Tag: homeschooling

Curriculum is the vehicle; learning is the destination

Posted on by Suki

The #1 most common question I get from new homeschoolers is, “What curriculum should I use?” This is an understandable question: there’s a lot of focus on curriculum in schools, and an implication that good curriculum is the end-goal.

In homeschooling, however, it is clear that a well-educated child is the end-goal. And it occurred to me that if learning is the goal, then curriculum is a vehicle. Just like we can get to the store by driving, walking, biking, or perhaps taking public transit, there are many ways to get to learning.

Life is like walking toward learning

Right from the beginning, our children are learning. Babies show through eye movement that they are learning every second that they are awake. The world is their curriculum.

As children grow, play becomes their curriculum. We give them blocks and they learn about geometry, gravity, and cause and effect. They climb a tree and learn about the importance of secure footing, fear, and exhilaration. They play with friends and learn social-emotional skills, bartering skills, and the strength of community.

Learning vehicles can take us to new places

If we constrained our lives to only visiting places we could walk to, that would be like learning in the world directly surrounding us. It works well for hunter-gatherer societies, but not so great when you need to attain certain skills to succeed in our society and in a career.

The curriculum we choose is simply a different learning vehicle. Maybe it can take us places further in our community—that’s “car curriculum.” Maybe it can take us to faraway places very unlike our everyday life—that’s “airplane curriculum” Or maybe it can rocket us to a new plane of existence by giving us insights we never would have discovered on our own.

The destination never changes

But no matter what curriculum you use, the destination is the same. We want our kids to learn. So does it really matter which curriculum you use? It can, but I can assure you that countless homeschoolers have found that a free video they happened upon in the library sparked more learning than the beautifully packaged curriculum they purchased for hundreds of dollars.

Yes, I do appreciate well-written curriculum. I love it when teachers are able to package up their approach in a way that inspires others to try new techniques. I have great respect for the skill it takes to break down concepts and skills into a well-scaffolded structure.

But remember: curriculum is the vehicle. Sure, sometimes it’s nice to get a smooth ride in a limo. But it can be just as fun to go over bumps on a one-speed Schwinn.

You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself
any direction you choose.

Dr. Seuss

Further thoughts:

“What do you have against the public school system?”

Posted on by Suki

It’s the sort of question homeschoolers report receiving in stores, at the Thanksgiving dinner table, while pumping gas… In this case, it was in the hot tub at my health club.

He prefaced the question by explaining that public education “was sort of a family business,” with relatives working as teachers and administrators. When he found out that I teach homeschoolers, and homeschooled my own children, that question was his response.

What do I have against the public school system?

I can’t answer for all homeschoolers, but I can certainly answer for myself:

I have nothing against the public school system

My husband and I were both educated in fine public schools. We had planned to send our children to our neighborhood public schools, and tried very hard to do so. But a variety of issues got in our way.

Like America’s founders, I believe that a healthy, robust public school system is essential to our democracy. That said, public schools can’t do it all.

All public schools are not equal

Our first foray away from public school, I have to admit, had something to do with convenience and a lot to do with environment. Our local school’s kindergarten program, at the time we looked at it, was overcrowded and uninspired.

It also started at 7:42 in the morning, and I had a baby. Frankly, I didn’t want to have to get a sleepy child to school at 7:30.

I won’t apologize for what we did: We bought our older child a really cool year of climbing trees and playing in the mud at an experiential learning school on an old farm. It didn’t end up being the school for us long term, but at the time, its relaxed schedule and lack of kindergarten academics suited us just fine.

Later in our children’s school years we avoided our local public schools for other reasons. Our high school didn’t offer the college-level math, science, and computer science that one of my kids wanted. It didn’t offer a band program for my other student. Because we have the resources (and I understand that not everyone does) we chose homeschool for one of the kids and a different public high school for the other.

Not every public school is equipped to handle every child

When my younger child was in preschool, it became clear that we were facing some difficult developmental issues. No diagnosis seemed to fit. School environments exacerbated the problems. Everyone we consulted with had the same advice: avoid public school special education for this child.

First we tried a little private kindergarten in a cabin in the redwoods. That failed. Then we tried homeschool. That succeeded. Our public schools just weren’t set up for our child’s needs at that time.

Not every child is right for public school

When my older child joined us in homeschooling, it was because he was very advanced and self-motivated in some areas and completely uninterested in others. In school, he would have been a mediocre student. In homeschool, he was a star. Eventually, he caught up in his lagging areas and he’s now a successful college student.

In school, he’d been frustrated that he didn’t have time to follow his passions. Once he had that time, he was more willing to address other areas of learning in a more gentle fashion.

Not every family needs to follow the same path

Traditional public education emphasizes following standards. In all seriousness, an adult once asked me how my children were going to be able to be educated if they didn’t follow California public schools’ standard of studying the mission system in fourth grade.

Maybe you think the answer is obvious, but for that parent it wasn’t. The possibility that a family could study missions at a different age, or not study missions at all, didn’t occur to her. Lest that seem a bit ridiculous, it’s important to remember that standards weren’t based on how children actually learn. They were based on how children were traditionally taught. My children are now extremely well-educated, though neither of them studied missions in fourth grade or memorized their times tables in third.

(I will add that neither my husband nor I, both raised in other states, knew much about California missions until we moved here!)

And by the way, homeschoolers can attend public school

We did, in fact, use the public school system throughout our homeschooling years. In our county, we are fortunate to have a healthy slate of alternative public school options!

Freedom of choice is as American as the Constitution

Freedom of choice is firmly embedded in the founding of this country. Our founding documents inspired governments and revolutions around the world for a simple reason: Freedom of choice—control over your religion, your body, who you associate with, what you do for a living—is fundamentally important.

Of course we all support reasonable limits on choices. We don’t allow parents to abuse children, but we do allow reasonable discipline. We don’t allow murder, but we do allow doctors not to continue life-prolonging treatments. We shouldn’t allow educational neglect, but we do allow a certain amount of freedom of choice in how our children are educated.

Education is a balancing act

We start with a baby, and if we’re lucky, we send a fully functioning adult out into the world. But there are many ways to get from the beginning to the desired end result.

Homeschooling is just one way to balance our children’s needs with the opportunities available to us. Homeschooling is not for everyone, and it won’t solve all the world’s problems.

But the freedom to choose homeschooling improves children’s lives, and I believe it can strengthen our public schools as well.

More about homeschooling

Gifted Kids: The disconnect between input and output

Posted on by Suki

…and what you can do about it

It’s hard to educate a child who is profoundly asynchronous, as many gifted children are. While a young gifted child may have a high school level vocabulary, they may struggle to hold a pencil. And the disconnect becomes even more pronounced as the child grows and seems to become more mature. When a child can read and discuss a history text at a high level, we expect that they should also be able to write an essay at the same level. However, it’s an unusual gifted child of 10 years old that can write a coherent essay; even more unusual for a 10-year-old to want to write a coherent essay.

My students’ parents have been asking me this question for years: How can I accelerate my child’s writing to match their analytical abilities? My answer is a multi-step one. Hopefully this will be helpful both for homeschooling parents who are frustrated with their child’s writing output, and school parents whose children are being held back from accessing classes they seem ready for.

1) A disconnect between input and output is completely normal for gifted kids

For homeschooling families, this can seem like a personal struggle. You may not notice other homeschooled kids having similar difficulties, but the fact is, it’s extremely common (within our uncommon demographic), and will require some patience on your part.

If your student is in school, you may be frustrated that educators generally understand little about gifted children and may use this disconnect as “proof” that your child isn’t gifted. It certainly isn’t proof that your child isn’t gifted; however, it may be evidence that your child is not mature enough yet to access advanced courses which require high-level output.

2) Forcing gets the wrong result

One of the first instincts when homeschoolers and teachers sense a lagging skill is to push on it. However, issues of asynchronous development don’t go away if you push on them—they tend to be exacerbated. Especially in writing, it’s important to remember that good writing never comes from being forced. Students need to develop fluency in writing things they want to write before they can be challenged to write academically.

3) Focus on success

I borrowed my “focus on success” approach from teachers in Special Education. They have to accept that some of their students will never be able to function at a high level, so it doesn’t make sense to focus on the things these kids can’t do. Instead they focus on making the kids feel successful at the things they can do, then work on improving their lagging skills as best they can.

How this translates to gifted kids is that if you focus on the lagging areas too much, the kids start to think of themselves as having a problem to be addressed. Then they start to think that the problem “defines” them and they may start to try to avoid confronting it. Especially if they are perfectionists, which is common in gifted kids, they start to shy away from “working on” the “problem” because they don’t feel successful at it. Then they develop a block, and once that happens, you have a lot more work to do to get back to the place where they can work on their skills.

4) Remember that maturity is important

Our gifted kids can seem so mature, but that’s only because certain parts of their brains are developed beyond what is expected for their biological age. The other parts of their brain show age-appropriate (and sometimes lower) development. In some areas of education, you simply have to have the patience to wait for maturity to happen. As long as your child is progressing and is happy and healthy, you probably have nothing to worry about. Waiting for maturity is the right approach, as frustrating as it can be. (The exception is if your child is indicating the presence of a disability such as dyslexia or dysgraphia. In that case, you need professional help.)

There is nowhere I have noticed the importance of maturity more than in developing academic writing skills. Even my best, most fluent creative writers balk at writing essays before they are mature enough to see the need for them. Sometimes the change is almost as sudden as flipping a switch: A child who refused to do any academic writing is suddenly a teen who writes, edits, and takes pride in a serious academic essay. Sometimes the process is slow—and it often happens too late for the comfort of parents and teachers.

5) Input almost always develops before output

I have heard of kids who love to write before they can read, but this is extremely unusual and not necessarily something you should want. Avid young readers who resist academic writing are simply not ready for it, and pushing them won’t help. If input is what they are enjoying, and if their output is keeping pace with their biological age, then you’re doing fine.

6) Adapt as much as you can so input progresses while output develops naturally with maturity

While you are waiting for maturity, you can help foster a love of writing by not pushing writing assignments that are meaningless to them. As long as writing is meaningful, most students will want to do it. Read “Approaching Formal Writing” for tips on how to work on writing skills in age-appropriate ways.

As I explain in my article “Adapting Curriculum,” there are many ways outside of formal writing to continue to engage with advanced materials while not expecting advanced output. For example, if you are reading college-level literature, you can:

  • Have lots of verbal discussions about the book
  • Make it social by taking part in a book group
  • Make creative projects based on the book—visual art, videos, creative writing, comics
  • Ask your child to dictate their ideas while you type or use dictation software
  • Watch movie adaptations and do comparative analysis
  • Go on field trips related to the book’s subject

You can do these sorts of activities for pretty much any subject. Don’t discount the importance of creative output in demonstrating a child’s understanding of a text—this is a natural way for children to interact with their studies.

7) Be patient and realize that much of maturity is biological

No matter how advanced our kids are intellectually, they are still, like all of us, one with their biology. In time, their bodies will grow, their hormones will mature, and it will all sync up. Remaining patient and trusting the process is one of the greatest challenges in parenting gifted children. We need to keep our eyes on the goal: producing happy, healthy, productive adults.

My “Teaching Writing” series:

The value of the personal touch….online!

Posted on by Suki

This photo is of a group of students who met for the first time. They are members of a long-running writing group and it was as if they were old friends…because they are even though they’ve never met IRL.

In my summer off from teaching online at Athena’s, I didn’t stop working. I read books, updated my classrooms, emailed with students and parents, consulted with our wise Athena (a.k.a. Dr. Kirsten), and sat in a circle on a lawn with some of my longtime students.

Wait, don’t I teach online? Isn’t online teaching all about being separated from your students?

Yes! And No!

Teaching is about connecting

One of my most important jobs as an online teacher is finding ways to connect with my students personally even though we are not in the same room, the same state, and even sometimes the same country. It’s a tricky part of online teaching.

This summer I got to see the fruits of my labor when I was hired to speak at a conference that, it turned out, a good number of Athena’s students would attend. I declared a time and place for the meeting and then, well, decided I’d have to wing it.

30-some homeschoolers meet on a lawn…

If I’d been a classroom teacher, I would have had physical memories to draw on: I could have brought familiar items from the classroom or done activities we’d already done together. But what would we do in an outdoor space?

The first challenge was to get everyone to make a circle. School is very good at teaching kids how to form geometric shapes. Homeschool, not so much!

Once we’d done it, though, I felt like we were back in our Blackboard classroom (which had developed ninety-degree weather, well-watered grass, and slices of watermelon being passed out by a parent). All the eager hands; those familiar voices chiming in with their creative, intelligent, and wacky ideas; and the smiles, though this time they were real rather than emojis. 😊

And then we connected

Here I am presenting at the conference.

When I asked the students what they liked about Athena’s, they pointed out everything that we teachers hope to convey: a safe space for all kinds of kids; a place where they could express their ideas; a place where they could explore a wide variety of topics with teachers who love what they teach and other passionate students.

I noticed that Dr. Kirsten had to wipe away tears!

Online education fills a need

The fact is, yes, we teach online. But no, we aren’t disconnected from our students. Online learning will never replace physical get-togethers, but it it fills a need that many students have. Our students feel that they are part of a community of kids and adults who share values and passions.

For me, the experience was one of the most memorable of my teaching career. Nevertheless, I’m happy to be back in our webinar room….though it is BYO sunshine, grass, and yummy watermelon.

Loving and loss

Posted on by Suki

I had a dream:

My family was in Paris. We were on our way to see a friend, who’d rented an apartment there on Forest Ave. (As it goes in dreams, all the street names were borrowed from Palo Alto!) My family and I were going there, but somehow we got separated and I was alone. Everyone around me was a tourist; no one knew anything. I tried to use my Google, but it kept sending me around in circles. “I know,” I thought. “I’ll call Abe!” I tried to use my phone, but it wouldn’t work.

“Oh, no,” I lamented, “I’ve lost my Abe!”

I woke up.

My favorite lil’ guy photo.

Not surprisingly, this dream happened in the early morning hours on the day that we were taking our firstborn to college. It’s a happy day, but it’s also the saddest: we’ve finished the job, and our son is leaving our house.

True: I know all the things you’re thinking. He’ll be back soon enough. He’s not going far away. This is just a natural part of life.

All true. But it’s also the official break with his childhood. It’s the official start of his adult life. It’s the very real experience of not having anyone to call on to take the garbage out.

My husband and I would jokingly call him “the man upstairs” in the last year. His bedroom was upstairs, and if we needed anything done, we’d text “the man upstairs” to get it done. It was great to have another adult in the house, but it was also clear that it was time for him to strike out on his own.

This is the sweet-n-sour taste of a job well done. When we send our kids off into the world, we feel good about it. We know that they will do the best they have with what they’ve got to start with (same as we did). We know that we’ve given all we could possibly give.

But we also know it’s an end. They’re going off to their own lives. The cycle starts again, and we think, misty-eyed, about our own college experiences.

And then they’re gone.

And we’ve lost. But we’ve also won.

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