World History vs Acorn 101

I have confessed to you that we are very relaxed in my home. Some people might even say that we are lazy. Well, my daughter must have agreed with "some people" because the other day she told me that she wanted to do real school with real text books and real tests. I told her that if that's what she wanted to do then we needed to do that.

Where else can a student become so academically bored that they become motivated to create their own schedule; their own course of study? I think it's important for a child to come to the conclusion that their education is their responsibility and it's important for that child to become self motivated and an autonomous learner...

Side note: Apparently, in the homeschool or unschool community, it is common for many students to take control and direct their learning at about the age of 11-13. This is the age when my first born also sat me down and told me how he wanted his school to look. Actually, he wanted it to look just like Crain Middle School, so I enrolled him. =D

My daughter and I sat down and talked about what subjects she wanted to learn. She said she wanted to learn the same subjects she would have to learn if she attended a public school: reading, writing, math, history, and science. When she decided on which subjects she wanted to include in her course of study we looked through our collection of various learning materials and programs so that she could choose the ones which would suit her. I have some courses on DVD, some courses and texts on computer, and even a few text books in MP3 format. Pick your poison!

After we decided on materials or approaches to each subject she created a weekly schedule. It reminded me of a college schedule and it was built around her already existing extra curricular activities. You know, "Thursdays are tennis and volleyball practice so I only want to read and write in my journal that day." She only wanted to do World History twice a week and Physical Science once a week.

Well today's schedule called for reading, writing, and World History. But, we weren't alone. Last night after her out-of-town volleyball game two of her teammates spent the night. I had told their mom that they could join us for school in the morning. We could all learn some world history together! I imagined each girl with iPod Touch in hand researching various historical figures, civilizations, regions... a little cooperative learning group in my living room. We had three times the research power in my house today!

However, we woke up to the most beautiful weather and that pushed school to the back burner. I feel bad that I didn't force World History but there was so much going on in our backyard! First off, it was cool and windy, eventually a cat caught a hummingbird and ate it in front of us, and the neighbor's tree was filling up the backyard with acorns.

I gave the children a bucket and begged them to collect them so we had a bucket full of acorns.

We were all lounging around on patio furniture or porch swings with our ipods when I asked the girls if they knew whether or not acorns were edible. I tweeted the question and then googled it. You know how you lose track of time when playing on the internet? By the time I found my answer the girls were inside.

The girls had done their own research and were in the process of tasting fried acorn that they had already boiled, peeled, and fried!

Well, I had read that acorns contain tannins which can be toxic so I had the girls bring me leaves from the oaks around the house. We used "Trees of Victoria" to identify the specific oaks so that I could get more information on the acorns we had just tasted. They tasted like nutty squash... and were not bitter at all.

Did you know that acorns were a staple to some native Americans? They would place the acorns in a basket in a river to cleanse them of the toxins. How did they know to do this without google? They were truly educated!

It just blows me away how every time we set out to learn about one thing we jump track and end up learning about something else. When we do that we are doing the opposite of school. We are learning from what life throws at us, in this case, acorns.

The beauty of learning in freedom - not having any time restrictions on when we "school" - is that it's not too late to watch our history DVD and maybe read some of "Pride and Prejudice" before bed. I'm pretty sure my daughter's schedule will be honored by midnight. ;)

Never mind, I know it will, because three girls just walked in and said, "Let's do school!"

Guess we are doing night school.

Dragons and Rockets and Pi, Oh My!

I attended a Homeschool 101 meeting for new homeschoolers and I was blown away by some of the observations and examples of "interest driven learning" and "child directed" learning and how allowing a child to follow his passions and interests unfolds as the child matures and grows. As the child gets older he may go from asking hundreds of questions about a wide range of subjects to honing in and becoming an expert in one.

The typical scope and sequence designed for the classroom can work against that natural learning and curiosity for the child learning in freedom - the home. It seems mind boggling that strictly adhering to a program designed to teach children "everything they need to know when they need to know it" could actually slow some children down. A few of us have observed this.

I heard a few examples but I have an example of how my children's curiosities take us away from our school books or my lesson plans:

The other day I decided to read "Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi" to my children for math. Looking through the book I realized that there were a few words I needed to familiarize myself with: circle, radius, diameter, and circumference...

I wrote these words on one of our dry erase boards and let the children witness as I review-taught. That's mom purposefully thinking out loud as she familiarizes herself with something she should know by now. Believe it or not my children have learned much from my bad memory.

For radius I told the children to think of sun rays. I drew a sun and several "rays" which "emanated from one point." I drew these rays about the same length which eventually suggested the shape of a bigger circle. (This was to set up my explanation of circumference.) As I drew these many "rays" I said, "rays" and "radius" out loud.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the book: Just mentioning the word "sun" set my seven year old off into a question tangent. He wanted to know "how come our sun is a small star but it's so bright?"

I explained that our sun is very close to us compared to the other stars and that is why it appears bigger and brighter... I didn't finish my explanation because that triggered another question, "How far away is the sun from earth?"

My hubby and I couldn't remember so I said, "I don't know the exact distance but if you headed towards the sun in a rocket it might take several months to get there." I added, "If you headed for the nearest galaxy at light speed you wouldn't get there in your life time..." Which brought up more questions... "How fast is light speed?" which triggered more questions...and more...

We ended up in a family discussion of what all it would take to get a human to the nearest galaxy - alive.

It is common for one topic to trigger curiosity about other topics. This is part of the reason many homeschoolers see adhering to a typical scope and sequence as limiting their child's learning.

Even my own plans to read a book and to talk to my children about "radius" had us orbiting subjects like "the solar system" and "light speed."

I think these questions that take us away from the lesson plan can be more important than the lesson. When a child asks questions it shows that child is thinking. Thinking should be the goal of learning and not just finishing a workbook. The questions can then be the curriculum.

Trying to review these words so that I could read a book I planned to read sparked so many questions that we almost didn't make it to the book. It got to the point where I told the kids, "Go get your notebooks because I want to read this story to you TODAY but keep asking questions and I'll write them down..."

The story is about a little boy who has to solve a riddle to save his father's life. The riddle is the definition of Pi and the little boy has to find that number. You get to be there for his "ah hah" moment and you are there as he tests his theory on an onion, a pie, a wagon wheel...

After we read the book we did our own hands-on discovery of Pi. We collected several round objects from the kitchen and cut strips of paper the exact length of the diameters. Then we could see how for each object (circle) three of the diameter sized strips fit around the circumferences "with some left over."

Days later we are still using the questions and looking up and talking about exact distance from the earth to sun, astronomical units, and today (now a few days ago) I said something crazy like, "I guess the closest we can get to time travel is looking up at the stars at night." Which was a remnant of our discussion of "light years" and galaxies being so far away it would take several generations to get there...

So we have already "put down the school books" to go off down a "bunny path" as one veteran mom put it...

This is an example of what I mean when I talk about focusing on the learning and avoiding the schooly things. I will abandon our "school" for "learning." The questions are the superior curriculum and I will "let the questions be the curriculum."

Rebecca ツ

This is your brain on tired.

I was thinking about dreams earlier. Not my hopes and aspirations but the little stories that play out in my head when I'm asleep. I close my eyes every night to end my predictable mundane day and enter an exotic world where the laws of man, God, and even physics don’t apply.

If I’m lucky I sleep. I have nights of insomnia which might explain my fascination with dreams. Dreaming is proof of sleep, right?

Sometimes I keep a notebook and pen by my bed so that I can write down my dreams as soon as I wake up. Consciousness pushes many dreams out of my memory. Maybe dreams weren't meant to be remembered.

I read somewhere* that during R.E.M. newly acquired information is filed and stored in the memory. I guess new facts and data whirl around like bits of confetti until we sleep and dream. That’s when the bits get defragmented and sorted allowing for more efficient retrieval. McMemory.

So while our brains are busy filing and doing very important serious work that’s for our own good we repay that feat by reducing it all to a nonsensical story.

It’s kinda funny how even when we are asleep we get bored. The tedious task of storing and filing data causes our unconscious minds to wander. To zone out. Dream.

*Every time I hear myself say "I read somewhere" what follows reminds me of Tim-the-tool-man-Taylor as he tried to relate Wilson's fence side chats...

My six year old's journal entries:

I encourage my children to keep a journal even before they can read or write. Of course, my six year old mostly draws:


He is on the verge of reading and he wrote his first sentences yesterday:

"I miss you I loves you DAD"

I read it back to him and he erased the "s" after love. He tore the page out and put it on his dad's pillow. Isn't that sweet? His dad has been out of town this week.

One thing that is so helpful to me, the teacher-mom, is that I can always look through the journals and see what they are learning or what they are READY to learn.

Like, yesterday, I noticed that my son had not only written a few sentences, but he had written a few words: boom, boo, pop, poop. I took a cue from the word "boom" and showed him how to write the words: broom and room. So, now he has a few more words in his journal:



He is not only thinking of words but he seems to be thinking of math. He hasn't officially learned multiplication but he seems to pick up whatever his big sister is doing:


Guess what this is:


He loves us all: (He loves his dad FIRST and me SECOND, Oh well.)

Coffee thoughts - multiple ages in the learning environment

This post should follow Family Learning: Converting Fahrenheit to Celcius (turned into a rant on democratic schools):

This morning my son and I were playing around on the internet. Actually, he had woken up and crawled in my lap while I was reading about Eva Braun. I had a dream last night about her children surviving….something about an article that was written before WWII coming back to haunt us…... something about two rivers… one was discovered to be frozen….for some reason that was important. You know how dreams are? I recently read, “Eye of the Needle,” by Ken Follett, so my mind must be wrestling with pieces of the book and my constant flipping between channels 75 and 29.

Anyway, as usual, my son started to quiz me. “What does H K L E spell?” May be when a child is on the verge of reading they have these random letters dancing around in their head mocking them as their minds try to make sense of them. He needs my input to help him crack the code and find a way to stick these random letters together. I guess it’s like my mind as I sleep. I have experiences during my day and at night my mind is trying to file but some things aren’t definable and easily classified so they hang around and torment me. I wake up and look up Eva Braun. Maybe the unsolved information gets left on the surface so that we can figure it out. So, my WWII dream and ABCs are on our minds this morning.

After the spelling quiz my son went over to the dry erase board and began to quiz me in math. “What is C plus 5?” I told him that it could be anything depending on what he wanted C to be. I told him to give me any number and we could find out what C was. We did this a few times until he was satisfied. Then I walked away to start this blog because something about my dream and his first morning thoughts about his ABCs seemed important to me before I finished this cup of coffee.

As I was typing he called me back to the dry erase board and he had written: F=9/3+365 He must have paid attention to his sister’s calculations on the dry erase board the past few days. The formula has been and is still on the board today. I told him that it was easy to solve because 9/3 is another way of expressing the number 3. I solved it and told him that F was 368 and that he had done Algebra today. He looked upset and said, “Now I have to skip to Algebra.”

I assured him that he didn’t have to skip to Algebra.

Now he is singing and playing bottle cap wars with his bottle cap collection.

But, this reminded me of when my oldest was learning Algebra. My daughter played around with some trinomials and factored a few with him. I made sure to make hers easy as she was just seven or eight. I blogged about it back then.

Over the years I have learned and observed the benefits of having different ages or grades learning in one room. I can see how multiple stages and ages are a good blend in the learning environment. They influence and challenge each other…….

Just sharing my morning thoughts over coffee.

I forgot to mention that at one point he asked me, "What is a google plus a google?" I answered with, "TWO google." He said, "No because a google is a mystery number." I went with it because he was defining google as a mystery number and he drew it as circles in circles. We could work with that. I just thought that was interesting. I guess to him as he learns how to add and subtract he watches his sister as she seemingly breaks all of the rules so he breaks and creates them too.

Paper Plate Puzzles

Paper Plate Puzzles - Create your own materials to teach number, letter, and word recognition:

All you need is: cheap paper plates, some markers or crayons, and a pair of scissors. Depending on the purpose of the puzzles you can tweak the design and its placement. We have used many variations.



For the younger ones who are learning their ABC's you can draw a letter and image in the middle of the plate and with the scissors make a distinct zigzag or wavy cut down the middle of the plate so that the image can be easily matched to its other half. This is easy enough as the child completes and image and sees the letter that starts the word. Notice the consonants are dark blue and vowels are light blue!





Maybe after the child knows his ABCs you can make the design placement or unique cut where matching is more of a challenge. For example: Take the paper plate and write one letter of the alphabet on the top of the plate with a marker and draw a picture that starts with that letter on the bottom of the plate. Use the scissors to cut a funky shape to divide the letter from the image. The picture can be matched with the correct letter like one big puzzle with two pieces. The child isn't simply completing the image by matching the two halves of the plate but trying to find a picture that starts with the correct letter.

Another variation would be to draw an image and have the child match the whole word:


My daughter made these paper-plate puzzles to help her little brother work on his reading skills. After he matches them he can try to read only the words back:



I have made number recognition paper plate puzzles too! Notice that the even numbers are red and the odd numbers are blue!



Have fun!

Converting Fahrenheit to Celcius (turned into a rant on democratic schools)

My children and I have a little game that we play whenever we get in the car. When I start the engine we all look up to see what the temperature is in Fahrenheit and then everyone guesses what the temperature would be in Celsius. Then I click the button to change the temperature display to Celsius and the winner gets nothing but the hoorays or boos from the other family members. If my oldest is with us he will win. After today, the game will forever be changed as my daughter was introduced to the conversion formulas in her math work book.

Do you remember the formulas? I certainly didn’t remember the formulas and I just went over all of this with another child just a few years ago. I’ve been in the fifth grade THREE TIMES and still, I am NOT SMARTER THAN A FIFTH GRADER.

Here it is just in case you are like me and can’t remember:

F=9/5(C)+32

That’s three easy steps!
1. Replace the letter C with a numeral (temperature) and multiply it by 9.
2. Divide your result by 5.
3. Add 32 to that.

C=5/9(F)-32

What is interesting is while I don’t remember the temperature conversion formulas that I’ve learned and that I have taught twice; I do remember what my first child was ‘into’ when he learned how to convert Celsius to Fahrenheit. I remember because it was during a time in our home school adventure when I decided to try out the methods used by “democratic schools.” If you haven’t heard of democratic or free schools let me just say that they are a shocking contrast to the schools that you and I spent 13 years attending. Many of us can’t fathom their existence without some twitching of the eye.

A democratic school is a school where the child is free and has control over what she will and will not learn. The child would work with teachers to create a curriculum and the “teacher’s” job would be to find ways to bring that learning to the child. The child may want to learn to play the guitar for the next few months and/or may want to learn how to create web pages. The child has that freedom. The children are encouraged to teach classes and to share what they have learned with others. The graduating body will have its share of “slackers” just like any other school. The alumni stories are amazing!

Anyway, after a several months break from academics and encouraged by a bit of “burn out” academically, I decided to give democracy a chance – in education. I told my children that we would only learn about the things they wanted to learn about. I told my children to make a list of all the topics that they wanted to learn about and that their lists would become their curriculum. They were in charge of “school.”

Each child created their own list. My daughter dictated her list to me. Her list contained the names of various fluffy creatures like: lion, fox, cheetah… We took the lists to the library and checked out many books on the first words on each list. We spent the next few days on the living room floor reading, learning, and sharing our discoveries with each other. This was a wonderful time in our educational journey together as a family.

My son had “gems and minerals” first on his list. He was always fascinated with rocks. One of the first books that he dictated to me before he could read was titled, “MY ROCKS” and it was a book about his rock collection. So it was natural that he would check out many books on this topic. He began to take an interest in diamonds and “diamonds” was added to his list of topics that he wanted to learn about. As he was reading about diamonds he found out that they had a melting point or boiling point, I can’t remember. This book only gave this temperature in Celsius. This made him curious about what how to go about converting Celsius to Fahrenheit. Converting Celsius to Fahrenheit was added to his list. One day, he came to me and said, “Mom, help me memorize the periodic table of elements.” It was amazing to watch one topic, “gems and minerals,” trigger a curiosity about diamonds, converting temperature, and eventually the periodic table of elements. When he wanted to rest, I let him.

My daughter at some point in her self created interest driven curriculum ended up wanting to learn how to create a webpage to display some of her favorite animals and her artwork. We did that. I miss those days and my son just told me the other day that he thinks he actually learned more during that time of academic freedom that at any other time in his life.

Many people fear that allowing a child this type of freedom would result in havoc or laziness but I can assure you that I didn’t see that.

I saw the opposite. I watched as one topic or interest would trigger another like a domino effect. Something happens to a child when they are allowed to be in charge of their learning. It becomes “theirs” and they cherish it more. Freedom is a good thing, especially for children, and it's very important for learning.

All that flooded back to my memory yesterday as my daughter’s math book explained the concept and gave the formulas for converting Celsius to Fahrenheit and vise versa.

My son was very influenced by his sister's lesson. Here is the post about that: Family Learning: Coffee thoughts - multiple ages in the learning environment

A few things I have learned while teaching my own children at home.

What have I learned from over ten years of teaching my own children at home? I have learned with each child that many of the educational materials out there are a waste of money, children can learn without a “qualified” teacher, and that children need a reason to learn.

I wonder how many children associate the first day of school with a big brown delivery truck. My six year old son’s school year began when the UPS man dropped off his school books. For me it was like Christmas but I don’t think all of my children shared my enthusiasm.

I wasn’t sure if my son would be in kindergarten or in first grade this year so I ordered materials for both levels. He picked up the kindergarten math workbook, flipped through it, and said, “This is too easy!” He had learned basic math skills by just living with competent counters. We made a point to count out loud and to verbalize our thought processes as to instruct. He ran off with the 1st grade math workbook and completed the first twenty lessons on his first day of school! “I’m in first grade like eleven year olds” he told his big sister.

He wanted to “do school” even on the week ends. I found myself saying things like, “No more school!” or “No school if you don’t eat all of your dinner!”

I witnessed the same thing when my now 15 year old was about five years old and ready for kindergarten. UPS was on strike that year and our materials were late. By the time the school books finally arrived my son had learned how to read on his own. What a waste of money! If I knew that a child could learn to read by playing around with refrigerator magnets I wouldn’t have invested what little money we had in expensive instructional materials.

Like his little brother, he ran off with his math workbook and completed the first 20-30 lessons on his first day of school. He finished his whole kindergarten math workbook before Christmas and had learned to read on his own. I didn’t even get a chance to “teach” him.

I think one of the things that helped my son excel in math was that his favorite computer game, Math Blaster, required that he work several math problems quickly so that he could save the world from enemy invaders. If that's not a reason to learn I don't know what is. Armed with an abacus and the ability to count to twenty, he spent much of his day solving math problems.

My daughter had a similar reason to learn to read. Her favorite computer game, Roller Coaster Tycoon, required her to read the messages that were flashing on the screen. She knew that in order to please her park guests she would have to read those messages.

She taught herself how to read without the aid of instructional school-like materials. She had this wonderful Leap Pad alphabet desk that would say any three letter word that she entered. She figured out how to get this toy to help her read Dr. Seuss books.

I didn't know that she was able to read until I caught her reading a book to one of her beanie babies. She acted embarrassed when I caught her. I don't know why. I guess she hadn't perfected her reading ability and she wasn't ready to share it with the world.

She figured out the concept of multiplication by organizing and grouping her beanie babies. She taught herself many basic math concepts during play time. I wrote about it at the time.

It would be a big confidence boost to be able to say that I was a wonderful teacher. More important than a good teacher are good learners who have a reason to learn! More important than a "qualified" teacher is an atmosphere conducive to learning, a reason to learn, and freedom to play.

If I wouldn’t have allowed my children the freedom to play most of the day I don’t think they would have had the time to use an abacus to solve math problems to save the world, cuddle up on the couch and demand that mom read ten books, figure out how to make their toys help them read words, or learn mathematical concepts while playing with their beanie babies. If I would have made my children sit in a desk and do school would they have learned as much? Would they have learned to read naturally and with ease?

A loving and educationally rich atmosphere or environment can be more important than a "qualified" teacher. I know that because I can’t say I’m a “qualified” teacher, yet my children still learn.

Did I mention that my daughter would be considered a "late" reader? I had read enough research to know that children don't need to learn to read at such an early age. That is the only reason that I can say that teaching her how to read was not a struggle - I waited until she needed a reason to read and saw the value in it. I had to tell myself "Just so she can read by the time she takes her SATs." And she did. ;)

Teaching Reading IS NOT Rocket Science!

I remember watching a program on PBS about teaching children to read. One statement that stuck out was “teaching reading IS rocket science…” Good thing I didn’t have a mouth full of liquids at the time. I thought it was a joke when I first heard the statement, but they were serious. A web search for “teaching reading is rocket science” brought up the article which I assume the PBS show was quoting. My reaction to the statement was “Only if you try to teach 30 children before they are developmentally ready!” For the average child learning how to read isn’t difficult; we make it difficult by expecting results so early.

Two of my children taught themselves to read. Any teaching on my part was purely accidental yet 100% effective. It wasn’t rocket science but my methods would be just as difficult to transpose to a classroom setting. I spent one on one time with each child for several hours a day. When my son was an only child I would read a stack of books to him during the day and another stack at night to try to get him to fall asleep.

Reading was an important part of our world. He lived 24/7 in a home that placed a high emphasis on reading and he spent much of his time sitting in front of a book or having a book read to him. We also wrote books together. He would say the words and I would write them down. I would fold the pages in half, punch holes in the paper, and secure the pages with ribbon or I would fold the pages down the middle and staple the folded area to create a spine. Our "readers" were written by the child. We created these books whenever we could and he could read these little books because he was the author.

Our refrigerator was decorated in refrigerator magnets shaped like the letters of the alphabet. We had alphabet puzzles, alphabet building blocks, alphabet shaped water toys, and many “ABC books.” Each day as we read side by side on a comfy couch I would point out a letter of the alphabet and then I would challenge my son to find the letter as I read to him. The only plan I followed was mother’s intuition. We did this almost every day until he learned how to recognize all of the letters. Eventually, I would challenge him find three letter words or common words. This family reading time eased him into becoming a reader. I didn’t teach him to read on purpose, it was purely accidental and natural. I followed a curriculum of love and a scope and sequence driven by mommy's intuition.



My daughter also taught herself to read but maybe because my time was divided between her and her brother she learned at a much later age. She and I didn't read 10 books a day. Still, I had confidence that she would eventually learn to read so I didn't force her to become a reader at an early age. At some point, using educational toys, she figured out how to read. She might be considered a late reader but she reads just fine now and she learned with little or no instruction.

I have one child who was an early reader and one child who was a late reader but both taught themselves how to read. I think the secret to their success might have been that they weren't taught how to read. They were allowed to learn when they were ready to learn – late or early. They lived reading and were read to often. Learning to read might be a lifestyle instead of some expensive miracle program.



There’s a point to all of this. Either children are smarter than rocket scientists or we are trivializing something that should be simple and natural. Are we trying to teach many children how to read too early thus making something as simple as child’s play seem as difficult as rocket science? Waiting until the child is developmentally and physiologically ready to learn would make teaching reading as easy as pie!

I know if I were teaching in a classroom I would be forced to observe the conclusions of the article that I mentioned and to understand why some people think that TEACHING reading is like rocket science. A child who is surrounded by love, books, and plenty of time and patience will find learning to read is as easy pie most of the time.

You want a nation of proficient readers? Then you want everyone to be the same and that's not reality. Read to your children daily, model the importance of reading by reading, and don’t expect all children to read so early. Let them learn when they are ready. I think children are better learners than we are teachers, anyway.

Here is the article "Teaching Reading IS Rocket Science." You have to give some of these people credit. They are masters at making something very easy and natural look like a very daunting task. Glad I didn't read this article ten years ago when I started homeschooling. They make a pretty strong case with their big words! As a homeschool mom I felt like the message of this article was "Don't even try it. It's too hard for you! Leave it to the 'educated' 'qualified' 'experts.'" Fact: Many homeschooled children are learning to read without these "experts" and some times before mom gets a chance to try to teach! I wish our public school teachers had to freedom to allow more time when it comes to learning how to read....

Homeschool burnout indicates a need for change.

A discussion of “free schools” over at the local Homeschool Yahoo! Group reminded me of one of my favorite memories of homeschooling my children. It was a time in my life when I had come out on the other side of a bout with "burnout." Burnout is terrible but it forced me to rethink “school” and “learning” and to decide which would take precedent in our home.

All teachers and students know what burnout is. For the teacher or homeschool mom it’s when going through the motions of school becomes drudgery and the family is stressed out. For the student or child it’s when the mind just doesn’t absorb anymore, the ability to focus is lost, and eager learning has been replaced with frustration; a learner’s block. Just going through the motions of school had replaced the excitement of life and learning in my home.

Burnout was inevitable, but it caused me to take an honest look at my goals for my children’s education. It forced me to ask myself some very important questions. Was I homeschooling my children so that we could play school at home or was I homeschooling my children so that we could take advantage of their unique learning styles and their individual personalities and interests? Was I homeschooling my children to play school with them or so that they could learn effectively? Was I trying to engage their short term memories or to change their thinking and their lives? Who should be in charge of designing curriculum publishing companies or children? Should a school day have a beginning and an end or should children be free to learn from their community all day long?

The answers to these questions were obvious to me. Burnout was the symptom and change was the only cure. I put the school books away and I told my children that they were now in charge of what they would learn. I told them to make a list of everything that they loved or wanted to learn about. My daughter dictated her list and her list consisted of various fluffy creatures that you would find in a zoo. How’s that for a curriculum? We took our two lists to the Victoria Public Library. I told each child to checkout books about one or two of the items on their lists. My children took home about 20 books each and we spent the next few days on the living room floor surrounded by several piles of books. My daughter couldn’t read at the time so I read to her.

I remember that my son’s long list contained the word “rocks.” I remember “rocks” from that list because that topic took him on a self directed journey through various topics and subjects. It was amazing to watch my son’s list of interests morph and flow through these various topics. He was in about the 5th grade and his curiosities lead him from gems and minerals to a focus on diamonds which led him to try to memorize the periodic table of elements and then to learn how to convert Celsius into Fahrenheit – all knowledge that would never be tested on the fifth grade TAKS test or some standardized achievement test! One of the books on gems and minerals gave boiling and melting points in Celsius only. A reason to learn!

I remember my knee-jerk reaction when he handed me the periodic table of elements and said, “mom help me memorize this.” My first thought was, “But 5th graders don’t have to know this.” Isn’t that sad that my old mind-set would creep back in and limit my child? Allowing him to follow his interests actually freed him to learn about concepts that his 5th grade math or science texts didn't address. That year I learned about myself and my preconceived notions about children, learning, schooling, and testing. Do you think I learned to respect the TAKS test and it’s results that year?

Sitting on the floor in a pile of books exploring topics that my children were interested in was rewarding on a whole new level. I was connected with my children, learning with them, and my children were actively engaged in and in charge of their learning. I was a part of that learning journey and it did take us all, as a family, on a roller coaster ride through various subjects. Because they were learning about the things they enjoyed their days were filled with excitement and our home was full of eager learners once again!

When I feel burnout creeping back into my home these discussions of free schools, democratic schools, interest driven learning, and unschooling remind me to be more flexible and that change is needed in my home; a change that will free my children so that they can learn without frustration or drudgery.



We have experimented with many different educational philosophies and approaches over the years but that was as close to a "free school" as my family had ever been. I'll share other examples of my favorite memories of homeschooling later.

Greek and Latin Roots Binders

All we did this week for “school” was start on our Greek and Latin Roots binders. We are using "English from the Roots Up" as our guide. (You can find a list of common Greek and Latin roots on the internet and use that for free, but "English from the Roots up" has a list of derivative words and even a lesson to go with each root).

I printed out a little homemade sheet that has the name of the Greek or Latin root on the very top of the page and then a list of words that are derived from the root at the very bottom. I left a big space in the middle of the sheet for drawing and coloring. The child can then decide on how they want to illustrate the meaning of the root or the meaning of one of the derivatives.

For example, one of our roots this week was "tele" which means far away or distant. An example of one of the words was "telephone." Kelsey decided to draw a picture of a telephone to illustrate the meaning of the Greek
root “tele.”


(image is of Kelsey's art work showing "telephone" and then a page from "English From the Roots Up")

For the root “photo” which means “light” Christian decided to draw a picture of a person taking a picture (photograph) of the Eiffel Tower. I will put these sheets in those clear plastic sheet protectors that have the three holes so that they can go into a three ring binder. Instant organization!



By the end of the year each child will have a HUGE binder full of his or her artwork which can serve as review of their Greek and Latin roots or which can go in our book shelves with the other books.



I think it’s cool to see “Kelsey’s Greek and Latin Roots” printed out on the spine of one of our books in our book shelves. She decorated a sheet that we slipped into the front of the binder, too.

We did this years ago when Kelsey was Christian's age and we still pull out the binder from time to time!

How could we tweak this and make it work with my high schooler? I am thinking that he can create a power point presentation to show each root, its meaning and derivatives by using pictures and sound. This would be part of his High School Language Arts (vocabulary) and Computer Science "credits." OR he could actually make a little book and try to have it published with one of the many self-publishing tools out there......



We created binders for other subjects too. I like this idea of creating binders because then you can make your study of history (or whatever the subject may be) last for several years. It's an ongoing learning project that you can ad to it as you come across information. Not only that but it's also an awesome way to review! And if you have to document learning, there it is!

Some examples of binders that we have made over the years are "Kelsey's Artwork" which included artwork from the time Kelsey was three years old. I would ask "What is this" and then label it and date it and stick it in the binder! I only did this with Kelsey because art is her bent. Another binder that we made was a Science binder. It was really just a collection of Robert Krampt's (how do you spell that) science experiments. Matthan created a "mind bender" binder where he kept his collection of brain teasers and riddles. I am keeping a binder with course details for my high schooler.....

Here are some samples from our World History binder:

A print out from "The Story of the World" and then Matthan's name in hieroglyphs that we found on the internet at virtual egypt, I think.



A writing project and a word search:



A color page and a map from "The Story of the World" and then a page that we printed out with some information that we found on the internet to ad to our binder:



Another root sheet. For "philia" which means "love" Kelsey drew a picture of a fox because she loves foxes. But, it led us on a wild goose chase as we searched the internet for a word meaning "lover of foxes" and even "fear of foxes" and couldn't find any so we created our own: lover of foxes = "vulpinphilia." LOL



Anyway, I want to get back to "note booking" or keeping binders to document our learning. Not that it is required in Texas to do so but because looking back at our old binders is a great review, a sort of SHOW AND TELL to friends and family, it tricks people in to thinking that you are organized, and also brings back great memories (for me.) Which makes me think, WHY NOT SCRAP-BOOK OUR LEARNING JOURNEY??? Because I'm lazy. I guess you could BLOG your learning journey! Imagine a WORLD HISTORY blog! We actually created one for our History Co-op one year. Where you link to images or information about what you are learning........

Labels - Goths and Emos and Unschoolers and School-at-homers...

Thoughts tonight in response to an e mail thread on the A2Z Yahoo! Group:

Goths and Emos and Unschoolers and School-at-homers...

This thread reminds me of the many times I asked or saw others ask "What is the difference between 'unschooling' and 'homeschooling'" which reminded me of a question my daughter asked the other day. With her fingernails and toenails painted black she asked, "What's the difference between GOTH and EMO?" "'Emo' and 'Goth' aren't they both freaks?" was my first reaction. I bet when anti-homeschool people see someone ask, "What's the difference between homeschooling and unschooling" they think the same thing, "aren't they both crazy?"

In our search to find the answer, to the Goth vs EMO question, we realized that there were as many definitions for each label as there were people who claimed to be one or the other. There also seemed to be much concern about who was a true GOTH and who was just a wanna be. Sure, there were some common characteristics for each, but still, the definitions were fluid.

I said, "Be above the labels." Don't worry about the labels or other peoples' image wars. Look at how they both claim that they aren't "conformists" but aren't they conforming to each other? There's a type of peer pressure to adhere to these peer-produced not-so-norms.

And then we found out that there were not just "goths" and "emos" there are "punks" too. Just when you thought you had figured out these two labels you find out that there are not just unschoolers and homeschoolers but there are "eclectic" homeschoolers and even "John Holt unschoolers" too!!! What the heck.

We didn't get anywhere. So we played around with some GOTH paper dolls and she realized that it was actually all kind of silly. People want to belong. It's what makes us cling so tightly to a group or label.

I told her that I loved the way that she dresses! I love her camo capris with all the pockets and buttons and how her t-shirts are always so long. I love her flip flops and her hair in her face. I love the way she is and everyone should be just like her - she's so neat! She should be proud of who she is and not worry about other groups. She's such a cool person! Then I realized, "Hey, I was GOTH and EMO before they had a label for it!" (went through that phase 25 years ago.)

But, seriously, I want to be above the labels. I don't want to be an "unschooler" or a "school at homer." We are just a family living and learning together and that means we can fit into all these labels or none depending on the mood. I can identify with all and with none. I love the way we are and I love the people my children are becoming. Let other people who are so inclined entertain themselves by trying to define us. I am not worried about their conclusions.

Don't identify with a label and don't try to fit into one. If you don't wear your label like a banner you won't be offended when you feel someone isn't on your team. There are only imagined teams anyway. GOTH vs EMO wars or the UNSCHOOLER vs School-at-Homer wars - hey, we are all freaks when it gets down to it. Be above the labels.

We've had some fun with this EMO GOTH thing. When I was taking this picture she wanted to make sure that some of her hair was covering one eye. When I was uploading her images to Xanga, Kelsey said, "See you later, I'm going to go write some depressing poetry!" She has also painted her little brother's fingernails BLUE.

I like to say, "ELMO instead of EMO." (Reminds me of that cartoon where the little boy opens his Christmas present and finds a "POLKA MAN" inside. His parents say, "you wanted a polka man, right?")

And speaking of LABELS and STEREO TYPES - THE BREAKFAST CLUB has been on T.V. lately! I love that movie!

Thank goodness the black nail phase gave way to a more summery nail phase....

Alphabet Soup

Learning happens all the time and doesn't have to look like school; it can look like play or even lunch.

I'm ecstatic that my three year old understands that there exists tiny squiggly lines that he calls, "A B C's." That's all a three year old needs to know about reading. This is the first step towards literacy. My intent, at this stage, is to just refer to those squiggly lines as "ABC's" and to make no distinction among them. Though some letters you can't help pointing out. The "O" looks like a circle or a ball and the golden arches are hard to avoid. Is “M” the first letter all children learn?

At this same time he is going through a stage where he won't eat and I'm trying desperately to find some food that will be palatable to him. While at the grocery store, I told my children to pick out anything that they would eat. My three year old picked out several cans of "ABCs." I asked him if he thought that the soup would taste good just because of the large, colorful, puffy "A" "B" and "C" printed on the label, and of course he said 'yes.' I warned him that it was a can of chicken noodle soup and that he didn't like chicken noodle soup, but he wanted "ABC's." So we bought several cans of alphabet soup.

Today, when I asked my children what they wanted to eat, my three year old shouted, "ABC's!" As he stared into his bowl, I took his spoon and fished out some letters. His big sister pointed out the "H for hhhhhhhhiney" so I dragged a refrigerator magnet 'H' down to where he could see it. As he captured individual "ABC's" in his spoon he would ask, "what this one do?" and we would tell him, "That's a W for wwwwwwwwwow" or "that's P p p p pop pop." We did this over and over again until I thought he was finished.

I began cleaning up some dishes at the sink, and he called me over again, "what this one do?" In his spoon was a green pea. He knows what peas are. I thought about telling him, "That's a pea," but then I realized how confusing that might sound in light of our recent conversations. I told him, "That's an O like a ball." I should have said, "That's a vegetable," or something like that. I didn't think that he might be asking because he knew the little green thing in his spoon was a "pea" but I had just told him that the squiggly noodle shaped like a "P" was a pea. This little inconsistency stuck out in his mind. He had to question it.

I think that's how children's minds work! If something doesn't make sense they set out to solve the mystery or to understand it! That's wild untamed learning. Children are scientist-detectives, naturally. He only asked about each letter once as if he remembered which letter he had captured and inquired about. Do you think he remembered each one? I don't know, and maybe not in the way I would prefer him to because he later told me that "H hhhhh is for butt. "

A Bad Day

My "paragraph panic attack"


March 3, 2004

I am schizophrenic when it comes to living my philosophy of education. I remind myself of a two headed dragon. One head looks like your stereotypical librarian and carries a crop and the other has chocolate all over the face from eating bonbons with the children. Unschooling is a natural but sometimes terrifying lifestyle for me. I freak out every once in awhile and panic because ‘we are not doing enough.’ Yesterday, that fear reared its ugly head and compelled me to dig up my son’s old Language workbook, which I wish I had thrown away.

Looking where we left off, I realized that we should be learning about paragraphs: what a topic sentence is, how to construct them. I tried to show my son how important it was to learn about “paragraphs,” so I got out seven Language text books; texts that would be used from 6th to 12th grades. These texts were some used by our local public school and had been given to us. I opened each of these seven books to the section on “paragraphs” and placed them all out on the floor in front of my son. I said, “See! If we were using and keeping up with our curriculum we would be learning about paragraphs every year for seven years! That’s how important it is to learn about constructing paragraphs!” Something about saying those words out loud ended my panic attack.

If my son were in public or private school or we were using a traditional curriculum he would be learning many of the same things over and over each year. Not only that, but each year starts out with a review of the year before. Traditional education is much like a soap opera: you can jump in at anytime and easily pick up on the plot.

I showed my husband how the table of contents were the same in EACH book year after year. Even Language books sold by other companies have basically this same table of contents. Why?? My husband said, “Well, we kept forgetting the information so we had to learn it again each year.” If this is true, why not learn the information that final year, like, in 12th grade? Even in my college freshman English course we had to purchase a book with a similar table of contents including how to construct a paragraph. Another suggested book was Strunk and White's, "The Elements of Style," which I highly recommend to anyone. It starts out with an explanation on "how to form the possessive singular of nouns by adding 's." So, if you didn't pick up how to add an 's to show possession somewhere during the 13 years of your public education, Strunk and White will be right there to teach you so that you can pass your Freshman English course! I still use this book to this day because for the life of me I can't remember how to properly use a colon and a semicolon. I am sure that I passed the 'colon and semicolon tests' in Junior High and High School.

I figure that as long as we are: keeping journals, reading books together, and researching whatever interests us; we will be fine! Basically, if my children enjoy reading and writing, they will have an advantage over children who are forced to read and write all of their lives and who might end up hating reading and writing.

Looking at how traditional curriculum is basically the same information year after year, helped me to relax. Even if we start “formal” academics in High School we won’t miss anything. I am totally delaying “formal academics” and focusing on relationships and having fun together while my children are young. Childhood is so brief and our home is not a school. I don’t want to create childhood memories of school work and stress, instead, I want to create good memories of being a loving home.

We flew kites outside in our front yard. I would rather my children fly a kite than sit in a desk learning how to construct a paragraph. They’ll have plenty of time for that. Right now they are gaining the experiences that they can one day write about.

I’m not for burning books or banning books, but, I think a practical hobby for my family should be origami. I can think of at least seven books with hundreds of pages with which we can start.

A Good Day

Selection from my Journal

February 15, 2002

Today I woke up to find Matthan looking through various History books. The name of one, in particular, is "The last 1000 years" by Dempsey Parr. I thought to myself, "If he is looking through a history book, I am not going to stop him for school." Was it Mark Twain that said, "I never let schooling get in the way of my education." I decided to fold clothes and wait until he got tired of the book, but he was really involved! In the back of this book there are many lists: Important battles; Prime Ministers; Notable People, etc.

While I was unloading the dishwasher, Matthan quizzed me on the U.S. presidents and then made fun of some rulers' names. He noticed that there were Danish Monarchs who were named, "Christian" like his little brother. He later asked, "Mom, why are there still Kings and Queens?" He had noticed that many countries who had once had Kings or Queens, didn't have them any more, but a few countries still did. He then went to the computer to look up Elizabeth II in the encyclopedia. This, strangely, lead us into a tour of Composers. I didn't know that J.S. Bach had a son who was a composer. His son's name was Christian! We listened to several excerpts of classical music which somehow lead us to World Languages, then we hopped to population growth charts which lead us to probability.

Our Encarta Encyclopedia has an "interactivity" section involving probability using a pair of dice. The computer can instantly generate and graph the results of up to 6,000 rolls which, when the results are graphed, would create a bell curve.** We made our own chart and rolled our own dice to see these results for ourselves. Then we flipped a penny about 100 times to see if we could show that there is a 1 in 2 chance of it landing head side up or tail side up. Then we used a paper cup! You know out of 100 tosses it landed on it's side 85 times! I think we might have tasted a bit of what John Taylor Gatto meant when he said that there is a difference between "school" and "education." What did Matthan and I learn? Nothing! But, Christian learned about gravity!

I had no idea that "chance" (probability) was a field of Mathematics! Things that seem random, might not always be, or they are predictably random.

**There are 36 possible different outcomes when you roll a pair of dice which will add up to either 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, or 12. You have a 1 in 36 chance of rolling a 2 - "snake eyes," or a 1 in 36 chance of rolling a 12, with 7 being the most probable with a 6 in 36 chance or a 1 in 6 chance if you reduce the fraction. There are six different ways that the dice can land and add up to 7. See how this can create the bell curve?

The Eight Parts of Speech jingle

1. All names of person, places, things,

Are NOUNS, as Caesar, Rome, and kings.

2. PRONOUNS are used in place of nouns:

I think; she sings; they work; he frowns

3. When the kind you wish to state,

Use an ADJECTIVE, as great.

4. But if of manner you would tell,

Use ADVERBS, such as slowly, well.

To find an adverb, this test try:

Ask, “How?” or “When?” or “Where?” or “Why?”

5. PREPOSITIONS show relation,

As with respect, or in our nation.

6. CONJECTIONS, as their name implies,

Are joining words; they are the ties

That bind together day and night,

Calm but cold, dull or bright.

7. Next we have the VERBS, which tell

Of action, being, and state as well.

To work, succeed, achieve, and curb—

Each one of these is called a VERB.

8. The INTERJECTIONS show surprise,

As Oh! Alas! Ah me! How wise!

Thus briefly does this jingle state

The PARTS OF SPEECH, which total eight.

(Some authorities give a ninth part of speech, the ARTICLE. A and an are called the indefinite articles, and the is known as the definite article. The words are, in reality, adjectives….)

This is from an English course copyright 1930s. “The New Self-Teaching Course in Practical English and Effective Speech” by Estelle B. Hunter, Ph.B. The Better-Speech Institute of America Chicago USA

"Let the questions be the curriculum" Socrates

Matthan's Favorite Photo

Here is a really neat picture that Matthan took from outside of the house looking through the glass door to the inside of the house where kitty was. It looks like a double exposure but it’s not. The light was behind Matthan so everywhere his shadow is you can see the inside of the house and kitty. Everywhere else you can see the reflection of the outside. You can see our outdoor UT welcome mat and then our indoor Persian rug. I like how you can see the white house bricks and then the inside tile. We thought this was a really neat ‘inside and outside’ picture!