Inspired Homeschooling

August 20, 2013 Parenting 1 Comment

The Poor Third Child

I just came across a post on Scary Mommy on the difference between parenting a first and third child. It made me chuckle with recognition. But she left out a few things, so I thought I’d add my own.

Food

First Kid: Introduced one food at a time waiting three days in between each new food to make sure there was no signs of allergy. No sweets until his first birthday. On his second birthday he asked “can I have cake again on my next birthday?”

Second Kid: Introduced nutritious whole foods as she seemed interested in them. Didn’t worry too much about a cookie here and there.

Third Kid: Let him grab food off my plate whenever he wanted. Cookies are a perfectly acceptable breakfast, and if he whines for the “whole bag” of Doritos, well, so long as it keeps him quiet, why not?

First Kid: I was totally neurotic about his exposure to television. If I watched TV while nursing him to sleep, I did it with the close-captioning on. He was not exposed to television at all until he was 2. Isn’t that what the AAP recommends?

Second Kid: She watched whatever her big brother was watching whenever he was watching it.

Third Kid: On the nights he wouldn’t sleep, I’d let him watch Weeds with me.

And speaking of sleep. . .

First Kid: I had a very strict schedule for him. Not that he ever followed it. And man would it stress me out when he didn’t fall asleep at 9am for his nap. If it took me until 11 to get him to sleep for his morning nap, what the hell was I supposed to do for his afternoon nap? I was clearly a failure as a parent because my kid did not sleep by the book. And if you happened to be the unfortunate fool who woke up my napping baby? God help you. (Sorry, Dad. You were recipient of my wrath on more than one occasion.)

Second Kid: She was just naturally a better napper than the first. Whether it was experience (mine) or temperament (hers) this just went much more smoothly for me the second time.

Third Kid: He’s just as bad a sleeper as big brother was, but it doesn’t bother me nearly as much. In fact, having to be home for naps is rather inconvenient. You don’t want to nap? Fine. We’re going to the museum. You don’t want to sleep at 7:30? Fine. Play in your room with your trains until you do want to go to sleep. Just don’t make too much noise. Mommy’s watching Fringe. (Hey, I still have some standards – that show is way too scary for a 2 year old.)

August 7, 2013 Education Theory, Rethinking the 3 R's Post a Comment

Teaching with Real Experiences: Part 4 in the Three R’s Series

“If we taught babies to talk as most skills are taught in school, they would memorize lists of sounds in a predetermined order and practice them alone in a closet.” Linda Darling-Hammond, Stanford Graduate School of Education

In the first few posts of this series, we talked about taking a relaxed approach to homeschooling and focusing on our relationships with our children, and our children’s relationships to the materialthey are learning. Now we’re going to look at the final “R” in the series: real experiences.

I think one of the best things about homeschooling is the ability to take advantage of the learning opportunities that naturally occur in daily life. The kinds of things that are unplanned, but leave an impression on kids because they come from their very own lives and aren’t imposed on them by on an external curriculum. I’ll share a few recent experiences from my own life to illustrate the point.

We’ve been spending a lot of time at parks this summer. We are blessed where we live with an abundance of amazing parks. One of our favorites has a creek with water just deep enough for wading and splashing and catching crawdads (crayfish, crawfish, mud bugs, whatever you like to call them), but not deep enough to have to worry too much about a 2 year old going under.

We’ve been meeting some friends there once a week to let the kids run wild while the mamas chat under a tree. These are some of my favorite times as a mom and as a homeschooler. As I watch the kids run up and down the hills, gather in little groups to chat or play with trucks, and engage in crazy, disgusting antics such as algae fights, my heart feels so content as the phrase “magical childhood” echoes in my mind.

As I watch, I love to see the learning that is going on – completely spontaneously.

Last week, I was amused as my oldest started bringing me random “treasures” he was digging out of the mud – an old hand weight, a hinge, a glass bottle (not a beer bottle oddly enough), an enormous bolt, a metal pipe. I had to chuckle to myself. We’re starting school in a couple of weeks and I have a huge archaeology unit planned. I’m so thankful for this spontaneous archaeological dig my son conducted, because I know it will be way more meaningful to him than anything I plan.

I seized the opportunity to think like an archaeologist. I asked him how he thought those things ended up there. How long might they have been there? What guesses can we make about what’s happened in and around the creek based on the small clues we found? I didn’t force the conversation. I just wondered with him about the really cool stuff he’d found. (And because, at times, I’m a really awesome mom, I let him bring the mud and algae encrusted treasures back home to display on our “nature shelves.”)

As our visit to the park reached the 3 hour mark, the boys started getting, um, daring. They started dropping rocks in the creek. Then they started throwing rocks in the creek. Then they started trying to find the biggest rocks they could lift to drop from the bridge. Then they started speculating. If it were possible for them to lift that largest rock there and drop it from the bridge, would the splash it created empty the creek? There was some discussion (that I couldn’t really follow) that the rock would actually be too big to make a splash because it was taller than the creek was deep. This is real scientific speculation. Kids do this all the time.

Again this morning, we were at a park. This one is walking distance from our home and doesn’t have the great creek feature of the other park. It was a spontaneous trip, and we took the neighbor boy along with us. It was a very hot day after some heavy rains, and so the shady sandbox beckoned. The sand was just wet enough to make some great structures.

The neighbor boy wanted to show us how he and his friends dig tunnels in the sand at school.

I didn’t have my camera with me, but the tunnels were similar to this one:

Ours were a little different, more of a tunnel under ground than through a hill, but you get the general idea.

Anyway, to facilitate a bit of scientific thinking, I wondered aloud, “why doesn’t it collapse?” Now we didn’t necessarily answer that question, but we asked it. And they thought about it. And that’s science. And then they started seeing how close together they could dig the tunnels without them collapsing. And we noticed that they looked like prairie dog holes. And then we remembered the chipmunk colonies we’d seen while camping.

This is a lot of science from two trips to the park. And none of it was premeditated.

When we know what we’re looking for, we can see the learning taking place in the everyday activities of our children. In my next posts, I’ll show you how to see this learning through real experiences for each of the traditional 3 R’s – reading, ‘riting, and ‘rithmetic.

To read the other posts in this series:

Part 1: Relax

Part 2: Learning Based on Relationships

Part 3: Your Child’s Relationship to the Material

July 25, 2013 Education Theory, Rethinking the 3 R's Post a Comment

Making Lessons Meaningful: Part 3 in the Three R’s Series

“Just as eating contrary to the inclination is injurious to the health, so study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in.” – Leonardo da Vinci

In the first two posts in this series we looked at taking a relaxed approach to homeschooling in the early grades and examined the role of our relationships with our children in the learning process. In this third installation of Rethinking the Three R’s, we’ll look at your child’s relationship to the material he is learning.

Passion and Desire

One of the most wonderful things about homeschooling is the ability to tailor an education to the desires and passions of your children. If your 6-year-old is enthralled by the inner workings of the human body, he doesn’t have to wait for high school to plunge deeply into anatomy. If your 4-year-old is crazy about Ancient Egypt, she doesn’t have to wait until the school’s curriculum says it’s time to study it.

True, parents whose kids attend school can, and often do, supplement their children’s learning at home in order to help them pursue their special interests. But when your kids are home with you full time, you have the luxury to go deep into an area of study without having to also follow someone else’s agenda.

We all know instinctively that when we are interested in something, we retain that information so much better than when we are being forced to learn something simply because someone else thinks we should. We also know that not everyone is equally gifted in all areas.

One of our most important roles as parents is to help our children discover their God given gifts and talents and to help them develop these in order to live the life God created them to live.

When you are planning your learning time with your early grades children, don’t worry about “what your 1st grader should know.” Think about what he does know and what else he wants to know. Is he interested in music? Search for low cost concerts (hint: check your city orchestra’s web site for field trip opportunities), check out books and CDs about the lives of composers, let him mess around with musical instruments, listen to as many different styles of music as you possibly can.

Maybe learning about animals lights her fire. Take her to the zoo, or even just to the back yard to watch the critters. Check out books on animals from the library – and don’t limit yourself to the books written at her level. There are amazing children’s TV shows that are filled with wonderful information on animals. No curriculum required.

In addition to deeply exploring the unique interests of your children, expose them to a broad array of new and interesting experiences so that they can discover interests they never knew they had. A good place to start is to expose them to your own interests. One of the best things about having kids is that I have an excuse to pursue my interest in dinosaurs!

Getting off the “conveyor belt”

The conveyor belt curriculum of most schools by necessity asks every child to be equally mediocre in every subject.

“The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed a standard citizenry, to put down dissent and originality.” ~ H. L. Mencken

The aim of homeschoolers is different. We want our fish to be the best little swimmers they can be. But we’re not going to trouble ourselves if they can’t climb a tree.

There is an infinite amount of knowledge to obtained in this life. Are you worried about gaps in your child’s education? Don’t be. There will be gaps. Aren’t there gaps in your education? There are in mine. What’s important is that I know how to fill the gaps when I need to. I was a woefully inadequate cook when I got married. One of my best meals was Kraft macaroni and cheese with frozen peas stirred in. It was fine because my husband did most of the cooking before we had kids. But when I started staying home, it made more sense for me to prepare the food. So I learned to cook. And now I’m a pretty darn good cook, if I do say so myself.

My husband struggled with math throughout high school and college. When he got to a place in his work where he need to do higher level math, he went to Khan Academy and taught himself what he needed to know. It finally stuck because it was relevant and meaningful, and he was able to learn it on his own terms.

Many of the things we want our children to learn will be organically in pursuit of their other interests. A child who wants to cook by himself will be more motivated to learn to read and understand fractions so that he can follow a recipe. A reluctant reader may be inspired to learn to spell so that he can search youtube for videos about his favorite video games.

Since a person cannot possibly know everything there is to know in this world, when deciding what to teach our children it makes sense to start with what lights them up. When their passions and interests are aroused, they will learn and retain so much more than they will following someone else’s agenda.

Next time we’ll examine the third R: learning based on real experiences.

To read the other posts in this series click below:

Part 1: Relax

Part 2: Learning Based on Relationships

Part 4: Real Experiences

July 23, 2013 Education Theory, Our Homeschool, Preschoolers, Rethinking the 3 R's Post a Comment

Relationship Based Learning: Part 2 in the Three R’s Series

In my last post I suggested a new set of “R’s” to guide our homeschool philosophy, particularly in the early grades.

I proposed

A relaxed approach
based on relationships
and real experiences.

I then encouraged us all to take a deep breath and relax.

Today, I want to think about the role of relationships in our homeschools. I want us to think about the relationships between and among the people in our homes, particularly between us as mothers and our children. I also want us to think about how our children relate to the material they are learning.

Let’s take a minute and perform a little thought experiment. Imagine you’re 5 years old. You’re going off to school for the first time and you’ve heard that your teacher is the best in the school. She’s kind and warm and funny. She’s gentle yet firm – you know your days will be peaceful. She loves kids and she loves teaching them. She respects children and encourages them to ask questions which she patiently answers. She laughs easily and her excitement for learning inspires her students’ sense of wonder.

Now imagine you’re the same small child, but you’ve heard your teacher is the meanest in school. She never smiles. She’s strict and harsh and has no patience for silly questions or nonsense. She is the quintessential schoolmarm taskmistress.

How did you feel imagining yourself meeting each teacher? Which teacher made you feel excited to be in school and to learn?

Like this thought experiment, research shows that a positive, supportive, encouraging relationship between teacher and student promotes learning. When you’re homeschooling, always remember that you are your child’s mother first. There’s a Jewish proverb stating that “one mother is worth a thousand teachers.” This is so true. You are better than your child’s teacher. You are his mother. Don’t ever let your role as his teacher diminish your role as his mother.

Don’t let learning conflicts destroy your relationship. If a lesson becomes a battle, leave it for a time until you are both calmer. Use the time to determine what the root of the problem is. Is the material too hard? Is it too boring? Is there another way to present the same idea? Is it really necessary to pursue this lesson at this time? Can you come back to the concepts in a week, a month, or even 6 months or a year?

I started phonics instruction with my oldest many, many times before we finally pursued learning to read together. I truly thought he was going to be an early reader. When he was two, he spent several days on the couch with the stomach flu. In between bouts of vomiting, he watched the Leap Frog Letter Factory over and over and over again. (This is a truly obnoxious video, but kids love it.) By the time his tummy recovered, he knew his letters and letter sounds pat. I thought for sure he’d be a precocious reader.

He wasn’t. When we started Sing, Spell, Read and Write in kindergarten, it was kind of a disaster. I tried various other programs over the next couple of years with various levels of resistance and distress. I never pushed it. I didn’t have it in me to force the issue. If he resisted too much, I’d drop it. I would ignore reading instruction for 6 months at a time and try again.

Eventually he started sounding out “environmental print,” signs along the road, words on cereal boxes, that sort of thing. Then he decided that he could read Bears in the Night by Stan and Jan Berenstain. That was the only book he could read for about a year. Then he started trying other books, but never read more than a few words. Finally, when he was 7.5 I told him we were going to get more serious about school. We would be doing 10 minutes of reading and 10 minutes of math a day. I told him he could read anything to me he wanted for those 10 minutes. He mostly chose easy reader books and the Henry and Mudge series was his favorite.

After about 6 months of this, he announced one day, “Mama, I’m going to read the Harry Potter books.” As it happened, the next day I found the first four books at Goodwill for $.99/piece so I bought them all. And you know what? He’s reading the first book. After a couple of days of reading, he came to me and excitedly told me, “Mama! I’ve already ready two and half pages!” It’s slow going, but he’s doing it and he is so proud of himself. And he will be a much better reader by the time he finishes this book.

All told, I would say over the first 7.5 years of his life he received about 3 hours of direct phonics instruction.

I’ll talk more about how you can teach a kid to read without a phonics curriculum (I’m not anti-phonics, so don’t jump on me here!) in my post about reading. My primary point here is that it was never worth it to me to fight my son about reading. I decided that if teaching my child was going to strain or injure our relationship, I’d rather send him to school.

And I didnt’ want to send him to school.

So what can you do if you’re finding learning time to be a battle? First, you can just stop. As I said before, there’s no reason your 5 year old has to have a formal curriculum of any kind. If sitting down to “do school” is a battle, go to the park instead. Wait awhile and try again in 6 months after he’s matured a little. And then, if you need to, wait another six months and try again. Or look for a different approach. Make train tracks shaped like letters and let him puff his train along the “j” track. Draw letters and numbers in the sand. Make cookies together and count scoops as you measure. Just go to Pinterest and look around at some of the “learning to read” or “preschool math” boards and you’ll be flooded with fun ideas that you and your child will love. Life presents so many joyful learning opportunities that can bring you closer to your child – there’s no need to doggedly pursue a curriculum that creates tension and discord.

You know your child better than anyone. You know what lights his fire. You know his interests and passions. If you don’t, find out. Put aside your curriculum and expectations and just spend some time following his lead in play and see what excites and motivates him. You’ll have a much easier time teaching him if you know what makes him tick. And you will probably discover he is learning things you weren’t even aware of.

Finally, pray. Ask our Lord how to reach your children’s hearts. Ask Him what it is you need to teach your children today, this month, this year. Ask Him to reveal to you His plan and purpose for each of your children and your role in helping each to fulfill that purpose. Pray to your children’s guardian angels and baptismal saints. Ask them to intercede for you and your children regarding their educations. I have been astounded and overwhelmed by the answers and blessings I have received when I have placed my trust in the Lord regarding challenging situations with my children. The Lord is truly good and he desires the best for you and your children. He will guide you if you ask and listen.

Your relationship with your child is the greatest educational tool you have. Don’t let your anxiety over what he “should” be learning when he’s little create a rift between you.

In the next post, I’ll look at the second relationship I mentioned above: the relationship between your children and the material they are learning.

To read the other posts in this series:

Part 1: Relax

Part 3: Your Child’s Relationship with the Material

Part 4: Real Experiences

July 19, 2013 Education Theory, Rethinking the 3 R's 5 Comments

Rethinking the Three R’s: Homeschooling the Early Grades

I recently had the honor of speaking at the Rocky Mountain Catholic Home Educators Conference where I gave a talk entitled Homeschooling the Early Grades: Rethinking the Three R’s. It was well received, and I thought I would share my thoughts here as well.

So here are my 3 R’s:

A relaxed approach
based on relationships and
real experiences.

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I was inspired to give this talk because I’ve noticed a trend recently in my various online homeschool groups where a new member will post an introduction along these lines:

“Hi! I’ll be homeschooling my 4 year old daughter next year and I know she’s young, but she really loves learning and I want to get her started and feed that eager young mind of hers. I was wondering if you could recommend a good reading and math curriculum. Also, I was looking at this logic book. Have any of you used it?”

That’s not a copy and paste, but it is accurate. Yes, someone once asked about using a logic book with their kindergartner. A friend of mine attended multiple conferences this summer in preparation of her first year of homeschooling year. Her one and only daughter will be two in September.

When I see these parents fretting about choosing the right curriculum for their wee ones, I want to grab them by the shoulders, look them deep in the eyes and say, “Relax. Take a deep breath. It’s going to be okay.”

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It’s not a race

This post will focus on that first R. Relax. It’s not a race. There is no reason whatsoever to begin a formal curriculum of any sort with a 3-, 4-, or 5-year-old. Or even a 6- or 7-year old. Research shows that by the time they’re 11, there’s no difference in the reading ability of those who received reading instruction beginning at age 5 and those who weren’t taught until they were 7. Most of the research showing an advantage for those receiving early childhood education also shows these advantages taper off about third grade.

Meanwhile, there’s more and more research showing the clear benefits of play and exploration for children. They’re better behaved, demonstrate more pro-social behaviors, are less likely to be obese, are more creative. And they’re smarter.

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We all know that there’s a wide variety of “normal” when it comes to developmental milestones. The normal range for a baby’s first step is 9-18 months. That means a baby who walks at the late end of the range is twice as old as an early walker when he takes his first steps. And there’s nothing “wrong” with the late walker and nothing particularly extraordinary about the early walker. They’re both within the normal range.

The same is true of later cognitive milestones. Some kids meet them way earlier than others – this doesn’t necessarily make them future geniuses. Other kids meet them way later than others – again, this doesn’t mean their doomed to failure. It just means we’re all different and develop at different rates.

“A berry ripens in its own good time…and so does a child’s readiness. Just as the one needs water and sunlight, the other needs the patient reassurance of loving adults who can trust children to grow according to their own timetables.” ~ Mister Rogers

One of the brilliant things about homeschooling is that our kids don’t have to be on the conveyor belt of a traditional school. Public education in particular is based on the idea of every kid getting exactly the same thing at exactly the same time in exactly the same way. It also assumes that kids learn in tiny, predictable, incremental steps. This isn’t true. Just like your toddler suddenly had a huge language explosion after walking around with a handful of words for months, so too can your young child go from reading “Mat sat on a cat.” to reading Harry Potter seemingly overnight.

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“What does education often do? It makes a straight-cut ditch out of a free, meandering brook.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

So if your 7-year-old hasn’t shown much interest in reading, don’t freak out. And for heaven’s sake, if your 4-year-old doesn’t want to do a cut and paste phonics work sheet, please, think twice about how important it really is. Remember, any curriculum you choose is your TOOL. It’s not your boss. You’re the boss. Follow your kid’s lead. If she wants to sit and write letters when she’s 4, then let her. Help her when she asks you. Don’t push. But if she’d rather go outside and hunt for worms and splash around in rain puddles, let her do that instead. It’s at least as good for her education, and much, much better for her long term growth and development.

My next post will look at the second R: Relationships. This includes your relationship with your child, as well as your child’s relationship to the material being learned.

To read the other posts in this series:

Part 2: Learning Based on Relationships

Part 3: Your Child’s Relationship with the Material

Part 4: Real Experiences

April 23, 2013 Gluten Free, In the Kitchen, Paleo, Recipes 1 Comment

Gluten Free/Casein Free Experiment Day 3 (And a paleo meatball recipe!)

So far we haven’t had any complaints about our change in diet. I made sure to fully stock the house with favorite “safe” foods so no one would feel deprived, and it seems to be working.

Some of the behaviors I’m noticing that I’m hoping will go away. Henry’s shirt chewing has increased again this week as has his back talking, neediness/clinginess, and fixation on Minecraft. Thomas was particularly fussy today. We have compounding factors with Thomas – in addition to the diet change we’re also night weaning.

On a related note, I slept through the night last night for the first time in over two years! Woo hoo!

So here’s what the kids ate today.

Breakfast
Sausage, strawberries, dry chocolate chex cereal.
Once again, Helen ate everything. The boys just ate the sausage.

Lunch
Grazing on ham and fruit.
Mini Egg Pizzas from Eat Like a Dinosaur.
Helen (it’s so nice to have a good eater in the house!) gobbled them up, the boys wouldn’t even taste them. Which is too bad, because they really did taste like pizza and even had a pizza like texture. I will probably make them again and hope the boys will give them a try.

Snack
Peanut butter Chocolate Apple “Cookies”
These were great. Cut apples length wise so you have apple circles. (I know I should have pictures, but really anyway you slice the apple is fine.) Spread with peanut butter (or seed/nut butter of your choice). Top with “safe” chocolate chips. This felt like a huge treat!

Dinner
Paleo Meatballs and pasta sauce
Quinoa pasta shells

Dinner was a huge hit with everyone. I’m so glad I made a huge batch of meatballs! I cooked half of them with marinara sauce for dinner and the other half I cooked in some chicken broth and froze for future meals. Here’s the recipe:

Paleo and Kid Friendly Meatballs

1 cup almond meal

1/4 cup coconut flour

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp salt

6 oz tomato paste

3 eggs

1 lb ground chicken

1 lb ground beef
1 lb ground pork
oil for frying
marinara sauce or chicken broth

Mix almond meal, coconut flour, garlic powder and salt. I used my stand mixer to mix everything up. Add tomato paste and eggs and mix well. Add meat and mix till everything is well combined.

Heat oil in a large pan until it sizzles when you drop something in it. Form meatballs to desired size. I used a one inch cookie scoop. Brown meatballs for a minute or so on each side and then transfer them to your marinara sauce or chicken broth. Simmer for 30 minutes or more until they’re cooked through. For our marinara sauce I used a jar of my dad’s homemade sauce, a jar of store sauce and about a cup of white wine. Is wine paleo? I don’t know or care. 🙂

The meatballs were awesome. They held together well and were delicious. Even with the big eaters gobbling them up, this made enough for at least two meals. I’m sending a few of the sauceless ones in Henry’s lunch tomorrow.

April 23, 2013 Gluten Free, In the Kitchen Post a Comment

Gluten Free/Casein Free Experiment: Day 2

Helen asked loudly at breakfast this morning, “Don’t you just love this diet?!! We get to eat scrambled eggs and bacon and fruit!” The boys weren’t as enthusiastic. They left their tacos untouched.

Breakfast
Scrambled eggs in corn tortillas with salsa
bacon
watermelon

Snack
Chocolate Chex

Lunch
Helen ate leftover meatloaf
I think Henry ate ham.
I don’t know what Thomas ate. He may have just had mama’s milk before his nap.

Sunday lunches are mostly grazing affairs around here. Fruit and nuts. Not sure what else they ate. Oh. Potato chips. 🙂

Dinner
Roasted chicken
mashed potatoes with unsweetened almond milk and Earth’s best soy free butter spread
roasted brussel sprouts
Almond dream vanilla ice cream for dessert

April 21, 2013 Gluten Free, In the Kitchen 2 Comments

Gluten Free/Casein Free Experiment: Day 1

We’ve decided to jump on the GF/CF bandwagon and see if we notice any discernible positive change from the diet. I’m hoping mostly for positive behavioral changes. I have some indication that my boys are addicted to wheat and dairy – they have very limited diets composed primarily of milk and bread. My oldest in particular. My pediatrician doesn’t seem too concerned that Henry lives on hamburgers, milk, and apples (“it covers all 4 food groups!”), but I actually believe nutrition is important. I’ve heard that once you get through the initial withdrawl, these picky eaters often expand their repertoire quite a bit.

So not only do we have GF/CF challenge, we have a very picky eater challenge. I’ve planned out a full week of meals and snacks based on Henry’s favorite foods that are naturally (or with minor tweaking) GF/CF. I don’t want to do a bunch of highly processed gluten free foods. But I don’t want them to feel deprived either, so I’m allowing more “junk” than I might normally (i.e. potato chips, dairy free ice cream, etc.).

Ideally I will keep a record here of how my family receives these meals and whether I notice any changes in behaviors.

So today we ate:

Breakfast
Henry just ate sausage. The other kids also had hashbrowns with mustard.

Lunch
Okay, this is sad, but they just jumped me when I got in from the grocery store and ate what looked good. It was past lunch time, so I just let it go.
Chocolate Chex Cereal with soy milk
Potato Chips
Pepperoni
Ham

Dinner
Meatloaf (with almond flour and coconut flour in place of bread crumbs)
Sweet potato fries
GF Ketchup (is all ketchup GF? I don’t know, but I bought some marked GF just to make sure.)
Steamed broccoli
Orange Juice (calcium fortified)

March 3, 2013 Parenting 2 Comments

Accountable Kids Preview

I wrote this a couple of weeks ago and forgot to publish it. We’re into the Accountable Kids system a good ways now, but I won’t spoil the outcome. Here’s how I was feeling before we started:

A few weeks ago I mentioned that I am seeking more discipline in our family life. Because I am a little weak in the self-discipline department, and because, as I mentioned, I hate being a disciplinarian, I decided to seek a little outside help.

This is completely out of character for me. First of all, my educational background is in managing challenging behavior in children. I should know how to figure this out on my own. Secondly, I HATE spending money on things that I feel like I could do myself. Finally, I am a total do-it-yourselfer not only for money reasons but because I can’t accept anything off the shelf. It’s why I homeschool. Why I don’t use curriculum. Why I make my own cleaning products. I like to have things my way.

So that gives you an idea of how desperate I must have been feeling when I Paypal-ed $95 to Accountable Kids for an out-of-the-box “chore” system.

I chose this particular system primarily because my best friend has been using it with her kid for a couple of years now and it works well for her family.

The basic set up is this. A child has a set of chores that he has to complete at set times during the day (morning chores, afternoon chores, evening chores). These “chores” are often simply self care tasks such as brushing one’s teeth or getting dressed. Once a child has completed those chores, he receives a “ticket.” These tickets can then be exchanged for privileges such as screen time, play dates, a new book, or whatever motivates that particular child. A child can lose a ticket for bad behavior. A child can also do extra chores to earn money, but must first complete his regular chores.

This all comes with a slick little peg board for hanging the various elements on.

I wanted to write a little preview of my hopes and dreams for what this system will accomplish for our family so that I can honestly assess how it’s working for us later.

So here are some problem spots I hope will be smoothed out:

Morning Routine/TV Time
As it stands now, my kids wake up and trickle downstairs to watch TV while I have a little quiet time and make breakfast. I take their breakfast orders while they watch TV, and lately, they eat breakfast while watching TV. Then, we fight about turning off the TV and getting dressed so we can get out the door to wherever we need to be that day. We leave 10 to 15 minutes late with me furious at everyone. It’s fun. You should try it.

What’s supposed to happen is that the kids get up, watch TV until breakfast and then turn it off while we all eat together. Then they can go back to the TV once they are fully dressed and have everything ready to walk out the door.

My ideal situation is that everyone find a different way to wake up in the morning before breakfast (playing with dolls? reading a book?). I would be ecstatic if my kids actually helped me get breakfast on the table or even (gasp!) got their own breakfast. I’d love to have some short family prayers or devotional time before we head off for our daily activities.

For now, I’ll settle for what’s supposed to happen, but I want to keep my ideal in mind as a goal.

Bed Time
This goes fairly smoothly for 2/3 children. I’d love to have some leverage with the other one.

Back Talking, Attitude, Imperious Demands
We’re currently working on this with time outs. I was never a huge stickler requiring one to say “please”, but things have gotten way out of hand. I am tired of being held hostage by a little tyrant who will make my life hell if I do not do exactly what I’m commanded to do the second I am commanded to do it. I tried modeling the behavior I want to see, responding kindly despite the rudeness, trying to help and indulge as much as I could, but it has only made things worse. I would indulge and indulge until finally I would snap.

I think this will be behavior I take a ticket for. Deliberate pig-headedness – i.e. refusing to get dressed when it’s time to leave the house, or ordering mommy to fetch your shoes because you don’t feel like doing it yourself, or screaming at mommy because she didn’t get your dolls clothes on just right? Yeah. I’m taking your ticket.

So I’m thinking at the beginning my kids, at least one of them, won’t have a whole lot of privileges. I’m trying to come up with things that won’t require tickets – things that I wish we were doing more of anyway. Things like reading books with mommy, or going for a walk, or playing quietly in your room.

It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. I’m nervous.

February 26, 2013 Education Theory, Our Homeschool, Parenting, Rethinking the 3 R's 2 Comments

Encouraging Creativity

“Hey, mom! Want to color in Cutielicious?”

Yes, I do. I love Cutielicious. It’s a super fun doodle book with just enough structure for the creatively challenged (me) and more than enough freedom for the artistically inclined (Helen). One of the best purchases I’ve ever made, it makes me happy to color in this ultra cute book with my little girl.

Usually.

“Ooooh! Let’s color the cookie page,” my little one exclaims. “Which cookie do you want to do?”

I select my cookie declaring, “I’m going to color it like one of the yummy sugar cookies with the slick pink frosting on it. I love those. I’ll try a pink circle in the middle and then color around it with tan.”*

“No. You have to color it all brown first.”

“I don’t want to color it all brown first, then it won’t look like I want it to.”

“But I want you to make it look like this one,” my little girl asserts, pointing to the sample cookie provided.

Um. That’s an ugly cookie. I don’t like the way it looks. I wanted to color it like the delicious cookie in my brain.

“Why can’t I color my cookie the way I want to color my cookie?” I ask a little petulantly.

“Because I want it to look like this one!”

“Then you can color yours like that one. I want to make mine a pink sugar cookie.” I’m a little surprised at how strongly I feel about this and how grumpy I am to have my small opportunity for creativity wrestled from me by my tyrannical daughter insisting I recreate the uninspired cookie offered as a model.

At her further insistence I copy this stupid cookie, while she criticizes my efforts.

“Those circles aren’t round enough!”

“That’s the wrong color.”

I take a deep breath and remind myself that I am a grown up, that the activity in front of me is not about my artistic (ha!) expression but about connecting and sharing time with my precious daughter. So I copied the ugly cookie.*

And then I thought about how often we suck the joy out of our children by asking them to copy the ugly cookie.

It may go something like this.

“Hey mom! Can I help you clean the bathroom?” a child asks enthusiastically while grabbing the spray bottle of homemade non-toxic cleaner.

“Sure! Here, spray right here. . .wait, no, that’s too much! No, don’t spray there, here, that’s enough. Okay now. Wait! Where are you going? I thought you wanted to help me!”

Or maybe this is more familiar.

“Mom! Look! I wrote a poem! Want to read it?”

“Sure! . . . Oh, you misspelled this word. You should put a comma here. Do you think it would be better if you. . . “

Or sometimes around here it’s:

“Mom! Can I make a cake?”

“Sure, first you need to . . . okay now . . . wait, let me just . . . good now . . . wait! I thought you were going to make a cake!”

The resentment I felt at being forced to copy that ugly cookie, the disappointment at having my joy and vision subjugated to someone else’s agenda, made me realize just how damaging it is to interrupt a child’s inspiration. Not only does it prevent their expressing their creativity, but it robs them of the motivation to act in any way. I copied that ugly cookie, but I didn’t want to and I hated every minute of it. And when I was finally allowed to create my own cookie, the joy was gone.

I’m pretty sure that had I had the freedom to create my own cookie first, I would have happily copied that ugly cookie to please my little girl. Of course, I’m a grown up. I can get over it. But every time we ask a child to copy the ugly cookie before they’re allowed to create the cookie that inspires their joy, we rob them of the opportunity to express their unique vision. We deny them the satisfaction that comes from acting on their internal motivation to create something that pleases them. Ultimately, we prevent them from learning to be self-motivated individuals who can conceive of an idea and follow through on it’s implementation without always having someone else tell them what to do and how to do it.

I’m going to try to cultivate an awareness for when I’m asking my children to copy an ugly cookie. I’d much rather see the beautiful pink-frosted sugar cookies lurking in their brains.

~~~~~

* I would like to say for the record that I can see that the “ugly cookie” I created under my daughter’s direction is, in fact, much cooler than the pink sugar cookie of my imagination. But that’s hardly the point now, is it?