Jenny E.

Hello everyone...
I joined the list recently and have been lurking (to be read as reading and
learning!) and browsing the archives.

My name is Jen and I live in CA. with my hubby and our two boys -- Beck (7)
and Dane (4). My boys have never been to school and I hope they never have
to.

Here is our story....Beck wanted to learn to read when he was about 4
1/2...so I helped him. By the time he was supposed to be registering for K
I started thinking about how horrible I thought it would be for him to have
to sit through weeks and weeks of learning the alphabet when he was already
reading. I starting asking around and decided that we could homeschool. We
were having a great time doing our own thing and then I read The Well
Trained Mind...sooooo...I got all excited and thought "that's what we need
to do. Our boys will have an awesome education and I will learn a lot too!"
I have recently come to the painful realization that over the last year or
so I have slowly been killing his love of learning. I never followed TWTM
"by the book" and we did lots of hands-on projects and field trips...they
just weren't really of any interest to my boys. I've started talking and
listening a lot more to others in our HS group that take the more child-led
path.

Now I have ditched any curricula I was using and I am just trying to get
back in tune with my kids. I have been reading everything I can get my
hands on about unschooling. I am trying to just sit back and let life
happen. It is comforting to hear other's stories of how they came to
unschooling.

I am also trying to let go of my anxieties and fears. My biggest fear is
not being able to provide a rich environment full of learning opportunities.
Right now...it just seems like they want to be left alone. I am trying to
respect that and let them know that I am here if they need/want me. I have
also made suggestions....and let them go if the boys say "No, thank you."

I am very open to any advice or words of wisdom that anyone would like to
share with me. Other than that I will just continue to read and learn.

Thanks to anyone that was able to make it through my rambling thoughts.
Namaste,
Jen :o)


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Heidi

Hi Jen

I'm coming through the same things you are, just beginning to trust
my kids' brains to be "knowledge absorpers" (Sp?) absorb?...

Wanted to say, about the rich learning environment. Do they have a
bathtub? LOL When I listed "Everything I Have Ever Learned" per
Sandra Dodd's advice in an article about parental deschooling, one of
the things in that list is my knowledge of how air pressure forces
water up into a sealed tubular structure, when the opening of the
tube is held under water. (cup, bathtub, 9 year old brain) I know
that water will "climb" inside a cup, by playing with it in the tub.
And, some time in my readings as a child, or possibly from a science
program on TV, I heard about the physics behind that phenomenon (air
pressure on the surface of the water being greater than the air
pressure inside the cup)

Of course, we want to provide lots of opportunities, but my point is,
your kids will learn from things you can't even imagine. Sort of like
the principle of the box the toy came in, being lots more fun than
the toy itself. Relax and watch your kids play for awhile. The
connections they make will amaze you.

HeidiC still deschooling

--- In [email protected], "Jenny E."
<mom2jrjedis@b...> wrote:
> Hello everyone...
> I joined the list recently and have been lurking (to be read as
reading and
> learning!) and browsing the archives.
>
> My name is Jen and I live in CA. with my hubby and our two boys --
Beck (7)
> and Dane (4). My boys have never been to school and I hope they
never have
> to.
>
> Here is our story....<snip>
>
> I am also trying to let go of my anxieties and fears. My biggest
fear is
> not being able to provide a rich environment full of learning
opportunities.
> Right now...it just seems like they want to be left alone. I am
trying to
> respect that and let them know that I am here if they need/want
me. I have
> also made suggestions....and let them go if the boys say "No, thank
you."
>
> I am very open to any advice or words of wisdom that anyone would
like to
> share with me. Other than that I will just continue to read and
learn.
>
> Thanks to anyone that was able to make it through my rambling
thoughts.
> Namaste,
> Jen :o)
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Jenny E.

Thank you for the welcome Heidi. Your words were just the encouraging type
I needed. I do have to admit that I think my oldest is still kind of
testing me -- "does she really mean I don't have to do those stupid lessons
anymore...or is she going to go back?" KWIM? And it's amazing how fewer
times I have heard "I'm bored." (I do know that it's okay for them to be
bored sometimes) but I think that before they wouldn't get involved in their
fantasy play because they suspected that at any moment I was going to come
in and tell them they had to stop and come do what I wanted them to do now.
Looking back....I am disgusted at how many times I actually did that!

And funny you should mention the bathtub. I just ordered a book called
_Bathtub Science_ or something like that. I just hope that when I put it on
the shelf the boys actually look at it...or at least ask me about it.
:::grin:::

Again...thank you for the welcome and kind words.

Jen :o)
Mom to Beck (7) and Dane (4)

----- Original Message -----
From: Heidi


Hi Jen

I'm coming through the same things you are, just beginning to trust
my kids' brains to be "knowledge absorpers" (Sp?) absorb?...




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

zenmomma2kids

>> Hello everyone...I joined the list recently and have been lurking
(to be read as reading and learning!) and browsing the archives.>>

Hi Jen and welcome. Thanks for sharing the story of your path to
unschooling. Here's mine: www.sandradodd.com/special/mary

>>I am also trying to let go of my anxieties and fears. My biggest
fear is not being able to provide a rich environment full of learning
opportunities.>>

It's okay to let go. Let go of the fear that has been instilled in
you by the experts. Look to your kids and they will be their own
experts in what is the next "right" thing to learn and do. Really. :o)

>> Right now...it just seems like they want to be left alone.>>

Right now is all you've got. Go with it. They're deschooling. Keep
reading and you'll deschool too. Each in his own way, each in his own
time.

Life is good.
~Mary