:
D1 and D2: "Can we do playdough today? You said we could do playdough today!"

QOC: "Oh yes, you can do playdough today. Go get it out." (Returns to puttering about on the internet, thinking about Christmas presents.)

D1 and D2 start setting up the playdough.

QOC: "Hey, what if we made our own salt dough. I mean it's playdough! Just like playdough! And we can mix it ourselves. Only we can roll it out and make Christmas ornaments with it."

D1 and D2: "Nooooo! You said we could do playdough! We want to do playdough! We can do that another day."

QOC: "Oh fine, do playdough. Hmm. We're almost out of salt."

D1 and D2 remain happily engrossed in playdough for two hours. QOC has twenty more ideas about potential Christmas presents.
For a similar reason, Montessori-style materials do not quite work--even though the ducklings love "projects" and beg to get them out. But I am no good at showing them a precise way to use something, and they are no good at following someone else's ideas of how things should be used. A basket full of jars to screw  and unscrew the lids on in precise order? Boring. A basket full of jars and another basket full of glass gems with which to work for an hour of "canning" like Little Sal's mother (this all being their own idea)? Engrossing.

So I'm intrigued by the potential of a more project-based approach--especially at this age. Free play is supposed to be the order of the day, but even free play needs stimulation of new ideas, a variety of materials (with guidance on how to use them properly), and a feeling of purpose and value. There's a need for something "more" in our days, especially with winter coming (though even outside there are moments of dullness when they start climbing all over me and the babies or squabbling), and it's not Letter of the Week with Matching Snack. That's not our style.

What works best--what I want to see more of--is for me to spend time simply observing and analyzing them (that's my secondary function, introverted thinking--Ti). Then I have an "aha!", a thought of something that would enhance and enrich their play and learning. Here's the tricky part: Instead of inflicting it on them right away, I want to move toward then analyzing that idea, working the bugs out (give my Ti a little more time to work), and transforming it into a simple provocation of a new arrangement of available materials or an offer of a new activity that can be done at any time in the future. (Usually they respond well if given plenty of advance warning.)

I'm also working on using their interests better instead of, at times, fighting them because they don't fit my scheme. I'm not too bad at this, but there are a couple of areas that have bugged me. One is D1's obsession with cooking. Every toy--every toy--becomes either something to cook with or something to cook. And then everything gets dumped together instead of being in nice separate containers and I cannot find a single wooden spoon or the pasta pot. Well, instead of fighting this, I'm going to give her more materials that are meant to be dipped and poured and stirred. And maybe we could tie it in to her budding interest in writing by giving her some recipe cards? And, of course, I should be giving her a larger role in real cooking--not just stirring the dish, but learning to measure properly. (D2 has some interest here, too, but I would say D1 is the driver.)

Similarly they love Curious George, which doesn't quite fit my standards for Excellent Children's Literature. Still, it's not awful, and there are quite a lot of directions you can go with Curious George, who tries to do all sorts of interesting thing. Right now we're just looking up more about jungle animals.

Looking back, this is something I have done in some ways instinctively, and it is always the way things have worked best. It sounds a lot like my earlier fantasies of how I wanted to homeschool. I've been leaning pretty strongly towards Charlotte Mason purism for awhile, but I'm feeling more comfortable with the idea of loosening up and using her (wonderful!) insights in a way that works for us.

I'm still not quite certain how Charlotte Mason and project-based learning will interact--they have some strong similarities in core philosophy and look almost totally different in outworking. A common factor that will be key both ways is the setting out of ideas before the children and then giving them time and opportunity to ponder and interact in their own ways. And there's still time to develop that, to blend the different flavors into our own unique homeschooling stew. After all, we've still got almost two years before "formal school" is even supposed to start.

Posted: 7:14 AM, Nov. 4, 2008		 Comments (3) | Add Comment | Link

Some Ideas With Resonance

Project-based learning.

Making art more accessible.

Juxtaposition

Organization

Yesterday we cleaned and reorganized the basement to make a play/work area and an art area. Now, how to arrange and supply the materials.

What do I have? How can I use it better?

What interests the children?

What do I need/want to do that I can involve them with?

How do I balance/intersect giving them ownership/following their interests with discipling/leading them in the way they should go?

Posted: 7:40 AM, Oct. 31, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did, October 1-November 3

Bible: King David, King Solomon, Elijah

Memory: Psalm 1, review of books of Bible learned so far, started Psalm 100.

Hymn: "Now Thank We All Our God," then we switched to "We Plow The Fields and Scatter" which was more fun and tied in more to our gardening.

Poetry: Just some random different reads, Mother Goose, etc.

Stories:
We went on a circus kick
Peter Spier's Circus: DOB thinks this is one of the most fascinating books ever, and the ducklings seem to agree. What goes on in the big ring and behind the scenes, start to finish, in a circus.
If I Ran the Circus, by Dr. Seuss: But of course.
To the Big Top, by Jill Esbaum: This gave us the flavor of the circus from the viewer's side, instead of the performer's. I found the overuse of vintage sayings a little tiresome, but on the whole it was a pretty good read.
Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert: Fascinating artwork and inspiration for some of our own.
Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, by Betsy MacDonald: Our first chapter book! I thought this would be a good place to start, since the chapters stand alone rather than having a complex plot. They thought it was hilarious.
Little House in the Big Woods, by Laura Ingalls: When we started this I thought--this will never work. It's mostly about 19th-century food preservation techniques. They love it. They love to find out how things are done. The only thing that could make it more fascinating would be if she described the outhouse in detail. D1 likes to play she is Mary (being the oldest) but D2 refuses to be Laura. I'd better get to Farmer Boy soon.
Curious George Flies a Kite, Curious George Takes a Job, by Margaret and H. A. Rey. I've decided to give up fighting Curious George and instead milk it.
The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind, Heather Forest. This has really weird illustrations, and the retelling is not my favorite, but D2 latched onto it and so we have read it several times.

Activities
Digging up the backyard and building garden beds. This has been my project, but they have really enjoyed it. They like to play the trenches are their houses or try to walk down the narrower ones.
Making a "Leaf Man" from gathered leaves and sticks. (The perfect art activity! No supplies, no mess, no cleanup, no storage.)
Planting garlic
Organizing the basement
Dressing up as the Cat-in-the-Hat characters.
Looking up jungle animal pictures online and finding one that looked like Curious George; creating a powerpoint slide about it.

Observations
D1 continues to work very hard on writing. She can almost write the entire alphabet in order--she still has trouble with J, K, N, and Z. She writes everyone's name and is beginning to sound out other words. She wrote a long letter to D2 and told me what it said. I need to make her some small books and get out lined paper for her to have another variation. I also need to organize the supplies so it's more accessible and give her a place to keep her papers so there is a defined limit. She draws more houses and people and also lovely geometric designs.
D1 also has striking insights on math and spacial relationships. She observes things like, "Half of the family are dressed." We then had an interesting time arranging pieces of apple and glass gems at breakfast in halves and thirds.
D2 is enjoying block construction even more and can get very absorbed in it; he made a bed and jungle trees.
D2 can draw some basic shapes and combines them into lovely designs.
D2 also asked to learn to crack eggs. We're still working on it. They both have helped more in the kitchen; I have split up the chores so I can work with them more one-on-one and attitudes and skills are gradually improving.

Posted: 6:58 AM, Oct. 22, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did, September 3-30

Bible: Joshua, Judges, now working through I Samuel up to David and Saul.

Memory: Psalm 1, Books of Moses, History, Poetry.

Hymn: The Bible Stands, but it hasn't gone over very well and I'm not too excited about it. I may move on to a Thanksgiving selection.

Poetry: Halfway Down, by A. A. Milne. Now it's caught on. We've also read a few other poems here and there, especially ones about pirates, and Edward Lear's "Pelican Chorus," and I think Mother Goose has been out a time or two.

Stories:
Doctor De Soto, by William Steig. Continuing on the doctor theme. It took them awhile to get this one, but they did eventually catch on.

The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies, Beatrix Potter (a few others earlier in the month, too, I think)

Peter Spier's Fast-Slow, High-Low: Not a story, but a lot of fun to look through and discuss.

Rooster's Off to See the World, Eric Carle. Also several Eric Carle matching books.

Two of Everything, Lily Toy Hong. Not a profound folk tale, just a fun little story. This one had them running around yelling "humble little hut," and "bamboo furniture."

Put Me in the Zoo, by Robert Lopshire. The guy with spots.

Animals Born Alive and Well, by Ruth Heller. A rather cool, if rhyming, book about mammals. We had a good discussion off of this one.

And some old favorites: Curious George, Henry the Explorer, A Birthday for Frances, Boats on the River (Which has spawned a forbidden game of pretending one is the river coming down from the mountains to the sea--by leaping off the back of the couch.)

Activities
Watching our wedding video, which triggered a little discussion on family history. (Also much excitement over getting to watch a real movie at last!)
Drawing around themselves and then adding clothes and faces--we did this out on the driveway with chalk, which both allows for much more numerous tracings and eliminates the need for storage. Far superior to butcher paper.
We had a windstorm and resulting 37-hour power outage, which resulted in a lot of play with flashlights and some basic instruction in fire safety.
Building houses with the downed limbs from the storm
Dressing up as pirates and going on a treasure hunt (done with photos of different locations around the house.)
Watercolors, especially with D1.
Snakes and Ladders
Picture sorting with D2.
Visited Eden Park, overlooking the Ohio River. We watched barges and riverboats; they climbed a hill in the woods with Papa, and we fed the ducks.
Acting out "The Three Billy Goats Gruff" with an old board propped up outside.

Observations
D1 has started painting recognizable objects, such as flowers, even copying a vine with flowers I had painted. She is also coloring and painting designs of different shapes: small squares within larger squares, for example.
D1 continues to copy letters. She got out the Eric Carle matching books (one word per page) and copied numerous words out of them.
We had one lesson in word-building with the magnets one afternoon. She is getting closer to grasping word-blending but still isn't ready to make the leap yet. D2 is quite good at picking sounds out of words.
D2 is making solid improvement in governing his tendency to melt down over small difficulties and ask for help instead. D1 is doing well at obeying instructions (at least ones having to do with doing helpful jobs) with a cheerful, "Yes, Mama."
D2 can handle climbing on bars well. He is doing fairly well at dressing himself when I am feeling up to requiring him to do it or when he forgets that he wants help.
When playing Snakes and Ladders, D1 was making observations on how many she would have had to have rolled to land on a different square.

Posted: 12:53 PM, Sep. 30, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did, August 21-September 2

Bible: Finished the Law, moved into Joshua.

Memory: Psalm 1; Books of the Law and History. (They love the song that goes with those.)

Hymn: The Bible Stands

Poetry: Halfway Down, by A. A. Milne (But we haven't done it much. Our review of these has not been very organized the past couple of weeks.)

Song: Skip to My Lou. (Woohoo! Dancing! I got a book of dancing games. We'll see if I can learn a few and which ones are appropriate for only two children.)

Stories:
Richard Scarry's Please and Thank You Book. I forget what particular offense triggered it, but I got on a bit of a good manners kick. This has some very well-received stories in it, and helpful lessons beyond mere table manners.
What Do You Say Dear? What Do You Do Dear?, by Sesyle Joslin. My favorite manners books ever. Just so you know what to do if you ever meet a baby elephant.
Doctor Ted, Andrea Beaty. If you have small children who like to pretend, you will love this book. And so will they. "You have gingivitis. You need a full-body cast." (Alas, there doesn't seem to be a sequel--at least not yet.)
A Trip to the Doctor, A Trip to the Dentist, by Margot Linn. We did both during the past two weeks, so I got some books to go along with it. Now, of course, they are playing doctor and dentist, too.
Each Peach Pear Plum, Janet and Allen Allberg. I had no idea what this book was, and I'm afraid half the characters are still unfamiliar to them, but they still love it. D1 likes to "read" it to the babies.

Activities:
Went to the park--all by ourselves! That was more of a milestone for me than for them. D2 made it to the potty twice while we were there, despite having to wait for a break in the nursing.
Visited the doctor and the dentist.
D1 helped me bake cookies and then we all had a tea party, with some emphasis on good manners.
I gave them some extra envelopes and boxes so that they could play "mail," which they have been doing quite a bit.
Went to a family gathering for Labor Day; they spent the whole time in the sandbox. We really should get them a sandbox. I'd have to spend a lot of time brushing sand out of their hair, but it might be easier than scraping mud off their legs.

Observations:
Just when I was getting ready to post that it was pointless to teach the sounds of the letters first as D2 was simply learning them as arbitrary names, he figured it out. One evening at the supper table he said, "Hey, 'p'-'papa,' 'p'-'person'." Since then he's been going around spouting beginning sounds as well as making up rhyming sentences: "I saw some chalk and it could walk." He likes to play a game where I'll tell him something like, "There are three things that begin with /k/ on the table," and he'll spot, "c-cucumber, c-carrot, c-cutting board." D1 plays, too.
D1 continues with copying letters and learning to spell words, though she still doesn't quite hear the blend of the whole word. She copied the brand name off the shoebox they were playing "mail" with several times.
D1 can skip.
D2 likes to climb on things and stand on the edges

Posted: 5:33 AM, Sep. 3, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

Thinking About Next Year

I had an idea last week. No, I had an Idea last week. The first glow has worn off, though, and I'm trying to consider whether it is truly a good one or not.

What I'm thinking of doing is spending next year (2009-2010) doing a series of units on various countries with D1 and D2. (Hmm, it already looks less shiny in print.) They'll be 5 and 4.

Here are the arguments against:

1. I really don't believe in formal lessons for children under 6. Cardinal Charlotte Mason rule! DOB asks, "Why 6?" and I concede that this is just an average based on overall development and undoubtedly some children are ready sooner. But I also notice that every mother thinks her children are the exception. The ducklings are quite bright, but they're not child prodigies and they are (as documented here) learning an amazing amount without any plotting on my part at all. So why mess with what's working?

2. I don't like unit studies. At least, I don't like the contrived connections that are often associated with unit studies.

3. I can't stand those insipid multicultural holiday lessons that are now obligatory kindergarten fare, teaching us that all people deep down are the same in that they like to dress up and overeat. One thing we would learn if we really tried to understand other cultures is that they all are more interested in teaching their children their own culture than other people's.

So, back to the reasons that made the idea bright and shiny in the first place:

1. D1 and D2 love talking about travel. Imaginary trips to Taiwan, India, and California form a major part of their play. The idea was sparked by D1's request to know what people ate in India. They also love cooking (or pretending to cook) and dressing up. Reading about various countries, making a few dishes and perhaps coming up with costumes would be right up their alley.

2. D1 has been begging me to do school for some time. I have promised her we will do school at least a few days a week next year. Admittedly, her ideas on school are vague: When I asked what she wanted to learn at school, she came up with a list covering everything from "opening the windows" to "climbing onto the fridge to get down D2's snack." So I could foist absolutely anything off on her and call it "school." Of course, she might be more savvy by next year.

3. It's not really going to be formal. Reading stories, doing an occasional craft, cooking together; we already do all those things. It's more that our informal activities will follow a sequence and a plan and I'll be better prepared. If D1 seems ready for it I'll toss in a little phonics and writing instruction and call it good.

4. It's not going to be contrived. We'll only study things that naturally flow together. We don't have to hit every subject yet anyway. So if science or math or whatever come up naturally from the books we read, more power to them. If not, we can ignore them.

5. I'm not going to be teaching a vague sort of cultural equivalency. We'll enjoy stories from or about different countries, but we'll also be talking about missionaries in those countries. (Thus implying--gasp!--that we don't think all religions are equal.)

And on the other hand again:

1. Will I be spoiling their fun by making lessons out of it? I have been a homeschooled kid, and so I know all too well how powerful the homeschooling mother's instinct is to destroy all the fun in a thing by turning it into an educational opportunity.

2. If I really believe children should start by learning their own culture, shouldn't I start there?

3. Lesson planning is like crack for me. Am I really doing this for my fun or theirs? Will I get too entranced with my own plans and not be sensitive to when I'm pushing too much?

4. I THINK life will be a little less hectic next year, but am I keeping in mind that I will have two toddlers? I generally find young toddlers harder to take care of than newborns.

Well, for now I'm going to continue with making my plans. It's addicting. And I can always ditch them if they won't work next year. One benefit to the "Oooh! Shiny new idea!" personality is that there are always new shiny new ideas and thus one never gets too attached to the old ones.

The general plan will be to choose countries for which we have good books to read and/or personal contacts. We'll read a story or two and look at some books with pictures of the country itself. (And there's always Earth Album.) We will, of course, look at a map and probably print one out and color one. (We love maps!) If we know someone who's spent a lot of time in that country, we can ask them to tell us about it. If we know missionaries in that country, we will read their prayer letters and pray for them.

Then, if possible and interested, we'll prepare a meal from the country and perhaps do a related craft; or we could just cut and paste pictures of that country into a little book. (DOB could help with this plan by taking me out to eat at appropriate ethnic restaurants in advance. I'm just saying. It's good for dads to be involved.)

If I decide to do handwriting instruction with D1 (likely anyway, as she can already print most capital letters and loves tracing letters), she can label a map with the country name and short things like that.

I don't figure on spending more than an hour on two or three days in the week. (Well, cooking might take longer, but we have to eat anyway.)

If I keep my focus on supplying them with new ideas and materials and let them run with them or not as it suits them, I should be able to avoid being the maternal killjoy.

Speaking of shiny, check out these cool squidoo lenses on geography: General, China, Japan, Mexico.

Posted: 5:16 AM, Sep. 2, 2008		 Comments (1) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did, August 1-20

Bible: Exodus and Numbers (up through Moses striking the rock the second time).

Hymn: Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us

Memory: Psalm 23

Poetry: Little, by Dorothy Aldis

Song: Baa, Baa Black Sheep

Stories:
Samuel Eaton's Day, Sarah Morton's Day, Tapenum's Day This series is the type of book I am always looking for: a great deal of information about real life to satisfy their curiosity, woven into a good story to bear repeated readings. Another great thing about this series is the attitude of each of the children toward their work, their parents, and the other adults in the community.

The Little Airplane, The Little Auto, Policeman Small, Papa Small, by Lois Lenski. I wish I could find a modern equivalent to these. I will admit the writing is a little over-simple. However, the combination of information in a story line is again what captures the ducklings' interest. And the information is not so simple; The Little Airplane in particular is so technical I have trouble following it, but they ask for it again and again.

The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Hungry Bear, by Don Wood. Adorable and hilarious. Also, since half the story is in words and half is in pictures, it's great to stop and discuss what is happening, how the characters will feel and how the story will play out. This is supposedly an important factor in reading aloud, but I always want to stick to reading the story.

Mr. Putter and Tabby Stir the Soup, Mr. Putter and Tabby Feed the Fish. by Cynthia Rylant. Early readers that we are just reading for fun now. Not quite Frog and Toad, but still very enjoyable.

Dr. Seuss's ABC. I've had to find a compromise position with using the letter names, because some books just don't work with sounds alone.

Activities
Watching road work (our neighborhood is having its gas lines replaced).
We managed a couple of trips to our neighborhood park and one lovely evening in Sharon Woods while Wondergirl was still here.
Amazingly, I've even managed trips to the backyard in the mornings solo. It requires careful orchestration, but it can be done. They've gotten good and muddy, scraped, and bug-bitten, as befits children in August.
Rubber stamps.
D1 is obsessed with the coloring book a neighbor gave her.
We tried making some mobiles last week. There's a reason I don't try ambitious craft projects very often.
On the other hand, D1 and I had a great time making silly hats. Maybe I should stick to craft projects as a one-on-one activity.
Pattern blocks (they've really enjoyed these).
D2 worked on puzzles matching numerals and one matching different shades of butterflies.
D1 visited their great-grandfather in the hospital, and they both went to see him at the nursing home on his birthday.

Observations
D1 can (finally!) pedal D2's tricycle. D2 still rides it with his feet on the ground.
They are pulling ideas out of books or life and into their play much more readily now. It's very fun to watch them shift from policemen to surgeons in the hospital to shark-watching divers.
I commented one morning that we were all together, just the six of us, and D1 observed, "We can be in rows of three, or two, or one."
She also made a comment on D2's counting that made me realize she now expects repeated countings of the same objects to come up with the same answer.
D2 is counting accurately groups up to five or so. He does his job of sorting the silverware much more readily if I give him specific numbers of different items to look for.
D1 talks a lot about what is true versus not true. We have encouraged her to allow for the category of silly, where everyone knows it is not true.

Posted: 5:50 AM, Aug. 20, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did, July 2008

Bible: Jacob and Esau through the Israelites in the wilderness. My Bible plan for the year is working great--I'm glad I took the time to break it down week by week, and it's been easy to adapt on the fly if we can't do all four stories in a week. We have continuity, but we're also moving along and not getting bogged down.

Hymn: "Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us"

Memory:  Psalm 23

Poetry: "Little," by Dorothy Aldis (About a new baby)

Stories:
The Duchess Bakes a Cake, by Virginia Kahl. This has grown from a passing interest to an obsession. In fact, they both can recite nearly the entire book verbatim, including the list of all thirteen children's names, right down to baby Gunhilde.
Bored--Nothing to Do! by Peter Spier. How they can build an airplane, fly it, clean it all up and still get sent to bed early always mystifies me, but the ducklings are not concerned about such details.
Rachel and Obadiah by Brinton Turkle. I always loved the Obadiah books, and now D1 does, too. Lovely stories about very real children in old Nantucket.
Samuel Eaton's Day, by Kate Waters. We have been looking at books about "a long time ago" (early America). This is a great series with photos from Plymouth Plantation. I appreciate Samuel's eagerness to work hard with the men.
1001 Things to Spot On the Farm and Long Ago, from Usborne. These play right into their current counting obsession, and keep D2 very happily occupied on the potty.
Ten Apples Up On Top, by Dr. Seuss. More counting! In fact, on the last page you can count up to 120 by ones or by tens.
Little Black Sambo, by Helen Bannerman. Well, it is a great story, despite the character names. This is another one that has been memorized.

Activities:
Wading pool
Fingerpainting
D1 spent one blissful night at VBS; D2 very politely asked to come home instead. He's not too thrilled with crowds.
They each have spent one morning at the office with DOB, in addition to their usual trips with him to the grocery store and the library. Also they are going once a month to the bank and D1 gets to help withdraw her allowance (in pennies) and then she and DOB work together to divide it in the appropriate categories.
Drew road signs on the driveway and rode bikes.
I let them each type a little: D1 and I sounded out family names, D2 and I looked for individual letters.
Made a "lovely light luscious delectable cake" just like the Duchess. We decided a hummingbird cake would be the best approximation.

Observations:
D2 is making considerable progress with potty training and mostly enjoying it. It is so much easier to work with an almost 3-year-old.
Both the big kids are doing a great job with chores: clearing and setting the table, unloading the dishwasher, helping with the babies, cleaning up their room regularly (after some help from Wondergirl to get it better organized). D1 is learning how to rinse and stack the dishes after breakfast so that I will be able to load them later. She also had a lesson in sweeping.
They have a new bed with a ladder, and they are both navigating it well.
They have memorized the first part of their address.
The babies are eating well, sleeping tolerably well, and D4 astonished us and horrified himself by rolling over three times.

Posted: 6:53 AM, Jul. 30, 2008		 Comments (1) | Add Comment | Link

Hands-Free Homeschooling

I know, it's hands-on education that is the wave of the future. But my hands are going to be very full for the next year, feeding two babies. A lot of things that are simple to do with a baby on one arm can't be done at all with two.

So I greatly appreciated it when my sister suggested that I make a list of things to recite with, sing to, or otherwise practice with the older ducklings  that I didn't need my hands available to do. Specifically, they have to be things I already know myself by heart, so I don't have to look them up in order to do them with the kids. It doesn't make for a grand or well-organized scheme, but the list provided plenty of things suitable for preschoolers to do during nursing sessions for the next several months.

I made a list with several categories:

Bible Passages (also books of the Bible)
Hymns
Poetry
Useful Information: full name and address, telephone numbers, etc.
Counting: 1-20 (they need a lot of work on the 'teens, but they love to count), 20-100, backwards, eventually skip counting
Folk songs

My goal is to have something going in each category and make sure we run through the list at least once a day, preferably in the morning. I may write the current selections out on a chalkboard I keep in the living room where I can see it if I forget. When they seem pretty familiar with current selections, we can move on--I don't require recitation at this age, but when they start chanting their story books after a few readings, it seems a shame not to give them a wide variety of ideas to chew on.

A lot of this is stuff I might do without having a formal plan when my brain is functioning better, but at this point I need all the help I can get. The older ducklings have really enjoyed having some special activities while the babies are eating.

Posted: 1:52 PM, Jul. 29, 2008		 Comments (1) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did, June 2008

Bible: Genesis 1-24 (Creation through Isaac). So far we've kept on track with my Bible reading schedule and it's been working well.

Hymn: Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us

Memory: Nothing, except reciting the Lord's Prayer every day at breakfast.

Poetry: Nothing consistent, but some from different books.

Stories: The Three Billy Goats Gruff, by Tim Arnold. Ad infinitum.

Tool Box, by Gail Gibbons. Just a nice little book about tools and what they do.

On the Go, by Ann Morris. Lots of pictures about how different people travel in different places.

Can You Find It Inside? from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I must lodge my usual protest against the compulsion to write children's books in tacky couplets. But I love the paintings chosen for this book. Some of them are downright funny, like the father horrified at the price tag for his daughter's new bonnet.

Olly and Me, by Shirley Hughes. Of course we love anything with these two. Surprisingly, it's a collection of free verse poems and the kindergarten version of first-person essays, a different topic on each page, which makes a nice change from a standard storybook.

Big Like Me, by Anna Grossnickle Hines. We all enjoyed this depiction of the big brother showing his baby sister new things as she grows up from a newborn to a toddler. Now if we just could get these babies born to practice on . . .

The Duchess Bakes a Cake, by Virginia Kahl. OK, so this is one of those books that silly rhyming couplets belong in. Because it is very, very silly. D1 enjoys it very much.

Petunia the Silly Goose Stories, by Roger Duvoisin. On the upper edge of their attention span and written with pretty obvious morals, but still quite fun.

Activities:
Birthday party for D1, who is now officially 4. (And going to be 5 next June.)
Swimming in the backyard.
Waiting for babies to be born.
Blowing bubbles and drinking through straws. (Combination of fun and speech therapy, which is hardly necessary but Grandma is a speech therapist and worries about them setting good models for the twins.)
Gluing and decorating foam dolls. I was surprised how much they enjoyed this; they both worked more than an hour without a whimper of frustration, which I usually expect with any sort of art materials, including crayons and playdough.
Visited Parky's Farm and watched the animals.
Trips to the grocery store and the library.
Acting out The Three Billy Goats Gruff.

Observations:
According to Grandma, D2 is making some progress with potty training, but we have not yet tried to translate it to home.
They both enjoy big numbers (20-99) even though they are not always entirely clear on how to get there.
They have been helping more than ever with the household chores. D1 often sets the table without even being asked and D2 is learning how to sort the silverware into the drawer.
D1 can stand on one leg without support and is getting better at jumping with both feet simultaneously.

Posted: 4:31 AM, Jun. 30, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

Lowercase vs. Capitals

Before D1 started learning her letters, I was quite convinced that the proper procedure was to teach lowercase letters first. The shapes are more distinct and the letters are more common. Words written in lowercase are easier to distinguish. All perfectly logical.

Although lowercase letters are more common in the world at large, I soon discovered that letters large enough to get the attention of a toddler are almost always capitals: fallen Scrabble tiles, book titles, signs. I compromised by teaching her both together.

Then she started teaching herself to write. Ninety percent of the letters she writes are capitals. For one thing, more capitals consist entirely of straight lines, which are much easier for her to write. She recognizes lowercase letters just fine, but she only writes a few that way (mostly in writing her name).

My sister brought me some mementos she found when cleaning out the house, among which was a letter I wrote at the age of four. Sure enough, it's in all capitals. I know I recognized lowercase letters, because I learned to read from ordinary picture books about that time.

So now D2 is learning his letters, even more randomly than his sister did. Once again, he's picking out the capitals sooner than the lowercase. The only alternative seems to be artificially limiting his environment and learning opportunities so that he only gets exposed to information in the "correct" order.

Posted: 1:51 PM, Jun. 18, 2008		 Comments (1) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did: May 2008

Bible: We have done a few stories in Acts, but we're really doing badly here. Our traditional reading method (finding the appropriate story picture in their own picture Bibles) is getting too labor-intensive for me to handle right before naptime. I have a beautiful Bible reading schedule for the next year that starts on Monday, so we'll see if I can figure out a way to do it. I feel like we haven't had closure with our last read-through, though.

Memory: ABC verse book, through I: "If ye ask anything in my name, I will do it."

Poetry: Some Mother Goose here and there.

Hymn: "Savior, Like a Shepherd Lead Us"

Books:
The Elves and the Shoemaker, illustrated by Margaret Walty
The Shepherd's Song, illustrated by Julia Miner
Make Way for Ducklings, Robert McCloskey
Cowboy Small, Lois Lenski
Mostly whatever repeats the children have begged me to reserve from the library. I haven't come up with any bright new ideas. I have also been telling them stories extemporaneously: Three Little Pigs and Three Billy Goats Gruff.

The Princess and the Painter, Jane Johnson. As picture story books on paintings go, I was impressed by this one. It's about the real people behind the painting, and there's a print of the actual painting (not just the illustrator's impression of it) in the back. D1 especially enjoyed it. I'd been reading about Velazquez art, so it was a good fit.

Activities:
Playing in the backyard, watching birds feed their babies, picking up worms, learning NOT to eat mushrooms (I hope!) but experimenting with wild strawberries.
Playing cowboys and firemen--er, firepeople. (We have a fireboy, a firegirl, and sometimes I am the firemama.)
Cutting straws. They both seem to have the right scissor position down.
We finally got down to try out the new jungle gym at the park a few times. (Now that I can't walk that far, we have to wait for just the right opportunity.) It has steps, for which I am profoundly grateful. No more spending my days giving boosts.
D1 was chatting with me about everybody's age this morning, so I printed her out a hundreds chart and she colored in different squares. I'm really trying to work with her on getting her numbers between 10 and 20 straight.
D2 is getting a little bit of potty training at Grandma's house. She plans to do an intensive effort sometime after the twins arrive.

Observations:
D2 is starting to come into his own a bit with climbing and other large-motor activities. He needs more chances to do it, though.
D1 is working very hard to teach herself how to write (sometimes on inappropriate surfaces, but that's a separate issue.) She will ask us to spell out whole words for her. She's also obsessed with making cards for people.
D2 is developing a deep interest in people's feelings, which makes reading books a little more challenging. "Why is the dog frightened?" "He's not frightened, he's sad." "Why is he sad?" "Because he didn't win the first prize." "Why didn't he win the first prize?" And so forth, until we turn the next page, where no doubt some new trauma is mirrored on some character's face

Posted: 5:42 AM, May. 31, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

Preschool Checkup

It occurred to me today, flipping through the parenting magazines at the doctor's office (I never take books out with me because I'm so bad at leaving things behind) that D1 has now officially missed her first year of preschool. She'll be four next month. So I felt the urge to discover what she should have been learning instead of staying at home playing with her little brother and watching her mother throw up.

World Book has a list of Curriculum Standards for Preschool. I'm not going to duplicate them all, just consider ones that stick out as particularly noteworthy. I would also point out that this list doesn't distinguish between three and four year olds, so this is the list for next year, too.

Size/Colors and Shapes/Numbers
Most of these skills (distinguish "big" and "little"?) seem more like toddler skills to me; anyway, she certainly knew colors and shapes and sizes by the time she was two, let alone four. Counting by rote was easy, too. Counting with one to one correspondence is something she's mastered much more recently, but she's really taken off with it and is starting to apply it to the beginnings of addition and subtraction. We do a lot of math at the breakfast table, counting how many pieces of fruit or pancake are on the plate, how many we're eating, how many are left. We also play games.

Reading Readiness
Do we read? Why yes, we do. Letter sounds aren't even on this list; I guess that goes with kindergarten. The only areas where she still has a problem is with left-to-right progression (at least, when she writes she's almost as likely to go one way as the other) and with writing her name--the two letters at the end are still not something she's very confident in writing. She knows perfectly well how to spell it, though, and she's practicing hard.

I do wonder if I should work more on the left/right thing but I also think it likely she'll grow out of it. That or I'll just start teaching her Hebrew.

Position and Direction / Time
I can't say I would have thought of these as school skills, but I'm pretty sure she knows up and down and day and night. (D2 does too, but he always thinks he can rearrange the world for his convenience.)

Listening and Sequencing
Well, she listens carefully to SOME things. Like most children she suffers from selective hearing at times . . .

Motor Skills
This is without doubt our weakest point. However, I'm impressed with how she's developed over the past few months. She is starting to jump well, and learning to stand on one foot. She loves to show it off. She's also just learned how to button her own coat, and therefore insists on wearing that coat even though it's far too warm.

I can't believe 5 piece puzzles are the standard for preschool. D2, let alone D1, can do 20 piece puzzles. I'm guessing this is bare minimum rather than average, though. D1 has figured out (or copied from DOB) the strategy of starting with the edges on jigsaw puzzles.

She loves cutting with scissors and is starting to be able to cut out strips of paper (she found some striped old wrapping paper to do it on last week.) She can draw, but she's terribly uptight about it. Most of the time she'd rather try to write letters, where the goal is well-defined.

Social Development
She handles two overnights a week at Grandma's house with no qualms (she'll hardly talk to us while she's there: "Hello! I'm at Grandma's house! See you later! Bye!") so I think she's sufficiently independent. (More so than I would like, perhaps, but that's the only way I've survived this pregnancy.)
Just when we had her trained to flush the toilet every time, our toilet started hanging and we're trying to teach her to NOT flush so we can go in and make sure it doesn't get stuck. Such is life. Other than that she's pretty independent with the toilet.
We are working VERY hard on crossing streets and parking lots safely, even without an adult hand, as all available adult hands are about to be filled. They're doing great.
I do want to teach them their address and my cell phone number, but I need to be more consistent about practicing. She at least knows our street name and it's not a very long street.
She's never asked to go to school, but she begs to go to Sunday school.
She is a big help around the house with both her regular chores and unexpected Mama-can't-stand-another-second chores.

So I think she is doing all right. On top of this, she knows a whole lot about pregnancy and prenatal development, from the timing of morning sickness (when the babies are "teeny-tiny") to the need for special care of babies who are born early. She loves to look up locations, from stories, songs, or conversation, on the map and can locate us (at least within North America) on a world map. She has memorized numerous Bible verses, some poems, lots of story books, and is familiar with many folk songs and several hymns. She can find things to do to keep herself occupied for several hours.

I don't think she's missed out on too much, except on the latest social life and entertainment preferences among preschool girls, and I think that's something just as well left alone.

Posted: 8:37 AM, May. 6, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did: April 2008

Bible: Working through Acts, very slowly. Pentecost, Stephen, Saul's conversion, etc.

Hymn: We've been trying to do "This is My Father's World," but not very consistently. I'm too tired to sing during our usual story time.

Memory Work: Bible ABC book, starting letter H, "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, He restoreth my soul."

Poetry: The Mother Goose books have resurfaced and they have been enjoying them. D1 gets the full-size one and D2 the board book and they hunt through for matching pages.

Books:
Pelle's New Suit, Elsa Beskow
Make Way for Ducklings, Robert McCloskey
Reprise from last spring, but definitely worthy of being re-read every spring. Many times.
Who is in the Garden? Vera Rosenberry
Jack's Garden, Henry Cole: We did these last spring, too, but this spring they really got into it, especially D2. I think it's helping us open our eyes to the things we can see in our garden.
The Tale of the Little, Little Old Woman, Elsa Beskow: The same story as the Wee Little Woman by Byron Barton book that we have gotten in the past. I like the pictures better in this version, but the ending of the story better in Barton's. A fun, brief folk tale good for very young children either way.
The Pea Blossom, Amy Lowry Poole: Adapted from Hans Christian Andersen. Love the illustrations, and it's a great story as well.

Activities:
Playing in the mud, playing with the rocks, playing in the pool. Digging, throwing, climbing, pushing, pulling, riding.
A little bit of planting and weeding.
We met a neighbor who grows all sorts of different things; we look forward to visiting his yard throughout the summer (and gratefully accept his surplus plants!)
Watching worms, birds, cats, rabbits. D2 had a little apprehension about birds on the ground in the yard but seems to be getting over it. He doesn't like things that move unexpectedly.
Grandma's cat had kittens, which they were excited to see and hold. D2 was under the impression that the Mama cat eats the kittens; we tried to explain that that's how she carries them but I'm not sure he got it.
Moving furniture and hauling books to get ready for the babies' coming.

Observations:
D1 is working pretty steadily at teaching herself to write. Not only is she learning how to copy different letters, she can write most or all of her name (and everyone else in the family's) now, and one morning she showed us how she had sounded out "CAT" and written it on her magna doodle (a wonderful invention, btw). She wrote it backwards, though. Then she proceeded to do "dog" the same way. I'm trying to find the right level of interference; some of her letters she forms from the bottom up or otherwise strangely. She's very obsessed with doing things "right," though. (That's probably why she prefers learning letters to drawing.) I may continue giving her occasional pages of dotted letters from here--she loves tracing letters--and showing her formation if she is interested.
D1 is also increasing balance and likes to show off standing on one leg or trying to hop.
D2 is full-fledgedly into the little-boy obsession with parking cars. He can spend hours lining them up on the couch--do all little boys go through this phase? On the other hand, he's entering into imaginative games more all the time. He still likes pointing out letters he knows, but I haven't noticed him picking up that many new ones.
D1 is starting to make sense of simple addition and subtraction. D2 is beginning to grasp what counting is for and understand numbers larger than three.

Posted: 6:51 AM, Apr. 29, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

What We Did, Mid-Late March 2008

Bible: Last Supper, Arrest, Crucifixion, Resurrection and post-Resurrection appearances.

Hymn: Christ Arose!

Memory Work:  Now working on F--Romans 3:23. D1 is always eager to start reading a new verse, but D2 takes a little longer to really know them well.

Poetry: When We Were Very Young, a new poem and an old poem every day. They are actually requesting poems besides "Disobedience"! The one about the toy soldier was very popular.

Books:
Millions of Cats: One of those nice old classics that can rely on an excellent story and clever drawings instead of garish colors. The climax might be a little gruesome for some, but that sort of thing (millions of cats apparently eating each other up) never fazes the ducklings. Great book. It served us well through the flu.
God Gave Us Two: Yes, it is rather sappy, and I have to edit out a too-obvious reference to new-sibling-angst, but they have two babies. So this one has been requested over and over. I suppress my desire to comment that actually papa polar bears have nothing to do with the rest of the family and mama polar bears kick out the big baby when the little ones come along, not to mention that they would all be eating seals and caribou rather than making friends with them. Why this annoys me when Beatrix Potter's don't, I'm not sure, but Potter's animals live in a dangerous world. Her cats may wear pants, but they still eat mice.
Treasury of Beatrix Potter: D1 asked for several of these stories: Squirrel Nutkin, Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle (who has a minor role in the Thursday Next series, which I've been reading), and the Tailor of Gloucester. Tom Kitten is still the favorite, though.

Activities:
Somebody has had the flu at every point for the past two weeks, so we haven't done much.
We did have an egg and carrot hunt on Easter, but we never did really color eggs. (I dumped some dye in the one pot for Easter breakfast.)
They did watercolor painting one day. D1 made lots of rectangles, trying out how to use the paints. D2 was not feeling well enough to stay interested for long.
We played a game with dice and poker chips a couple of times. We've played the Very Hungry Caterpillar a few times, too.

Observations:
They wanted the counting bears and frogs out one day last week. D1 especially was sorting them in careful rows by color. She said they were at the museum watching the star show. (That's from January.)
D1 can count by twos up to six at least (while we were playing the poker chip game) and calculated how many people would need plates if there were three guests coming for breakfast.
They are still asking for Mis Numeros in Espanol almost every day. They both know all the numbers from one to ten in Spanish and I think D1 knows most or all in French. D2 looks set to learn the names of the numerals in Spanish before he learns them all in English.
They've been doing a lot of pretend cooking. Most of my pots are in the living room or bedroom, full of plastic food. D2 was making cookies in the crockpot for awhile, but D1 stuck with the more plausible soup.

Posted: 9:31 AM, Mar. 29, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link

Too Smart for Charlotte Mason?

I feel like I need some sort of disclaimer at the top of this post, in case someone takes it too personally. I don't claim to know everything. I don't know enough to tell you what to do with your kids. I'm just exploring in my own mind the question of how far Charlotte Mason's principles can be trusted and how serious I am about following them. My children are still very young (3.5, 2.5, and twins coming soon), so I have no real experience to draw on, and though they are bright and verbally gifted, I don't think they're any smarter than your kids and I can't guarantee results. Check back in twenty years and I'll tell you how it went. That being said . . .

I belong to a list devoted to applying Charlotte Mason's principles for young children under the age of six: avoiding formal lessons, spending much time out-of-doors, participating in a rich home life. Every so often someone posts something along the lines of:

"Of course I *love* CM's ideas, but my child is so gifted  (long list of achievements starting in infancy) that we have to do lessons or she would be bored."

Well, maybe so. I don't know their child. But is the world and everything in it really such a small field that a four-year-old can't find enough to do and learn without a lesson plan? I'm twenty-nine, much smarter than even the most profoundly gifted four-year-old, and I am never bored even if nobody does lessons with me.

I can't help but think there must be some miscommunication somewhere. Some possibilities come to mind:

1) They are seriously misunderstanding CM's advice to think they must somehow hold back their child and prevent them from learning anything taught in school. Quite the contrary, CM expected many children to teach themselves reading, writing and arithmetic before their sixth birthday. But she expected that to grow out of the children's interests and questions, not out of a formal scope and sequence imposed by the mother.

2) They have trouble interacting informally with their children and feel a need for lesson plans to give them some ideas, because their child is tired of being sent off to play while they do laundry. There are many perfectly good parents like this; their laundry gets done much more quickly than mine does, I'm sure. Keeping books of projects and activities around is a good idea; for many families it will be helpful to schedule a special time for Mom to sit down and do things with the kids.  But that's not the same thing as formal lessons; far better is to watch the child and suggest projects that seem likely to be a good fit. And they still need to make an effort to include the children in the laundry. Even Einstein got his socks dirty.

3) Their house is a really boring place. Modern suburban life is rather devoid of interest. There are few grown-ups to watch working. The landscaping is all the same. Buying a curriculum may seem simpler than resolving this problem, but it's only a band-aid. If life isn't interesting, make it more interesting. Let Mom take up a complex and absorbing hobby--and let the kids watch and help. Travel around to watch people at work and, if they seem nice, ask them questions. Go visit new parks, museums, businesses, etc. Horrify your neighbors by piling up scrap lumber and mud in the back yard for free exploration.

In the end, though, I think people still really haven't absorbed the point of Charlotte Mason's advice. The world is a rich, wonderful, amazing place. Learning to read and write is a tiny, tiny portion of it. A four-year-old who is ready to read--who gets read to and who has her questions answered--will learn to read without any need for a curriculum. (I did it myself, so it's not like I'm a hereditary dimwit who's completely clueless about the challenge of gifted children.) And if they don't, they are not being held back while they learn a million and one other things.

For mother to turn her attention from going out and exploring, from answering the children's questions, from hunting up new and challenging books that match the children's interests, from teaching handcrafts and household skills, and to focus instead on introducing the three R's, is to turn from a rich, diverse, nutritious banquet to a making sure they down their bowl of oatmeal. Indeed, perhaps a child with an abnormally strong taste for oatmeal (traditional school skills) needs extra encouragement to entice them into a more adventuresome diet (imaginative play, physical activity, out-of-door time, crafts).

The smarter a child is, the less they should need formal lessons at an early age, because they have a greater capacity to perceive, inquire, and learn without being prodded. If your child is zipping ahead, teaching themselves to read and write, asking dozens of insightful questions--why slow them down with someone else's idea of what they should be learning?

Posted: 9:21 AM, Mar. 20, 2008		 Comments (8) | Add Comment | Link

My New Rule of Thumb

"If an activity takes longer for me to prepare than they spend doing it, it's not worth it."

This has coalesced from various advice and people. It has its origins in the question of who is doing the learning. Five minutes for me to spend setting out materials and thirty minutes for them to spend freely exploring them is a good trade-off. Thirty minutes of me tracing and cutting for them to spend five minutes gluing is not. (I'll exclude clean-up time; they should help with that anyway, and it's too much of a wildcard.)

Similarly, fifteen minutes to locate and read a good story together (note they are involved in the story part) which they then take and interpret in their own play for weeks is a good learning investment. Twenty minutes for me to prepare a learning activity from the story that keeps their attention for ten minutes is not.

This is probably too strict of a rule for many people. I once saw a blog of a mom who had created little bags for each letter of the alphabet with various hands-on items that corresponded to that letter sound. Very cute. Though not a good trade-off on my system, I'm sure she had a great time doing it and her daughter learned her letter sounds. And that's a perfectly valid reason, if doing crafts like that is fun for mom.

But D1 learned her letter sounds just fine with my quick printout of family pictures for each letter of the alphabet. And D2 is learning his just as well with the even less elaborate method of me or D1 answering his questions when he points to a stray letter on a book, sign, or (this being the stage of life we are at) barf bucket.

So I like the reassurance that the ducklings are learning and can learn with very little time and energy invested on my part, because right now I have very little time and energy to invest. When I do have a little, we can do some things that require a little more investment of my time but still have plenty of bang for the buck: messier craft materials, muddier play outside.

When I have a little more energy than that, rather than burdening them with elaborate learning programs just to keep myself occupied, I'd rather read or write something for myself, or try out some project that interests me. And if they learn something from that, too, it's all gravy.

Here's today's high-return learning activity.

Materials:
Stack of poker chips
Dice

Procedure:
Each person rolls a die in turn and takes the corresponding number of poker chips from the stack. When the stack is exhausted, compare each individual stack to find out who won. They wore out me and two uncles playing this game; they probably stuck with it for forty-five minutes.

Posted: 3:08 PM, Mar. 19, 2008		 Comments (0) | Add Comment | Link