Growing Without Schooling #77 - Vol. 13, No. 5.
Date of Issue:  October 1, 1990

Questioning College:  Interview with Herbert Kohl

“You’d have to go to school for that,” people say, about experiences or opportunities that it’s hard to imagine homeschoolers having access to.  “What about biology labs?  What about team sports?”  Sometimes these questions are posed as challenges from a critic of homeschooling, someone who wants to point out that at least some things are surely impossible for homeschooling parents to provide.  Just as often, though, these questions come from homeschoolers who are feeling stuck about a particular issue.  Maybe they’ve been homeschooling successfully for a while, but they’ve come up against a problem:  their child wants to play a team sport, or have access to school’s social life, or whatever it may be.  If we take that interest seriously, the family wonders, will school be the only way to satisfy it?

This is the kind of challenge that we at Growing Without Schooling like to meet.  If someone says it can’t be done without going to school, we start thinking of, and looking around for, ways that whatever it is can be done.  For this issue of GWS, we’ve interviewed homeschoolers (both parents and children) who have found a way to get or provide the experience in question without having to give up homeschooling.  We’re hoping that their experiences, and even more important their ways of thinking about such questions, will help others who may be feeling stuck.

These homeschoolers have in common what they refused to believe:  that they had to accept the whole of the school experience in order to have access to a part of it, and that what they wanted could be found only in school.  Jesse Schwerin and Kevin Davies didn’t believe they had to enroll in school full time just to get the parts of it (running on the track team and riding the school bus) that they wanted.  Susan Shilcock didn’t believe that enrolling her child in high school, or even enrolling her in one class, was the only way to give her access to biology labs and equipment.  When this refusal is combined with a willingness to think creatively about what else might be done, it becomes relatively easy for parents and children to find alternate solutions.

Often, families find that focusing on the specific activity or experience that they are looking for, as opposed to thinking that school must be the answer, brings results that are closer to what they really wanted in the first place.  After all, if what you want is to run on the track team, do you need to go to classes, take tests, and all the rest of it, just to get that one activity?  If what you want is the chance to use lab equipment, is school the only place where that can be done?

John Holt wrote to a group of students in 1970, “…We have to push out against the walls of circumstances that hem us in.  One of the reasons we have to push is that unless we push we can’t really be sure where the walls are.  We may find that we are walled in, not so much by a real wall as by a wall that we have built in our imagination…”  John was writing to people who thought they had to go to school to get a good job.  The same is true of people who think they have to go to school to get biology equipment or sports teams.  It may be true in a particular situation, but it may not.  It has certainly not been true for everyone.  The only thing to do is to test those walls, see how far they expand, find out for sure what can’t be done and what and what is, in fact, very possible. –  Susannah Sheffer

OFFICE NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

[SS:]  “Back-to-school” season has brought us more calls than usual from reporters wanting to do stories on the children who are not going back to school.  In the past few weeks we’ve spoken to writers from Time, The Nation, The Boston Globe, Harpers, Parenting, and New York Newsday.  An article in the Utne Reader, which listed us as a resource, has brought in many inquiries, too.

Some of you may have expected to see our fall John Holt’s Book and Music Store catalog bound into this issue of GWS.  At the last minute, we learned that postal regulations now prevent us from binding a third-class piece of mail in with a second-class piece, so we are mailing the catalog to subscribers separately.  This issue of GWS is only 24 pages because we expected the catalog to be included in it.

In the catalog you’ll see Nancy Wallace’s new book, Child’s Work, which we have published here at Holt Associates, and A Life Worth Living:  Selected Letters of John Holt.  You can help us by asking your local bookstores to order these books, and by reviewing them for newspapers or magazines.  We’ve also put together a collection of John Holt’s book reviews (from GWS and elsewhere) called Sharing Treasures.

One note about the availability of A Life Worth Living:  just as we were going to press, we learned that there had been a delay at the publishers of about four weeks, so that instead of having the book here in late October, as we had anticipated, we will have it in late November or early December.  We encourage those of you who want a copy of the    book to order it as soon as you get the catalog.  We will maintain a list of requests for the book, in the order we receive them, and will fill them as soon as the shipment of books arrives.  If you order by credit card, we won’t charge you until the order is shipped.  We especially encourage you to order early if you’re hoping to have the book by Christmas.

We would like to hear from people - adults or children - who enjoy math, and are perhaps doing it in interesting or unusual ways (other than just out of textbooks, in other words, although if you are enjoying that, tell us about it too).  We would also like to hear from or about young people who are doing science with real, working scientists - in the lab, in the field, etc.

NEWS & REPORTS

New Law in New Hampshire

Just after GWS #76 went to press in July, we received a copy of New Hampshire’s new homeschooling law (previously called Senate Bill 373).  According to a mailing from the NEW HAMPSHIRE HOME EDUCATORS ASSOCIATION, two parts of the law went into effect as of July 1990:

(1) the compulsory attendance law now includes home education as one of the exceptions to the public school attendance requirement, and

(2) a Home Education Advisory Council was established, appointed by the commissioner of education.  The council will have six members nominated by New Hampshire homeschooling organizations, two representatives from the State Department of Education, and a representative from each of the following:  the School Board Association, the Principals Association, the School Administrators Association, the Nonpublic School Advisory council.

The rest of the bill, which will go into effect in July 1991, includes the following provisions:

1.  Parents notify, by August 1 of each year, the commissioner of education, resident district superintendent, or principal of a nonpublic school, of their intent to homeschool.  The notification must include a list of subjects to be taught, name of correspondence school used, if any, name of curriculum provider used, if any, an outline of “the scope of instructional sequence for each subject,” and a list of textbooks “or other instructional materials used.”

2.  The State Board of Education is given authority to adopt rules for administering home education programs (more about this below).

3.  Parents must maintain a portfolio of records and materials pertaining to the program for at least two years from the date ending instruction.

4.  Parents have a choice of evaluation methods:  a written evaluation by a certified teacher who has reviewed the child’s portfolio and met with the parent or child; a national student achievement test (composite results must be at or above the 40th percentile); a state student assessment test (ditto); or “any other valid measurement tool” mutually agreed upon by the parent and whoever is overseeing the education (local public school, private approved school, or commissioner of the State Dept. of Education).,

5.  If the evaluation does not show educational progress “commensurate with (the child’s) age and ability,” the parents are allowed a probationary year of remedial work.  If after another evaluation at the end of that year the child has still not shown progress, the commissioner must notify the parents that they are entitled to a hearing and due process procedure.  The hearing officer can order that the home education program be terminated if educational progress is deemed insufficient, if the parent doesn’t comply with the statute requirements, or if the parent fails to provide the minimum course of study as required by the law.  The hearing officer can also allow the home education program to continue if the parents are found to be in compliance with the law after all.

The New Hampshire Home Educators Association comments in its letter:  “During the next year, the State Department of Education will be working on rules and regulations for administration of the statute.  We as homeschoolers hope to hold these at a minimum level, but we believe that there will be pressure by educators to restrict and define the law as much as possible.  In addition, we believe that challenges to this law, even though it doesn’t go into effect fully until July 1991, will be issued during the 1991 legislative session.  Therefore, although we believe that this statute represents good homeschooling legislation, we know that we must continue to be part of the process so that additional requirements and restrictions do not become burdensome.”

How many in MT and ND?

Whenever we receive them, we print reports of how many homeschoolers are in a particular state.  The 1990-91 reference guide of The Grapevine, a Montana homeschool newsletter, says:  “The Office of Public Instruction reported (that) 564 home schools notified county superintendents in 1987-88 and 725 in 1989-90 in Montana.”

And the August 1990 issue of the North Dakota Home School Association newsletter reports that an official in the state’s Department of Public Instruction told the NDHSA that “he estimates there will be 600 homeschooled children [in North Dakota] in the upcoming school year.”

Do any other states have such figures to report?

State News

Arkansas:  The July issue of Update, the newsletter of the ARKANSAS CHRISTIAN HOME EDUCATION ASSOCIATION, mentioned that homeschoolers had requested a meeting with the state Department of Education to discuss streamlining the state’s annual testing of homeschoolers.  We spoke with Tom Holiman of ACHEA and learned that this meeting did take place in August, and that one result was the formation of an ongoing task force, made up of both homeschoolers and Department of Education members, to meet once a month and monitor the state’s testing situation and procedures.  According to Tom, homeschoolers had complained that staffing problems within the Department had made test administration during the past couple of years unnecessarily chaotic.

Maine:  A new law which protests the privacy of homeschooling families’ records became effective on July 14, 1990, according to the July/August issue of the ReMAINEing At Home newsletter.  The law is an addition to the previously existing law, as follows:  “The United States Family Education Rights and Privacy act of 1974…governs the dissemination of information about students, as well as applications for equivalent instruction through home instruction, comments on the completeness of those applications and all educational records of a student receiving equivalent instruction through home instruction.”  (The underline part was added this year.)

South Dakota:  The August newsletter of the SOUTH DAKOTA HOME SCHOOL ASSOCIATION discusses the state’s new regulations:  (1) Homeschoolers will now be able to take achievement tests at home; (2) The state is attempting to delegate the responsibility for home visits to local school districts; and (3) The state continues to hold minimum time requirements for homeschoolers, despite homeschoolers’ objections.

SDHSA comments about the homeschooling climate in the state in general:  “Our relationship with the state department of education appears to be the best it has ever been.  I (the president of SDHSA) and other state leaders met with the department earlier in the summer.  We were received in a spirit of cooperation as they believe that most homeschoolers are doing a good job.”

Tennessee:  In GWS #76 we wrote that homeschoolers had filed suit against state Commissioner of Education Charles E. Smith, charging that his policy of denying their requests for waivers of the BA degree requirement (for parents teaching grades 9-12) was unconstitutional.  The judge ruled against the families on that issue.

In the September newsletter of TENNESSEE HOMESCHOOLING FAMILIES, Sandy Madsen adds that also at issue in this case (officially called Crites v. Smith) was the August 1st deadline for annual registration of home schools. Up to now, families who have failed to register by this date have been denied permission to homeschool.

The case involved the Crites family, who moved to Tennessee from Texas (where they had been homeschooling legally) on August 9, 1989.  They immediately filed a letter of intent but were denied the right to homeschool because they had registered too late.
Prior to filing the recent lawsuit, Commissioner Smith was advised by his lawyer to issue a memo to all superintendents saying that the August 1 deadline no longer applies to homeschooling parents from out of state who plan to move to Tennessee after the deadline for that year, so that is where things stand now.  Homeschoolers who move from one district to another during the school year and those who decide to homeschool after August 1 must enroll their children in school or homeschool illegally.

Speaking to Estonian Teachers

Merike Tamm of South Carolina wrote us about her recent trip to Estonia:

This was my first trip to Estonia, my parents’ homeland.  It was wonderful to meet and stay with many relatives and to attend the largest song festival in the world, held every five years, with 30,000 singers.

It was also tremendously exciting to participate in the Estonian Teacher Conference, which included about twenty-five foreigners of Estonian origin from around the world and more than a hundred native Estonians.  The conference was organized at this time to take advantage of the fact that so many “outside Estonians” (as we’re called) were coming to Estonia for the Song Festival.  Estonian teachers, who have lived in a closed, communist society for fifty years, were hungry for any information from Western countries, and invited us to speak on any topic connected with education.

My forty-minute address on “Homeschooling Throughout the World” (given in Estonian) was scheduled first among the outsiders.  I answered many questions immediately afterwards and was told by many that it was the most popular talk.  I also led a two-and-a-half hour discussion session on homeschooling the next day, which was supposed to be a small group discussion, but about one hundred teachers showed up.  I was exhausted and excited by the experience.

Homeschooling is not a new idea to Estonians.  In fact, I was probably drawn to teach my children at home in the U.S. because I had heard many times that Estonian mothers a century ago often taught their children to read at home before sending them to school at age 8 or 9 or 10.  Estonians are the strongest individuals I know, with the strongest passion for education.  They are also traditionally rural people and are uncomfortable with large institutions.  So homeschooling suits the Estonian people well, and they know it.

Homeschooling in Estonia has a long history, but very few chose it during the recent decades of communist rule.  Everyone was astounded to hear of its recent growth in many countries.  Estonian teachers seemed much more comfortable with the idea of homeschooling and of helping homeschooling parents than American teachers do.  In fact, the national Department of Education wants to help parents who choose homeschooling by publishing special materials for them.  I am trying to help with this, by sending some samples of homeschooling teachers’ guides, materials catalogs, etc.

I’m sure Estonians would be interested in John Holt’s books, but right now their economic situation makes it impossible for them to undertake translating and publishing them.  Maybe in a few years.  Many people do know English, however, so I plan to send English-language copies of John Holt’s books to some people I met at the conference.

Organizing Homeschoolers’ Dance

A reader asked us to find out more about the homeschoolers’ dance that was advertised in GWS #74, so we asked Jenny Rodriguez, the Massachusetts teenager who had organized the dance, to tell us about what she’d done:

I wanted to organize some kind of event for homeschoolers.  I like to dance, so I decided to organize a dance.  I wanted it to be for the whole family, not just for teenagers, so it could be supervised, and so parents could have fun too.

The first thing I had to do was find a hall to hold it in.  A friend of mine had had a dance the year before, so I asked her what hall she’d used.  It was at a church in Melrose, Massachusetts, so I called them and they told me I had to write them a letter telling them what I wanted to do.  I wrote the letter, they approved of it, and I had to give them a small donation.

I advertised the dance in GWS and in our state homeschooling newsletter.  I didn’t get a very big response to the ads, but I invited my homeschooling friends, and a few others came, so there ended up being about ten families at the dance.

The day before the dance I decorated the hall, and went to a warehouse to buy some drinks and snacks.  The night of the dance, I set up a table and the stereo.  I didn’t have to do much work other than these few things.  I was the DJ, so I didn’t get a chance to dance myself, but I enjoyed setting up the event so others could have fun.

I knew everyone who came to the dance, so it wasn’t an opportunity to meet new people.  If others are thinking of organizing a dance as a way of meeting new people, one thing to do would be to put your ad out earlier than we did, and try to get the word out to people in different parts of the state.  I already had a group of homeschooling friends, but I think organizing a dance would work even if you didn’t already have a group of friends.  It might help in that case to say a little more in the ad about what you were planning.

I used to go to school dances, but I wanted this to be for homeschoolers.  The atmosphere was different.  There was more supervision, and it was more fun with parents there too.  The kids didn’t mind having the parents there - the parents weren’t getting in the way, and sometimes they were getting up and dancing too.  I made sure to have different kinds of music, and we even had some square dancing.  I wasn’t sure how to do that, but my friend’s father is a square dance caller so I had him do it.

I think this could be a good way for homeschoolers who have never been to a dance to have a chance to go.  Afterwards people came up and told me they’d had a nice time.  I might do another dance again sometime, although I’m not planning anything definite right now.

FEELING OK ABOUT BEING AN OLDER READER

[SS:]  When I was interviewing Anita Giesy about her experience with school’s social life for this issue’s Focus (see page 19), our conversation turned to the subject of older readers.  Anita, by her own description, only began to read fluently at about age 12 (she’s now 17).  I had been thinking about the stories about older readers that were in the past couple of issues of GWS, and it seemed to me that often what was hardest for these young people was not the fact of not being able to read, but the problem of handling situations in which reading was expected, or feeling pressured or different from others of the same age.  Anita and I talked about how she handled these situations in the hopes that others would find her perspective and experience helpful.

We always say that it doesn’t matter when you learn to read, but some of the kids we hear from, or about, seem to find it so hard not to be able to read at, say, 9 or 10 - because others tease them or think they ought to know how.  From what you’ve told us in the past, it seems as if you managed to escape that.

I didn’t escape it totally, but I escaped enough of it to relax.  When I babysat, there were some kids I was very comfortable reading to because they weren’t judgmental.  One girl was old enough to know that I was supposed to be reading better at my age, but she wasn’t judgmental if I stumbled on a word.

I still, every once in a while, get anxiety attacks at the thought of reading aloud, even if it’s something I could read to myself.  I have to put my fears aside and say, “Yes, you can do this.”

A mother wrote to us about her daughter being in a situation in which other kids wanted to play a game that involved reading and writing.  This girl couldn’t really participate, and she said they didn’t understand that she was trying her hardest.  Should parents try to protect their kids from these situations, or help them cope with them?

I was lucky because I had my friend Ellie, and she understood.  We often played games with her younger brother, who, being younger, wasn’t a great reader either, so she would just read all the questions (or whatever it was).  At home, we played a lot of games that involved question-reading, and Mom would either help me or just read them, depending on how tired I was and whether or not I was in a mood to try reading them myself.

I think parents have to say to their child, “Yes, there are going to be kids out there who read better than you do, but if you want to try, or to work on this, I’ll help you.”  That was always Mom’s line:  “If you’re ready to try, I’ll help you any time.”  But it was my choice one way or the other.  Just try to tell the child that it’s not bad that she can’t read, but it is going to limit her sometimes.

It seems to me that if everyone was only saying, “It’s OK, don’t worry about it,” maybe a child could come to feel that the adults were giving up on her, that they never expected her to read at all.  Somehow you knew that people didn’t feel that about you.

Mom said in so many words, “You can read, you just need to work on it more.”  She always made it clear that I could do it, but I would have to put time into it to get to the goal of being able to read smoothly.  At first I read slowly, one word at a time, and it was hard to get the flow of the sentence.  I knew that I would have to work on it to be able to read more smoothly, but that if I could do that, reading would be less frustrating.

When Mom read aloud to me, I would follow along.  I could learn without feeling that I had to read myself.  Then Mom started realizing that I was reading along with her when we would read at night.  She would start to fall asleep, and I would get impatient and want to go on with the story, and I would point to where we were, so she knew I was reading enough to know that.  And later I would read to myself when Mom was sewing, and when I came to a word I didn’t know I would spell it out, she would tell me what it was, and then I’d continue.

That’s interesting, because it reminds us that it’s not as if you suddenly started reading at 12 without having been able to read at all before then.

No, it was definitely a gradual process.  Twelve was when I was able to read smoothly and comfortably.

Let’s come back to the kids who are in difficult situations with people who expect them to read.

It would be even harder if we were in a daily situation, like school.  But also, you learn to adapt - I’ve read about tricks that adult non-readers use, and when I read that now I think, “Oh, I know that one!”

What’s an example of a trick?

Reading every other word to try to get a quick sense of what something’s about.  I often felt that I would have been able to read something if I could slow down and take my time, but if I was afraid that people would think I was dumb if I really took the entire time that I would need, I would try to read every other word to get a feeling for what it was about.  When I was in Carousel when I was 8, we went out for something to eat afterwards, and I looked at the menu and thought, “Oh no, what am I going to order?”  But I ended up ordering what one of the other people had ordered.

But when you use a trick you do think, it would be easier if I just knew how to read.

I wrote to one girl who had been in a difficult situation and said maybe she would have to learn how to say, “Reading is hard for me and it’s something I’m working on.”  Were you ever able to say that?

When I was younger I think I was good enough at the tricks.  But when I was older and more comfortable with the idea, I would sometimes say that, like to the kids I babysat for.  I would say it’s not my best thing, and I can read now but I don’t always read fast, and if I get nervous it’s even harder for me.  It takes being strong, knowing that this is a weakness, not a failure, and it will come in time.

One thing that happened a lot, that I would never give in to, was other people quizzing me:  “What’s this word?” “How do you spell this?”  I just refused.  I said, “I don’t get quizzed.”

You said that you knew you would have to work on reading, and that it was your choice when to do that.  I think some people wonder whether kids will ever try to do something that’s so hard for them.  What made you decide to work on it?

I don’t think there was any one moment, but it was just a basic feeling of, for example, being sick of having Mom read me the menu in a restaurant, wanting to be able to read over the descriptions myself.  I was getting to the age where I might be going out with someone else besides Mom, and I didn’t want looking at the menu to be a big deal.  I also wanted to be able to read to myself.  If I got a letter, I wanted to be able to read it privately.

You get to a point where there’s enough reading in the world that you want to be able to do it.  I think kids in school who can’t read would get to that point, but they’re ashamed of it, so they keep it to themselves and there’s no one to help them.

I think it will be so helpful to people just to hear from you that it all works out eventually.

I feel it has worked out, and you know, I feel it’s an even bigger accomplishment for me when I finish a book.  I went through a period where I would read parts of lots of books but never finish any, so now I’m proud that I can finish them.

I still have to stop myself from shying away from things that involve reading in public.  The camp that I go to is divided up into tribes, with chiefs, and I used to shy away from being a chief because I knew it involved writing down information and relaying it to the group.  But this year I was the chief, and I found that the writing in that situation was very easy.  So I have to say to myself, “You can do it, don’t shy away from something just because you think you can’t.”

I think that question about shying away comes up for homeschoolers who might like to get to know someone in another state but are afraid of the writing part of it.

My mother’s my editor.  John Holt was the only person I felt comfortable writing to by myself, sounding things out and spelling them as best I could, because I knew he wouldn’t judge it.

I guess someone might say, “But what happens when you leave home and don’t have your mother around?”

I have a dictionary.  And when I’m traveling next year, my journal will be for me, so I won’t worry about how it’s spelled.

It’s interesting that you talk about keeping a journal - it means that writing has a place in your life even if it’s been hard for you.

I’ve always loved writing.  I’m the only one of Mom’s children who has written for the joy of writing.  It was always made clear to me that I should go ahead and spell something how I wanted to spell it and then correct it later, or I could ask Mom how to spell a word.  My grandmother once asked if I wouldn’t learn to spell the word better if I had to use the dictionary, and I told her no, after you call out a word and have it spelled to you enough times, you remember it.  And it’s interesting - my older sister developed her spelling skills by spelling words to me.

A homeschooler I know, who finds reading difficult, wants to get involved with theater, but is afraid of having to read scripts.  What should she do - not get involved with it, do it and explain to people, find an improvisation group that won’t require reading…?

I think she should either find time to get away by herself to read it as slowly as she needs to, or explain to the group, “I am a slow reader, I need time to work on figuring it out, but by the time we go on I will have it ready.”  When I did that play when I was 8, I took it home and memorized it right away, so I dealt with it that way.

I like the idea of saying, I’m a slow reader” instead of “I can’t read” or “I’m a bad reader.”  I like the way that implies that you can do it, even if it will take a little extra time.

AN EXPERIENCED HOMESCHOOLER LOOKS BACK

The Hobarts are among homeschooling’s earliest pioneers - they had taken their son Robert out of school even before John Holt began publishing GWS.  Now Albert Hobart writes about Robert’s college experience and reflects on the family’s years of homeschooling:

Robert continues to do well at the University of Missouri-Rolla.  The university is considered the most demanding of the various University of Missouri campuses.  But fortunately Robert finds the academic side of things relatively easy, and he’s made the transition from homeschooler to college scholar with little difficulty.

He’s just completed his sophomore year and up to now his grades have all been excellent.  His part-time job at our local Wal-Mart (evenings and weekends) doesn’t seem to interfere with his studies.  In fact, I think the two go well together.

For the past couple of years Robert has been included in the University Scholars Program (UMR’s equivalent of a “dean’s list”), which allows him a 30% “discount” on his basic tuition.  And recently he was surprised and pleased to be given a partial scholarship, something he hadn’t asked for.  It will pay the lion’s share of his tuition expenses next semester.

For Robert’s sake I’m glad that we live so near the university, because in many ways the school just happens to suit his needs.  First, UMR is relatively small as state universities go, and Rolla is a small town, so the school has a friendly relationship with the community.  that’s probably the main reason Robert decided to attend.

Robert took his first course at UMR three years ago when he was 17, under a program that allows “qualified” high school students to take courses for credit.  The admissions director knew that Robert was a homeschooler and had never attended the local high school (or any high school).  He decided, on the basis of an interview, that Robert was qualified to take the course.

Later, when Robert had successfully completed two or three courses, the admissions director invited him to enroll as a full-time student, though he had never taken any of the usual entrance exams.  The director told me recently that Robert could have done the same thing at any University of Missouri campus, but since the other three are so much larger, the process would have been more formal and more time-consuming.  Robert would have been asked to take his initial course at a community college.  Once he had proved himself there, he would have been allowed to take regular courses at the U. of Missouri campus as long as he maintained a “C” average.  When he had successfully completed a total of fifteen credit hours, he would have then been allowed to enroll as a full-time degree candidate.

Incidentally, no one at the university seems to be the least concerned, now, that Robert doesn’t have a high school diploma or a GED.  If anything, they seem amused by the fact that someone could have slipped through without the usual documentation.

Second, though UMR is devoted mostly to engineering, it has a small but excellent liberal arts department.  Thus the most experienced professors are often assigned to teach the basic courses.  Robert is especially interested in history, and he plans to make it his major.  He had an opportunity to meet some of the senior professors in the history department right from the beginning, and I think he found that very helpful.

Third, class size for most courses is generally limited to thirty students, and this gives everyone a chance to ask questions.  Judging from what Robert tells me, I think he finds class discussions one of the most enjoyable aspects of his college experience.

When Robert took his first course at UMR, I was afraid he might be reluctant to speak up in class.  He was younger than the other students, and as a homeschooler he had never had much practice with this sort of thing.  But to my surprise he was eager to join in, and it seems he more than held his own with his conventionally schooled classmates.  I think his home education was partially responsible for his success, since he was usually better informed than the other students, and since he often had a more genuine interest in the subject at hand.

Fourth, because of its relatively small size, UMR shares its resources with the community in ways a larger university simply wouldn’t consider.  For example, there aren’t enough interested musicians and singers in the student body to fill all the places in the university orchestra, chorus, and other musical groups.  So people from the town are invited to join in, and join in they do.  UMR is accessible to people in town.  I’ve had an opportunity to meet students, teachers, and others associated with the university, and to get a feel for what the school is really like.  As a parent  who’s always been involved in his son’s education, I appreciate this.  Robert, in turn, is having a different experience from what he would have had at a university that separates itself from the surrounding community.  One reason we favored homeschooling in the first place was that we felt strongly that education should not be a cloistered activity, segregated from the rest of society.

Robert’s homeschooling turned out to be an asset in other ways than his comfort in class discussions.  One of these had to do with enthusiasm.  Going to school was a new experience for him, and enjoyable for that reason alone.  His first course, American History, was a subject he particularly enjoyed.  As a result, he completed his assignments well ahead of time, sometimes weeks in advance.  And he was willing to make an extra effort in those areas where he seemed deficient.  For example, since he had no experience taking tests, at my suggestion he practiced writing short essays on the study guide questions his teacher handed out at the beginning of the term.

Alas, it appears that many of his conventionally schooled classmates had just the opposite approach.  They could barely drag themselves to class in the morning, and some didn’t come at all.  A few put off their reading until the night before a test, and then found themselves unable to answer even the easiest exam questions.  Many seemed reluctant to participate in class discussions, not only because they hadn’t done the reading but because they really didn’t have much interest in the subject anyway.  I can only conclude that these reluctant students had been jaded by the years they had already spent in mediocre schools.

Homeschooling also allowed Robert to develop his own style of learning.  Here’s an odd example.  He always prefers to study during the day because his mind is much clearer then.  He’s never found it necessary to study at night.  I find this hard to imagine, and wish I could have been half that well organized when I was in college.  When Robert started UMR, however, he found it hard to imagine why so many of his classmates cut classes and short-changed their studies.  Of course he’s grown accustomed to all that now, along with the other strange habits of university under-graduates, most of which he finds amusing and some of which he’s tried himself, at least temporarily - letting his hair grow, keeping  his room in the dorm a mess, sleeping through breakfast, etc.  But he still does all his studying during the day.

Another advantage of homeschooling was that it gave Robert the opportunity to involve himself in meaningful work.  Once we made the decision to teach Robert at home, it seemed apparent to us that our Boston suburb didn’t have a great deal to offer him.  To be sure, the town did provide more than its share of after school and summertime activities for children, but these activities, as desirable as they might have been, seemed peripheral to us, and a poor substitute for what children gain from direct participation in the important activities of the world around them.

We thought that living in the country might give Robert more opportunities to involve himself in meaningful work.  Partly for this reason, we decided to leave our Boston suburb and move to the Missouri Ozarks, where we eventually purchased a small tree farm.  On our tree farm there was always plenty to do, work as well as play.  We asked Robert to contribute an hour of work a day to the family welfare.  Actually, this was a rule we all followed, though my wife and I usually worked many more hours a day than that.  Like many children, Robert had been doing chores all along - helping with the dishes, raking the leaves.  But now (he was 8 or 9 at the time) much of the work he did was more or less on a par with the work my wife and I were involved in.  For example, right from the beginning he helped us gather and split twenty cords of firewood, clean the chimney, maintain our farm vehicles, repair our farm house and other buildings, and pick up and haul away the truckloads of junk and trash left by generations of previous owners.

As he grew older, he was able to assist us with more demanding work.  He helped us plant thousands of pine seedlings, construct roads, build two cement bridges, repair erosion damage in our various fields, and clear fence lines and erect fences.  These tasks required an ever increasing degree of skill and commitment on his part.

We didn’t give Robert an allowance, but we always paid him for the work he did, so he earned all his own spending money.  (He still does.)  Most days he worked only an hour or so, but when a big project came along, he was willing to work all day for many days at a stretch.  And sometimes he’d put in extra hours when there was something expensive he wanted to buy, like a movie camera.

Finally, and probably most important, homeschooling allowed Robert to develop his interests in ways that wouldn’t have been possible, or perhaps even imaginable, in school.  Drawing is one example.  Even as a toddler, Robert always liked to draw, and Cynthia and I made an effort to supply him with the paper, crayons, pencils, pens, and other supplies he needed.  When he was 5, we brought home a tall roll of newsprint paper, the unused end given to us free by our local newspaper.

The sheer size of this newsprint paper (the roll was about as tall as he was) seemed to challenge Robert’s imagination, and for the next few months he began each day by cutting a large piece of paper off the newsprint roll and drawing a vast underwater landscape which featured schools of fish, along with rocks, sand, scuba divers, sunken ships, and other fanciful additions.  He often worked on these drawings for several hours, and sometimes his friends joined in for a group effort.  Sometimes I joined in too.

As time went on, his drawings slowly changed, reflecting his interest in other subjects.  First, he added whales and sharks, and then dinosaurs on the land beside the water.  Later he drew these animals attacking and eating one another, and later still, they evolved into various types of armies, preparing for great battles.

At the same time, he included more and more information, often scientific - various types of identifiable dinosaurs, for example, or various types of sharks.  He had seen these in books or on television or in the Boston aquarium, and he knew the correct names for each.
During the Bicentennial celebration Robert’s armies turned into Lexington Minutemen and British Redcoats.  Previously all of his drawings were two-dimensional, but now he was depicting overlapping forms and three-dimensional space.

At 7 or 8, he stopped making large drawings, and chose instead to make comics.  He cut the newsprint paper into pages and stapled them together into little books.  This allowed him to show a series of drawings and tell a story.  At 10, he and his closest homeschooling friends (two brothers) began to draw stories about hero dogs they named after their own pets, and they passed these back and forth, often by mail (since they lived quite a distance apart).  I guess they continued to create and share these books until they were 15 or 16, and this probably did more than anything else to cement what I suspect will be a lifelong friendship.

Though all this has seemingly little to do with college studies, I think it formed a kind of framework which supported all the rest of Robert’s education.  For example, it led him to read the widest variety of books and plays, to make movies with his friends and to earn the money for his equipment, to an interest in music and opera and art forms generally.  It led to an interest in fantasy games and war games and the math that goes with them, and to use computers so he could invent new games and write them down (20-30 pages, single space).  And it led to his interest in real adventures - history and politics.

Actually, Robert’s interest in drawing led to our unexpected (and soul-wrenching) decision to become homeschoolers.  When he was 5, we sent him briefly to a private school near Boston.  It was a school which proudly practiced the open classroom model, according to which children are allowed to choose their activities for the day from among a number of learning stations situated around the room.  For the first couple of weeks he apparently spent a good deal of his time at the art station where each day he would take a large piece of paper and draw fish.  Apparently Robert was unusual in that he took his drawing home each day when school ended at noon, and continued his work after lunch.

Perhaps the teacher became dissatisfied with Robert’s neverending interest in drawing fish.  I’m not sure what happened.  But one day, when I picked Robert up after school, he met me in the hall with tears in his eyes.  His teacher, he told me, would not allow him to take his drawing home.

I knew that up until then drawing was about the only activity Robert really felt comfortable with in his new surroundings, and that it meant a great deal to him to take his drawing home.  So I made an appointment to talk to the teacher about it the following afternoon.  To my surprise she was adamant, and even a little hostile.  It was her classroom, she said.  She was the expert, and Robert’s schooling was now in her hands.

Within a week we decided to take Robert out of the school.  Of course, there were many factors that went into this decision, but what set it all off was this seemingly trivial incident.  We were now homeschoolers, something we had never even imagined before, and our lives were changed forever.  It took us several months to adjust to the whole idea, but Robert didn’t seem to miss school one iota.  He was now drawing his fish completely and happily at home.

CHALLENGES & CONCERNS

Two-Career Families

Barbara Hageman of Connecticut writes:

In response to the letter from Tammy Maltby in GWS #76 about her two-career family trying to cope with homeschooling:  I thought I would share my story, since we have almost become a four-career family!  We are blessed with two older children in college and do not qualify for financial aid, so I work 50-60 hours a week, and my husband, in addition to his professional career, picks up odd hours some weekends, if they coordinate with my shifts.  Of course the college kids work too.

So where does homeschooling for our fourth grade son fit in?  Actually, the need to work these extra hours for a couple of years was the catalyst that brought us into the homeschool arena.  When would I ever see my son, if he went off to school all day, and I was off to work before he got home?  (Previously, all my children went through a Christian school, where I also worked, so we spent all day together.)

he result was an odd schedule, but it has been very successful for us, without too much stress.  My husband works all week during the daytime.  He is responsible for reading with Andrew every evening for 30-45 minutes before bedtime.  Sometimes they read mysteries, sometimes history or science articles of interest.  He also takes Andrew on local field trips Saturday or Sunday afternoons, once or twice a month, and makes sure he gets to sports practices.  Neither my husband nor I volunteer to coach sports or lead scouts, because we want Andrew to have some instruction from other adults as well.

Andrew and I work on school things in the mornings from 9-11:30.  Some of our mornings are very structured, some are almost all oral, and at least once a week Andrew makes all the plans.  After lunch we go to work.  Yes, we!  I was blessed to find a job in the afternoons where Andrew could come right along.  They were very supportive of our homeschooling effort, and my position is in a one-person office, where I do everything.  While I work, Andrew draws, reads, plays with games or toys that he brings along, works on a Socrates interactive video, watches PBS, or finishes up written work.  He also uses the typewriter to write letters, runs errands to all the offices around the building, and has even gotten the yogurt store next store to let him help them make waffle cones.

Whenever I applied for jobs I was upfront about the one requirement that he be able to come along, and no one ever acted like I was crazy.  This weekday job averages 27 hours a week.  On the weekends I work for an elderly lady nearby, doing personal care for her on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, from 4 PM to 8 AM the next morning.  This gives me another 34 hours of work, and I don’t miss much at home.  It leaves me time to drive to scouts, swim team, soccer, and be involved with church.  It has been worth the sacrifice to see the growth and development of our son this year, and to know that my priorities are in the right order.  It is also important, of course, to assist my older children with their education.  It has made us a much closer family in many ways.

From Pat Everest of Colorado:

My husband and I are homeschooling four children (7, 5, 3, and 1) and we both work full-time.  John is an electronics technician and I am a paramedic and EMT instructor.

While John works full-time from 8-5 each weekday, I teach four evenings a week and work approximately six 24-hour shifts in the ER and on the ambulance service, as we are a hospital-based ambulance.  We too cannot afford babysitters, and working different shifts is one way to avoid paying sitters.  Since I am the one home during the day, I am in charge of the majority of our schooling.  I would love to be able to plan special, enriching activities but many days I am too tired and we just get through the required stuff.  We do not use a supplied curriculum, as I prefer to pick and choose the best parts of the materials I have discovered.  We do not have much extra money to spread on school items so when we do purchase materials they are well used.  We do belong to a homeschooling group, but as they are based fifty miles away and meet in the evenings, we have yet to attend a meeting.  We do attend special functions such as the science fair, fun run, picnics, and some of the field trips.

I have found that it is helpful to concentrate on schooling for an hour or two every morning, and then the kids have the rest of the day to themselves to play, do chores, etc, and I have time to plan for work and to clean.  They, too, do not have friends close to us, but they play with each other.  Rather than plan fun, creative, and exciting things, we just do the daily chores and make every trip out of the house something special.  Grocery shopping becomes a field trip as do trips to the post office and library.  Once every month or two we take a “real” field trip to a site nearby.  If I am really planning ahead, we study about where we are going beforehand, but many times we just go and then the kids investigate further on the next trip to the library, if they found the place we visited interesting.  Our first trip to nearby Mesa Verde National Park was memorable to the kids because of the ladders and rock paths they got to climb.  It wasn’t until the second or third trip that they became interested in the museum and the lives of the people who used to live there.  It seems that when I work to provide “educational activities” they usually do not work out the way I had planned, but when the activities just happen, the kids all come out learning something special (though not what I had intended).  They do learn what they want to, though!

I guess the advice I would give to Tammy from my three years of homeschooling is to plan an hour or so each day to cover what you feel are the basics, and then let your children lead you from there.  They will learn the most just by being with you and your husband and by being allowed to discover things for themselves.

From Barbara Freeman (FL):

We are a two-career family from financial necessity, and homeschool our 12-year old son.  My husband’s job requires frequent travel and is an 8 to 5 job, so most of the schooling is done by me.

As a nurse, Tammy might find my solution a good one.  I work out of my home as a medical transcriptionist for a 3-physician heme-onc group.  In our area transcriptonists are in short supply so there is opportunity for flexibility.  I have invested about $600:  $400 for a typewriter and $200 for a transcriber.  My typing ribbons and correcting tape cost about $60 per month.  I provide early morning pickup and delivery and average twenty hours a week of typing.

When I first thought of doing this my typing speed was only 30 wpm.  It quickly improved with practice and when I reached 60 wpm I was ready for this type of work.  I wouldn’t recommend starting until your typing speed is around 60 wpm or the job will take forever.

This isn’t a perfect solution (for instance, I can’t find a vacation replacement and the work is all waiting for me when I get back from a short trip.  In this work you don’t make long trips.).  I’ve done it for several years and will be happy to discuss the ins and outs of it with Tammy or other readers.

From Marion Cohen (PA):

Ours is also a two-career homeschooling family; my husband is a physics professor and I am a writer and part-time math teacher.  We have the additional hardship of being, essentially, a one-income family, since writers make no “real” money.

I do have a few suggestions that might be helpful:

1.  Changing (if the law allows it) from the Calvert curriculum to one less expensive and less time-consuming.  We use no curriculum, as do many other homeschoolers.  You might also get textbooks free from the school nearest you, or inexpensively at five-and-tens or thrift shops.  Thrift shops have been, in general, great sources for all sorts of material - and toys - and even many of John Holt’s books.

As for “time-consuming,” you might consider not specifically “finding time to homeschool,” but incorporating education into the family life.  This is described amply in many pages of GWS; I don’t need to go into it here!

2.  Or find (i.e. keep on the lookout for) a babysitter who likes to help with Calvert.  Babysitters for schooling families often help with homework.  Your babysitter could double as a tutor.

3.  Try to link up with other homeschooling families in your area, perhaps by joining, or forming, a homeschoolers’ support group.  Then perhaps you could form a tutoring pool, akin to a babysitting pool.  Or perhaps even live with another family and share the workload, including the careers.  Then you might be able to work part-time.  Or you might find a family where the parents want to work, so they could earn the income while you stayed with the kids.  This could solve the problem of playmates for your kids (if, indeed, that is a problem).

4.  Or you could simply get a babysitter who has children of her own.

5.  As for being employed at home, several parents I know support their families by running a daycare center in their homes, or just taking care of two or three other children.  Or perhaps you could work as a private-duty nurse (in the person’s home) for someone who would love to have children around.

I realize that many of these suggestions would take time and energy to implement, but if you keep your eyes peeled for advantageous situations, you will probably eventually find them.  Eventually isn’t soon enough, but it’s better than never.

From Pamela Wheeler of Indiana:

I wonder if Tammy has considered being the babysitter, not just for her own children, but for others whose parents will pay Tammy.  It shouldn’t be difficult to figure out how much you need to bring in to make up for not being a nurse for a few years.

Also, a tutoring situation may be borrowed for some goods or services you have; for example, garden produce, babysitting, etc.  And a seasonal garden produce stand is a good money-maker.  Kids love working in the garden and would probably enjoy taking care of customers.

Single Parents

From Christine Wilkie of Pennsylvania:

I recently became the contact person for our state’s support network for single-parent homeschoolers.  We have about eleven families on our list.  The group is mainly for emotional support, and to let the children in these families know that there are other families like theirs.  Some parents may want to get together to trade time with the children or help each other in more practical ways, but right now the families are too spread apart geographically for that.  I’ve found that single-parent families can usually reach out to the extended family or to people in the community or church for help needed in day-to-day living.  This is good also because single-parent families need to interact with two-parent families, singles, etc., to avoid becoming another sub-group.

A major consideration for a single parent is income.  Some single parents get child support, but other sources of income are usually necessary.  One mother I know works part-time, and her ex-husband watches the children while she works.  Others work at home.  It is quite a challenge to homeschool as a single parent, and if you’ve just become a single parent, the decision to homeschool may have to be reconfirmed in light of your new situation.  When you’ve taken stock and know that homeschooling is still what you are going to do, you become more creative and aware of opportunities to make it work.

I opted for daycare in our home, and am still doing that.  I realized we would need more income, however, so I set out to find a job that would fit my schedule but would also be a job I felt good about doing. I didn’t want to be a burned-out homeschooler.  I found a position as a counselor in a group home, with a schedule that allows me to be home on weekdays and Sunday (I work two nights and a Saturday).  I’m also fortunate that my mother lives with me - I have extended family right there when I have to work.

As single-parent homeschoolers, we have to realize that we cannot do everything perfectly.  I am always wishing I had more time with my children, but then I realize that if they were in school we would be together even less.  I still spend more time with my family than many two-parent families do, because we homeschool.

One question I’ve come across is about allowing children to stay home alone when a parent needs to go somewhere.  As children grow older, they don’t always want to follow their parent around on errands, shopping, meetings, etc.  I think that at an appropriate age and level of maturity, children can benefit from time at home on their own, to feel responsible for accomplishing tasks, working on a project, or just relaxing.  Single parents may tend to feel guilty if they can’t always be there and meet every need perfectly, but it is not good for children to have a parent who always feels worried.  Sometimes the parent can even fall into an attitude of pitying her children, and the children end up feeling sorry for themselves, too, and start believing that they can’t do as much as other families can do.  Single-parent homeschoolers should remind each other that they have taken on a lot, and though it is definitely not an ideal family situation, we have to remember that we are still families; there are obstacles, but they can be overcome.

I talk to my children directly about these issues.  They have been part of the decision to continue homeschooling, so we pull together and take one day at a time, and remember that we are just as important as any type of family.  There are people who will be supportive.  Don’t be afraid to let people in.  I’ve had people from our church take my children out to do things I did not have time or money for - skating, bowling, etc.  Single parents need to exchange information on resources, where they have gotten support, and different options to make things work.  Homeschooling, even as a single-parent family, can still be rewarding and successful.

Without Much Money

Wendy Westwood (NY) writes:

We’re not poor, by any means, yet there has never been enough money for the cultural indulgences we enjoy:  concerts, theater, museums, galleries, etc.  Art supplies and books threaten to break the budget every month.  Here are some of the solutions we’ve found:

Barter for tickets.  What skills can you trade?  Stuff envelopes, stick on labels, sort them for mailing; deliver posters around town; make phone calls.  All these and more “behind-the-scenes” jobs need to be done.  In exchange, they can yield free tickets.  Our local arts center uses volunteer ushers from the community, including some parent-and-child teams; in exchange for working at a specified number of events, they earn free tickets to other attractions.  In addition, they enjoy the many performances at which they work - sometimes with interruptions of late seating, etc. - at no cost.

Ask for scholarship tickets.  Our arts center has certain series whose events are underwritten by a local business or industry, providing a number of free tickets for those who could not afford to purchase them.  If these are offered in your community, find out how they are distributed.  If they’re handed out through the public schools, for example, or through the poverty program, let the administrators know that they are missing people like you and that you too are interested.  If there’s not such a program in your community, see if you can get one started.

Get to know your local arts presenters.  Find out their needs and let them know yours.  It’s not unusual for an event to be undersold.  Rather than have an embarrassingly low turnout, which can make both audience and performers uncomfortable, a presenter may give free or drastically reduced tickets, just to build up the audience.  If the person in charge knows you’re interested, you will be in line to receive such freebies when they’re available.

Exchange free child care services.  Perhaps some of these events are OK for your older children, but not your youngest.  Maybe it’s something that would be enriching to you but not your children.  When we first moved to our new community, we found a few other compatible families and started a child-care exchange, in which a pool of families trade babysitting services among themselves without any money changing hands.  This has enabled many of us to attend events that would have been out of the question if we had to pay a babysitter in addition to buying tickets.  It’s also built some of our children’s and our own closest friendships.

Look into special children’s performances.  Our arts center offers many daytime events for school groups.  Sometimes these are the same attractions offered in the evenings, but at lower prices.

Consider attending in-school performances.  With a good relationship with your school district, you may be able to attend some of these at absolutely no charge.  Our major problem has been knowing when such events are happening.  Find out who plans such programs - it may be a PTA or local arts agency, an individual teacher, or an administrator - or make friends with a teacher or parent who can keep you posted on what’s coming up.

Find out how arts events are reviewed in your local newspapers.  Ours doesn’t have its own arts reporter.  They invite each presenting organization to supply a review written by someone independent of their group.  When a children’s or family event is presented, sometimes a parent/child team reviews it, and earns free tickets at the same time.

Can’t afford carfare to get to the event?  Make sure the presenter is aware of the problem, as you’re not the only one facing this challenge.  They may be able to arrange free shuttle bus service to some events.  Perhaps there’s a single member who would like to drive a young family to an event they could enjoy together.

Can’t afford art supplies?  Neither can your public schools, sometimes.  During years of austerity budgets, your public school art teachers have learned to do without.  Get to know some of them and find out their resources in your community.  Scavenge leftovers from factories, retailers, print shops.  A real test of creativity is making something form “nothing,” and scavenged art supplies have the advantage of not dictating a right way to do art.  Nor will you be concerned that your children are going through the supplies too fast.

Your libraries have lots of books on how to make your own art supplies, even glue and modeling materials.  By salvaging “junk” and making what you can, you’ll save your art budget for the few supplies you will have to purchase

If you live near a college or community college, there should be a wealth of activities available.  There are more free events than we could ever hope to attend at our local college.  The music department offers student and faculty recitals and full-scale concerts.  The dance students present mini-concerts and works-in-progress, which are sometimes more interesting than the finished pieces.  The art department has free gallery exhibits.  Foreign language departments sponsor cultural activities, usually free.  Our college owns a nature center, where it offers free guided nature walks and instruction on weekends.

College students may be resources for you, too.  For two semesters I hired students to teach a creative movement class for a small group of preschoolers.  Our community offered nothing along this line, but I found a music education major who was willing to teach for $5 per class.  By word of mouth, I lined up 5 kids and found a free room on campus.  In exchange for my making the arrangements, my daughter took the class for free.

“Special-Needs” Children

From Diane Macbeth:

Last April I received a call from a lady in New York State.  She had a child with Down Syndrome who was approaching school age.  School district authorities threatened that all types of legal action would come against her if she did not put her child in an approved program.  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.  I was reliving the events of my life some thirteen years ago.  I knew that no one could pull one over on me when it came to the new homeschool law in Pennsylvania, but how was I going to inform this lady of what to do in New York?  I told her she would have to begin by getting a copy of her homeschool law.  We exchanged addresses, telephone numbers, word of encouragement.

In the mail later that afternoon was thick envelope from ALLPIE, the Alliance for Parental Involvement in Education.  I had never heard of them, but to my surprise the letter was from homeschooler Katharine Houk, in New York, asking for suggestions to pass on to parents in her network who were homeschooling handicapped children.  I telephoned Katharine immediately, and told her of my conversation earlier that day.  She assured me she could help the mom with the D.S. child.  I assured her I would help in any way I could with contacts she had in her network. The National Handicapped Homeschoolers Associated Network (NATHHAN) was born.

But NATHHAN really began in 1976 when my first and only child, Robbie, was born with Down Syndrome.  Three months after his birth I was thrust into single-parenthood.  After returning to my parents’ home in Pennsylvania, I tried to get regular employment, but there just wasn’t enough time to schedule therapy appointments, make emergency visits to the doctor, and still maintain my career as a legal secretary.  The career was put on hold indefinitely and I entered a brand new world, one that included a new vocabulary with words like hypotonia, adduction, dysfunction, atlantoaxial dislocation - to name just a few.

After five years of on-the-job training with therapists who worked with Robbie and me together, and lots of supportive teamwork from a loving, caring family, it was time for Robbie to go to school.  In one way I was excited and really could visualize him in school, but part of me could not.  I had already spent five long years in professional motherhood teaching my child, guiding his every step of growth.  When he was born I was informed that he would not live to see his second birthday.  And now I should quit?

I sought out the “perfect program” for him, but my school district told me there was none.  I would have to accept what was “appropriate” for him.  When I refused I was threatened by school authorities - my child would be taken away from me I would go to jail!

In 1982, after a brief school placement, Robbie was taken to the hospital with a partial respiratory arrest because of negligence in the school setting.  That brush with death should not have had to happen to my son, but that was enough to remind me of my responsibility.  I had already observed classes with violent behavior, classes with children sitting literally tied up in chairs, a classroom where a child was placed in a big black box for poor accomplishment.  And I also observed the frustration of parents who were afraid to stand up for what they wanted for their child.

I didn’t know that the homeschool movement existed until 1988, but I was a strong advocate for any parents who wanted to school their special needs child at home.  I was alone with only my family to support me.  I sought help from private schools in the Christian sector who were supportive of my desire but ultimately insisted that Robbie belonged in a special program.

Robbie is now 14.  He can read and write.  He can do arts and crafts.  He paints, writes poetry, and sings.  He plays the handbells.  He loves to do his laundry (with help), works at the public library once a week as a volunteer page, and has even received personal letters from Presidents Reagan and Bush.  And our latest accomplishment is bowling - on a real league with real kids (as we like to put it).

I deserve no credit.  Robbie deserves it all.  He has been patient, understanding, loving, and in many cases has gone the extra mile in helping other people to better understand him.  When asked the age-old question, “Where do you go to school?” Robbie smiles and cheerfully responds, “Oh, I homeschool.  Do ya hear me?”

I am grateful to Howard and Susan Richman for allowing me to share, through their PA Homeschoolers newsletter, the experiences that Robbie and I have faced together.  Because of this, approximately twenty families nationwide have called or written to share hopes, fears, and challenges that face their individual homeschool programs.  NATHHAN families are currently in NC, MI, TX, PA, NY, CA, AZ, and WA.  Growing without a school is possible despite any handicap - Down Syndrome, Muscular Dystrophy, Cerebral Palsy, blindness, deafness.  I would love to hear from anyone who is planning to homeschool or has already been homeschooling special-needs children.  Write or call:  NATHHAN, 814 Shavertown Rd, Boothwyn PA  19061; 215-459-2035.

Queries

Here are two similar queries.  We will forward letters to these writers; please let us know if it’s OK to publish your letter in GWS (with or without your name), too.

From Pam Glaser Ernstoff of Massachusetts:

I am an Orthodox Jew with two children, 4 and 2.  The other children in my synagogue all go to private religious schools.  There’s a lot of pressure and emphasis on early reading - Hebrew and English - at age 5-6.

I went to an alternative school in junior high, and skipped high school altogether.  I traveled, had my own small business, worked many jobs, and wrote extensively in a journal.  My parents didn’t help me learn, but today I give them a lot of credit for allowing me to follow my heart and stay home.

I had no trouble getting into college at 20, and was shocked to find that I knew more and did better than many of my traditionally schooled classmates.

My son is one of three 4 year olds in our town who are not attending nursery school.  I love being home with my children, watching them learn and grow.  I would love to correspond with any Jewish people, especially if you are teaching, or want to teach, our religion and history.

And from Tamar Gindis of New York:

We are a traditional Jewish family living in Manhattan, but we are hardly traditional in that we are an inner city, Jewish, observant, homeschooling family.  I have three children 2, 4, and 6 3/4, and find that my greatest worry is isolation from the Jewish community - for my eldest child who truly enjoys being with other children, and also for myself and my two younger ones.

I am looking, therefore, for other families open to homeschooling and concerned with their Jewish identity for us to befriend and play with, with whom we can share experiences, support and be supported by.

WATCHING CHILDREN LEARN

On a Movie Set

When Pat and Day Farenga met Andy and Kira Endsley at the Clonlara conference this past May, they learned that Andy, when he was 15, had been an extra in the movie Glory.  We talked to Andy, now 17, about this experience, and to Kira, now 15, about her acting experience.  Below is a transcript of what they told us.

Andy:  I’m involved in what’s called “Living History Units.”  We dress up in a costume or uniform from a period in history, and then spend time at historic sites, or do reenactments of battles, for the enjoyment of the public and also for our own enjoyment.  A lot of work goes into the historical accuracy of the uniforms.  Being involved with this now takes me all over the country.

I started doing this at a local fort in Perrysburg, where I live, five years ago, when I was 12.  From the time I was very young, I was always dressing up in some sort of outfit, pretending to be that person.  I also read about history.  I was the youngest one in the group at that time.  I was in school then, but school didn’t do anything for my interest in history.

I started out as a drummer in the group.  There were other drummers, and I learned from watching them.  I had tried to take lessons in drumming, but it didn’t get very far.  I wanted to learn historical drumming, and the teacher didn’t have any knowledge of that.

The group got a call from someone they had known who worked in the film industry.  Since the unit I was with was known for its special attention to historical accuracy, we were asked to be part of the battle scenes in Glory.  It was originally scheduled for only a one-day shoot, south of Atlanta.  But as with any film, they went a little over budget and a little off schedule, and they needed people to stay for the next week.  Most of the people had regular jobs they needed to get back to, and it was during the school year too, so about eighty percent of the people left, but I was able to stay on.

My father and sister were also on the set, just as spectators, so they got to talk with the crew, and made friends with a number of them.  When my father and I went out to California after my sister took an acting class there, we met up with our friends from Glory again, and they told us about a film that was taking place in South Dakota, and that led to my next project - Dances With Wolves,  which will be out in November 1990.  In the opening scene - if it doesn’t end up on the cutting room floor - I’ll be carrying the American flag in a charge scene.

I like behind the scenes work, and I’d like to continue working on the technical aspects of film.  It started as a fluke, just because of my involvement in the reenactment unit, but it’s been snowballing ever since.  You meet people who remember you, and they give you a call when they need you on another project.  A week ago I got a call from our contact out in Montana.  He wants me to work for three and a half months as a production assistant.

I’m not planning to go to college, at least not a straight four-year program.  If this production assistant project goes well, there’s a good chance that the same guy will hire me again, and within a few months it could turn into a full-blown career.  I look at college as being the same mistake that continuing with high school would be.  There are these teachers who assume they have a certain set of knowledge that they can give you, and in order to get that knowledge you have to go to them and be taught.  And they assume that a degree, for some reason, makes you better than before you had the degree.

I became a homeschooler at the end of my freshman year in high school.  My mother had seen a diminishing interest in learning in me, ever since I’d been in school, but I guess it came to a peak toward the end of my freshman year.  I had gone from public school to a parochial school thinking it might be better, but it really wasn’t any different.  I had nothing in common with my peers, and now, the majority of the people I spend my time with are three times my age.

Kira:  Because I got to hang around the set of Glory, I met all sorts of people, and when I went out to LA for an acting class, my father and I had dinner with those movie people again, and that led to my being in another movie.  I hadn’t done much acting before then.  I hadn’t been in any school plays, but I had started taking acting classes.  I always wanted to act, but I never did anything about it until two years ago.

Now I’m doing a couple of plays around here - in community theater, and in a professional show, but I wouldn’t be one of the professionals!  Most of the people are older than me, but I get along very well with people older than me.

I started homeschooling about four months later than Andy did.  The transition was harder for me.  I was asked to try it for the first nine weeks of what would have been my eighth grade year, and I didn’t want to at all.  Then after those nine weeks, I wanted to keep doing it, but I kind of didn’t want to let my mom know that I wanted to.  I said, “Oh, I’ll try it a little bit longer.”  But it ended up that I loved it and didn’t want to go back to school.  I liked the freedom to explore what I wanted to do.  When you’re in school, you really don’t have any time to find out what you want to do with your life.  You don’t have any outside activities.  Everything revolves around school and friends.  Now I’ve found a lot of activities that I like a lot better.

At first I was worried about losing my friends.  I did lose some, but they were the ones that didn’t count.  I still have a lot of friends from school, the real friends - I guess you find out who your real friends are.

I’d like to continue with theater and film.  As of right now, I really don’t see how college could benefit me.  I think I have enough opportunities outside of college.  I plan on being home with my parents for a couple of more years, but it depends on what comes up - something might come up where I’d have to leave.  I’d be able to handle that if it happened.

A Day in the Life

Patti Blystone (WA) writes:

Today I am sick with a bad chest cold and cannot even manage to get up off the couch.  The kids are therefore running their day the way they want to, and I am merely an observer.  When all is said and done, I suspect it would be just as well for them if days like this came along more often!

Seth (10), Sean (7), and Dylan (2) get their own breakfast, and then build an enormous blanket fort using the ironing board, every chair in the house, and all the clothespins.  They call this “Paradise” and it is complete with its own bowl of fresh fruit (Sean tells me that every paradise has fruit).

I read aloud to the inhabitants of “Paradise” a book called Left-Handed Kids by James T. de Kay. (The boys’ father is a leftie and Seth does some things left-handed.)  We find out that one-third of all U.S. Presidents since 1945 have been left-handed.  Reagan was born left-handed but was forced to switch!  The boys then try drawing pictures left-handed.

Sean starts playing games on the computer but soon asks me questions (while still playing) that seem to have nothing to do with what he’s doing.

Sean:  How long is a yard?
Me:  36 inches.  Do you know how long an inch is?
Sean:  Yeah, about that long. (Holding up fingers.)
Five minutes later:
Sean:  How did man invent matches?
Me:  Wow, that’s a tough one.  I’m not sure.  I guess someone happened to     find some rocks that contained a lot of sulfur and discovered that they     caught on fire easily when a spark got near them.  Then maybe they tried     grinding up the sulfur and sticking it on the ends of wooden sticks.
Sean:  Yeah, then they glued it onto cardboard sticks, too.  So that’s why     matches stink so much.  Sulfur really stinks.
Ten minutes go by.
Sean:  Mom, do trees have feelings?
Me:  I think they do but they just can’t tell us about them.  What do you     think?
Sean:  I think they do.  But I don’t know about apples.
He goes and gets an apple.
Sean:  You know, God made apples like the bottom of those big pop bottles.      These bumps on the bottom of the apple make it stand up better than if it     were just round.
Me:  So what came first, apples or pop bottles?
Sean:  I guess apples.  God didn’t know they were going to invent pop.
After five minutes of munching:
Sean:  They should have made pop bottles more like apples so when you were     done drinking it you could just eat the bottle.
Painting has meanwhile commenced in the kitchen.  This is usually a mom-    directed activity because I’m fussy about spreading out newspapers, doling     out squirts of tempera and rolling up sleeves.  I can’t see what’s going     on but I can hear the easel scraping across the floor and the water     running.  After an hour, everyone is still painting…and not fighting.      My curiosity gets the better of me and I slowly shuffle in to check out     the art scene.  Naturally there is paint on the floor, cabinets, clothes,     and faces.  Proud, smiling faces.  There are works of art spread all over     the counters and floor to dry.  Today I don’t care about the mess.  Sean     tells me he has decided he wants to become an artist.  I decide to worry     about cleaning up later and head back to the couch.
When the boys figure out they are hungry they crawl into their fort,     looking like savages in war paint, to eat lunch.  Fruit, of course, in     paradise.

Working in a Bookstore

Geoffrey Litwack (PA) writes:

You asked about my experience with working in a bookstore.  To start at the beginning, I met a woman who worked in a bookstore called The Bookhouse.  This came about because I went in there often asking her each time if she knew of any books 400 pages or more.  This went on for a few years, and during this time we became friends.

Eventually she opened her own children’s bookstore not far away from our home - The Children’s Bookworld.  Mom, of course, had also met her, and when she opened her store Mom asked her if she would be willing to have me work for a few hours a week.  She said yes, and I have been working three hours a week ever since.

I have learned a lot about how bookstores are run, the names of wholesalers, how to organize shipments, set up displays, ISBN numbers and how to use a bookstore computer.  I’ve also had the enjoyable experience of previewing manuscripts and giving my opinion, which has always been valued by the owner - something I appreciate greatly.

Older Readers

Ann Boland (WV) writes:

Our oldest son - now 14 - didn’t really begin reading until he was 11.  If it weren’t for GWS we would have considered homeschooling a failure and sent him off to school.  As it was we did have our doubts.  We would go through cycles of putting pressure on him, working with him daily on phonics or sight reading.  He would be unable to recognize a word a few minutes after we had worked on it.  He would get frustrated, we would get frustrated.  We found that the best thing to do was to not work with him unless he really wanted us to - which was rare.  We have always read to him and he always had a great understanding of what was read to him.  I think he enjoyed hearing stories so much that it made no sense to him to sweat out a story word by word.

He had to put with razzing from our friends or fear of being in a situation where someone would find out he couldn’t read.  He learned to handle these situations but I think they led to him feeling insecure about his own intelligence.  When he was 9 we enrolled him in the gifted program in our county.  It involved one day a week in a group of about ten kids.  Although he passed the other tests, they were reluctant to take him because he couldn’t read.  I think they finally took him because they wanted to feel they had some influence on this poor homeschooled child.  In this setting, he realized he was as smart as the other kids, which was a real boost for his confidence.

I have noticed that he learns in a scattered sort of way.  When I was helping him learn to ride his bike I would hold it and run along as he rode.  All the while he would be talking, pointing to things along the road, and seeming otherwise distracted.  This was very frustrating to me but I had promised I would help him half an hour a day for a week.  After three days he just took off and rode by himself.  This is the way he picks up most things.  He seems to be doing a dozen things at once, yet he does learn very well.

This is apparently the way he learned to read.  All of a sudden (or so it seemed to us) he could read whatever he wanted to.  He loves to read now and always has a book that he is into.  He went from being unable to read the simplest paragraph to being able to read books written for adults.

The biggest thing I have learned from this is to trust my kids to learn what they need to (or want to) learn when they are ready.  Reading GWS and other parents’ experiences with “late readers” was very helpful.  I would also keep thinking about what John Holt said about reading - a child can’t help but learn to read in a home where reading is a valued part of life.  This makes a lot of sense to me but I would find myself doubting because there were so many “experts” (teachers, school authorities) who doubted.

From Janna Books (NM):

We have read to Tasha since infancy and she has had an increasing desire to read herself.  She would often, at ages 4-7 especially, curl up with a chapter book and tell-read herself a story.  But it seemed to me that she was frustrated that her efforts in word-for-word reading did not produce a smoothly flowing narrative as she was used to hearing or telling.                                                When she was 8 1/2 I began to have “official” school with her.  This was not my preference, but rather a response to pleas to have “real” school and to her frequent cries of boredom.  I began by reading her a story with one or two sentences per page.  I would then read one line at a time, and she would repeat the line after me the first time through the book, and read by herself the next time through.  When she could read the entire book with less than ten mistakes we would move on to another book.  When she finished a book she would get a small reward.

After reading several books according to this system, we began a book that was rather difficult for Tasha, so I fudged on the rules and more readily supplied the words she couldn’t get, without keeping track of the number of mistakes she made.  At this time I particularly felt that reading pages or books over again wasn’t necessary, and moving on to new pages or books would build her vocabulary and skills just as well.  Soon I didn’t even need to read any of the material to her first.

She continued reading this way for a number of books until the level of reading (still in the I Can Read category) was causing her to depend too much on phonetic decoding.  I was not comfortable with this and decided to give her a respite from reading and let her natural maturation carry her forward.  During this period, I noticed an increased amount of “real-world” reading of signs, cereal boxes, etc.

When Tasha turned 10, I asked her what particular things she would like to do during her schooling time.  She named reading, Spanish, science, and writing (she got a diary for Easter which she is avid about).  Today she wanted to read a chapter book aloud to me.  We got through two and a half pages of Pollyanna in about thirty minutes.

I didn’t think Tasha would have sat down and waded through a book on her own (as she has recently with some Dr. Seuss books) until she was 9 1/2 or 10.  And maybe starting earlier was not all that helpful.  But when she was 8 1/2 I just felt she needed to start so she could gain confidence.  She has often talked of how much she wants to be able to read the kinds of books she is interested in.  I feel that now, I can follow her lead.

From a later letter:

In the two months since I wrote to you Tasha has picked up several chapter books and is reading them on her own, silently.  She has finished one.  She rarely asks for help.  She spells a word to me every now and then and occasionally asks me to read a difficult passage to her so she can comprehend it.  She has read to her sisters when I didn’t even know she was doing it.  She is so much more able to figure out labels and signs now, too.  One year ago she was struggling with 12-20 words to a page.

Helpful vs. Unhelpful Teaching

From a story Earl Stevens wrote two years ago and then recently reprinted in issue #10 of his Talk About Learning newsletter:

Jamie, eight years old this August, has become a baseball fan.  He likes to practice, and our backyard games of catch have become a little more serious.  It’s still for fun, but now he wants to improve, and he works very hard at it in between clowning around.  Now we try for accuracy and power.  Now we try to catch the ball no matter how wildly it is thrown.  Now we have baseball gloves.  In the beginning it gave me pleasure to imagine myself teaching Jamie the skills known by any person who has played a little baseball.  I would be the coach.

At the beginning of the summer Jamie’s catching technique was to stand in one place like a statue, holding his glove out in front, palm up, like Lucy Van Pelt, the Peanuts cartoon character.  Soon he was beginning to get the hang of moving his body and his glove with some efficiency and expertise.  With a little intensive instruction, I told myself, he could catch practically anything that comes his way.  He’ll be a much better player, and he’ll be more satisfied with his own skills.  Wrong.

I used to be a school teacher, and I still have to work hard to modify the habit of being the person whose answer to every problem is more instruction.  I don’t always succeed.  “Hold your glove lower; don’t be afraid of the ball; reach for it; stay loose; try for the catch even if you don’t think you’ll get it; move toward the ball.”  At first Jamie cooperated and gave it his best, but as the number of specific instructions increased, I could see him losing interest in our game of catch.  He wanted to be nice to me so he kept at it, but I could see that he was not having much fun.  He was mainly interested in pleasing Dad and ending our lesson.  Also, instead of getting better at catching the ball, he was getting worse.

There was nothing wrong with the advice I was giving.  But I was saying too much too soon to somebody who needed to remain at the purely experimental level for a while.  When we are busy “getting the feel” of a new skill we don’t want to focus on unsolicited advice.  At this stage, practically anything we do is an improvement.  Intense, unwanted instruction at this point tends to take our minds off the pleasures and rewards of experimentation (fooling around).  The goal of becoming highly skilled begins to get in the way of learning any skills at all.  I have to remind myself again and again that it is much more important for children to become interested in something than it is for them to learn to do it correctly.  We always get better at things we enjoy doing as long as we are allowed to continue doing them.  Sometimes we get so good that we seek out an expert, a teacher, to help us help ourselves more efficiently.

Like everyone else I sometimes forget that being a good teacher doesn’t always mean giving specific instruction.  Sometimes it means having the patience to not interfere while something important is happening.  Many of us did not experience this luxury as part of our schooling, and we don’t entirely trust it for our children.  Learning to play baseball is not a very momentous skill compared to the things we would like our children to learn, but the dynamics of learning are the same.  One must think, experiment, and care.

The following day I said to Jamie, “Let’s just have some fun throwing the ball around.”  Jamie was suspicious and not sure he wanted to play.  He felt kind of tired and thought we should wait until tomorrow or the next day when he would be feeling better.  I finally coaxed him into the yard, and we tried it.  At first he was tight, and I could see that his movements were stiff as he attempted to do everything “correctly” as explained to him the day before during his lesson.  Each time he made a mistake he glanced at me for the expected comment, but none was forthcoming.  I appeared not to notice or care, and after each uncriticized mistake he was more relaxed instead of more anxious.  He began to concentrate on the ball instead of on me, and, little by little, he began to improve again.  So what if he suddenly starts missing the high ones because for some reason he isn’t reaching.  He’ll notice, and he’ll do something about it.  There is no danger that he’ll spend years and years not reaching high enough to catch the ball and be forced to take “remedial baseball.”

Jamie asked a question about how to use his glove on a fly ball.  I remembered to give him the short version of the answer and then leave it alone.  He feels free to ask for help if he knows that he’ll get a specific answer without having to suffer through a speech…

Helping People Do Things

Meghann O’Day (AR) writes:

I’ve helped people do things, but I don’t know if that can be qualified as teaching.  I think I’ve helped my friend Tara be looser, more relaxed.  I also think I’ve taught other kids that homeschoolers aren’t weird or stupid.

I’m teaching my sister Bridget, 5, to read.  I read to her a lot.  We used the McGuffey’s Primer for her to read from, and then she started reading library books.  She can read a lot of beginner’s words, but she still needs help with new words.

I never really start out to TEACH anyone anything.  I just try to help them with something they are already interested in.

[SS:]  The way I look at it, what Meghann does - help people do things that they are already interested in - is teaching, though not the kind of unasked-for, un-helpful kind that she (like many of us) associates with the word.  It’s the kind of teaching that helped Jamie Stevens (see previous story) get better at catching balls, as opposed to the kind that made him anxious and unable to focus on the task itself.  Meghann seems to know intuitively which kind of teaching works better, and so I think her letter has a lot to say to the rest of us.

Children’s Questions

Gail Nagasako (HI) writes:

One day Thumper (7) asked me where the universe came from.  As we’d already read an anthology of Creation Stories from various religions and cultures, I gave him a scientific theory, telling him how some scientists believe it came about from a “big bang” whereby the parts of the universe were exploded out from a solid mass.  Thumper replied, “I don’t believe that.  I believe it was created bit by bit and the parts came together like dust bunnies.”  Dust bunnies are, of course, those little balls of fluff that appear somewhat mysteriously under beds.  Given what I know and what I believe, I thought his explanation and analogy were an incredibly clear statement of that possible source of the universe.

This to me is one of the wonderful fringe benefits (or is it the main reward?) of homeschooling - just as I saw his first step and heard his first word, I have the honor and privilege of sharing his world and thoughts.  I have learned much from him of life and love and what’s truly important.

Eating Letters

Karen Raskin-Young (CA) writes:

In reading Sue Smith-Heavenrich’s letter in GWS #74 about her 3-year old son’s way of learning letters, I was reminded of my son Jeremy.  By the age of 2 1/2 he was used to alphabet books and a set of wooden letters that stuck on a carpet board, but a comment he made one day when I came home from work started us in a new direction.  “Cookie Monster ate a W today,” he said, reporting what he’d seen on Sesame Street.  My interest piqued, I took up a piece of bread and started cutting.  The bread didn’t work so well, but slices of American cheese were perfect, and I cut Jeremy a W to eat, which charmed him.  For the next year and a half there were almost daily carvings.  I cut letters and numbers, sometimes taking Jeremy’s requests, and later progressed to words and surprise messages.  The process fascinated Jeremy, and I think he learned letters quickly and became interested in their structure partly because of it.  He graduated to forming letters from popsicle sticks and sometimes huge, thin, rectangular boxes, and he was an early reader.  Of course, he no longer eats American cheese - a small price to pay for so much fun and learning.

RESOURCES & RECOMMENDATIONS

Theater Group Wants Children’s Writing

Wendy Westwood (NY) writes:

I’m attaching information on the Child’s Play Touring Theatre, which performed here this year.  They solicit stories and poems from children, then present them as plays in their touring performances.  I found some of them rather overdone - too much style for kids to follow and enjoy the storyline - but many were well done, and the audience enjoyed them.  Some area homeschoolers worked together on a script that received an honorable mention, but wasn’t presented here.  It seems the most acceptable scripts require few actors and very simple sets, props, costumes.

Some excerpts from the information Wendy enclosed:

This year, Child’s Play will read more than 30,000 new stories and poems by children… Briefly, here are some of the elements we look for during the reading process:

Strong Story Line.  Stories with a well-defined beginning, middle, and ending are essential.  Given a well-constructed and imaginative plot, our actors can develop additional dialogue and action, expanding and adding detail to the original work.

Dialogue.  Many children have a talent for natural-sounding dialogue.  In writing conversations for their characters, they often reveal much about themselves.

Topicality.  We are delighted to find stories that include children’s thoughts on current world and national problems and events.  They often provide unique solutions and perspectives on so-called adult matters.

Magazine of Kids’ Reviews-We got the following announcement in the mail:

Kids aged 10 to 17! Here’s your chance to tell ‘em what you like…and why! Hey! Check This Out! is a magazine of news and reviews for kids - by kids.  We’re brand new and we need reviewers.  Books, magazines, movies.  Discover the best - or worst - of what’s out there.  Tell ‘em what you like.

“The Kids’ Project”
Jan Hunt (OR) writes:

I am enclosing a brochure about The Kids’ Project, which has been going on in Portland for a couple of years.  They hold discussion groups (and are currently televising some of them), put up billboards, put on some TV public service spots, run booths at children’s festivals, and generally try to raise awareness of children’s rights.

[SS:]  Some excerpts from the brochure that may interest GWS readers:

The Kid’s Project - creating a world in which children are treated with dignity and respect… Our goal is to produce a change in the way children are seen.  If we can shift the way people see their kids, we believe that a shift to more respectful and understanding behavior toward them will naturally and easily follow.

HOW ADULTS LEARN

Allowing Time for Piano

From Cathy Earl (CA):

I always intended to have a piano if I had children, because I had loved my free exploration of the piano as a child.  So I was thrilled to get a piano when Mindy was 5.  Not much exploration or playing occurred, however.  I longed to play, but what with laundry, marketing, cleaning, cooking, doing neat stuff with my kids, reading (I have to read some every day - a total “bookworm”) and my freelance writing, I never took the time to play piano.

Finally, when Mindy turned 7, I got this manipulative urge to get her on that piano.  She’d had access to it, and she’d freely chosen not to do much with it (and internalized that piano is not as important as housework and reading).  I certainly didn’t want to require piano, or bribe her to play.  What I decided to do was allow myself the time to play.  Now I sit down at the piano about twice a day - even if there isn’t much food in the refrigerator and the laundry is piled high.  I’ve learned and played Christmas carols, classical pieces such as Bach’s Minuets, popular music such as Joplin’s “The Entertainer,” and so on.  I’ve also started talking with piano students (almost all children) about what they are learning and playing, and about my problems and successes.

The result has been that both my girls have spontaneously begun to fiddle with the piano, to pick out tunes, and to ask for help learning popular tunes, classical pieces, and Christmas carols.

It’s been wonderful, and the most wonderful part isn’t that my children are using the piano, but that I’m enjoying piano so much.

Using the Computer

John Boston of Home-Centered Learning (CA) writes:

I had an interesting “encounter of the learning kind” last year with my computer.  I bought my new computer in January, 1989.  It was going to save me time keeping track of my Home-Centered Learning families.  It was going to help me put out my newsletters.  What no one told me was that it takes time to learn how to do this.  I knew how to type, but slowly; that was no problem.  I bought some “How to” books and started reading.  I understood the words, but not the meanings in computer terms.  I tried to make dBASE and Lotus 1-2-3 work by following the book, word for word.  This only led to some foul-up that I couldn’t explain.  The books did not help.

I had taken a Saturday workshop in the word-processing program WordPerfect, so I just used that program and gave up on the rest.  I put the books to rest.
After about eight months I tried the books again.  Still no help.
Then last Christmas I had a little time (not because the computer was helping) and started reading the books again.  This time I was ready (as educators say when they refer to “reading readiness”).  The books made sense to me.  Just reading them made sense.  I could then go to the computer and do what the book asked.  I could follow the directions with ease.  At that moment I felt that this must be how a child feels when all those letters, words, and sentences fall into place, and reading becomes a reality for them.

It took me almost a year of just playing around with the computer to learn its formula.  It may take children many years to figure out the written word.  But when they are ready, they will.  I know from experience.

Study Group By Mail

From Gene Burkart (MA):

I’ve been studying Ivan Illich’s work since I went to Mexico in 1973 and attended some of his lectures at the Center for Intercultural Documentation.  In the years that followed I read whatever I could find that he had written, never expecting that I would ever meet him or meet anyone else who was interested in his work.  But then in 1984, through my name being on the GWS friendly lawyer list, I was sent a flyer notifying me about the Maine Summer Institute, where Illich was speaking and holding workshops and informal conversations.  I went there and met people who were interested in Illich’s work, and afterwards I started corresponding with some of them.

That winter Illich was again in Maine for several days, and I spent some time with him and his colleagues.  Afterwards I gave him a ride to Boston, and during our long conversation I told him about my frustration at not being able to find other people in my area who were interested in his work - I felt I needed a circle of peers to help me continue my studies.  He was sympathetic but he couldn’t really suggest anything for me to do.

That following summer Bill Ellis, who runs Tranet (a network for people interested in “appropriate technology”) held kind of a follow up in the Maine Summer Institute.  Bill told me about the multi-logs, as he calls them, that he has going - people write comments or letters on various topics and send them to some person or organization who copies them and sends them out.  This got me thinking that some kind of Illich study group through the mail would be the best thing for me to do.

Then Susan Hunt, who had organized the original Maine Summer Institute, had an article about Illich in the UTNE reader, at the end of which was a notice saying people could contact Tranet if they wanted more information.  About thirty people wrote saying they were interested in Illich and his work.  So I decided to go ahead and do something through the mail.  I used those names to start.  I wrote a cover letter describing what I hoped to do, how it would work:  I hoped we would read something of Illich’s writing, nothing to lengthy, and would all then write a one-page comment about what we’d read.  I would copy and circulate the comments.

I got about 20 responses, and I think we ended up starting with about 15 people who wanted to participate in it or receive it.  Now, some people get it who don’t write for it, but most people do write for it.  I keep sending it to anyone who has ever contributed, even if they aren’t able to write now.  Some people are shyer about their writing and don’t want to contribute, but are seriously interested in Illich’s work, and I certainly want them to get it.

I get about three of these collections of comments out a year.  People have volunteered money on and off, to help with postage and copying, even though I’ve never explicitly asked for help.

I think the whole thing has been very successful.  I’ve gotten to know the people who are involved with it fairly well by now.  I’ve met many of them, and have spoken with others on the phone.  It’s good to know that there are other people who share my interest.  Also, the discipline of having to study a text and articulate my own thoughts on it, by a regular deadline, has been a very good exercise for me.  Knowing that people are going to be reading it makes it different from just writing it on my own.  And seeing how others have taken that same text and written up a response is very interesting.  It really shows how diverse everyone is.  After you’ve read someone’s comments a few times, a personality begins to emerge - you really get to know a person, in a way, through this.

This has worked so well for me that I’m very impressed with the power of using the mail.  It’s a very simple thing, but it seems to have great potential.  It has made me realize that you don’t have to look only for people in your own neighborhood to find others who share your interests.  And I’ve gotten together with many of the people who are participating in this, so it hasn’t just stayed a correspondence.  I certainly didn’t expect that to happen when I began this.

Using the mail this way seems so adaptable to different kinds of interests - it’s basically just letter writing.  I can imagine others using it for all kinds of different interests, and it seems to be something that would work well for homeschooled children and teenagers, too.  The hard part can be finding others to participate, but today there are so many different newsletters about particular interests that people could probably use them as a place to find names of others.

FOCUS:  YOU DON’T HAVE TO GO TO SCHOOL FOR THAT

Sometimes it seems as if some things are just impossible, or at least difficult, for homeschoolers to have access to.  People say, about lab equipment or team sports or a graduation ceremony, “That’s something you’d have to go to school for.”  We’re not so sure.  For this issue’s Focus, we interviewed parents and children who have found ways to get these things without going to school.

Having a Graduation Ceremony
Interview with Dawn Bowden of Maryland:

I went to school through tenth grade, and then homeschooled for eleventh grade.  I considered going back to school for senior year, not because I was discouraged by homeshooling (I was very happy with it) but because I felt like maybe I’d be missing out on everything.  Senior year is supposed to be your year, the year you’ve worked for, and I thought all my friends would be going to the prom and graduating - all those things you look forward to when you think of senior year.

But then I decided not to go back, because I realized that if I went I would be missing out on the things I had developed within myself.  I had made certain discoveries about myself, and I felt that if I went back into the school system, especially now that I felt
that a lot of what goes on within the school system is wrong, I would lose that.  I decided that if I went back, maybe I’d get to do some of the things they would get to do during their senior year, but it would also be more claustrophobic than ever.

What were some of the things you discovered during that first year of homeschooling?

While I was homeschooling I went to school a couple of times to sit in class with my friends, just to see whether I’d want to be back in that environment.  Some of the teachers were OK, but in some classes the kids had to be a certain way, just to keep the classroom in order, and that kept the kids from really being able to express themselves.  And they couldn’t talk in class because they’d feel that they were being laughed at by the other kids if they were interested in something.

You think there’s sort of a prejudice against being interested in things, among kids in school?

Yes, so they just goofed off and made jokes.  These are kids I’ve known since fifth grade, but I felt that I had grown so much more during the year I’d been out.  I didn’t feel that as much when I was around my real friends, but I felt it when I went back into the school.  Maybe they just act that way when they’re in school and not when they’re out of it, I don’t know.

Did you observe or think about these things when you were in school?

Oh, no.  I had always been in that kind of environment.  I think you have to be able to stand back and look at it, and not be within it, to realize exactly what goes on.  That’s why going to meetings and talking to a lot of homeschooling people also helped me decide not to go back in, because there are a lot of things that I don’t agree with in the school system.  To go back in to something that you strongly don’t believe in anymore, just to go to a graduation or a prom, just seemed wrong.

It’s interesting that you were able to gain the distance, and have these insights, in such a short time.  What kinds of things did you do during that first year?

Part of the problem I had in school was that I’ve always enjoyed reading, but I think it’s much more beneficial for me to think about it than to have to write it down on paper and explain it.  That takes the enjoyment of reading it away.  But that’s what you have to do in school - I guess it’s so that the teacher can see that you actually did read the book.  But I know I read the book, and I think I’m old enough to evaluate it myself, or know what I got out of it.  A lot of what you’re doing in school, by eleventh grade, is just busywork.

I haven’t done that much school work in homeschooling.  But I was able to go to museums when I felt like it.  Every week, or every other week, I go with my friend who’s in college, and we see if there’s anything at the museums that we’re interested in.  My cousin is homeschooled as well, and my grandparents have taken us throughout Virginia and Maryland, to historic places.  It was fun, it was like a vacation, but we both also found out a lot about that stuff that we didn’t know before.

This year I’ve been working for a computer company.  I learned to do a program that does computer animation, and then I taught it to people in the office and we did a presentation for a trade show.  So I did all kinds of things that I wouldn’t have been able to do in school.  I had free time to decide what I wanted to do.

I wonder whether having had that time affects the way you think about your future.

I’m very interested in communications, and this year I took courses at the community college in radio and television.  So now, when I go to college, that’s what I want to major in, and I already have credits in it, and I know what I want to do.

Coming back to graduation - when we arranged this interview you were telling me that when you went to the school’s graduation you began to regret not being able to have one of your own.

I went to the graduation because my best friends were graduating.  All the names that were being called were people I’ve known for years, and in a way I wished I was part of it, but even so, it was so big that it felt really impersonal to me.  I didn’t end up regretting it that much.  I sat there and realized that it wouldn’t have been worth it to me to go to school for a year just for that.

Then my Mom had the idea that it would be nice for me to have a graduation, so that I could have some recognition.  It is a milestone, and maybe you don’t feel that it’s as recognized if you don’t have a ceremony, if you just quietly pass on to the next stage.  So my mother talked to Manfred Smith and Barbara Klein of “The Learning Community” [SS:  Enrolling in The Learning Community is one way in which Maryland homeschoolers can fulfill the requirements of the law] and they arranged it.  It was just my best friends and my relatives and neighbors.  Manfred and Barbara stood up and talked, and presented me with a diploma, and they each gave me presents.

It was nice, because it was even more recognition than you get when you graduate from a normal high school.  They both said something about me; they didn’t just say something in general to a class of 500.

So it turned out it wasn’t even a choice between going to school and having a graduation ceremony - you had them both.  How did it work out with the other aspects of senior year that you had originally worried about missing?

I didn’t go to the prom because I would have had to go with someone who went to the high school, and my boyfriend goes to college.  I probably could have gone if I had really wanted to, but it wasn’t that important, and all my friends ended up having a horrible time.  It wasn’t something that I felt I missed out on.

I think some kids who have been in school through tenth grade might find it very hard to leave school then.  Did you worry about being different from everyone else?

It wasn’t hard at all for me.  I didn’t like the high school very much, and my friends and I didn’t want to be like everybody else.  They went back to school that year, but I still saw them a lot.  I get asked a lot of questions, but it doesn’t bother because I’m doing something that’s important to me, and maybe other people don’t realize it’s acceptable and if they ask me questions, and I talk to them and explain it, they get a better idea of what it is.

How did you find out that homeschooling was an option?

My cousin started homeschooling a year before I did.  My parents knew that I didn’t like school, and my mom asked if homeschooling was something that I wanted to do.  I said yes, I wanted to try it.  We started on a trial basis, and I guess it wasn’t until I had the option to go back to school for senior year that I realized I had been doing well with homeschooling and didn’t want to stop.  For a while at the beginning I didn’t want to do anything.  My mom said to Manfred, “Dawn doesn’t seem like she’s motivated to do anything, all she wants to do is sleep.”  Manfred said, “She’s going to need that, just give her time, after a while she’ll get tired of sleeping and she’ll want to do something else.”  I had had ten years of having to go to school every day, and I was really grateful for that time to rest and not do much of anything.  They let me do that, and in my own time I started doing more.

Access to Lab Equipment

Interview with Susan Shilcock (PA):

How did you arrange for your children to have access to biology labs and equipment?

As we thought about the coming year, we realized that we wanted to give Amanda (now 14) access to some of what she would have if she were in high school.  When we went to a meeting, at the local school, for parents to hear about courses available at the high school level, the point was driven home very clearly that students who wanted to go onto college ought to have a solid math and science foundation starting in ninth grade.  We wanted to keep that option open for Amanda, and she too was aware of some of what her friends in school were doing and sometimes wondered whether she should be doing more, especially in areas she didn’t usually spend much time on.

She had the option of sitting in on a science course at the local high school, but she didn’t want to do that.  We started looking for other ways for her to be around scientists and soak up some of the atmosphere of what science can be.  She was invited to be in a course with five or six homeschoolers, but that didn’t fit into our schedule.  We thought about her taking some science courses at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, or an adult night school course, but ultimately her interest wasn’t strong enough for her to want to do all that traveling.  We talked with her about the idea of a private tutor, sometimes with her younger sister and sometimes on her own.

How did you go about finding the tutor?

We realized that we had a friend very close by who had taught high school biology for ten years, and was even a homeschooling parent, so that seemed just right.  We approached her about the possibility of teaching some version of biology to our children - I say both “teaching” and “biology” very flexibly there, because if they end up becoming interested in something tangential that wouldn’t strictly fit under “biology,” that will be fine, and she is not accepting responsibility for their learning a certain amount of material.

When we talked about the idea with her, she reminded us that now she teaches part-time at a local college, and I thought that might be interesting because maybe they could go in to the college and see what it’s like.  She said they would probably be able to watch a lab in progress, and I asked if they would be able to use the lab themselves at some point.  She thought that would be possible, so it looks like that is going to happen.  When the children are ready to use labs, they will have access to them.

So when you thought about giving them access to science equipment, you were thinking about something more than the equipment you already have at home.

Yes, we have microscopes and test tubes and a lot of other equipment that they’ve been working with since they were little.  But I thought it would be valuable for them to see, and to feel comfortable in, the new atmosphere of the lab.

They may get to see some of the formal procedures of lab work, too, or some of the conventions of the science culture, that they wouldn’t otherwise have seen working by themselves.

It really opens up a whole new area of the world for them, and I’m not sure where it will take them.  At the very least it will help them feel that they’re messing around with the same topics that other kids their age are messing around with.  And although they’ll only be meeting once a week, they won’t have to waste time waiting to get a turn at things, and their specific questions will be the ones getting discussed.

Science equipment is often one of the first things people bring up when they talk about things homeschoolers won’t have access to, but it sounds as though it wouldn’t be that hard for others to set up arrangements with people who work in labs.

I think the key is usually the person - keep thinking of all the people in your life, and talk about your goals with them.  It’s very likely that someone will be able to help you make a connection.  If you’re talking with the person in the stationery store about how your child loves horses, that person may say, “Oh, my cousin is a veterinarian,” and all of a sudden you have a possible connection.  If you don’t say, “Gee, I wish we could have more chemistry in my child’s life,” or whatever it is, it’s very unlikely that someone is going to come up to you and guess what you were wishing for, and offer it.  So you have to keep talking to people.  Sometimes it takes more work to set these kinds of things up, but I think the final product is usually closer to what one would want.

Participating in Team Sports

Interview with Jesse and Virginia Schwerin (of Massachusetts; Virginia is Jesse’s mother):

How long have you been running on the school team?

Jesse:  One season, and I’m planning on running this coming season, too.  The assistant coach asked me to run.  When I ran my first race, he saw me, and then he saw me run a 10K race - that’s 6.2 miles - and I came in first for my age group.  One day he said to me, “I think if you come on the school’s cross-country team it will really improve your running.”

What would you say to a homeschooler who was thinking of joining a school team but was worried that it might be hard to go to school for just that one activity?

Jesse:  I live in a small town - everybody knows everybody else - so it wasn’t that hard for me.  Sometimes it feels awkward coming to the school after school hours.  Sometimes some of my friends take the bus home and then go back to school, and it’s less awkward when I can walk there with them.

Was there any problem with being allowed to join the team?

Virginia:  The assistant coach didn’t know anything about homeschooling policy, but saw that he had a kid here who was very interested in running and very motivated, so he kept asking if he was eligible to join the team.  I ended up writing to the school and telling them what we were going to do - I didn’t ask permission, I just wrote the athletic director of the school and said, “My son is a home-study student in the Lenox School District, and he’s qualified for sporting events, and he will be joining the cross-country team.”  The people in the athletic department were encouraging - there was no problem at all.

Do you remember whether, before you worked this out, you were feeling at all stuck about how to have access to team sports?

Virginia:  I think there was that feeling.  Jesse probably forgets that because he has so much going on in his life now, but I do remember that we were feeling that way.  Three years ago, when Jesse was almost 12, we had moved to this town from California, where there’s a huge homeschooling population, and Jesse had a lot of friends here, but none were his age.  There were no older homeschoolers at the local gatherings here - we were going on two-hour treks to meet them.

We ended up working hard to find out what was available in the community.  Jesse started taking horseback riding lessons where we knew there were going to be a lot of kids.  Then he joined the community soccer club, and auditioned for the theater.  He also started working in Maggie Sadoway’s health food store, and being behind the counter, he met a lot of people.

Someone might say that sending a child to school would be easier than setting up all those different things.

Virginia:  We certainly know of plenty of children who go to school and don’t have friends.  We took in a goddaughter this past year - she’s a good friend from California who was failing school and didn’t have any friends; she just wasn’t into school at all.  She came and homeschooled with us, and that gave Jesse a companion last year.

It never occurred to me that school should be the solution.  It did occur to my husband, and Jesse himself thought school was the easiest answer.  But then we thought about the time he would actually spend with the other kids, engaged in activities - we talked to him about how he’d spend most of his time in the classroom, being quiet.

I now see a lot of benefits to homeschooling during that junior high time, even if it was sometimes lonely for Jesse.  He wasn’t around all that pressure to go along with the group, and he was able to find his own way, his own feelings about things.  He’s ended up being really confident in peer groups.

[SS:]  Another way for homeschoolers to have access to team sports is to become involved in community teams and leagues.  We’ve heard from a few families who have done this and enjoyed it.  One advantage seems to be that the children on community leagues come from several different schools, so the homeschooler may feel less an outsider.

Writing in Groups

Interview with Jacque and Nathan Williamson (VA; Jacque is Nathan’s mother):

How long has your writing club been meeting?

Nathan:  The first one met for about a year, and then we stopped for a while.  The one we have now, with a new group of people, has been meeting for about a year, too.

Jacque:  There are about fourteen people, ages 5 through 13.  We meet every other week.

What gave you the idea to start the club?  Were you specifically looking for others to write with?

Jacque:  Nathan may not realize that he had a lot to do with starting the club.  I had gotten the idea of doing a writing club - I wanted to get a group of kids together.  Nathan was starting to write a book, and when we went to visit another homeschooling family I encouraged him to bring it along, just to read to the other kids.  While the kids were off - we thought - playing, I was talking to the mother in the kitchen and saying, “Wouldn’t it be a good idea to get the kids together to write?”  We happened to look in the living room, and there were all the kids, listening to Nathan’s writing, giving responses.  Then the other kids pulled out some of their writing and started reading it, and we thought, “Well!  It’s already started!”

Nathan, had you ever had other kids respond to your work, before that?

Nathan:  Almost everything I’d written before had been short pieces, and not things I wanted to share.  But I felt really positive about sharing my work with those kids because they liked it so much.  If they hadn’t liked it, I might not have wanted to keep sharing my work.

Jacque:  I had been thinking that the children were getting older, and really had some meaningful things that they were writing.  I thought that an audience would be a positive addition to that.  I had only a vague model of how a group could work.  I knew that writers got together to share what they did, and to critique it, but I wasn’t sure how to do it for children.

How did you figure it out, then?

Jacque:  We just did it.  I think that by the time we got our club going, Susan Richman, in Pennsylvania, had written her first piece about writing clubs, and from that I saw that all they did was bring work to share and talk about, and I thought, “Well, we could do that.”

Since you learned on the job, do you have anything to say to others about mistakes you made, things you might do differently now?

Nathan:  When we first started, a lot of people didn’t bring things to read.  The worst thing for a writing club is if people don’t bring things, because it really isn’t a writing club then.  When we got to the point where everyone started bringing something, that’s when our writing club really took off, and when everyone started having fun.

Jacque:  We found that if a few children didn’t bring something to read, the others became very reticent to share their work.  What they had to say was often very intimate, and they didn’t want to share it if everyone wasn’t going to.  We also had a very bad experience in the first group with a child who wasn’t there to share writing - she was there for social life, and that really broke the group up.  We got frustrated, and when we started the group up again, I was careful to choose children who really wanted to write.

It’s interesting; when you structure a group so that it’s just people bringing their work and asking for comments, you have to have people who are truly working on writing during the rest of the week.  It’s not the same as going to a class and waiting to be given an assignment.

Jacque:  Now that we look back on it we realize that the first group was more of a school-like situation.  The kids weren’t there because they wanted to write, but because their parents decided they should go, or they wanted to be with other kids.  Also, the first group met on Friday afternoons because we had two former homeschoolers who were now in school and really wanted to be involved with the group.  They had a writing club at school, but they liked ours because the writing was far more creative and they found the kids more supportive.  But as the year went on, we found that the school kids were too tired, and were overloaded with schoolwork so they didn’t have time to write during the week, and didn’t bring anything to the group.  They ended up dropping out of the group.

Nathan, you said earlier that if the kids hadn’t liked your writing, you might not have wanted to keep sharing your work.  How did the group get used to offering more critical comments to each other?

Nathan:  When you start a writing club, as in most new situations, you don’t feel really comfortable with everybody else, so most of the comments are in the category of, “That was really brilliant” or “I liked that a lot.”  As we began to know each other more intimately, we started giving more comments about what we really felt, not just what we thought the others would like.  We started being able to say, “I liked that part in the story, but I think you could do something else better in this other part.”  That will come when everybody really feels comfortable with everybody else.

It’s not really that helpful for you, as a writer, to hear, “That was great.”  You don’t learn that much from that aside from the fact that they liked it.  If they tell you something that they didn’t like, you have something to work on.

And then you begin to count on the group to point those things out to you.

Jacque:  We discovered that when people made very specific comments, all of us tuned in and thought, “Oh, yes, that’s helpful.”  If someone said, “Your beginning caught me right away, and your last line tied back in to the first line,” we became more aware of those techniques.  As time went on the group got far more specific with its comments.

Nathan:  When people don’t comment, it becomes more of a story hour than a writing club.  You’re just listening to other people’s writing, so it’s more of a reading club.

It’s interesting that your group includes both kids and adults.  Do you ever have the problem of the adults taking over the discussion?

Nathan:  There was a time when the kids weren’t giving many comments, and the adults would kick in and overload us.  Some of it was helpful, but I didn’t like it because I thought the writing club was for children.

Jacque:  They definitely made their wishes known.  They said, “This is really for us.  We like your comments, but keep them extremely short.”  The group decided that they wanted to focus on their own writing, and we would be there as aids, but that’s all.  Sometimes we do bring our own work and talk about it, but it’s a large group so there isn’t always time.  One parent had a letter published in Time magazine, and she talked about how she had written the letter in a way that would make it likely to be published.  Other parents have talked about having writing published, too.  But the kids themselves are publishing more and more, so when we talk about publishing our work we’re feeding into their interests.

Nathan:  It’s helpful to have guest speakers, if you look at it that way, even if it’s your parents.  I got a lot out of what the person said about the letter in Time magazine.

Did you know, from the beginning, that you would be able to arrange for a writing group without having to turn to school?

Jacque:  I don’t think Nathan ever looks towards school for anything.  If he needs something, he’ll look in the community, or within his circle of homeschooling friends.  I tend to do a tremendous amount of research, so if I want to figure out how to do something I’ll turn to other people, or to books.  I remember that at one point, when we got the writing group going, I thought, “Whoa, I’m in over my head, I don’t know what kinds of comments to give.”  But we figured it out.  I feel comfortable not having all the answers, letting the kids know that we need some help on a particular problem.

Nathan:  There’s more out in the community than meets your eye at first.  If you take the time to poke around, to look, you’d be amazed at what’s out there.  I’m now studying electronics with a man who moved into our neighborhood.  He and Dad became good friends, and he said he wanted to get me or my brother interested in electronics.  He brought some phones over and took them apart, and showed us how the phone worked, and it was tremendously interesting to me, so he said, “I’ll show you more.”

Do you have a regular arrangement with him?

Nathan:  No, it’s just off and on.

Jacque:  We’ve discovered that people without children are a goldmine for homeschoolers.  We have three situations within walking distance where we’ve discovered people without children who love to share their interests with our kids.

Riding the School Bus

Interview with Kevin and Freda Davies (Ont; Freda is Kevin’s mother):

Why did you want to ride the school bus?

Kevin:  I wanted the chance to meet some more kids my age who were in the area.  The bus ride was about an hour long, each way, and I’d heard from my friends about funny things that happened to them on the bus, so it seemed like the bus ride was when a lot of the socializing took place.  I thought about actually going to school, but I didn’t think I was really ready to go back to school.  I had gone to school for grades 1, 2, and a little bit of 3, and I was 16 at the time we’re talking about.  So I thought, could I ride the bus without actually going to school?  My mother ended up getting permission to do that.  I rode the bus two or three days a week, and then spent the day in town.  Usually I went to the library and did research by myself.

Freda, how did you get permission for Kevin to ride the bus?

Freda:  I went through several different people.  I started by asking the bus driver.  She said to ask her boss, but he said he couldn’t give me permission.  He said I had to contact the fellow on the school board who was in charge of buses.  I phoned him, and he said there was no way.  He cited a bunch of possible problems, like insurance.  I insisted that there must be some way.  He finally said I could try his superior, who was a superintendent for the particular area.  I went to see the superintendent, and he said Kevin would have to be enrolled in school to ride the bus, so I should try to see the principal of one of the high schools.  He gave me the name of a principal and a guidance counselor.  The principal was insistent that Kevin would have to take courses at the school, but the guidance counselor was more sympathetic and said, “We can say he’s a student and is doing special studies.”  He wrote a letter, got his principal to sign (not the same principal - he was from a different school), and then we had to present that letter to the bus driver and everything was fine.

Even though the experience didn’t end up being what Kevin hoped it would be, it was a way for him to explore the school scene without actually going to school.

Joining in School’s Social Life

Interview with Anita Giesy (VA):

How did you get involved in the social life of the local school kids?

My best friend, Ellie, has always gone to school.  We took dance together when we were 5, and then I moved to her neighborhood and we became very close friends.  I had always gone to her birthday parties, so I knew her school friends to a certain extent, but it wasn’t until her 16th birthday party that I really started talking to one in particular.  She suggested that I come to Young Life, which was an after-school group.  From there it just kind of grew - I got to know that group of friends, and did things with them.

Had you been curious about Ellie’s social life at school before that party?

Not really, because I heard all about it.  She would tell me stories, and that was enough for me.  I was also in a performing group that went into the schools, so I got to see the school system that way, and I realized that it wasn’t something I wanted to be involved in.  And I knew I was Ellie’s special friend, so I never felt left out.  But at the party, when I started talking to Ellie’s good friend from school, I saw that we had a lot of things in common - just having Ellie as a friend, first of all, and we both babysat a lot, too.

At first I wanted to make sure that I wouldn’t be invading Ellie’s world, but she assured me that it was OK.  I was curious, I think, so I decided to try it.  Once I got to know the kids at the after-school group, they started inviting me to other things.  I went to the homecoming game a couple of times, and a few school dances, and I even ended up dating one of the guys.

Did they sometimes make references to things that had happened at school that you didn’t know about?

Usually they made enough references so I knew who the various teachers were that they were talking about, and I could understand the stories.  And from what I’ve heard, they don’t have much time at school to socialize with each other, so it wasn’t like I was missing that.  They get a twenty-five-minute lunch period, and they have to stand in line and eat during that time.  And Ellie says they get sick of each other, sick of being with the same people day after day.  So in a way I was a breath of fresh air.

The never made me feel like an outsider.  I sort of looked at it as a learning experience - now I’ll get to see how regular teenagers act.  I once made a comment to Dad about how I was getting tired of regular teenagers after being around them for a while, and he asked, “Does it ever bother you that you’re not a ‘normal’ teenager?”  I said, “No!”  A lot of them are really involved in trying to get through school, but they aren’t that interested in it.  Some of them are interested in other things that are going on in the world, but a lot of them aren’t, too.  It’s funny; one of Ellie’s friends commented that I wasn’t an ordinary teenager, and I tried my hardest to explain to the why I preferred that, but she felt that I had missed out on something.  I felt that my brief experience with doing the normal teenage thing more than made up for it.

What do you think she meant by an “ordinary teenager”?

Growing up going to school, and having the social scene.  She was looking at one path and saying, “This is the one you should have been on,” and I was saying, “Gee, there’s this path and this path and this path, and here’s the one I happened to take, and I’m just as happy with it.”  My mother, growing up, always wanted to blend in, but I’m the exact opposite.  I enjoy standing out; I don’t like the idea of being just like everybody else.

Did the school kids ask you about your life outside of school?

When they first met me they didn’t know I was homeschooled, and we had other things in common to get the relationship going.  When they found out, I think it mystified them - why I would pick that.  They knew there were problems with their way, but they didn’t see totally abandoning it.

They would ask me “Do you know” questions:  “We were learning in science class the other day about this microbe and that gene; do you know about that?”  I would say, “No, maybe I don’t know that specific thing, but maybe I know something else over here that you don’t.  Maybe we haven’t learned the same things, but I have been learning.”  Actually, I did know something of what the girl was talking about in that case because genetics is something I’ve always been interested in.  The funny part, too, that I was always trying to communicate to them, was that yes, maybe the AP classes they were taking were interesting, but I wouldn’t have been in them because way back when, I didn’t learn to read at the expected age, and I don’t think schools would have managed to teach me, so I wouldn’t have ended up in any advanced classes.

Some homeschoolers seem to find it much harder to be different from others - they seem to mind it more.  I wonder whether you ever felt that there were some things you couldn’t talk about with these kids, for example?

There were some things.  One was just the big difference of opinion about homeschooling, because they did think I was missing out on something.  With some of the kids I never developed more than a social friendship, but with a couple I did feel that I could talk about anything.

When I was growing up I always had a link to what the world thinks of as the norm, through Ellie and through being in ballet, so I guess it helped to have that.  And I could see how much that world was a struggle, so I never wanted to be in it.  Also, I’ve always tended to want to keep worlds separate - I had friends that I didn’t want to share with my family, or if I was with my older siblings I didn’t want my younger friends with them.  But I think as I got older it became easier to blend these worlds.

Being the youngest in my family helped, too, because I always felt that homeschooling wasn’t so strange since all three of my siblings were doing it too.  And because we were one of the first homeschooling families in our area, we were always in the press’s eye, doing newspaper interviews, so I grew up with the idea that this was something neat, something that got you a lot of attention.

How does your experience with traditional social life, these past couple of years, affect the way you think about social life in the years to come.

I think I could fit in with the mainstream if I wanted to, but I think I could have anyway, whether or not I had these experiences.  But I don’t feel that I need to go to college to meet people.  I’m going to be meeting lots of people in lots of ways.

Questioning College:  Interview with Herbert Kohl

[SS:]  I suspect that many GWS readers already know Herbert Kohl’s work through his books 36 Children, Reading, How To, and others.  We were excited to read his newest book, The Question is College (available here; see our fall 1990 catalog), because it challenges the idea that college is the only, or the best, way to spend those years of one’s life, and talks about moving directly into one’s chosen work through apprenticeships and other opportunities.  Herbert Kohl talks about the importance of loving one’s work in much the same way that John Holt talked about finding work worth doing.  I think his book will be enormously useful to older homeschoolers and their parents, and perhaps the following interview will generate some discussion of these issues as well.

Susannah Sheffer:  Many people believe that college is essential to getting a good job, or to have a successful adult life.  Can you say briefly why you think that isn’t true?

Herbert Kohl:  There are a lot of people who develop very useful crafts, skills, occupations through apprenticeships.  In my own community in Northern California, for example, lots of people who work in computers are self-taught or have found a mentor for themselves.  They’ve moved directly from that mentorship into the computer industry.  In computer technology, it is not necessary to go to college.

The same is true of environmental work, where one can enter as a volunteer or through some apprenticeship and later on decide if college would be useful.

SS:  Some people say, “But isn’t it important to have a degree?”

HK:  I think a lot of parents feel that it’s very important for their kids to get a degree and then figure out what they want to do.  My feeling is that it’s good to have an experience in an area in which you might like to make your life’s work, and then see what kinds of credentials you need, once you’ve made the commitment to that work.  You should figure out what you want to do, and then get experience doing that, before you decide that college is of value per se.

I think degrees are particularly unnecessary in areas where the need for interested people is greatest.  If what you want to do is in a field in which we don’t have enough people, you may be given alternative routes, or allowed to get a credential while doing the work.

Now, I don’t mean to discourage, say, someone who at 16 desperately wants to get into medical training as soon as possible, knows what it involves and wants to get started right away.  By all means, go to college in that case.  But if you’re just going to college because you’ve heard about the need for a credential, or you feel you’ve got to leave home and are ready to be out in the world - you don’t need to go to college for that.

SS:  How did you come to question the necessity of college?

HK:  Two ways.  One was having gone to Harvard, and getting to know some of the Brightest and Best who were the people who engineered the US involvement in Vietnam and thought up computer-based simulations that involved assassinating local leaders and in general imagining genocide in the service of capitalism and elitism.  These were the prestigious members of the university, whose cleverness and intellectuality was unquestioned.  As soon as I recognized the moral brutality of some of our most sophisticated and well-educated people, I had to say to myself, “I’m not going to be like that, and if that’s what universities produce, it’s frightening.”  So I’ve never been particularly impressed by degrees.

The other way I came to question college was knowing some wonderful kids who just said no to it.

SS:  What were their reasons?

HK:   One was that they’d been to school too long and hadn’t gotten anything out of it.  Another was that they really did have something they wanted to pursue, that college didn’t offer.  And they felt that at precisely the point at which they were ready to go out in the world, they were told to spend another four years in school.  Some of the most independent youngsters I knew didn’t reject college so much as hungered for life, for experience.

SS:  Conversely, what do you think would be a good reason to go to college?

HK:  If you love learning through books.  My first two or three years at college, though they were socially terrible, were wonderful in that respect.  There were no books where I grew up, and the notion that people studied and talked about ideas was magical enough to me to sustain four full and rich years.  After that, I knew how to find my own way, I could teach myself.

Another good reason to go to college might be a desperate need to go away from home and yet feel secure within an institution.  Some people may need a certain amount of stability on their first step away from home, if their lives have been very fragile or stressful.

SS:  I want to go back to the idea of going to college because you love learning through books.  I can see how for some people, college is in fact the place to find others who love what you love.  But its it true that it’s the only place for people who have what we might call academic interests?  Do you know any young people who have those interests but haven’t gone to college?

HK:  Two former students of mine love philosophy and sociology, but their route into those areas has been through working with the homeless and in poor communities, and doing environmental work.  These guys will go to college for a semester, take classes that they want to take, and then leave.  What’s interesting about them is that they will choose to learn things after they’ve had enough experience to ask the right questions.  They can find their teachers because they’re looking for who might potentially have an interesting answer to their questions.

SS:  That’s interesting, because I’m still thinking that someone who genuinely loves philosophy or whatever might not want to put up with the other aspects of college.

HK:  My grandparents came from Eastern Europe, and when they came to this country they would occasionally take adult education classes set up on the lower east side of New York.  An adult from the community who knew something would announce a class, and people who wanted to learn that would come to the class.

I’ve kind of taken a note from that, and I now teach a poetry and writing class - I’ve been teaching it continuously for about twenty years.  I announce to people that I would like to do this class for whoever wants to come, because I happen to love poetry, try to read as much of it as I can, and I want to share it.  So I say that in the class we will all read poetry together, discuss it, write together, read our own writing if we want to.  There’s no fee, no institutional grounding, no credit - it’s just there for the sake of it.  Right now there are about fourteen of us.  It’s really quite wonderful - it’s become a community of people who care about poetry.

SS:  I think it’s so encouraging to young people to know that that sort of thing can grow in communities, that they don’t have to go to college for it.

HK:  I would encourage people to say, “Here’s something that I’d like to learn - anybody want to learn it with me?”  Actually announce a class the way people announce that they want to sell a car.

SS:  In The Question Is College you talk about the conflicts that arise when kids don’t want to go to college and parents think they should.  What are some ways to make that conflict easier?

HK:  I think talking about the doubts with someone else helps, and of course talking with your children helps too.  The most important thing is to convey to your children the idea that your love for them is not for barter and will never be withdrawn just because you disagree with them.

The other thing to do, when you’re having these doubts, is really look around your community and see what people are doing and what routes they took.  You’ll be surprised at how many people, when you talk to them, will say, “No, I didn’t take the regular route.”

SS:  I was struck by the stories of conflicts between parents and teenagers in your book - some ended so badly, with the parents and teenagers not speaking at all, and some ended so well.

HK:  If I’m upset with my children’s choices, I have to look hard at what’s bothering me so I can get to the point where I realize that maybe they’re disappointing something that I want for them, or they’re not taking the path I would have them take.  I have to understand that if the choice is really important for their lives and I don’t support them, they will walk away.  This means that you have to respect your children as people who are independent of you.  I think it’s terribly important not to make threats that are beyond what you really want to happen.  Never say, “I’ll never speak to you again if you don’t go to college.”

My oldest daughter used to paint and draw in private.  I don’t think we knew how much of it she was doing until she was in junior high.  She was one of those kids who would do homework at the last possible moment.  One night we asked her what she was doing, really hinting at was she doing what she was supposed to be doing, and she showed us these beautiful drawings.  We immediately said, “This is amazing, have you ever thought about doing anything with it?” She said, “Yeah, I kind of have.”  When she graduated from high school, she said, “You know, I really have been taking this art thing very seriously, and I don’t want to go to college, I want to take a year to see if I can become an artist.”

That’s when you, as a parent, have a serious decision to make.  You can say, “No, go to college and become an artist later.”  Or you can say, “Why don’t you make art your hobby?”  But we said OK.  I don’t think we had any choice, by the way.  I think she would have done it no matter what we said.  Well, she did it and then decided that she did want training in art, so she went to Rhode Island School of Design, and now is intending to be a printmaker and painter.

SS:  Let’s talk about teenagers who don’t want to go to college but still have to figure out what they do want to do.  Sometimes we talk as though the way to figure out what you want to do is to sit in a room and think about it, but maybe you can only figure it out through trying various things.

HK:  You’ve hit upon the main reason why I wrote the book.  I’ve had the opportunity to meet and talk with a lot of young people, and I realized that they didn’t know what there was to do, what choices they had.  So I began to collect books and descriptions and photographs to help them think about how it’s possible to live and what it’s possible to do.  There are probably thousands of different things that one can do, but if you look at what high schools say, and sometimes what parents, who may have very little experience, say, you hear, “It’s possible to go to college, to be a doctor, a lawyer, a businessperson.”  But what else?  The notion of coming to a vocation is incomprehensible to most young people.  So they’ve got to talk to people who’ve done all sorts of things.

SS:  I think it’s important to think of doing something rather than being “a something” - a doctor or lawyer or whatever.  What you do doesn’t have to have that kind of name.

HK:  Exactly.  Do a survey of people in your own community and then get bigger and bigger if you have to.  Talk to people and ask them what they do and how they came to do it.  The young people to whom I’ve suggested that say that when they’ve tried to talk to people, there have been maybe one or two gruff people but the most surprising number will stop and tell you what they do and how they became what they are.

SS:  When it comes to time to make a connection, find a way to apprentice to someone, what’s the best way to do that?

HK:  First of all, parents have to encourage their kids to believe that they’re interesting people.  The kind of letter you write, or the kind of phone call you make to find that apprenticeship, will reflect that.  It’s a good idea to give a history of your interest in the work or the subject.  Instead of just saying, “I would like to observe you working,” say, “Since I was 7 and I first did the following thing, it occurred to me that this might be what I wanted to do with my  life, and now that I’m 17 I’ve done the following other things, and now I’d like to talk with you.”  Fill that in with specific and concrete experiences.  It’s important to learn to present yourself in a pleasant and natural way, focusing on your strengths.  So I would say to parents, help your kids see what’s strong about them.  Don’t only talk about what they don’t do or can’t do.

SS:  What about the young person who just has no idea what to do?

HK:  I think kids who are that resistant to trying something probably feel that their world has narrowed down to a couple of double binds and one or two vicious circles.  So you want to break out of that.  Traveling might be a good way, or getting work that requires being in some place you’ve never been to.  I’ve known kids like that who have tried working in the salmon canneries in Alaska - or here, where I live, a lot of young people who wanted to get away from the city and try doing something physical are working as lumberjacks.  So trying some kind of intriguing work, even if it’s not work that’s going to lead anywhere except to a discovery of more aspects of yourself, can be a good idea.

SS:  That’s good to hear, because some kids get stuck thinking that what they do now has to be what they want to do for the rest of their lives.  They wonder what will happen if they don’t like it.

HK:  Learning what you don’t want to do is a very valuable thing.  You won’t make that mistake again.  And thinking about why something didn’t work out can give you valuable skills in analyzing your own life.

SS:  Can you see practical parts of your book, the parts about how to go about finding work and apprenticeships, applying to kids younger than college age, too?

HK:  I set out to write for sophomores in high school and older.  When the book was published and I started talking to people about it, I thought, “This is probably something to start doing when you’re 10 or 12.”  I would write the book that way now, if I had a chance to do it again.  The notion of a vocation, and that you can do lots of things with your life, is something to plant early.

SS:  Among homeschoolers there are kids who are thinking about and doing apprenticeships at those younger ages.

HK:  I think those kids could pick up my book without the urgency of feeling that they need to leave home right away.  They can explore what they want to do without that anxiousness.

SS:  And then it can be a more gradual thing - they can move fairly smoothly into being 16 or 17 and thinking about the more adult issues of how to live on their own, support themselves, and so on.

HK:  I think that would be a wonderful way to go.

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THANKS TO THOSE WHO WRITE TO GWS:

I want to go on record with my heartfelt appreciation for all the “advice from mothers” that has been printed in GWS in past years.  There’s no way to measure how much those accumulated words of wisdom and experience have smoothed our way.  With plenty of issues of GWS in the house, I never had to feel that we were alone.  More to the point, I never had to feel that I was alone, because other mothers were sharing their experiences with me.

Now that there’s a fairly large base of older homeschooled children out there to draw on, and now that their experiences are appearing more and more in GWS, my children are enjoying the same feelings of camaraderie with homeschooled kids in other places as I have felt with their mothers.  In fact, after reading the letters from Mika Perrine and Jonathan Kibler, as well as the interview with Amanda Bergson-Shilcock, in GWS #73, Ariel stood up and said, “Yea!  I’m not alone!”  Whether or not we actually need that kind of reassurance, it’s awfully pleasant to receive it.
–  Cerelle Simmons (TX)

Growing Without Schooling was founded in 1977 by John Holt.
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