Day 6: Interest Based Learning

By the time Hunter was 18 months old to 2 years, he had learned all of the letters and sounds of the alphabet.  He did not learn this by order with the usual reciting or singing the  'ABCDEFG' song that other children have been learning.  He knew each letter by sight and would sound them out when he saw them.  He also could differentiate between complex shapes and would say their names when he saw them in his external world.  Our family and close friends were excited and amazed by this - they would often express to me how smart he is.

I would have liked to have taken credit for this however, his ability to learn this information had nothing to do with any education processes we were doing together at the time.  It was all him seeing and getting into things that he was interested in.

A friend had given us a Leap Frog gaming system which I noticed that he really liked how the characters looked and sounded.  Unfortunately, the game system was very buggy and did not work as well as we would have liked, so I went on a search for other Leap Frog products and found the video Talking Word Factory where the story focused on some Leap Frog characters, letters, and their sounds. He enjoyed this movie so much that he asked to watch it 2 or 3 times per day. Within 2 weeks, he had learned all of his letters and sounds.

From here, I attempted to move him into some workbook activities with his new skills and found that he didn't like this.  He was also introduced to other reading programs by me and other members of our family which he would do with us because he liked doing things with us though I can say that he didn't actually like the content and would have to push himself to get through a few pages and unlike the video, he never asked to do these workbook activities or reading programs.

It was the same with his learning shapes.  He liked watching Nick Jr. on TV which was focused on pre-school education and presented shapes, animals, art, science, numbers, math, and information about other cultures.  When I took what he was learning and applied methods of classical education with reading, worksheets, and book work, he was not as interested and eager to move on to other things like baking with me, helping his father with projects, dancing to electronic dance music and perfecting the art of woodcutting and making chainsaw sounds.

It was around this time that we started mentioning to our friends and family that we were considering homeschooling Hunter and we found they were either in complete disagreement, they had concerns, or they saw it as one of those 'on the fringe' of society kind of things.  Through the years they've all come to accept that we're homeschooling though they do not trust it and often ask, "How's homeschooling going? What is he learning? Has he learned how to do this yet?", "Are you guys keeping up with everything?", "What grade is he in now?", "He needs more time with other kids," and/or "You really need to start teaching him about this."

Obviously, it would be pointless to attempt to judge our friends and family for their concerns because they are all concerns that I have had myself and I realize that they come from fear of the unknown and our beliefs about education that we have been ingrained with from the beginning of our learning process with adults - who, in-turn, as children went through the very same learning process with adults. 

Day 4: My Second Impression of Homeschooling

I have worked in the food and beverage industry for most of my life and even while I was working in the public school system, I continued working in a restaurant as a server, a bartender, a hostess, and a manager-on-duty.  I did this because I found that working in the school system with my position of an Educational Technician was unstable - there was no pay for vacations nor holidays, we were not allowed to contribute to the decisions made for the student's education, and there was no job security as when a student that we were assigned to graduated or was no longer attending school, we were sent home.  I was also working in the school system at a time when I was able to see the effects of the No Child Left Behind Act and how special education students were forced out of the Life Skills programs and into mainstream classrooms.  On a daily basis I watched teachers, students, and parents struggling to make the changes required to satisfy this law and it never worked - everyone was beyond stressed and this created an emotionally charged environment.

For me, the end point is when I was working with two students - one was graduating that year and the other would be graduating the next - and because my main student, the one who was graduating, made it to graduation and left school, the administration pulled me out of my one-on-one work with the second student who actually needed my support more than my first student.  When they called me to take on a new student for the following year, I declined and instead of going back, I decided to go into managing a restaurant that I had been working in for some time.

During my second year of managing the restaurant, I had a 20-year old girl on my staff that was working on her Masters degree.  When she was not at work, she was focused on her education and her future so she wasn't into the same social activities that the other staff were into.  I remember her being bright, cheery, really pleasant to be with, and up for challenges.  She was also able to fit in with the other staff despite her outside interests and activities being different.  When she told me that she was homeschooled, I became excited because I had been curious about homeschooling and homeschoolers and this is something that I wondered if it would be possible for me to do for my youngest child, Hunter.  She worked for me for two years and it was great getting to know her, learning about the homeschooling process, and seeing how someone who was homeschooled interacted with others and their environment.  See, there's this myth that homeschooled kids aren't 'socialized' or aren't able to function with stability within the system and I found out from this girl in real time that this definitely was not true.

Working and playing - a daily thing in our restaurant

During her second year with us, her mom came to work for our company at the front desk of the hotel so I utilized the many times that I had with her in one-on-one communication to ask questions about homeschooling laws, requirements, procedures, the time investment, curriculum and what I could potentially expect to see based on her own experiences with homeschooling her children.  See, homeschooling tends to look like this HUGE thing - like this big deal or a commitment that goes beyond what we think we can give to our children but this mom assisted me to see that it's actually quite simple and more convenient for some parent's schedules.

Out of all of this, though, what stuck with me the most is when the mom shared with me that by the time children are 8 years old, they start teaching themselves.  She told me that the only part I am actually required to provide are the 'morals' or principles.

To be continued.