Re: 2240 Tina Struck by Lightning
Luz Shosie and Ned Vare
on 8/13/02 5:05 PM, [email protected] at
[email protected] wrote:
Wow ! Did ya' see that lightning strike ?
Tina describes the way many parents feel. The idea is that if a kid isn't
"studying" something, time is being wasted, and the kid's future is in
jeopardy. That's fear tactics. Sheila's advice ("don't bug him about not
'studying' something" ) agrees with a great deal of evidence on child
development that says kids don't "need" to study stuff, they need to freely
investigate their surroundings on their own terms -- that's called play, and
it doesn't mean "organized sports" (necessarily).
What happened (above) was that Tina recognized that it was she herself who
needed to unlearn the false assumptions that "educators" want us all to
believe -- that we NEED their services and that they know how to raise our
kids better than we do.
Let me add to Sheila's elegant post:
I've had two sets of kids. One set (twins, b&g, went to a variety of
schools, mostly the public, and came out stressed badly and not knowing much
at all -- even fearful of learning. The other, a boy ten years younger,
never set foot in a school (except Montessori briefly when he was 4 and
dropped out on his own - he quit at 4 ! - and also took a night class in
converstational French when he was 12. A French woman spoke French and in
eight sessions he learned to speak that language better than I had learned,
taking French for six years every day in a "good" private school) and
learned everything in sight -- without a moment of stress or unhappiness or
coercion or anyone telling him what to think or do or -- least of all --
study.
The transition from being required to study things that don't interest a
person to becoming interested/curious in something by one's self is
delicate. School makes learning compulsory, and therefore onerous. . . it is
on other people's terms and there will be tests, so you don't even know
which information is important and which is not. That creates stress, and
changes learning from an enjoyable experience into a threatening one. It
takes kids a while to see that learning can be enjoyable experience, once it
has become a "duty" done for gold stars or other people smiles.
Kids don't need incentives to learn about things that interest them. But
schools give "rewards" and soon kids only learn for the "rewards" instead of
the joy and satisfaction.
Advice: Give the boy things like maps, real tools -- such as tape measures,
microscope, magnifying glass, binoculars, a sewing machine, paint, have a
junk yard bring a wrecked car and put it in your yard. etc. Those are toys
for people who do real things. He will play with them. (don't tell him what
to do with them, though, just make them available, visible) He just needs
access to the real world, he's 10. Life is long.
Ned Vare
[email protected] wrote:
> Message: 4Ned's turn:
> Date: Tue, 13 Aug 2002 18:22:32 -0000
> From: "inmdcrew" <Hatfield72@...>
> Subject: Re: Thoughts on Pre-unschooling from a newbie
>
> --- In Unschooling-dotcom@y..., "kayb85" <sheran@p...> wrote:
>>
>>> This pre-unschooling time so far is full of doubts. How come my
> 10
>>> year old can't find any thing to interest him? He's still waiting
>>> for me to tell him what to study
>>
>> I would just tell him that he doesn't have to study anything
>> anymore. Tell him all he has to do is play.
>> Sheila
>
>
> Sheila,
> Thanks for the encouragement. This goes against everything I was
> ever taught. I think it is a matter of me deschooling more than my
> son.
> Tina
Wow ! Did ya' see that lightning strike ?
Tina describes the way many parents feel. The idea is that if a kid isn't
"studying" something, time is being wasted, and the kid's future is in
jeopardy. That's fear tactics. Sheila's advice ("don't bug him about not
'studying' something" ) agrees with a great deal of evidence on child
development that says kids don't "need" to study stuff, they need to freely
investigate their surroundings on their own terms -- that's called play, and
it doesn't mean "organized sports" (necessarily).
What happened (above) was that Tina recognized that it was she herself who
needed to unlearn the false assumptions that "educators" want us all to
believe -- that we NEED their services and that they know how to raise our
kids better than we do.
Let me add to Sheila's elegant post:
I've had two sets of kids. One set (twins, b&g, went to a variety of
schools, mostly the public, and came out stressed badly and not knowing much
at all -- even fearful of learning. The other, a boy ten years younger,
never set foot in a school (except Montessori briefly when he was 4 and
dropped out on his own - he quit at 4 ! - and also took a night class in
converstational French when he was 12. A French woman spoke French and in
eight sessions he learned to speak that language better than I had learned,
taking French for six years every day in a "good" private school) and
learned everything in sight -- without a moment of stress or unhappiness or
coercion or anyone telling him what to think or do or -- least of all --
study.
The transition from being required to study things that don't interest a
person to becoming interested/curious in something by one's self is
delicate. School makes learning compulsory, and therefore onerous. . . it is
on other people's terms and there will be tests, so you don't even know
which information is important and which is not. That creates stress, and
changes learning from an enjoyable experience into a threatening one. It
takes kids a while to see that learning can be enjoyable experience, once it
has become a "duty" done for gold stars or other people smiles.
Kids don't need incentives to learn about things that interest them. But
schools give "rewards" and soon kids only learn for the "rewards" instead of
the joy and satisfaction.
Advice: Give the boy things like maps, real tools -- such as tape measures,
microscope, magnifying glass, binoculars, a sewing machine, paint, have a
junk yard bring a wrecked car and put it in your yard. etc. Those are toys
for people who do real things. He will play with them. (don't tell him what
to do with them, though, just make them available, visible) He just needs
access to the real world, he's 10. Life is long.
Ned Vare
[email protected]
In a message dated 8/14/2002 4:50:45 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
nedvare@... writes:
I can't claim to be an unschooler, but I can identify with this. My 12 year
old boy recently bought the video "Happy Gilmore" -- a silly take-off of
Caddyshack (you may not even know what the heck that is -- but they're both
golfing movies). Anyway, he asked if we could go golfing sometime. I'm not a
golfer, but I said yes, and we went to a driving range and rented a couple
clubs and had at it. It was such a joy to do something with my son wherein I
didn't know any more than he did. I don't mean to imply that I know more than
him in everything else, but only that here was something of general interest
that we both were ignorant of. We just mimicked the guys we've seen on TV,
and those around us, and hacked away for an hour. He did really well, and
picked up some pointers from a guy next to us who was creaming the balls
while looking as if he was barely trying.
It will be awesome to see where this goes, and to learn it together, and
hopefully it will help me to take a back seat to him in other areas as well.
Bob
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
nedvare@... writes:
> they need to freelyNed,
> investigate their surroundings on their own terms -- that's called play,
> and
> it doesn't mean "organized sports" (necessarily).
I can't claim to be an unschooler, but I can identify with this. My 12 year
old boy recently bought the video "Happy Gilmore" -- a silly take-off of
Caddyshack (you may not even know what the heck that is -- but they're both
golfing movies). Anyway, he asked if we could go golfing sometime. I'm not a
golfer, but I said yes, and we went to a driving range and rented a couple
clubs and had at it. It was such a joy to do something with my son wherein I
didn't know any more than he did. I don't mean to imply that I know more than
him in everything else, but only that here was something of general interest
that we both were ignorant of. We just mimicked the guys we've seen on TV,
and those around us, and hacked away for an hour. He did really well, and
picked up some pointers from a guy next to us who was creaming the balls
while looking as if he was barely trying.
It will be awesome to see where this goes, and to learn it together, and
hopefully it will help me to take a back seat to him in other areas as well.
Bob
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Betsy
**A French woman spoke French and in
eight sessions he learned to speak that language better than I had learned,
taking French for six years every day in a "good" private school) and
learned everything in sight -- without a moment of stress or unhappiness or
coercion or anyone telling him what to think or do or -- least of all --
study. **
I agree that foreign language learning/forgetting is a great
illustration of how pointless it is to "teach" someone something before
they have a desire or need to learn it.
I sometimes use it to whap people over the head when they are being
unsupportive of unschooling. "Did you take a foreign language in high
school?" "Can you say anything besides Hello?"
Betsy
eight sessions he learned to speak that language better than I had learned,
taking French for six years every day in a "good" private school) and
learned everything in sight -- without a moment of stress or unhappiness or
coercion or anyone telling him what to think or do or -- least of all --
study. **
I agree that foreign language learning/forgetting is a great
illustration of how pointless it is to "teach" someone something before
they have a desire or need to learn it.
I sometimes use it to whap people over the head when they are being
unsupportive of unschooling. "Did you take a foreign language in high
school?" "Can you say anything besides Hello?"
Betsy