work product mindset
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Hi all,
My toddler's favorite book is "Oliver Finds His Way," a very sweet book about a little bear who gets lost in the woods chasing a leaf and then figures out how to get home.
So, I googled it yesterday to see if I could print out some photos of the book for him to play around with or to put on the wall and came across this:
http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/lessonplan.jsp?id=967
And after having been immersing myself in unschooling discussions for awhile now, it just looked like something from another planet. All I could think was, "How about just enjoying the book?!"
"OBJECTIVE
Students will "use correctly words and phrases that indicate location and direction, such as up, down, near, far, left, right, straight, back, behind, and in front of." --Massachusetts History and Social Science Curriculum Framework"
I mean, seriously? How many kids don't know "up" until there's a lesson about it from a framework? Don't you pretty much learn directions like "over" and "through" from living on earth among humans? Why do you need to make a map or bring an overhead projector into it?
And I've seen this in myself, wondering how I can prove my kids know something if we have no work "to show for it." And that's why I keep reading here, so I can continue to feel more and more that lesson plans like this one are not only unnecessary, but insane.
Michelle
Wife to Bob
Momma to George (12), Theo (9), Eli (6), and Oliver (18 mo)
If my life wasn't funny, it would just be true, and that's unacceptable.
-- Carrie Fisher
My toddler's favorite book is "Oliver Finds His Way," a very sweet book about a little bear who gets lost in the woods chasing a leaf and then figures out how to get home.
So, I googled it yesterday to see if I could print out some photos of the book for him to play around with or to put on the wall and came across this:
http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/lessonplan.jsp?id=967
And after having been immersing myself in unschooling discussions for awhile now, it just looked like something from another planet. All I could think was, "How about just enjoying the book?!"
"OBJECTIVE
Students will "use correctly words and phrases that indicate location and direction, such as up, down, near, far, left, right, straight, back, behind, and in front of." --Massachusetts History and Social Science Curriculum Framework"
I mean, seriously? How many kids don't know "up" until there's a lesson about it from a framework? Don't you pretty much learn directions like "over" and "through" from living on earth among humans? Why do you need to make a map or bring an overhead projector into it?
And I've seen this in myself, wondering how I can prove my kids know something if we have no work "to show for it." And that's why I keep reading here, so I can continue to feel more and more that lesson plans like this one are not only unnecessary, but insane.
Michelle
Wife to Bob
Momma to George (12), Theo (9), Eli (6), and Oliver (18 mo)
If my life wasn't funny, it would just be true, and that's unacceptable.
-- Carrie Fisher
Sandra Dodd
-=-
My toddler's favorite book is "Oliver Finds His Way," a very sweet book about a little bear who gets lost in the woods chasing a leaf and then figures out how to get home. -=-
OH!
I was just trying to think of how to introduce something over here. It's about a bear (partly) and getting lost in the woods (a little girl, kind of) and parenting.
The only tie-in with "work product" is that the URL for the page has "teacher" in it (for no really good reason).
The part of the story that starts there is enough to get the point I was hoping to share. It's very much like what one might decide about the very last cookie--what is the value of one cookie? It's from a Russian folktale, and will require reading this link and the exciting conclusion at "next page":
http://www.doverpublications.com/samplerkids/0224/teacher16d.htm
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
My toddler's favorite book is "Oliver Finds His Way," a very sweet book about a little bear who gets lost in the woods chasing a leaf and then figures out how to get home. -=-
OH!
I was just trying to think of how to introduce something over here. It's about a bear (partly) and getting lost in the woods (a little girl, kind of) and parenting.
The only tie-in with "work product" is that the URL for the page has "teacher" in it (for no really good reason).
The part of the story that starts there is enough to get the point I was hoping to share. It's very much like what one might decide about the very last cookie--what is the value of one cookie? It's from a Russian folktale, and will require reading this link and the exciting conclusion at "next page":
http://www.doverpublications.com/samplerkids/0224/teacher16d.htm
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]