GROWING WITHOUT SCHOOLING #52, Vol. 9 No. 4.
Date of Issue, August 1, 1986.

As you saw in the last issue, we have begun planning special activities here each month instead of a general "Open House."  In July, Wendy Baruch showed about 20 adults and children how to weave baskets, a fun and rewarding pastime.  By the time you get this, we’ll have had the "homeschoolers Picnic," which will include an impromptu musical jam, a treasure hunt, a watermelon feast, and bubble-making.  Check this issue’s "Calendar" for September and October.  Please note these events are no longer on the second Thursday of the month.

The Family Circle article featuring the Maher family may or may not be in their Sept. 19 issue - we’ve heard conflicting reports.  Also, a Wall St. Journal reporter spent a long time on the phone with Pat Farenga, gathering facts, so watch for an article there, any of you who read that publication.

BOOK OF HOLT LETTERS

Since John died, those of us who want to continue his work (and that group includes any and all of you who think of yourselves this way) have had to think very seriously about what it means to do that.  I’ve been lucky enough, in recent weeks, to experience the coming together of two activities which, in their relation to each other, have contributed directly to this process.  I’ve come to Boston to work on GWS and, at the same time, to organize John’s letters for publication.  Few tasks fit together as neatly as these do; while putting out GWS was a daily concern of John’s for the past several years, his letters tell the story of how he came to care about that, and why.  John, by his own admission, couldn’t keep from writing letters.  If he had an opinion, he told someone - no matter how famous that person might be.  If he wanted to know something, he asked - no matter that no one else was asking the same thing.  When John had something to say, he wrote it down, and more often than not he sent it in the mail to someone who would soon write back.  So John’s correspondence files contain literally hundreds of conversations.  If his published writings are, even at their freshest, necessarily the end of a particular path of thought, the letters let us see John questioning, doubting, testing things out, and - without realizing it - drawing for us the rich personal, political and societal background against which his actual daily work was set.

John Holt was always surprising people.  He took some delight in this; often, when he had a book about to come out, his letters would be full of speculation about whether people would say "John’s gone too far this time," whether he’d lose some old allies or make some new ones.  I always found - and I’m still finding - that when John said something surprising it was usually most interesting, and that if it surprised even those of us who thought we knew his thinking, it was especially worthy of attention.  When John Holt - fiercely devoted to making schools better places for children - started saying he was no longer interested in this, some people realized they’d better pay attention.  Others decided he’d stepped out of the territory of concern.  All this is in the letters: John’s efforts to explain himself, to prove he meant this, and his concern, his raw disappointment, expressed to his closest colleagues and friends.  What comes through most strongly in the letters is that none of this was easy. Perhaps the reason John was able to defend his ideas so strongly was that they had been so hard-won.  "You can’t imagine how much I hated facing that," he said at one point of his conclusion that schools would not change.  I think often now of the many critics, less familiar with John’s work, who say by way of dismissal, "John Holt gave up."  John took printed space to answer this charge - some of it in GWS - but he answered mostly by talking about the schools.  One thing I believe publication of John’s letter’s will do will be to make available a full story, one that is at the same time the story of a man’s life and of a particular era, with it’s tensions and beliefs.  I’d like to think that no one, after reading John’s letters, will be able to say "He took the easy way out," but rather will, after experiencing with John a particular time, a particular journey, be able to see with more clarity what John was doing and why he believed in doing it.
— Susannah Sheffer

REMEMBERING JOHN HOLT

From the speech Norm Lee (NY) gave at the memorial service for John Holt in October 1985:

…In 1960, soon after I had been fired from my first teaching job for the sin of using "unconventional" methods (I had surrounded my English class with paperback books and said, "Let’s read our way to the door"), I discovered John’s first book.  I ran to my still-teaching friends.  "Read this! HOW CHILDREN FEEL!" "But, Norm," they said, "the title is HOW CHILDREN FAIL." "Just read it," I told them.  "You’ll see that this man knows what those kids in your classroom are going through all day."

I took to supplying paperback books to the kids in schools, helping them set up bookstores - promoting reading as a subversive activity.  (Entire villages were reading paperback books just to see if there were any dirty ones.)  Then my two sons were born, and it suddenly struck home: there were only two priorities: I had to change the schools before they reached kindergarten age, and I had to stop war before they reached 18.  I later learned that these were exactly John’s priorities too: to stop war; and to bring an end to America’s War on Children.
So I started training teachers in college.  Six years later, when I finally realized that there was as much chance for changing the institution, as there was to get the morning sun from the west, I gave up entirely on the system and started a self-reliance magazine.  We would show people that they could do most important things better than institutions.  Just then I found John Holt had started GROWING WITHOUT SCHOOLING, and I wrote to him.

He came to our festivals, the "Good Life Get-togethers," and participated in them wholeheartedly.  He led homeschooling workshops, tightened tents, made tape recordings, convinced people that they could play the cello if they’d get past the idea of "learning" it.  And he observed and listened to the children tirelessly.

One morning about 6 o’clock, when we were walking quietly among the tents in the campground and enjoying the bright July morning sunshine, John was stopping to tighten a tent here and pick up a paper there.  We were talking very quietly about the way the world was going, and he suddenly said, "It will take a long time for people to begin to listen to the John Holts and the Norm Lees.  But eventually they’ll have to, if there is to be any kind of livable world at all."  I was silent all the way back to the cabin.

The thing about John is that he cared so deeply.  He cared so deeply that he made us care.  We hear him talking to us when we play his tapes; we are so grateful that he left them for us to hear.  We hear his voice when we read his words in his books.  We see him in the letters in GWS; and in the encouragement it is giving the growing number of people who are trying to make this threatened orb a place safe for the children he loved.  We see him in the faces of the children - in their joy as they discover the world and make sense of it on their own terms.  And we see him, too, in the tender expressions on the faces of the people assembled here, remembering him with loving hearts…

______

Karen Cox, an American in England wrote in the newsletter of EDUCATION OTHERWISE:

…About a year after our arrival in Michigan, we arranged for John Holt to come to western Michigan to speak at two colleges.

…I remember the first evening he came to stay with us.  We had taken him to the auditorium in my husband’s college where he was to speak that evening.  While the crowd gathered, John sat on the edge of the stage and greeted the nearest children.  Soon there were children sitting on both sides of him swinging their feet and talking to him.  Both John and the children appeared content to be there, none of them thinking about the impression they were making, or whether there were "important" people who should be paid attention.
Later that evening, we took John and his cello home with us.  John had spent a busy day in traveling, lecturing, dining with dignitaries, and giving a formal address followed by a question and answer period.  We had explained to our children (then ages 5,7, and 9) that he would very likely be tired and want to go straight to bed.  But John wanted to visit with the children.  He sat on the piano bench and took out his cello.  The children crowded around curiously and he grinned at them but did not play: they hadn’t asked for a performance so he wasn’t giving one.  But he did want to share something he loved - and isn’t that what play is at its best?  John sat there with his beloved cello, almost shyly, and invited them, by his look, to enjoy this wonderful thing with him.  When they seemed fearful of touching it he said, "Do you want to hear the bumblebee?"  (Aha!  I thought, he’s going to play something for them.  That will be nice.)  But he had something else in mind.  He made a sudden buzzing sound on the cello and the children laughed with delight and surprise.  Before long each of them was having a go, all huddled round John and his cello.

The children said good-bye with genuine sadness when John left.  They hadn’t had a chance to finish carving their Halloween pumpkins with him before he had to leave.  But "See you in Boston," we said to each other.

And it was in Boston that we met again.  This was perhaps the perfect place to see John.  He once said that he felt incredibly lucky to be able to live in the city he loved best, doing work he really enjoyed.  We met him in his crowded office and took him with us for a picnic in the Boston Public Garden.  We three adults talked among ourselves and to the children as they came and went.  We talked about children, perhaps John’s favorite topic.  He found children endlessly fascinating, as we did.  Not everyone who says the right things about children likes to be around them, but John did.  His chief delight in the office was a toddler whose mother worked for GWS.  The baby had the run of the premises and a big sign on the office door warned newcomers to enter carefully so as not the knock the baby over…

"LD." KIDS BLOSSOM
A reader writes:

…Our daughter, who is now 13, was diagnosed as learning disabled in the second grade in South Carolina.  At the time she was an acute asthmatic.  The school system tested her while she was taking heavy doses of epinephrine.  The drug caused her to lose her ability to concentrate and she became hyper from the drug.  My husband and I were very upset.  She couldn’t read and was very low on all the tests, they said…

[After four more years of public and private school] she has been home over a year now.  We have watched her blossom into a warm, loving, self-assured young lady, and we are very proud of her.

As an aside, our friend here also has an L.D. student who is a teenager.  He started having extreme physical problems from the stress he felt at school.  He was removed from school two weeks ago and the physical problems have almost totally disappeared.  He is becoming self-confident and self-assured.
I should mention that my daughter who was labeled an L.D. student in reading had taught herself to read by age 3.  I would take her into bookstores and if she could pronounce the titles of the books she wanted I would buy them for her.  She would then bring them home and read them to me.  Because we played games with her she could add, subtract, multiply and divide by the time she reached first grade.  All of that was lost when she entered regular school…
It has taken years to deprogram her from the L.D. label.  It has been within the last six months where she will read for pleasure…

RICH FAMILY PREFERS HOMESCHOOL
Another reader writes:

…John Holt indicated in TEACH YOUR OWN that hardly any subscribers to GWS or homeschoolers were wealthy.  Well, my husband makes $500,000 (five hundred thousand) dollars a year, so obviously I could afford anything for my three children.  However, we homeschool and plan to continue to do so.  There is no limit to the wonderful opportunities we can give our children when they aren’t shackled by school schedule.  I have the world at my fingertips with my husband’s business travels, and sometimes go on short weekends with him, leaving my children with another homeschooling family, but I ache for my children the whole time, and find that my favorite times of all are when I’m on the floor playing with them, or working together with them, etc.
The best thing about having money is having a housekeeper (just once a week for heavy cleaning) so I can spend all my time with my family.  I feel the Lord has blessed me with an idyllic situation.

The kids don’t even know we HAVE money, because we’re still bargain hunters, coupon clippers and generally thrifty consumers.  They still need to learn the values of thrift and hard work, so as our income increases, our lifestyle does not.  this way we are able to bless others all the time with money we don’t need.  I am trying to develop so many values in my children that I don’t see how it would be possible if they were away seven hours a day or more.
I just thought I’d let you know we ARE out there…

UNAFRAID OF HARASSMENT

David Kent (TX) gave us a copy of a letter he sent to Linda Mills (TX), in response to "Preventing Truancy Harassment," GWS #50:

…Before we moved to Texas from Virginia in 1981, we were very concerned about this question of profile.  Why should we waste effort and money in court action if someone blew the whistle on our skulking miscreant truants?  And suppose we lost in court for some reason?  Much easier to hide them completely, exercise the greatest caution even with those who claimed to be homeschoolers, make friends with everybody, evade direct questions.  A great deal was at stake, we thought, enough to justify taking precautions until the day arrived that we felt sure enough of our approach that we could put our heads out in public.  As the children moved into school age, we considered pulling our names from the GWS directory.  It sounds as if this is about where you are now.
Then we did a real mental flip.  We saw that society was intimidating us to the point we intimidated the children, as surely as if we had hired an armed guard (or teacher) to pen the children in during these "school hours."  Us, the agent of the school system?!  We then unwrinkled the whole sheet and decided to do just what we wanted to do with our children, no matter what.  If the school system didn’t bother us, we wouldn’t bother the school system.  We then relaxed and the children blossomed.

So what happened?  Were we bothered by cops?  Yes.  In fact, we were bothered by the Department of Human Resources.  But we had learned to walk right down the middle of the street like we owned it, and nothing was stopping us.

1)Cops.  One day Robert was taking a printing proof from the house to where I worked, about four blocks away, because we had a deadline.  On his way home, a cop pulled up beside him and asked why he wasn’t in school.  Robert: "I homeschool."  Cop: "Have you ever been to the police station?"  Robert: "Why, no."  Cop: "What’s your address?"  Robert told him, and the cop moved on.  No great sweat for Robert, and there is a clear reason why this cop stopped him: he was wearing his overalls.  Since then when he has gone out during the day, to the store or wherever, he wears his good clothes and is never stopped…We have not TV, so we neither dread nor glorify cops; they’re just guys.

2) Austin school district.  Truancy lady came by one day for a chat, to find out about a school-age child.  Oh yes, we had two, we said, they are homeschooled.  Lady kept asking what it was we didn’t like about the Austin schools.  A couple of days later, we had a letter in which we were ordered under pain of court action and a $150 a day fine to get Robert in school no later than Friday.  We wrote a very stiff reply, describing in great detail what our program was, with a few legal points thrown in, quoted the remainder of the Texas school law that the district had omitted in its letter, and never heard from them again.

3) Dept. of Human Resources.  Child neglect and educational neglect was what we got from DHR.  They had heard from a source (whom, of course, they could not identify) that we had six people living in a two-bedroom apartment and it looked like some school-aged children, too.  Turned out this nosy neighbor mistook for our children a couple of small girls who played noisily outside her window all day, but it was too late for apologies, then.  Agent came on like a ton of bricks: we would have an agent come out to the house to interview us, so we hopped to it and prepared a written statement and had her read it before we said anything, pulled out a pad and pen and told her we were taking notes of everything said and waited.  She read the statement, said they didn’t really want to pry, were surprised to learn I was employed (had been told otherwise), backed right off, but said they would have to refer the children to the school district, since the homeschooling was out of their territory; hence, #2 above.  So the bears have all jumped at us and run away.

There remained the neighbors, and these can be pesky.  One old lady down the street asked every time she saw Robert why he wasn’t in school.  Then one day she and I began talking about dogs and break-ins - two very favorite subjects of hers - and during the conversation she said out of the blue she had some kinfolks that had never gone to school, and a good thing, too, the way these awful schools were getting, and in a second she was railing away at the schools more effectively than most people could manage.  Gave me a good chance to explain a couple of reasons why we wanted to teach them at home, and now she is friendly with us.  Other neighbors have been very friendly and interested in the children’s progress.

We learned you can’t hide your children if you wanted to.  Some homeschooling friends of ours nearby use a post office box to be on the safe side, and were shocked to hear a friend of theirs in town ask point-blank, "How’s the home teaching coming along?"  Everybody in town seems to know it, but nobody was complaining; they seemed to understand why our friends weren’t outgoing and to be sympathetic with what they are doing.

Today, if someone asked me, "Is school out today?" I’d say, "No way, it’s never out, we’re homeschooling."  If people see that you are determined, sure of yourself, and friendly, and not some radical flake, I don’t think they’ll give you problems, and your children would love it.

Of course, I am a radical flake.  Never had Shakespeare and the classics beat out of me in school, so I read a lot, stuff people wouldn’t touch with a 10-foot pole generally, so I leave you with a couple of quotations:

   Obliged to wean our souls from
    things on which they thrive,
   We give up living, just to keep
    alive.
   Should they be said to live who can-
    not breathe free air
   Or see the light, without
    oppressive care?
            - Maximianus

   How sad to guard our life with gate
    and wall,
   And scarcely trust the strength of
    our own hall.
            - Ovid
______

And from Joseph Ciano (MO):

   I have always homeschooled my sons (12 and 14).  I have never given consideration to school hours per se.  We have gone anywhere at anytime.  When people ask we simply state that they are homeschooled.  We have never been threatened with arrest.  We have been left alone because we do not act or think as if we were doing something criminal (having a good time).  I also do not get upset with people if their mindset is geared to the usual.  Every contact like that, "Is school out today?" is to me an opportunity to publicize homeschooling, so I welcome it.

It is difficult for my children to go places on their own as we live twelve miles from town.  But even in CA they were never far from my watchful eyes and ears.  However, we might go shopping at Sears, etc. while they visited other shops of interest to them.  So, yes they would be "on their own."  When questioned they might simply reply, "We are home educated and today is a field day in Consumerism."  My children are well aware of their legal right to be home educated and so am I, so they speak with a great deal of authority and lack of timidity.  They could probably quote Pierce vs. Society of Sisters, etc…

CALIF: FRIENDLY COUNTY…
From Connie Pfeil (CA):

1984: …When Gretchen turned 6 I sent in my affidavit and we became a private school.  This year we transferred across the county to the Independent Program at the Venture school in another district.  The program was originally for high school students but last year opened its doors to four younger homeschooling families.   This year the program has more than 15 families.   The gentleman who is "supervising" us and his principal are both incredibly supportive of homeschooling, very open to our individual ideas and, in fact, keep stressing the importance of each child’s own individuality and learning style.

Each child receives a supply and material stipend of $100, is encouraged to establish a relationship with the local school, but for those of us from other districts, we have a formal relationship with a school in the new district.  We will be able to use materials, library, computer room, etc.  We also have access to the Instructional Media Center and to old books being discarded.  Our "supervisor" comes to visit every few weeks for an hour or so, to talk to the kids, answer any of my questions and just to get to know us so he can better help us find what we want and need.  We are asked to keep a daily journal of activities, creative moments, and reflections.  We are also going to "assess the effectiveness of our homeschooling program" with a couple of tests.  This is kind of threatening, and I’m not sure how I feel about it.  On the one hand, I’d like to "know how she’s doing," and then, with a post-test, how I did.  But on the other hand, I don’t believe tests are the way to find that out…

[John Holt commented here: "Nor do I.  All tests measure or can measure is how good you are at taking tests - which might be interesting to know.  But they don’t and can’t measure learning."]

1986: …Things are even better here in Contra Costa County than they were in ‘84.  There are now five school districts with Home Study Programs - the original one (San Ramon), and four others, Mount Diablo, Martinez, Byron, and Brentwood.  They all offer different programs and some are more enthusiastic than others.  We were with the San Ramon program in ‘84-’85 but are now with the Mount Diablo one, as it is closer.  These two have the largest programs; the others have just one or two families.

…The Mount Diablo program is a more structured program than San Ramon’s was last year.  They are giving us (in exchange for the $2,000 Average Daily Attendance tax money) appropriate school texts, $30 of supplies from the central warehouse, use of equipment (tables, maps, video stuff, filmstrip viewers and films, models, cassette tapes, art prints, etc., etc.) and monthly workshops/seminars for the parent-teachers.  The Home Study Teacher, Marj DeWitt, visits each home twice a month and also arranges field trips and helps to make all the "neat stuff" of the district available to us: Gifted and Talented classes, assemblies, libraries.  In return each family signs a contract which is really very acceptable…  Interested people or school districts can write to Joyce Hardy, Home Study Program Administrator, Mt. Diablo School District, 2730 Salvio St, Concord CA  94519…
______

[DR:]  Connie mentions a "contract" between the family and the school district, and I just want to say briefly that, to the best of my knowledge, what educators call "contracts" and what a court would consider a "contract" are two very different things.  I plan to write more about this in the next GWS.

…AND AN UNFRIENDLY ONE

In May, the Alameda County school superintendent sent a "Notice Regarding ‘Home Schools’" to all families in the county who registered as private schools.  It said:

California’s Compulsory Attendance Law requires that every child shall attend full-time school from age six through age sixteen.  That law requires that all children be enrolled in one of the following:
1. public school
2. private school
3. private tutoring program

A number of parents have been educating their own children within their own homes, outside of the structure of a public school system, using the private school exemption by filing an annual Private School Affidavit with this office.  A recent Alameda County Counsel Opinion on this matter has stipulated that such "home school" teaching is not a legitimate private school, but is actually a private tutoring program.  Private tutors in California are required to hold a valid California Teacher’s Credential for the grades and subjects to be taught, and such credentials must be verified by the school district of residence of the student.

If you are operating or considering operating, a "home school," and do not hold a valid teaching credential, we suggest you contact your school district of residence to enroll your child now for fall semester classes.  Enrollment in a recognized private school would be the only other acceptable alternative (except for valid private tutoring) to public school enrollment.

If you hold a valid teaching credential and wish to tutor students, those students must be registered through their school district of residence.
It is the responsibility of parents that their children comply with the State’s Compulsory Attendance Law, and those students not complying with that law will be deemed truant.
William Berck
Superintendent
______

[DR:] Pamela Pacula (CA) of HOME CENTERED LEARNING says, "I don’t see that the County has a legal leg to stand on if homeschoolers meet the challenge."  There are no requirements in California state law about where a private school may meet or who may teach in one.

The Oakland Tribune published a supportive editorial on June 26: "…Those parents who choose the home schooling alternative should be allowed to do so with minimal state regulation and without fear of state harassment.  State compulsory education laws originally were meant to ensure all children an opportunity to become literate, not to give formal educators a monopoly on dispensing learning… Professional educators would be better off concentrating on the results they get from students who do attend their schools…"

Ginny Schwingel (CA) says that as of mid-July, the situation was at a standstill.  Nobody was being prosecuted because school was out for the summer, but there were rumors that some districts in Alameda County were looking for families to take to court in the fall.  Ginny said that many homeschooling families were afraid to "rock the boat" and hoped that the whole affair would blow over.  No one was raising money; no one knew any helpful lawyers; many people in neighboring counties were taking the attitude, "It’s not happening to us, so we don’t have to do anything."  She says that the best thing that has happened so far is that  communication between the fundamentalist Christian homeschoolers and others has improved.

Ginny’s district, Fremont, is introducing an Independent Study program, which she is working to make similar to the ones in San Ramon and Concord (see Connie Pfeil’s letter in this issue).  No district in Alameda County, which includes Berkeley, Oakland, and Hayward, yet offers Independent Study.

COURT NEWS

ARKANSAS: On May 19, Doty and Phyllis Murphy filed suit in US District Court, asking that the recent homeschool law be declared null and void.

OHIO: There’s been progress in a number of the Ohio prosecutions, according to the June issue of CLONLARA/HOME BASED EDUCATION PROGRAM’s newsletter.  In each case, the issue was that the parents did not possess a bachelor’s degree, and in most of the cases, the judge remanded the issue back to the schools for a proper administrative hearing.  Ohio law does not specifically require a college degree, only that parents be "qualified to teach."

TENNESSEE: Ramona Sumner (7637 Hunter Rd, Hixson TN 37343; 615-842-7789) lost custody of her two older children in a recent divorce, in large part because of her homeschooling.  She would appreciate any help or suggestions.
TEXAS: The state was granted an extension until July 28 in Attorney Shelby Sharpe’s class auction suit, Leeper et al v. Arlington Independent School District et al.

OTHER LOCAL NEWS

COLORADO: Some interesting items from the newsletters of the COLORADO HOMESCHOOLING NETWORK and the NORTHERN COLORADO HOME SCHOOL ASSOCIATION:
The Colorado Home Schooling Advisory Committee continues to meet monthly with state officials to work on problems.  The group has succeeded in revising the form for "Parent Request to Use Home-Study Systems," but they were not able to remove the word "Request," offensive to some, as the state regulations specifically use it.

A homeschooling parent, Leona Hemmerich, is running for State Board of Education, and another candidate, Jerry Crisp, says he supports home schools.
Homeschoolers and state officials met with representatives of two school districts, Aurora and Cherry Creek, which usually turn down homeschool requests.  As yet there has been no change in the boards’ actions.
CHRISTIAN LIBERTY ACADEMY has refused to seek approval from the State Board of Education.  About 50 families in the state have been using their materials.  The state has no choice but to delete CLA from the list of state approved curriculums.

KANSAS:  KANSANS FOR ALTERNATIVE EDUCATION  reports that a revised truancy law was passed May 8,  For the first time, truant officers must give written notice to families of suspected truants, and the parents have 5 days to give an "acceptable response."  Every report of truancy must now be investigated by Social and Rehabilitative Services, or by the county attorney.

MARYLAND: Last year, Jim Mayor (26824 Howard Chapel Dr., Damascus 20872) obtained the homeschool policies form each county in the state and typed up a one-page summary list.  Might be useful for those looking for the best possible district in Maryland; send him a SASE for a copy.  However, the Mayors caution that some policies have already changes since the list was made.

MICHIGAN: Rep. Tim Walberg has introduced House Bill 5356, which would remove the teacher certification requirement for homeschoolers, and require parents to test their homeschooled students in the 4th, 7th and 10th grades.  Test results would not be submitted to state or local authorities.  Supporters and opponents of the bill testified at a public hearing June 20.  There will be three more hearings and the bill will probably go to committee in September.
Meanwhile, Pat Montgomery of CLONLARA SCHOOL and three families filed suit on June 20.  They named 13 state officials as defendants, and said their civil rights have been abused, as the regulations as applied to homeschoolers are unconstitutionally vague.

ONTARIO: Some homeschoolers are concerned about the "Shapiro Report," which recommended more state control over private schools.  Barney McCaffrey has set up the "Citizen’s Committee for academic Freedom" (PO Box 271, Killaloe, Ont.) to "inform and educate legislators and the general public on some of the more sinister implications of Shapiro’s recommendations."

TEXAS : The May Texas Home Educators Newsletter says that in consequence of the public protest of their proposed definition for "private schools" (GWS #51), the State Board of Education has drafted a formal resolution urging the Texas Legislature to either define the terms "private school" and "parochial school" or to authorize the State Board to do so.  The state officials say that for now, home schools are to be treated as private schools.

WEST VIRGINIA: Deirdre Purdy of ALTERNATIVES IN EDUCATION reports that a three-person committee - a lawyer who is a homeschooler, and representatives for  WEST VIRGINIANS FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM and WEST VIRGINIA HOME EDUCATION ASSOCIATION - met with the state superintendent about the Attorney General’s ruling on home schools (Trouble in W.V., GWS #51).  The superintendent agreed not to prosecute any families until 1987 if homeschoolers brought a "friendly suit" to get the issue settled.  So all the above groups are raising money, and Deirdre and Wally Purdy (and probably other families as well) will file suit in Kanawha County Circuit Court (Chaleston).  They will ask for a "declaratory judgment " on their behalf, a tactic that John Holt often recommended.

WYOMING: An AP story from Cheyenne, dated 6/5/86, says there are 107 home schools across the state, with about 181 students.
In the Spring/Summer newsletter of WHEN (WYOMING HOME EDUCATION NETWORK), Jack Murphy wrote, "for a while it appeared that Albany County home educators would be required to submit a daily schedule and to reveal test instruments used for the children.  However, that proposal was withdrawn after objections were raised by some home educators… If such imposition is made, we have been advised that home educators should comply with the letter of the law by submitting to the board (or administrator) evidence of a sequentially progressive curriculum in fundamental academic topics but not feel obligated to comply with the other local requirements…" - DR

GET-TOGETHERS AND FAIRS

When Susannah asked Susan Richman (PA) how this year’s "Homeschoolers Weekend" went at their farm, Susan replied:

…After doing this for five years I think we’ve learned a lot about having this sort of big get-together that might help others who are thinking about hosting something similar.  Every year it all gets easier, too, rather than harder, more enjoyable for our family and I hope for everyone else.  I’m wanting to explore just why I think it’s gone so well.

First, we are not afraid now to be VERY organized.  Schedules typed up and passed out to folks listing times of discussions, meals, kids’ activities available.  It’s all out in the open, so people know what to expect, and then we see to it that it really does happen, by announcing things via loudspeaker, etc.  This year we had four time slots for discussions on Saturday (starting after lunch) and two discussion times on Sunday, with two or three choices each time slot.  I know the first year we had the Weekend I felt very unsure about what type of structure to have - I didn’t want to appear like a school with bells ringing and schedules to follow, but at the same time I wanted people to know that we had planned a lot for them, that they’d made the usually LONG trip for something worthwhile and substantial, not just a vague picnic of chit-chat.  We’ve been to a few too many of those…  I always try to involve as many people as possible in brainstorming ideas for discussion sessions, trying to make them focused and concrete - for months ahead of time I’m always asking homeschooling friends what they’ll want to talk about at the weekend.  The discussions I’ve been part of have all been good in-depth sharing times, not "once over lightly."
Beyond planning for the parent discussion times, there’s the planning for all the kids - 100 or more each time.  I’ve felt it’s especially important to help the kids feel that we indeed welcome them fully.  We’ve NEVER had a "leave the kids with a kind aunt or grandmother" type of announcement; instead, we encourage whole families to come, seeing this as a good place for homeschooled kids to meet one another informally.  Kids had several options this year - they were welcome to sit in on and take part in the discussions if they wanted to, they could join in a number of activities planned by families (these were all clearly located by maps and signs and written up on the schedule of the day, and we also announced them over our loudspeaker system when their time came), they could swim or fish in our pond (with parents), or they could just  play with friends around and about.  Anyone planning on having something this size should be sure they do have enough SPACE for everyone, especially kids, to spread out.  We also made a "hay jump" in the barn, and that was a good hit with kids.  Also had two new batches of kittens and they were carried and loved and patted all weekend long, and kept many kids happy.  I was especially pleased that this year several KIDS led activities - Emily and Niki Kissel (6 and 9) led a gymnastics team, teaching everyone a simple routine, Nathan Wilcox (9) gave a puppet show that showed how to make several types of puppets, Jaime McMillan (8) demonstrated how to make nature prints, and Willy Moffat (11) worked with his mother in helping kids make junk sculptures.  Last year Emily Murphy (12) demonstrated several science experiments, and her good feelings about it were what led to her family hosting last fall’s "Homeschoolers’ Science Fair."
We started asking all parents to help with providing family activities after Howard felt exhausted by being a one-man entertainment crew for the first several years.  He’s lead nature walks, sing-alongs and square dancing in the barn, demonstrated goat-milking, and got freeze-tag games going.  He did everything except talk to another adult or join in a discussion session.  We realized we needed help, and lots of it, so last year we wrote right on the registration form for the Weekend that ALL families would need to provide some half-hour activity to share with others while discussions were going on - and everyone came through.  (Oh, not everyone, but plenty enough - we didn’t really expect that EVERYONE would offer something, and didn’t need THAT  many activities anyway!)  Howard has really appreciated the change, and feels like HE has a great time at the Weekend now, too
That’s probably the first and most important "rule" about having something like this - make sure you structure it so that YOU have a good time and don’t feel put upon.  In line with this I make sure that I hardly step in the kitchen all weekend to tidy up or do dishes or mix juice (let alone cook!), but instead am careful to let others know how THEY can help, and try to have everything labeled beforehand so that things are reasonably easy to find.  Everyone is always very helpful about cleanup, especially kids.  We always have a "watermelon and popsicle" cleanup after Saturday night’s potluck supper - all kids who help out with gathering up litter for five minutes get first go at slices of watermelon and, this year, yogurt and orange juice popsicles…
I’m including a copy of the schedule we had this year, so you can see what topics were discussed.  Seems all did indeed go well, and were well attended.  The one year we offered FOUR concurrent sessions and only three time slots, things seemed to drag, and always one discussion folded because not enough folks showed up.  Better, we’ve found, to have to end sessions a bit before things get stale than to ho-hum through the last 20 minutes.
…There are more and more really committed and serious and LONG-TERM homeschoolers attending the Weekend.  Less and less of the families whose oldest child is 11 months old and who think the idea is wonderful, but who fade away when kindergarten time comes along… In every discussion there were LOTS of experienced folks who’ve been at this for years and could show many different perspectives, and discuss how things have changed for their families over many homeschooling years.  One mother, a "novice" and a bit nervous about doing everything "right," said that she was so pleased to find that there was no ONE  way to do things properly, that each family must instead find their own way… She had at first viewed the Weekend as a chance to take notes from the "experts," and I think was grateful to find instead that she felt now a bit strengthened in her ability to make her own decisions.

One interesting discussion was on the value of networking, newsletters, get-togethers, group outings, support groups, etc. - and how much "togetherness" among homeschoolers is just too much trouble and even interruptive of homeschooling rather than supportive of it.  Again the differences between families were brought up - some feel much greater "homeschooling social needs" than others, and enjoy and take part in regular group gatherings.  For others a VERY few gatherings a year is just right, recharges them enough and lets them get in touch with other families they might want to get to know better on their own team.  I think it is perhaps a mistake for homeschooling groups to take on too much in the way of planning too many group activities - IF this makes a burden on one person, or even if this lets everyone else feel that there is no need that they can fill by offering something to others (the "pros" are providing it all).

One thing that has worked just incredibly well out here is that here has been a chain reaction of families offering "fairs" at their homes.  The Murphys started it last fall with their Science Fair, then the Latinettes followed up a few months later with an Arts Fair, and just this spring the Fullmers had a Social Studies Fair.  I’ve been to them all, and they have been wonderful days, with the right balance of time for families to share with others very concretely about what they have been doing at home, AND lots of free time for kids to play and parents to TALK.  This all has involved no homeschooling organization "superstructure" or committees or burdensome planning for anyone over a long period of time, as these are all individual family offerings.  (Our newsletter is certainly a help in getting the word out about these get-togethers - you do need a local vehicle for sharing information.)  One mother at the Weekend, whose husband is a chiropractor, is now thinking of offering a Health Fair in the fall, and we are seriously considering having a Math Fair here at our farm (thinking it will be a good time to investigate the more wonderful side of mathematics like Moebius strips, brain-teasers, geometric constructions, etc.)
These fairs give a real focus for the gathering, people know WHY they are coming and their kids know they will be taking part (and usually getting inspired by others).  I think this might be a bit different from monthly "support group meetings" that lack a clear focus, that might seem pointless to both kids and, eventually, parents.  Or that may not even involve the children at all but relegate them to baby-sitters.

When I was describing these family fairs to a TV interviewer last winter, she asked just how was this different from SCHOOL gatherings or classes - it sounded so organized and subject-oriented, I guess.  I answer that, first off, these were not COMPULSORY gatherings - folks who don’t want to participate, who don’t like this sort of thing, are perfectly free not to.  Second, these involve different ages, and everyone has their chance to share and be listened to respectfully.  And third, these are not COMPETITIVE fairs, no prizes are given out to turn some kids into winners and some into losers.  Children participating are free to talk or NOT talk about their display, collection, experiment, book, whatever it is they have brought.  Some choose to be quiet, feeling uncomfortable before a group, AND THAT’S OK - there’s no pushing the shy child, but most really rise to the occasion and talk on and on about what they’ve learned about at home.  Often parents share too, as these are true FAMILY studies, not just an "assignment" for the child.  Kids would field questions from both kids and adults, and these questions were genuine ones, not "quizzes."  We have always come away from one of these Fair days feeling good about our own homeschooling, and feeling inspired by what others have shared.
…One organizational bit of advice if a family thinks of having a fair - it has worked best to have these be all-day affairs, with more formal sharing of projects and displays done early, before lunch.  After a great potluck lunch - I always say that these get-togethers are wonderful for the FOOD if for nothing else!  - the kids usually scatter for play and the parents enjoy the free time to talk (and talk and talk…)

PUSHING -MORE OR LESS?
From Mike Kern of Washington:

…It amuses me to attend a homeschool meeting and find that except for a few crazies (mostly me) everybody is trying to outdo the schools at their own game, "molding minds" or stuffing them…
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On the other hand, Ruth McCutchen (KY) writes:

…At our annual KENTUCKY HOMESCHOOLERS picnic, I was especially pleased to see a growing interest in the more relaxed approach to homeschooling.  There were parents of fairly young children who were already noticing signs of tension and strain in their children.  This, they attributed to the teacher-type, school-type things they were subjecting their children to.  It was obvious that these young parents want very much to believe in and trust their children in relation to learning, but it’s still such a foreign concept in our push, push, push, push society…
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[DR:]  John Holt used to predict that most parents who tried a very school-like approach at home would either relax, at least somewhat, or give up and put the kids in school.  Certainly the bulk of the evidence we have seen at GWS has shown this to be true so far.  Let us know what you see.

CARL ROGERS ON LEARNING

Stephanie Judy (BC) sent an article, "Personal Thoughts on Teaching and Learning" that well-known psychologist Carl Rogers wrote in 1952.  Some excerpts:

…My experience has been that I cannot teach another person how to teach.  To attempt it is for me, in the long run, futile.
It seems to me that anything that can be taught to another is relatively inconsequential, and has little or no significant influence on behavior.  That sounds so ridiculous I can’t help but question it and at the same time I present it.

I realize increasingly that I am only interested in learnings which significantly influence behavior.  Quite possibly this is simply a personal idiosyncrasy.

I have come to feel that the only learning which significantly influences behavior is self-discovered, self-appropriated learning.
Such self-discovered learning, truth that has been personally appropriated and assimilated in experience, cannot be directly communicated to another.  As soon as an individual tries to communicate such experience directly, often with a quite natural enthusiasm, it becomes teaching, and its results are inconsequential.  It was some relief recently to discover that Soren Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher, had found this too, in his own experience, and stated it very clearly a century ago.  It made it seem less absurd.
As a consequence of the above, I realize that I have lost interest in being a teacher.

When I try to teach, as I do sometimes, I am appalled by the results, which seem a little more than inconsequential, because sometimes the teaching appears to succeed.  When this happens I find that the results are damaging.  It seems to cause the individual to distrust his own experience and to stifle significant learning.  Hence, I have come to feel that the outcomes of teaching are either unimportant or hurtful.

When I look back at the results of some of my past teaching, the real results are the same - either damage was done or nothing significant occurred.  This is frankly troubling.

As a consequence, I realize that I am only interested in being a learner, preferably doing things that matter, that have some significant influences on my own behavior.

…This whole train of experiencing, and the meanings that I have thus far discovered in it, seem to have launched me on a process which is both fascinating and at times a little frightening.  It seems to mean letting my experience carry me on, in a direction which appears to be forward, towards goals that I can but dimly define, as I try to understand at least the current meaning of that experience.  The sensation is that of floating with a complex stream of experience with the fascinating possibility of trying to comprehend its ever changing complexity…

THE THREAT OF FORCE
Q. Isn’t it good for a child to be made to do things he doesn’t like?
A. No, it isn’t.  It isn’t good for any of us to have to submit, without any other reason, to naked superior force.  It makes us feel cowardly, ashamed, resentful, rebellious.  It fills us with the desire to push someone else around as we were pushed around.  There may be times in ordinary social living, when children, like adults must be compelled by the threat of superior force, to do things they don’t want to, but it is never good for their character and these situations should be kept to a minimum. - JOHN HOLT, 1968.

SUPPOSE YOUR MOTHER MADE YOU…

Over the years I’ve had a few long phone calls from parents who are concerned about the lack of academic interest shown by one of their children.  Among other things that cause them worry is the fact that the child will show an interest in something and the parent will arrange for a chance to follow up on it - lessons, a visit - and shortly thereafter the child loses interest.

Somewhere in these conversations I’ve said something like: how would YOU  feel if someone older than you say your mother, or mother-in-law - lived with you now and always worried about whether you were OK, whether you read too little or too much, and whether she should do something to fix you up?   Suppose she got upset because you signed up for a course somewhere and then dropped out?  Suppose she MADE you continue?

The parents laugh ruefully in recognition.  "That would be awful, I’m always signing up for things and dropping g out," they say.

There are many good reasons for dropping out of an adult education class - the brief exposure was enough to satisfy one’s curiosity, something about the teacher turns one off, one has less time than expected because of other changes in one’s life.  Aren’t we lucky that, as adults, we CAN quit? Nobody tells us we have to finish what we begin, or worries about what that says about us.  So maybe it’s reasonable to extend that same privilege to our children. - DR

LOOKING OR ENTHUSIASTS

Peter Bergson  (PA) wrote in the PENCIL Sharpener,  Summer 1986:

…Many of us remember that one teacher, coach, librarian, who so loved what he or she was doing that we couldn’t resist getting caught up in their work with them, even though we had had no interest in their business originally.  I’ve talked with many people who came to love Greek, grammar, graphs, geography, just because the enthusiasm of one adult was so infectious.  It seems to me that  this is the type of situation we should be looking to provide for our children - to place them in the company of interesting people who have a child-like fascination and sense of wonder about their work , and who would relish the opportunity to share their love of algebra or hieroglyphics or cabinetry with another person.

My wife, Susan, has been on the lookout for such people for the last couple of years.  One of her most recent finds occurred after Emily (8) took an immediate liking to one of the artists-in-residence at our resource center.  It wasn’t so much that Emily was desperate to learn more about recycling and care of our environment - she was already one of the committed - it’s just that she took an immediate liking to Sandy Drayer, new head of the Lower Merion/Narberth Watershed Association.  So Susan asked Sandy if there were some way that Emily and she could continue to work together.  It turned out that Sandy was looking for a helper in her environmental work and was delighted to take Emily on as her assistant.  as I write this very sentence, Emily is standing by my side, bouncing up and down, excited to tell me of her afternoon’s project with her new friend…

HONEST ABOUT REQUIREMENTS

Last year, Nancy Wallace (NY) wrote in response to Paula King’s letter in GWS #42, about Paula tutoring a 4th grader in reading:

…What a neat letter… There she spent three years (only three years) and actually succeeded in healing wounds caused by school, wounds that practically destroyed Ian academically and that would have destroyed him psychologically before many more years had passed… Yet Paula says that in a way, she failed because she always had to push him - he was never really self-motivated.

…Her letter reminded me a lot of my own experiences in my last two years in high school, first at Pacific High School, and then at a place called Continuation School, which was for high school dropouts.

Pacific was small and intimate - 35 kids and about 7 teachers - and grades and mandatory classes were unheard of.  You took as many or as few classes as you felt like or you could make up your own classes and either teach yourself or find someone to teach you.  And teachers, bending over backwards not to appear coercive, never seemed to notice if you showed up in class or not.  It all would have been wonderful except that school was compulsory - and we knew that if we didn’t go to Pacific we had to go somewhere else.  In addition, since most of us thought that we wanted to go to college, we felt that we had to take the courses that were supposedly required for college entrance - 2 years of math, 3 of english, U.S. history and so on.

After a few months at Pacific I found the dishonesty intolerable.  The school was pretending to be like a family, but it wasn’t, it was a school.  The teachers just couldn’t admit that we were taking their classes because we had to, and the kids often seemed confused and resentful as they alternated between believing that they were really being given the freedom to choose and realizing that they weren’t.  The bind we were in, really, was that not only did the state insist that we show up at school, but it was really our parents’ expectation that  we would go to college (we only acquiesced) and our parents’ expectation that we would take the required courses to get into college - and yet the teachers were all pretending (or hoping) that their classes were fun and interesting and that’s why we showed up.  And even if we did find an occasional class interesting, there were enough other kids in the class (maybe only 2 or 3) who really didn’t want to be there, and so right away the atmosphere changed and there was no way that class could be fun.

Continuation School was, by way of contrast, a totally honest place and it was the first school that I ever felt happy in.  First of all, we all knew that it was either continuation school or jail.  The superintendent of schools had told us that and the police officer who stopped by regularly made it clear, too.  In addition, there was the clear-cut rule - no unexcused absences or you were thrown out - with the result that you’d end up in juvenile hall until you were 18.  The two teachers, who were very much on our side, wanted us to graduate as soon as possible so that we could be free from the threats of the Supt. and the police officer and get on with the business of life.  They made it clear to each of us exactly what subject we had to take in order to graduate (in my case it was a year of U.S. History) and they set up the school in an unusual way - regimented and yet free, but always totally honest.  School was for three hours a day and each morning we had to write down the things that we planned to do for that time.  We were free to do nothing or to do one thing for the whole time (like U.S. History)but we had to actually do what we said we would.  The teachers were wonderful and interesting people and they worked on poetry and philosophy with me when I asked for help, but they never seemed disappointed when I spent my three hours just doing my U.S. History so I could get out of there and be really free.  Unlike the teachers at Pacific, who thought that Pacific was free, the teachers at Continuation School knew that school couldn’t be free as long as it was compulsory and I knew that what they really wanted to do was to help me escape.  Which they did.

…Paula’s structuring of Ian’s academic life helped him to be free, too.  Her own kids don’t need that  structure, because for her, it doesn’t much matter whether her kids read when they are in fourth grade or not (they’ll be happy and busy and that’s what counts).  But for Ian, the expectations of his parents, the school and even himself, were different.  Her structure helped him to succeed and gave him back his self-confidence, and now he even has the tools he needs to become self-motivated if and when he pleases.

It’s not just Paula, though, who is torn between structure and freedom.  Probably most of us are, most especially if we are dealing with school authorities who require certain kinds of academic accomplishments from our kids.  The important thing is for us and our kids to be clear about why the structure is necessary (and perhaps it isn’t, in which case we should be honest about that, too) and we and our kids also have to agree that the structure is OK, as long as it serves and gives them their freedom.

To be less philosophical about it - if the superintendent requires a standardized test each year, it may be necessary for our kids to do a certain amount of structured work to get ready for it.  But if good scores on the standardized test mean another year of homeschooling without too much hassle, how can we feel guilty about that structure?…

LETTERS ABOUT TEENS

From Nicole Flores of California:

…I dropped out of high school when I was 15 and in the ninth grade.  My mom and her boyfriend made it legally possible by turning our home into a private school.

It’s great.  They’ve been providing me with resource materials and three years later I’ve become interested in subjects I would have shrieked about if I was still in high school.  I’m writing science fiction stories, reading physics, and most importantly I’ve learned how to think for myself and make my own decisions.  Basically, the freedom I lacked in school has enabled me to grow up…
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Mary Bell (TX) writes:

…Our second son stayed home for 7th and 8th grade.  We followed John Holt’s instructions of not trying to teach him anything - we just let him "decompress" as John called it.  The first months Kenny read almost nothing.  He stayed busy with projects but did no "school work."  After two years he decided to give high school a try, so he took the SSAT (Secondary School Achievement Test) for admission to the Catholic High School and scored so high that they put him into advanced World History and advanced Algebra.  His reading score was in the 98th percentile, and this was a kid who almost never reads.  He once said to me, "What did anyone ever learn from a book?" I almost died, since I love to read.
So now Ken is finishing his 10th grade and does not plan to go back to high school.  In Texas he has to wait until he is 17 to take the GED, but he does not want to ever go back to high school again.  He wants to give college a try later on…
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From Lorraine Clark of Media, PA

…My daughter, Lorraine, is now 14 and except for one year in a small, private kindergarten, has been completely homeschooled.  Nancy Wallace’s letter in GWS #50 regarding long-timers has given me motivation to write.
One of the early benefits of homeschooling still continues - that of Lorraine being able to, and having opportunities to, communicate with people of all ages, even though now many people take her to be older because of this ability.  We have been discussing her peers’ communication abilities and note the following: several of her homeschooling friends appear to be shy; however, if they feel a sincere desire for communication on the other person’s part, an honest, thoughtful, in-depth (if appropriate) conversation will follow.  This is in contrast to her schooled friends who seem to be initially non-shy with many clichŽs at their disposal for light talk.  Needless to say, much thoughtful or in-depth communication does not usually follow.  Lorraine seems to be acquiring the skill to bridge this gap, as I may say I am, too.

Regarding Keith Organ’s "Rock Music, Not Classical" (GWS #50): Lorraine has been taking piano lessons for several years.  During this last year, lessons have been spent entirely on learning blues and jazz for piano.  The emphasis toward the end of this year has been on quality and feeling of the sound, whereas I perceive classical piano studies emphasize manual dexterity.  Her music-reading ability has progressed as much as if she had continued with classical, maybe even more.  I don’t mean the entire year has been spent on piano, she has many other interests - computers, pen pals, surveying, horses, friend, family - I mean the entire year of piano lessons has been spent on blues/Jazz.

My oldest daughter Linda (26), is homeschooling her daughters Jessica (6) and Dian (4), with baby Melanie looking on.  Even though Linda was not homeschooled, I feel that Jessica and Dian are second generation homeschoolers!…
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An update from Ruth McCutchen ("Busy Family in Kentucky," GWS #46):

…The most frequent response that I get nowadays to the statement that my children are homeschooled is, "Really? How wonderful!  I admire you but I could never do that!  I just don’t have what it takes, etc., etc.."  When I tell them that I don’t do it, the children do and try to explain a bit what I mean, I’m met with incredulity and further remarks about how his/her child could never be trusted to do it that way and more moans and groans about parental inadequacy.
Now that Deborah, Rebekah and Abigail are 17, 15 and 12, I find more and more that they really  are doing it on their own.  They long ago reached the point of asking me more questions that I don’t know than ones that I do.  It would be embarrassing if it were not so amusing.  I understand that for one to say, "I don’t know" is a real sign of maturity and I do so love being mature.  So, we go the library and bookstores (new and used) where the girls get books on subjects they want to find out more about and sometimes I have them enlighten me during our walks or share duties around the house.  A great many things they ask are things I "learned" in school but have forgotten since - not having any use for it.  For that matter, I wasn’t interested in it then.

Abigail, who taught herself to read (with only casual help from me) between the ages of 6 and 8 , now reads adult-type books both to herself and aloud to our 80-year-old cousin Floren with whom we live…Some of her other interests and occupations include: Bible reading, US presidents, US states and their capitals, geography, human anatomy, baby-sitting, a self-designed walking/exercise program, math (two or three times a week, using the ARITHMETIC MADE SIMPLE book, affectionately known in these parts as ARITHMETIC MADE IMPOSSIBLE), cooking, piecing a quilt, crocheting, writing penpals, playing her clarinet and cello, and last (but certainly not least) doing yard and house work.  She prefers housework and has a real flair for decorating.  She even likes to iron, something she definitely discovered on her own!…

Rebekah is dragging herself methodically (for the second time) through ARITHMETIC MADE SIMPLE.  Every time she reaches a part that seems to her confusing or just unclear, she goes back to base one.  This second time through has been much easier.  Though she enjoys some math, overall it is not her favorite pastime and she takes comfort in knowing that C.S. Lewis didn’t care much for math either.  She works on it every day though, even Sundays, and resists my suggestion to take a day off from the aggravation.  She tells me there’s so much she wants to learn she can’t dilly-dally by taking a day off. (Now, I know there are people out there who have to threaten their children to get them to do "school work" on any day, never mind week-ends, who won’t believe that this is a self-driven learner.  They probably wouldn’t believe either that I’ve never forced or even coerced my children to clean their rooms or spaces, and yet, I have one super neatnik, on who is basically tidy and who has some extremely organized clutter!)

…Other areas of interest for Rebekah are Bible prophecy (especially as it relates to the Jews); English literature and history; ancient history in general, with an emphasis on the Romans; physics and chemistry; and Latin, which she’s studying from a book she got (along with nineteen other books) at the public school’s dead textbook depository.  She also plans to get into Greek soon.  Along with reading enough to get fairly frequent attacks of eyestrain, she finds time to play the piano enough to cause occasional outbursts from other family members.  She’s been taking lessons for fifteen months and it wouldn’t be putting too fine a point on it to say that she’s fast closing in on her mother, who took lessons (the "you must practice for thirty minutes a day" kind) for eight years as a child.  I’m beginning to think this freedom thing might be carried too far!  She continues with her writing (poetry and short stories), drawing, correspondence, and house and yard work.

Deborah has been using the very good algebra book by John Saxon, Jr. for four months or so and has completed, on her own, approximately 4/5 of the lessons… She has been studying Latin for about the same period of time using a book I got at a flea market for 25 Cents, which is the same publication I used in the high school I attended where only the "brains" took Latin…  Spelling has never been Deborah’s strong suit, so recently she began leaning 50 words every week, using a little dilapidated book (from Floren’s collection) entitled SEVENTY LESSONS IN SPELLING.  It must be at least 75 years old but is full of those words that trick so many of us… She studies the lesson for one week, waits a week while studying a new list, and then without review, has one of us give her a verbal test.

Her continuing interest in geography and maps (both old and new) has led to a growing interest in history and current international events.  This has spurred her to read the daily newspaper (mostly the front section) and to start a file of clippings which she has found particularly interesting.  Much of her reading now involves non-fiction on other countries, Pakistan and India being the most recent…

Deborah plans to attend college and has been reading up on the various institutions in BARRON’S PROFILES OF AMERICAN COLLEGES, the reading of which is quite an education in itself.

This update is incomplete, but it does give one a fair picture of what these older homeschoolers are doing without pressure or coercion, simply because they find the world an interesting place and have had time to pursue their individual areas of interest…

THE NEED FOR APPRENTICESHIPS

Joyce Kinmont (UT) wrote in the Tender Tutor, April 1986:

Since Dick works away from home (he’s a "working father"), he has less time to spend on his own business.  His talents are in video, which is not where Robbie or Ritchie’s interest lie.  When Dick repairs machines no one is interested in helping him (although at least he is at home).  When he transfers people’s old home movies to video, Robbie does splice the films for him.  When he tapes programs and such, Tina usually helps him.  (She wants to be a photographer, so they may end up with their own production company someday.)

But the point is that we haven’t really been able to come up with anything satisfactory for our boys to do.  And that is a real problem all over our society.  (Even the boys in school are seldom doing what they really should be doing.  When they finish school it may take them years to find out what they want to do.)

My boys do know what they want to do; there just isn’t anyplace for them to do it!  When they were younger we could supply them with tools and materials and space and time; but now that they are older they really need to be employed in something real, making a valid contribution.  The old apprenticeship situation, with a few changes, would be so good for boys today.

Robbie needs to be outdoors working with a forest ranger or a geologist, learning their trade.  But that isn’t possible so he is really marking time, playing around until he is 16 and can get a better job.  And even then he will be working in a fast food place, not learning what he needs to know or developing his best talents.  Ritchie should be working with an engineer.  Last month he wanted to learn about jet engines, so he made regular trips to the plumbing supply store, and we had a lot of noise and fire in our backyard.  That kind of thing was great when he was younger, but he’s almost 18 now, and there ought to be a lab somewhere where he could go to conduct experiments with sophisticated equipment and work with real jet engines.

…I hope homeschoolers will be able to open up the world of work and let their teenagers in!…
_____

[DR:] Yes, indeed, and we hope they will tell us about it.  The issues of apprenticeships, exploring work options, alternatives to college, finding work worth doing, and in general bridging the gap between childhood and adulthood, are of extreme concern to us.  You’ll find several more stories about these topics in this issue, and please keep sending us your ideas and experiences.

NOT IMPRESSED BY COLLEGE

From Mike Kern of Washington:

…I am amused by the homage that homeschoolers pay to institutions of prestigious higher education, e.g. Harvard.  My wife and I both graduated from Harvard and I think to expect Harvard to be fundamentally different from high school is naive.  Harvard differs from high school like army generals differ from army majors.  It’s older, more sophisticated, etc., but like majors and generals, Harvard and high school are in the same business…
_____

And from Zelma Klinger (Sask.), whose daughter hopes to apprentice at a radio station next year:

…This year, as my daughter graduates from Grade 12, people are asking, "Are you going to college?" as if to say, "Surely now you’re going to do something normal."  I have no kinder things to say about college than about high school.  I feel it’s just more of the same.  I realize that for some it’s inevitable (there just isn’t any other way to become an M.D., D.D.S., D.V.M., etc.) but for great many, it’s just a symbol or something to do.  I feel most professors are well paid for precious little.  Universities are overcrowded and graduates have a hard time finding jobs in many cases.

A B.A. seems to be a prerequisite for just about anything.  It’s a good way to rid yourself of many thousand of hard-earned dollars.  Every major library contains a B.A.!  I would like to hear comments on this…

HOW COLLEGE FAILS

From a file of unpublished articles by John Holt:

My own college experience contributed almost nothing to my education, and was for the most part an impediment to it.  What do I mean by this?  I mean, in the first place, that during my years of college I neither discovered nor was shown (with two very slight exceptions) anything about the world that seemed to invite further exploration.  I did not uncover or become aware of talents or possibilities within myself which might seem worth further cultivation.  I did not become in any sense better acquainted with my own society or with the world, or aware of problems which needed my attention.  I was not prepared for or directed toward, in any way, the work which I was actually to do.  In fact nothing that happened to me at college gave me in any sense the important notion that one of the great tasks of a growing person is to discover his work.  All I did, like most of my classmates, was to go through college thinking that when you got through, you got a job - which was not at all the same thing as finding one’s work.  Nothing that I heard or encountered at college gave me the idea that it might be important, or possible, for people to find work to do in their life from which they would get deep satisfaction, and which might have something to do with their own talents and aptitudes.  Nobody ever suggested to me what work that might be.  Nobody ever suggested to me what kinds of work there were to do, or discussed with me, or encouraged me to think about what kinds of work might be worth doing, particularly, what kinds of work I might find worth doing.
The job or career I did prepare myself for was in fact wildly unsuited to my tastes and temperament.  If I had gone into what my schooling ostensibly prepared me for, that is, industrial administration, I would have been both dreadfully unhappy and a failure.

I began college with the hope of majoring in physics.  During freshman year I took a sophomore physics and a sophomore mathematics course.  I did very well in the physics and adequately in the math.  But it seemed to me, and I think in retrospect with good reason, that I really understood nothing of what mathematics was about.  I was one of the many students who learns from school to go through all of the motions, copy down the formulas and proofs and do the problems.  But what the language of mathematics meant, where it came from, where it might lead, what it was for, how it could possibly apply to any serious work or thought, of all this I had not the slightest idea.

I therefore decided, perhaps rightly or wrongly, that there was no point in my continuing in physics although I loved the subject.  Nobody for as much as a second discussed this question with me.  Nobody in the physics department, where I had done well, said "How come you’re changing?"  Nobody asked me why I thought I wanted to go into industrial administration.  In short, I, like most college students, stumbled and slid into this career or that solely on the rather haphazard basis of whether or not I was doing well in this course or that course, found this professor or that professor interesting, or some such trivial consideration.  It did not occur to me that it would be a good idea, before I decided to go into physics, to find out somehow what kinds of things real live physicists did, or what sort of lives they led, or how they in fact felt about their work.  The only talk I ever heard around such questions was from some businessmen, who simply said, as if this was all that needed to be said, that the physicists who worked in their companies, or companies known to them, generally did research not of their own choosing and did not make much money.
Older people that I knew used to talk quite frequently about "the serious business of earning a living."  But, as Thoreau rightly pointed out, and as I was to see exemplified in the lives of many people I later knew, someone who works only for money - only to earn a living - is badly cheated…

I had said that I did not, while at college, uncover any capacities or talents in myself that seemed worthy of development… All I learned about myself was that I was a capable student, which I knew before I got to college.  In any case, this talent, though it had its minor uses, did not seem to me to be one in which anyone could take deep satisfaction.  …In general,  I would say that I left college thinking rather less of myself as a person than I did when I came in.

…It seems to me that there are several things that a young person growing up into this society should be helped and encouraged to do.  One is to learn more about that society itself, so as to know better what its needs and problems are.  In other words, a young person should learn as he grows what there is out there that needs to be done, what problems call for his attention.  He ought also to learn more, as he grows, about the ways in which people are doing something about what needs to be done out there…  Young people who think they might want to go into teaching should be encouraged, and long before they make any educational commitment, to talk to teachers about their work, its problems and satisfactions.  If they want to go into science, they should go to places where scientists are actually at work, so as to see better what in fact the daily work of scientist is like.  they should talk to some scientists about what they are doing, the joys, problems, frustrations, etc…

I find myself remembering the first serious conversation that I ever had with anyone about my work.  It took place in the summer of 1946 after I had completed my three years in the submarine service.  The dropping of the atom bomb had convinced me that civilization was in very serious danger and that ways had to be found - ways very different from any yet attempted - to establish some kind of permanent peace - some kind of rule, law and government over the entire earth.  I had no idea how to begin this work.  That is, I was in the position of someone who has discovered that there was a problem calling for his attention, but does not yet know in what ways he might work about it.  While I was in New Mexico that summer, I talked to someone involved in the dealings at Los Alamos.  I remember almost nothing of our conversation except that I came out of it feeling that in the Los Alamos situation as it was described to me, there would be little opportunity for me to do what I thought needed to be done.

Later, when I was in Maine, I managed to meet and talk with a man who had spent a large part of his life in the foreign service.  It had occurred to me that perhaps that was a useful place to work for world government.  He quickly disabused me of that notion, pointing out that when one works in the foreign service of the government, the only foreign policies, international policies, that one is allowed to advocate are the extant foreign policies of the US government.  Neither publicly nor privately can one criticize them or propose something in their place.  This was exactly what I needed to know…

What I am saying is that these are the kind of conversations that ought to go on while a young person is in college.  Only by the greatest good fortune did I decide, and was I able to turn my back on the career that I had thought I had picked out for myself in college.  Many young people are not, or do not think they are in a position to make that decision after having spent four years studying what they think will be their specialty.  I had already known more than one young person who feels, in graduate school, that he does not really want to do what he has prepared himself to do, that he has no real enthusiasm for it, but who also feels that he is stuck with it.  Fortunately I did not feel stuck.  I let go of my as yet unborn business career without any hesitation or qualm…
It may be worth saying something here about the way in which I did find my work.  There was a good deal written in those early postwar days about world government.  One very striking piece, which appeared in the Atlantic, was written by a young ex-marine named Cord Meyer, Jr.  As it ended with a call and a plea for world government, I wrote him a letter, saying in effect that I was as convinced as he was of the need for world government, and wanted to give my full time to working for it, and did not know how to go about it, did not know what sort of working opportunities there were.  He wrote me back very promptly, saying that he was glad to hear from me, that the idea did indeed need people who were willing to work for it, and adding the names of a couple of organization already in existence.  I went to see both of them, and talked to their people about what they were doing and what I might be able to do, and eventually found myself working for one of them at a salary which would have scandalized my college associates if they had known of it.  

The story seems to illustrate the kind of three-way coming together that needs to take place when someone finds true work.  On the one hand you have a social condition or a need - something out there that needs to be done.  In the second place, you have the young person, with interests, talents, and capacities - also tastes and concerns.  In the third place you have some kind of place and opportunity for actual work, an opportunity which may in many cases have to be created - as, for example, Ralph Nader created his own work opportunity…

MATCHMAKER FOR APPRENTICESHIPS

A reader alerted us to the existence of the CENTER FOR INTERIM PROGRAMS (233 Mt Lucas Rd, Princeton NJ  08540; and we sent for information.  Cornelius Bull, a former educator, founded this network to help young people (in particular) find apprenticeships and work opportunities in their fields of interest.  From a 1982 New York Times reprint, in the Center’s literature:

…For a fee, Mr. Bull creates tailor-made, affordable programs for students, often combining some work for pay with some volunteered for room and board.
The center, barely two years old [in 1982], has created interim programs for about 75 students in many parts of the globe.  So far, Mr. Bull has relied entirely on word of mouth, doing no advertising.

Moreover, he makes clear that he is not interested in setting up a "wander-yahr" of aimless drifting in an exotic place.
"I’ve lived through the 60’s," he said, shaking his head, "and I’m committed to structure and to the development of skills.  I help kids focus on their goals, assess their resources, and I offer them opportunities.  They have to do the rest - and they do."

…"I was pre-med at Duke and not really sure whether I wanted to be a doctor or not," said one student, Tim Johnston.  "Mr. Bull arranged for me to work with a doctor in the emergency and operating rooms in a Florida hospital, and it’s given me a firsthand look at the doctor’s life for five months.  I’ll go back to college in January with a much better idea of medicine."

David Tripp, a Virginia Tech student, took his sophomore year off to spend seven weeks sailing on a research vessel in the Caribbean.
"I’m glad I did it, and I learned a lot about sailing, about myself and about being with people," he said.  "Part of making it work was being adaptable.  We were supposed to study humpback whales, but when we got there it was off season, so we had to settle for coral reefs and conch."

He added, "Mr. Bull can give you the opportunity, but then you have to make it work."

For two months Mr. Tripp is working in a hamburger stand in Virginia, and then he will study in Greece for the Spring term.
Parents and students agree that the real service of the Interim Program is the amount of unusual opportunities that Mr. Bull has amassed.  Files on his contacts fill two drawers and are growing all the time.

One parent said: "He’s really good at assessing young people and helping them find out what they want.  I would have had to spend hours finding out about these opportunities and making sure they’re reliable.  Even then, most of the ones that are well known are expensive and not that unusual."

The 53-year-old Mr. bull is especially keen on apprenticeships.  Yet his job often involves persuading someone to take on an apprentice.

He is not always successful on the first try.  For instance, several students have wanted to work with wildlife; one student is combining three months on a farm in Kenya with study at the Konrad Lorenz Institute in Austria.  But Mr. Bull has been rebuffed so far on proposals for a gorilla farm in England to accept an apprentice.

He still believes that the farm, which he learned of through a cousin in England, would be a rare opportunity for the right student.  "I haven’t given up," he said.  "I still think I can get them to come around."…
_____

[DR:]  After a free exploratory interview, the Center charges a flat fee of $600 to cover a two year period of time, plus telephone expenses.  $600 is a lot of money, but it pales in comparison to the cost of college tuition these days.  Besides, some of the positions  are paid , so students can earn while following their interests - unlikely at college.

Some work that interim students have done: apprenticed in theater, construction, ceramics, journalism, veterinary medicine; volunteered at a zoo, a bird sanctuary, an orphanage in India, a Mexican village, an aquarium; earned room and board as a dorm assistant in Australia, an ambulance driver, a ranch hand; restored Byzantine chapels in Greece, and traveled with a mime group in England.
The Center for Interim Programs specializes in helping college students who want to "take a year off," but I suspect they would be just as willing to help someone who wants to stay out of college altogether.  If you become involved in this program, do please tell us about your experiences.

WORK PERMITS & G.E.D.

From Frances Korn (N.Y.):

…I pulled my elder daughter out of school when she was in 8th grade.  She is now 16 and recently expressed the desire to get a job (at least part-time) and to go to evening classes to get her high school equivalency diploma.
In order to be admitted to the G.E.D. course, she needs (a) a full-time job; (b) working papers in order to get the job; and (c) a release form from the last school she went to.

I asked the school for the papers, and they have her down as dismissed from the school as of the beginning of the 8th grade.  Since she has been "dismissed from the school system" already, she can’t be dismissed a second time!  Therefore she can’t get the release papers,  which means she can’t be given working papers, which means, in turn, that she can’t get a job; and neither can she go for the G.E.D.  course to get her high school equivalency diploma!  …The bottom line is that a student has to have at least completed 8th grade to get the various papers.

…I am being run around in circles, and wonder if you can advise me how other homeschooling parents get around the problem of working papers prior to the age of 18?…
_____

[DR:]  We sent Mrs Korn’s letter to Seth Rockmuller, a homeschooling parent who just happens to be an attorney for the New York State Education Department.  He replied:

…I am  enclosing a copy of Section 100.7 of the Regulations of the Commissioner of Education.  As you will note, there is no requirement in that section that an individual have a full-time job in order to be admitted to such preparation course.  However, you will note that in subdivision (e) of section 100.7, there are certain requirements which must be met by school districts in providing alternative high school equivalency preparation programs for students under 18 years of age.  The nature of those requirements is such that Mrs. Korn’s daughter may well not be eligible for participation in an alternative program.

…There are, however, high school equivalency diploma preparation programs run by agencies other than school districts and boards of cooperative educational services, and such programs are not subject to the requirements of section 100.7 (e)…  Other programs may be run by community-based organizations or post-secondary institutions.  Information concerning such programs is available from the LITERACY ASSISTANCE CENTER in New York City, and I suggest that Mrs. Korn contact Jackie Cook of the Center at 212-26-5323 for information…  The one drawback to that approach is that her daughter would not be eligible to take the high school equivalency exam until she reaches 17 years of age.

…Mrs. Korn may also wish to note that a student may receive a high school equivalency diploma by providing satisfactory evidence of successful completion of 24 credits or the equivalent as a candidate for a college-level degree or certificate at an approved institution (8 NYCRR 100.7 [a] [2] [iii]).
With respect to Mrs. Korn’s questions concerning employment certificates, I am enclosing two booklets, one entitled "Laws Governing the Employment of Minors In New York State," which is prepared by the New York State Department of Labor, and the other entitled "Legal Information Concerning School Attendance," which is prepared by the State Education Department.  The School Attendance booklet contains the relevant statutory provisions.

There is no requirement that a student complete 8th grade in order to be eligible for an employment certificate.  Pursuant to Education Law 3216(3), a full-time employment certificate may be issued to a minor 16 or 17 years of age who is not attending a day school.  Such a certificate is valid for work in a factory or any other trade, business, or service.  The procedure for obtaining an employment certificate is set out in Education Law 3217.  Although a schooling record is required for a full-time employment certificate in New York City, there is no requirement that the schooling record indicate that  the applicant has completed 8th grade (Education Law section 3222).  There is also no requirement that a student obtain "release papers" from school in order to obtain an employment certificate, unless this refers to the schooling record which is required…

If either you or she requires additional information, please feel free to contact me…

AT HOME AND LEGAL

To finish my story of how we decided to homeschool and what we did to become legal (GWS #49-51): having such a reliable lawyer, I relaxed quite a bit.  I should have done this a lot sooner.  The idea that these authority figures had some power over me kept me very defensive.  Now with Gene Burkhart doing all the work of my defense I could simply talk to my superintendent and let him know what kind of parent I was and what our homeschool would be.  At the same time that I was hiring a lawyer, my friends the Bridges (GWS #37) were doing their own negotiating without a lawyer.  Both of us were working in our separate ways on the same school district.

One key thing that Dorothy and Michael Bridge did which affected both of our work was to give our superintendent a copy of the current GWS and the name and phone number of a superintendent in Rockland, MA who had been so friendly to homeschoolers.  All these things - a friendly superintendent, a friendly lawyer, and two families requesting approval  - seemed to create a turnaround in our negotiating.

On Gene’s advice I restructured my curriculum report.  The first one was denied, but the second one reflected only two changes.  I listed our areas of study under the subject category that educators would regard them as (like cooking projects under Math because of fractions and measurement).  Also I took Shane to the library and we searched out a whole bunch of books that we felt we could have fun reading.  For the authorities this bit of spice was my curriculum material.  In other words, with Gene’s help I learned to speak the language of the educators.  I learned to think like them, which let them see that we were being responsible.  This is all a good superintendent needs to know, that responsible creative discipline is applied.  They want to see that you have it.
This curriculum was approved in January of 1984, after fourteen months of homeschooling.  The first year was definitely the hardest.  Each year since, I’ve just resubmitted a new curriculum and received approval.  The school department has Shane registered as a regular student and they receive federal monies for his attendance.  As a result we’ve been given lots of resources, the gym, the libraries, they bought us books, and I’ve had a few conferences with helpful teachers.  In the end it’s turned out very well.

Shane just turned 12 a few weeks ago and for much of the summer was planning to attend our local Catholic school!  We’ve been around in circles, a story I promise to tell in the future, but for now if any of you with older children would like to write to me about your problems and successes I promise to write back and maybe some of our discussions will end up here in the magazine.  Please be sure to tell me if we can print what you say.  As our children get older the questions get deeper and I think we all find ourselves wondering how other homeschoolers are answering them. — WENDY BARUCH

EARNING MONEY AT 6

Carol Wilson wrote in Western Pa. Homeschoolers #13:

…Luke’s latest "gung ho" involvement has been his first business: Luke’s JOB SERVICE.  He’d been saving his small allowance plus all the "card money" from relatives, for a first bike (two wheeler), but it wasn’t fast enough, so he’d been selling off used toys.  He and his dad had been washing our cars together for awhile and so it started by John paying Luke $1.00 if he’d wash the entire car himself, to John’s meticulous specifications.  Luke loved it and got so good he and Dad felt he was ready to go public!  So he wrote up (only wrtiting he’s done in months) small advertisements to hand out to neighbors and friends.  He charged $1.00, until folks told him he was doing such an excellent job he needed to charge more - now it’s $1.50 for a small car and $2.00 for a large car.  In one day he washed five cars.  My son, who has always resisted cleaning help…ahhh, the lure of capitalism.

He began adding "wall washing" to his advertisements as he’s always enjoyed this job at home, and I felt he did a good job (at least if you only cared about having the bottom four of five feed cleaned!).  So far no takers on this yet - they really don’t believe a 6-year-old can do this properly - but one lady said she’ll have him help wash walls when she moves down the street in a month.
So, Luke’s saved his half of the needed amount for the bike, tax, training wheels - a whopping $35!…

KIDS PUT OUT NEWSLETTERS

[DR:] Jeremiah and Serena Gingold (CA) each put out a "Pen-Pal Newsletter" which we find impressive; the quality of the writing and the choice of non-fiction topics (largely history and current events) make them more interesting for me to read than the usual fantasy/poetry/artwork sort of children’s publication.  I asked Jeremiah and Serena to tell us more about the newsletters, and received these replies.  First, from Jeremiah:

…I will try to tell you about how my newsletter and pen pal club started.  My mom is helping me with this by writing down what I have to say, since it seems really complicated to me.

2 1/2 years ago my family moved from Los Angeles, where we had a homeschooling group and lots of friends, to the Sierra foothills near Yosemite.  This is a very rural area with houses far apart, and since we don’t go to school there are few places to meet other kids.  I was really bored and lonely and I needed something to do.

My mom suggested writing to friends in L.A., but they couldn’t read very well and did not write back.  I hated writing so much at that time.  So, I started making wordsearches, codes, and puzzles, and copied them by hand to send to several friends.  (Somehow I did not consider this writing.)  That was really the beginning of my newsletter.

When I saw the GWS pen pal list I decided to write to a few more kids.  My sister and I put our names on the list and we got so many letters!  But some people only wrote once.

Around this time I started doing Independent Study at Mariposa County Independent Learning Center [GWS #44].  My mom and I wanted to do our own curriculum without school textbooks.  My teacher loved the work I was doing on my newsletters and asked if she could make a copy to keep for my schoolwork file (since I almost always refused to write she did not have much of a file).  After that I began to work harder on my newsletters and they became my schoolwork.  I started adding book reviews, history reports, news, and made up math codes with the new math I was learning.  My sister also started making a newsletter for her pen pals.

Then my teacher offered to make copies for us to send to our pen pals on the school’s copy machine.  The pen pals loved the newsletters and I thought it was much more interesting to do than regular schoolwork.  I started writing a whole lot and stopped hating it.  It was so much fun to see my writing and artwork  in print!

My writing got better and better.  Pretty soon, though, I thought that it was getting boring having only my  opinions.  I wanted to exchange information and ideas.  So I said that anyone wanting to receive the newsletter must contribute something to it each month.  It works pretty well.  Lots of parents write to thank me for encouraging their kids to research and write.  Everyone likes seeing their work in print.  Of course, not everyone wants to make the commitment.  Many of my original pen pals stopped writing, so I had to get more.  Now we have around ten families who contribute.  My mom now has to type the newsletters to save on room, and there is even a parents’ page!.

The Pen Pal Network is open to kids who like to research and write on many subjects.  We are peace-activists, feminists, and non-religious.  Some of our recently covered subjects have been: Indians, nuclear power plants, Black Americans, and famous women in history.  You don’t have to be a great writer, you just have to want to exchange opinions.  My pen pals range in age from 5 to 9.

_____

His mother Pam adds:

…I just wanted to make a few comments about the kids’ newsletters (so I wouldn’t cramp Jeremiah’s style by putting in MY opinions).
He in particular has developed so much from writing these newsletters…  For Jeremiah, everything has to MAKE SENSE.  His mind balks at doing something "useless," which is why he hates doing schoolwork so much.  To write a book report seems pointless to him, since he has already read the book.  But to put it in his newsletter so that many others can read it and learn from it, well, that’s something real and worthwhile.  He loves to share his knowledge.

Also, not being involved with other kids, he had been missing out on discussions and other points of view.  This has been alleviated a little by the newsletters.
Both kids have also come to appreciate the efforts of others.  One little girl always had her letters written by her mother, with the girl printing her name in an uncertain hand.  Recently this girl printed an entire article alone, and wrote that she can now read, too.   Serena was so proud of her I couldn’t believe it.  I’m so glad that they have the opportunity to care about so many other people, being as isolated as they are.

What is really great is that we have created a homeschooling group for ourselves with people of our own interests… Being in a position where we had no connections with other people, writing became a necessity of life.  And because it was necessary, Jeremiah forced himself to overcome his difficulties with it.  Two years ago I had to write down articles for him to copy over…  It seemed to take forever, but now he can write alone with no "secretary"…
_____

And from Serena:

…I am 7 1/2 and my newsletter is called the "Pen Pal Flyer."  I am starting a club with my pen pals called "Homeschoolers for Peace."  We write a lot of letters to the president and stuff.

I have a suggestion for pen pals.  Have your mom write to you pen pal’s mom.  Then you will get to be better friends.  Our best pen pals are family ones.  They all have kids my age and my brother’s age and our moms write, too.  It’s like when you meet a new kid at the park.  You will probably never see them again.  But if you moms talk to each other, maybe your mom will invite them over.  One pen pal family  came from Missouri to see us and another sends us birthday and Christmas presents.

Homeschooled kids who would like to get my newsletter can write to me.  They must be able to write articles.  I am interested in articles about anything, poetry, puzzles, and pictures.  Please send 75 cents
for a sample copy together with an article or letter entitled "All About Me."
I really love homeschooling.  We have a lot of fun.  I want to be a reporter when I grow up, like my grandpa…

NO EVIDENCE FOR EARLY SCHOOLING

From a paper called "A nation Really At risk," written by Dr. John Raven of Scotland, in response to John Goodlad’s study, A PLACE CALLED SCHOOL:

…Another of the organizational changes which Goodlad proposes is to lower the ages of compulsory entry to, and exit from, school.  These recommendations derive from other myths.  He has, for example, accepted the early-childhood-education myth.  he has accepted the myth of the trivia-mindedness of adolescents.  And he has accepted the myth of the power of the peer group.
While there is no doubt that parents of young children lay down some of the most enduring motivational dispositions required by society, and develop in their children competencies and self-images which have a profound impact on their lives, I know of no evidence that the same is commonly done (except negatively) by schools.  The task is to support parents as educators who do things which few teachers do, not to get children into school.  There is good evidence that early education in schools has very little impact on the very educational outcomes with which Goodlad is preoccupied.  One of the clearest findings from the IEH work (Walker) was that children in school systems which recruit children at 7 years of age are indistinguishable at 11 from children in school systems which recruit children at 4 years of age.  There may be a societal need for day care facilities so that mothers can go out to work or so that children from today’s small families can make contact with other children.  But such needs must be separated from the argument that traditional forms of early childhood education in schools increase scores on traditional attainment tests.

Not only does schooling at this age not have an effect on subsequent educational attainment, the research evidence points convincingly toward the home as a much stronger, and much more important, educational agency  than the school - especially in relation to the really important qualities which young people need to develop.  Schools are, in general, very much worse than most parents at developing adventurousness, inquisitiveness, self-confidence, and curiosity in children.  If educators wish to promote the development of young children, their starting point must be with community support networks for adults - community support networks which will enable more parents to relate to their own children in a sensitive, developmental way.  It is parents, and parents alone, who are in a position to give each child the individual attention he or she needs, and to "read" the meaning of his or her gestures in such a way as to know how to be able to create a developmental environment which will lead the child to develop his talents…

BUCKING THE SYSTEM

From Sue Radosti (IL), who is expecting her first child:

…I’m glad for the experience of having to buck the system to ensure a safe birth for our child, because I think we’ll know better what to expect when facing similar pressures to conform over the issue of education.  One thing I’ve learned is that you can’t rely on your feelings to bolster your convictions when things get rough.  I believe in home birth (and homeschooling), but that belief is a combination of feelings and reason.  So when the peer pressure comes pouring on and my feelings turn to self-doubt and despair, my reason comes to the rescue and says, "Hey, don’t forget the facts, the documented reality of what hospitals and schools do to little people!"  I’m wondering whether this idea has any relevance to Deidre Purdy’s observation of the forever-young homeschooling population (GWS #50).  It’s so easy to feel enthusiastic about homeschooling when your kids are still under compulsory age, but those feelings can’t stand up very well to the real pressures that homeschooling brings to any household.  That’s too much like trusting your taste buds to convince you that sugar isn’t good for you.  You’ve got to have a rational base to fall back on…

TRYING SCHOOL

Leslie Westrum (IN) wrote:

…Ming (Madeline, almost 6) came dangerously close to going to "real" school in the fall.  At the worst of cabin fever season she began to look wistfully at the schoolbus in the mornings, and at last she decided she wanted to "go to a real school like real kids do."  And I was so burned out on the effort of just surviving, and being isolated out here with three little ones, that I told her if she really wanted to go, she could.  I called the school and they were getting ready for their end-of-the-year testing.  They asked me to bring her in for the two days of tests.  She spent the entire week telling anyone who would listen that she would be going to school the next Thursday and Friday for her tests.
Thursday finally came, and we got up early, dressed, found milk money, took Mike to work so we could have the car, had breakfast, made our beds - the mad rush I remember from my years in school.  We took James and Becky to a friend’s house, then took Ming to school.  We met her teacher (she loved saying "my teacher"), and when she was settled in (which took about one minute) I left her.  People have always said by keeping the kids home I would make them too dependent, but Ming was perfectly at ease with this bunch of strangers.  We picked her up after school -  the teacher said everything went fine.  The next day the same thing - I hate those getting ready for school mornings.  The following Tuesday the tests were all graded, and I had my meeting with the teacher and the principal.  It was extremely enlightening.

I was shown Ming’s test, which was all in code and meant nothing to me.   Then they tried to sell me on what wonders would be wrought if I enrolled my child in school.  They stressed that they have two computers in the kindergarten classroom (they use them for pre-reading drill).  Ming did excellent in most of her work.  In some areas she merely did "acceptable."  The areas in which her work was only acceptable were constantly referred to as her "weak areas."  Her so-called weak areas were penmanship, creative writing, and social studies.  (Social studies in kindergarten?)  Also her pre-reading skills are not too great.  (She just finished the fourth grade reader and is working on the fifth, but since kindergartners don’t read they didn’t test her reading.)  I know her penmanship is lousy.  It’s genetic.  Her father and grandfather are both brilliant, and neither of them can write worth a hoot.  As for creative writing, I was told that each of the kids in kindergarten had written a book this year.  Ming has been writing her own stories for a couple of years now.  I was not impressed.  I was also told about their wonderful arts program.  They got to make a ceramic pot and have it fired this year.  My parents first bought a kiln when I was 7 or 8.  Again,  I was not impressed.  The arts program may be wonderful, but the bulletin board and hallways were filled with the usual thirty-of-a-kind clone pictures from kindergarten up to sixth grade.  I didn’t see any work that struck me as being original.  Just follow the directions stuff.  Ming currently spends an hour or so a day reading on her own, just  because she loves to read, and another hour or more making pictures that are nothing like the school "house, tree, sun in the corner" stuff.

Finally I asked what they intended to do about her reading.  They said they would give her the first grade curriculum in first grade.  If she finished it before the year ended they would "broaden her base on that level," meaning they would give her  more of the same kind of work to kill time for the rest of the year.  In second grade they’d give her the second grade work, then "broaden her base" again.  Same thing in third grade.  (Three years of what she call "baby work.")

Now comes the clincher.  At the end of third grade if she can still read the fifth grade stuff, then she is probably gifted, so they’ll put her in an accelerated program.  They want to hold her back for three years, then push her.
I told them thank you kindly, and that if we decided to enroll her we’d let them know.  Then I fumed half the way home and cried the rest of the way.  I couldn’t believe a system could be so insensitive.  I was outraged; I had to cool off before I could cry about it.  I feel so sorry for all the little kids stuck in this system.

I asked Ming how she felt about school after her two days of it.  Her reaction: "The playground was nice, but not as nice as at the park" (we go there on "errand day" each week).   "We only got a little bit of recess.  Some of the kids were nice, but not as nice as my friends.  They didn’t give me time to draw enough.  I didn’t even get to read at all.  We had to sit still too much.  I really liked drinking milk out of little cartons, though."

Final conclusion - the major things wrong with our homeschool are (1) that we don’t get to go to the park enough, and (2) we don’t have milk in little cartons.  The solution we have arrived at is that once a week or so we go to the park.  We pack a lunch, and take along little cartons of milk (and we don’t have to get up early in the morning)…

YOUNG LEARNERS

Maggie Edmondson (ME) wrote when her children were 5, 4, and 2:

…This may sound incredible, but I got through five years of chemistry without ever understanding the basic fact that it is the study of the elements from which things are made and the ways in which they interact and combine.  In fact it only dawned on me two weeks ago!  I could see a whole new world of exciting discovery opening up before me.  This great revelation came while reading a book to Joe on atoms and molecules - I just wish this had sunk in 20 years ago!  Joe is an avid investigator and sets up experiments all over the place - a few days ago he spent the whole morning with a jar of water and a straw and I was amazed at the number of ideas he came up with.  He is now putting on paper the various arithmetic processes which he already knew - addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, fractions and series and now has an excellent grasp of the way our number system works.  I have overheard some wonderful conversations between Joe and Anna (who is also excited about arithmetic), e.g.  Joey, do you know what?  5 minus 2 is 3!"

…I have noticed with all of the children that after we have read about a new subject it takes anywhere from a week to six month for their minds to process the information and then they either tell one of us all about it, or draw a picture of it, or they may come up with a question.  About a month after reading and talking about the life cycle of salmon, just as Anna was going to bed she asked, "Why don’t the eggs of that fish fall back down the waterfall?"  (Luckily I figured out what she was talking about - another advantage of homeschooling.)  One day I read a long, fairly technical book about rain, hail, sleet and snow to Joe.  Thirteen days later, over breakfast, he started telling Ron all about it - how hailstones are formed, the function of lightning rods, weather balloons and so on, just about everything we’d covered in fact.

Lately we’ve talked a lot about the solar system for one reason or another and this sparked a series of pictures by Joe of the earth and sun complete with land masses, seas, a dark and light half, our house, part of the sun ("because it’s so big"), lines made by rockets in the sky, stars, roads, the North  and South Poles.  All this makes me certain that children do not need our gimmicks for seeing what they have assimilated or the nice ideas we come up with to try and reinforce their learning; they just need some time to digest it in their own ways.

…After breakfast each day we all do housework (although Emily is not really expected to do much).  I hope they continue to enjoy it as much as they do now.  The first day Joe’s job was to wash the dishes and since there was a huge backlog I sorted out a certain amount for him to do, but he just wanted to keep on going, so he went on until they were all done, three hours later.  He seemed incredibly peaceful and happy after doing this and was very affectionate and open - he’s usually very intense and wrapped up in himself.  I could cite many instances of this satisfaction from doing needed work or accomplishing something (like the tottering table Joe spent four hours sawing and hammering together a week ago)…
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From Anne Quick of Toronto:

…Polly (almost 5) seems to be learning to read by writing, in the way that I’ve become familiar with through reading all those great back issues of GWS.  I find it very interesting that, although she loves stories and we read aloud a lot, the words she’s learned first are those with an immediate practical application:  names of relations (so she can write to them), names of subway stations, and words like "exit" and "escalator" (we ride on the subway a fair bit).  There are many things I don’t like about living in the city, but as John says somewhere, you can hardly escape learning to read there: the printed word is constantly thrust before you.

Another of Polly’s practical approaches was to learning numbers.  Almost as soon as my husband suggested to her that she could be a real help doing the food shopping at our co-op if she learned her numbers, she did.  So, for several months now she’s been trotting off to the right box or barrel, filling a bag with rolled oats or whatever, memorizing the price per kilo, then punching it in the scale, pushing the label button, tearing off the label, and carrying the now-priced item to our grocery box.  Needs very little supervision and is very proud of herself!

…She has a pretty romantic view of school, without knowing anything about it, of course, and would like, I think,  to go.  She does go to Sunday School, though, and doesn’t always like that, which is helpful when we talk about why she isn’t going to school.  I must say I find Sunday School depressingly like regular school myself - convinced churchgoer though I am - the fishing for answers, the emphasis on discipline, the art projects that have to be done a certain way in order to be right - yuk!

Remembering how I too used to push discipline, encourage kids to crayon between the lines in coloring books (we don’t use coloring books any more), show them the "right" way to paint, cut, etc., I thank God (and John Holt, and GWS!) that I snapped out of that .  We have found, since we’ve begun to encourage our children to do (a) what they want when they want to, and in their own way, with help offered only on request, and (b)real things, that everybody’s life is much richer and fuller, and easier!

Polly and Jenny (2 1/2) help garden, cook, sew, clean, shop, and organize their own play (which is full of wonderful imaginative games with dolls and dress-ups) entirely.  I’m constantly amazed at what they can do on their own.  Polly can sew on a button quite respectably - something I didn’t even attempt till I was 9 or 10 - and right now is into all sorts of little sewing projects designed by herself - not very well executed, it’s true, but beautiful and imaginative, in my view.  Off her own bat she’ll decide to lug a basket of dry clothes up from the basement to the bedroom, and sort them.  One day she announced she was going to dust and vacuum the downstairs, and did!  Jenny, too, wants to do real things, and cuts her own cheese, spreads her own liverwurst, etc., with a little help.  Just tonight she set the table quite successfully, and was thrilled!
Enough, enough - just want to say that it’s working for us, and we’re very happy…
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From an article about families getting together to build play equipment, written by Cliff Buckwalter in the PENCIL (PA) newsletter, Winter 85:

…Most everyone had brought their own tools and the kids were in hardware heaven.  There was one little boy in particular who was curious about the purpose of each piece of equipment and hardware.  His father, unfortunately, thought that answering more than three of his questions was an annoyance.  I have found this attitude common in many adults.  It is as though we have this "three question limit" rule imbedded in our brains.  One or two questions - fine.  Three questions?  OK.  Any more and it’s "Now wouldn’t you be more interested in playing in the sandbox?"  Mind you, we say this to a child who has his head buried amongst all the tools and looks like a dog with a new bone.  But children are smart.  This boy heard what his father really said: "I want you out of my way," and so he went.  Sad.  I was sad and so I said to the father, "Children have a great need to know."  But I think he took this to mean,  "Children need to know when to shut up."

…Our Family Build Day was a great success.  We built some wonderful play equipment, got to know each other better, and had fun doing it.  There was a lot of eager talk about doing it again…

Towards the end of the day, some people lingered, talking with one another, some putting the finishing touches on the swings we’d built.  The father that had earlier been unkind to his son was on a ladder, boring holes into the beam for eye bolts.  His son stood on the ground near him.  The father was using a spade bit that was too short to go through the beam.  He was half muttering, half talking out loud to himself, trying to figure out how to bore a hole on the opposite side of the beam so the holes would line up.  As adults do when they are stuck, he looked to someone else, in this case, his son.  They stood looking at each other for a moment, neither speaking.  Then, almost intuitively, the son bent down and picked from his dad’s tool box a very long and very skinny thing and held it up to his father.  "What’s this for?" he asked cautiously.  Then the lights went on all over the place and the father jumped from the ladder, scooped up his son with a hug and said, "Can I show you?"

Well, he did even better than that.  He let his son climb the ladder and together they drilled the pilot holes with the long, skinny pilot hole bit that the father had forgotten about until his son picked it up for one more question…
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Debbie Healy (CA) wrote last year:

…Andy (5) has also taught himself to write, which he does in all capitals at this point.  But we know how all that came about: he loves football.  So, what does he spend his spare time doing - he studies football in books, magazines, on TV, and live.  One day Andy and I got a big old box and we made a miniature football stadium.  We put in all the details: the crowd, locker room, scoreboard, press box, yard lines, goal posts, etc…  Andy has about a dozen little football players which he can pose, so he likes to set them up on the field.  Well, he wrote in all the numbers on the yard lines by himself.  Then one day he asked me how to spell "Raiders."  Later when I looked at the stadium, he had written "Raiders" in one zone and "Rams" in the other.  I asked him how he knew how to spell "Rams" and he said he looked it up in his program from the Rams game we took him to.  That was just the beginning.  (Actually it was the end of the stadium - Andy decided to "wash" it with Glass Plus when I had my back turned that day!)

Since then he has probably made no less than one hundred football fields on all different sizes of paper using crayons, markers, chalk, paint and anything else we can think of.  He even purchased a small patch of Astroturf and white spray paint with his own money to make a more realistic field.  On each field he puts yard lines and marks them all with the correct numbers.  Since his loyalties change often, so do the team names he decides to put in the endzones.  Some days he does nothing but make sheets filled with cheering fans which he hangs on the walls while he plays a "real" football game with his dad (he’s getting too tough for me to handle!)…
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From Wendy Reininger (ID):

…This was Erica’s "kindergarten year," but I suspect we did much more than the average kindergarten class - all very naturally.  Erica has a deep interest in science, so many of our activities were in this area.  Her other big interest this year has been learning to write and read.  Her interest in learning is so bright and shining - her enthusiasm is a joy to watch.  Of course, if it’s something she’s not interested in that I’ve decided to try with her, nothing happens.  As I’ve read so many times in GWS, the child can be trusted to lead.  At least, I see this over and over again in Erica.

Some specific examples of our activities include: getting a mouse and caring for it through a bout of mites, setting up a small aquarium with three goldfish and a snail, catching caterpillars that are now in chrysalis form, looking at aquarium water under the microscope, investigating the contents of a trout’s stomach, long involved discussions about germs and the body’s defense system, discussions about surgery (our cat had a broken leg), a fossil-finding  expedition in a nearby canyon (we found lots of small bones - probably recent - but she loved it), and looking at many, many books about stars, planets, the earth’s crust, volcanoes, animal life - her interest in these matters seems unlimited.  She understands and asks questions about things that I doubt the schools would get around to for years, if ever.  In science, that is.
In mathematics there’s been practically no interest.  Not that I haven’t tried - my best school subject was math, and I’ve approached the subject in different ways with her.  The only two things that seemed to spark an interest were working with geometrical shapes ( we made interesting patterns with small triangles, square, and other shapes, which she’ll go back to and do occasionally) and playing dominoes (although we often end up making long lines of dominoes balanced on end just to watch them fall down when we push the first one over).

When she was 4 1/2, we started using the Montessori sandpaper letters, and she quickly learned the sounds and shapes of the letters.  Following a Montessori sequence, she started forming simple phonetic words with cardboard cut-out letters, then reading them, then forming and reading longer phonetic words.  Now we’re working on phonograms.  One of our best activities is using a small chalkboard set up in the kitchen, where I draw a little picture and then print the descriptive word beside it.  I usually try to make my picture pretty vague so she actually will sound out the word, and she enjoys my silly pictures.  Then she draws a picture and prints a word.  She chooses hard words - although I never indicate that I think they’re hard ones.  She spells them phonetically, and often asks how to make a sound like "ch" or "oo" that she doesn’t know.  We make these pictures and words for each other off and on during the day.  She takes great pleasure in coming in from play and discovering a new word on the board.  Now we’re starting to do phrases like "the pink piglets," and we’ll build up to sentences.  I’m making some little reading booklets for her now, and I’m expecting she’ll want to make some of her own, too.  This has been a fun and easy process for both of us - very unhurried an flexible over the past year and a half.

Something we tried that did not work was the printing kit described in GWS #36.  I ordered the extra large print, since Erica was 4 1/2 at the time.  She found the kit interesting, but suddenly she developed a great confusion over how letters and words are formed.  She began to confuse "d" and "b," "p" and "q," and to write many letters and words in their mirror image.  This was after only two times of using the printing kit.  I put the kit away, but it took months for her to straighten herself out on letters again.  Every once in a while she’ll still have a little trouble, where before using the printing kit she had no trouble at all.  I’m saving the kit, as I’m sure once she’s older and very clear again on her letters, she’ll use it without the confusion.  It was too early to introduce it.

I’m taking a correspondence course through the MONTESSORI WORLD EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTE (Box 3808, San Luis Obispo, CA  93403) on primary education (ages 2 1/2 - 7).  I find the course to be excellent.  It’s given me a deep insight into Maria Montessori’s ideas and discoveries about the young child’s learning.  Much of what John Holt has to say fits very well with Montessori, it seems to me.  I’ve found the course to be valuable in setting up my own homeschooling program - both in terms of philosophy, curriculum, etc. and in terms of my credibility with the public school system.

I visited the man who oversees homeschooling for the state of Idaho - their curriculum superintendent.  He was very cordial and supportive.  My Montessori training prompted him to suggest that I seek state accreditation for my school, even though I have only one student.  That way, he said, I could avoid having to seek the approval of my local school district of our curriculum and not have to be involved in testing.  I hope to finish the course soon so I can do that.  Then I might take the elementary level Montessori course.

In the meantime, I am writing my homeschool plan for this fall, when Erica will be starting "First Grade."  As I get things down on paper, I’m amazed at how good it all sounds, even though we’re planning quite mundane kinds of activities.  When I get it written, I’ll send you a copy.  Even though in Idaho we are not legally required to send Erica to school until she is 7, I want to lay the foundation for future years by notifying our school district of our plans for this year.  That way we can set up our relationship with them before they have any legal right to look over our shoulders.   We hope to show them a strong, positive home program over the coming year so they’ll feel comfortable with us and our basically unstructured, untesting approach to teaching…

ONLY A FEW TOYS

From Sian McLean (NS):

…We know of only one other family who feels as we do about toys.  I have read very little in GWS about this and wonder what’s going on out there?
Our daughter (almost 2) has very few toys.  They fit in a box that tucks under a stool.  All are hand-me-downs or gifts, and frankly I feel she still has too many and am about to do something about that.  Now that the weather is good she literally does not play with any except a few handmade stuffed animals.  We once read an interview in the first issue of In Context of a French fellow who traveled and observed.  He said a child needs only one toy, any more are confusing.  He also talked about the Lappland children using very sharp knives at 18 months - 2 years!

Our house is full of interesting things to children.  Real things.  Things that perform tasks, things that adults use.  How many times have we heard how children will play with boxes or blankets, or whatever, for hours on end even though they have a room full of toys.

I hate plastic of any kind, especially plastic toys!  I hate useless items.  I see toys akin to T.V., providing the completed fantasy.  At least toys do give the child a bit of power.  I am not denouncing the fact that children get enjoyment from their toys.  What bother me is that they are not playing with real things, and often children who play with toys a lot don’t know how to do real things, like make a sandwich or sweep the house or rake the garden bed.
The other thing that incenses me about toys is the blatant consumerism they represent, and that is learned by our children.  Aside from knowing that our daughter will have a fuller, balanced and more rewarding education at home, my prime objection to school is that it’s full of little consumers who want bizarre things.  I see this in every child I know who attends school and it certainly rubs off on those who don’t.  We can’t put blinders on our child, but we can certainly reduce her exposure.  I have to fight all the time with my own crazy desire to buy things and luckily satisfy it with minimal groceries, tools, and materials.

There are so many things that our young children can use and play with in a household.  In fact, there is very little that eventually they can’t use, i.e., dangerous.  There are some excellent children’s tools available from Green River Tools in Brattleboro, Vermont.  And any inventive adult can see ways to include even the youngest child in what they are doing.  It may, and often does, take longer, even to the point of being left undone (therein lies my frustration).  I must admit I often long for the days when Willow was content in the backpack watching!

Our small collection of toys does get used when other children come over.  I think I shall put them away entirely and see what happens when we have young visitors.  When we visit other households with varying amounts of toys (usually strewn all over the house) Willow immediately goes for the dolls and seems at a loss with everything else, except miniature dishes and cutlery.
One of the most absurd toys I have seen is a Fisher Price (most of these I find outlandish!) musical instrument kit with bits and pieces that try to imitate real instruments.  All the sounds it makes are awful!  For the same price I’m sure a parent could purchase two or three real instruments: a harmonica, pennywhistle, recorder, etc., and get pleasant sounds and practical enjoyment.
My tirade could go on and on.  Am I alone out here in mall-studded North America?…
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[DR:]  I remember John making the point - I think to someone asking about whether one should force a  small child to share toys - that it was probably good for little children to have some property over which they had total control, something that was really theirs which they could treat as they liked.  Toys would be the most common such possessions, but perhaps other kinds - tools, books - would have the same effect?

JOINING IN FANTASY PLAY

From a letter by Marie Baker:

…I think John once wrote in GWS that no time are children involved in more serious work than when they’re playing.  Sarah (7) and Becky (2) have an intense need for pretending - with me very much a part of it…
The problem is that I really don’t enjoy pretending.  In fact sometimes I hate it.   But  we usually do one or two hours of it a day anyway since I do have some idea of its importance.

…Often they each want to pretend something different.  I try to do both at the same time - a real balancing act.  Other times they manage to agree on characters and actions for at least part of the time.  They tell me who the characters are and what their actions are, then I make most of the sounds.  Becky and Sarah are each a major character and the fashion dolls and large plastic horses round out the cast.

…We’ve moved a lot and Sarah’s a loner anyway, so she doesn’t play with other kids too much.  But next year we plan to move to the country with the land co-op of homeschoolers we’re helping to start.  I’ll be interested to see how much they’ll need me for pretend after they get used to a stable environment with other kids nearby that they know well.  Even now, when Sarah does get with friends, they tend to disappear to a private spot and become very absorbed with make believe…  Becky follows them everywhere, wanting to be included completely, so they usually incorporate her into the action in one way or another…
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Susannah Sheffer replied:

…You say you "really don’t enjoy pretending."  I feel as if I’d have to hear some examples of exactly what sorts of situations make you uncomfortable before I could really think about this.  Right away, though, I want to ask you if you feel uncomfortable with all levels of participation in their games, or only with the total level of involvement that they may be asking of you.  Sometimes you can get stuck thinking that you have to be as immersed in it as they are or it’s no good.

Now, I’m fairly certain that if at a given moment you really don’t want to play they’re going to notice this and feel the difference - same with any activity.  When three very good friends of mine, children 10,8, and 5, ask me to play this way with them, I will tell them if I don’t feel like it right then, and I’ll say something like "You know that kind of game is no good unless everyone really wants to be doing it."  They understand even if they wish I did feel like it at that time.

but, too, you may find yourself saying "I don’t feel like it" more than you need to.  You may really mean something more like "I know I can’t play those games as fully or as genuinely as you can, and I’m uncomfortable doing anything less."  I know I find some tensions inherent in trying to imitate or recapture the kind of involvement that I remember having with such games as a child.  There’s a part of me that remembers so vividly what that felt like, that anything else seems somehow inauthentic.

On the other hand - an this is what I’m hoping to suggest to you - there is a way in which you can participate which is satisfying to the children and which may make you feel more comfortable.  If you think of yourself as being able to bring some of your adult knowledge and experience to the situation, rather than trying to leave it outside, you’ll begin to see what I mean.  I’ve found that if we’re pretending to be on a train, for example, and I inject some of my knowledge of what trains are like into the situation by saying something like, "Let’s wait for the conductor to take our tickets," then that gives the child who is directing the flow of the play an idea she might not have thought of.
Of course, it’s important to do this with care.  it would, as I think you know, make a mess of the whole thing to get in there and really start directing what went on.  You sound as if you have a good sense of how important this sort of play is to your children and what it may mean to them as a way of assimilating and making sense of things.  It’s their way; it may not be yours.
What would happen if you turned that fact into something positive?  I’m thinking that you might sometimes want to say something like "That’s your work, you do that better than me."  Of course, you would have to mean, and sound as if you meant, that that activity, being theirs, was as real, valid, important to them, etc., as your work was to you.  I can see an advantage in letting them know that you respect not only how  important it is to them, but the simple fact that they do it so well; this may help them accept your suggestion that pretend play works best with other kids (it usually does).

I remember when I was at the age when pretend play was a big part of my life; I remember my father, a stage director, asking me very seriously about it because he felt that the actors with whom he worked needed to recall and draw on that wholehearted immersion in fantasy - make-believe being a very genuine form of acting - and I remember distinctly the feeling that he was asking me these questions ("How do you get the idea for your character?" "How do you and your friend decide what will happen next?" etc.) because he  understand child psychology, or even the psychology of his particular child - rather, he truly thought that we were good at something which his actors could benefit from learning more about.  I’ll never forget how that felt, to be taken so seriously…

"ON YOUR OWN" BOOKS

In GWS #49, a reader asked for recommendations for good books on preparing children to be by themselves.  Laura Pritchard (OR) responds:

…A good book for young children on first aid emergencies is titled FIRST THINGS FIRST.  Copies may be obtained from Upjohn, 3rd Flr, 99 Park Av., NY NY  10016.  This book is excellent for a parent to read to pre-reading children, as well as being a good handbook for children to read through by themselves periodically.

For older children who would be left unattended at home, an excellent book  is THE OFFICIAL KIDS’ SURVIVAL KIT: HOW TO DO THINGS ON YOUR OWN, by Elaine Chaback and Pat Fortunato (Little, Brown).  This is a perfect reference book that should be left available to children at home alone.  There’s info on everything from accident  prevention to baby-sitting tips; from power failures to completing household chores; from etiquette to medical emergencies.  An easy to read index helps children find the needed information quickly.  It is written in understandable language.  The authors encourage adult participation in reading through this book initially, as well as providing spaces throughout the book for parental notes…
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[DR:] The June ‘86 issue of Ms. magazine has a four-page excerpt from ON MY OWN: THE KIDS’ SELF-CARE BOOK, plus a list of 18 more books on being alone and safe.  If this issue is not in your library write MS., 119 W 40th St, NY NY  10017.  ON MY OWN is aimed at "latchkey" children and has a strong school slant - what to do if you miss the schoolbus, etc.

WORRIES ABOUT SAFETY

From Carol Petersen of Pa.:

…I was appalled at the mother who left a 7- and a 3-year-old alone for 3-5 hours a day (GWS #47).  She needs to realize that she was very, very lucky that nothing happened to those children.  Every year in our area hundreds of children die or are crippled in accidents, falls and fires, left unattended.  The fires occur not necessarily because of children breaking the rules they’ve been taught, but also from faulty wiring, furnace sparks, gas leaks, etc.  In other words, you can be a diligent parent with obedient children and still lose them to an accident they are not physically, mentally or emotionally mature enough to respond to properly.

…One fire I recall so vividly reading about told of several children who responded correctly to the smoke and heat coming from the basement, escaping to the outdoors, only to have the eldest, age 8, return to get the family cat (a decision based on the emotions of  a normal 8-year-old).  He never came back out.  I tremble to think of a 7-year-old, not just responsible for themselves but also for a little 3-year-old…

PROSTHESIS IS PERSONAL CHOICE

A reader wrote:

…A question I had hoped to ask John Holt was this: would you make wearing a prosthesis requirement, or would you let the child choose whether or not he/she wished to wear it?  Our daughter was born with phocomelia - a severely deformed and shortened left arm and hand.  We require her to wear her prosthesis six hours a day.  She takes occupational therapy for one hour every other week.  She resists wearing it mostly out of discomfort, but partly for its being more tedious to operate than her own small limb, and partly for its appearance (this last is only and issue in public).  We are currently in the process of getting a cosmetic hand which seems to also be more functional.  I’m hoping the new prosthesis will  be more desirable to her.  I was just wondering if you might have any thoughts on this subject…
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[DR:]  I passed this letter on to our friend Karen Franklin (26 Noyes St, Needham  MA  02192) who listed herself in our "Resource" section as willing to correspond on physical handicaps.  Karen gave us a copy of her reply:

…I have some understanding for your concerns, fears, worries that you have for you daughter.  I have a 6-year-old daughter with Cerebral Palsey.  It manifests itself mainly as poor motor control of her legs.   She wears braces, sometimes uses a wheelchair, and sometimes walks with crutches.  In most other ways she is a typical 6-year-old.

My father was wounded in WWII and his arm is amputated above the elbow.  Until he was 20, he was right-handed, but after he lost his arm, he learned to do everything with his left side.  Only having one arm has never slowed him down…  The strength and coordination he has is amazing.  As a matter of fact, I didn’t realize until I was an adult that he was "handicapped."  I mean, I knew he only had one arm, but it never occurred to me that others might see him as disabled.  Of course he gets frustrated sometimes by what he can’t do (usually some handyman carpentry project - its hard to start a nail) but 99% of the time he has adapted to his life and is comfortable with it.

My father has a cosmetic, nonfunctional prosthesis.  He wears it to work, to town, etc.  When he gets home, he takes it off the moment he walks in the door.  He finds it heavy, hot, uncomfortable, cumbersome, and inhibitive of his movement.  We all think of Dad as wearing his arm when he gets dressed up - sort of like wearing a tie or dress shoes.  It’s not really a part of him, just a part of his outfit.  My 2-year-old once told Grandaddy, "Take off your arm - it’s too hard and there isn’t enough room to sit in the chair with you."
The Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, 3/2/86, had an excellent story about a young man who has been recruited by a number of colleges, as well as by the pros,  as a starting baseball pitcher.  He also has phocomelia, he is now about 18 or so, says he threw away his prosthesis when he was 4, and has a fastball that’s hard to believe…   I will try to locate the article and send it to you.

I think John would have told you to trust your own instincts, and not let orthopedists or therapists pressure you into something you don’t feel right about.  They may be experts in their field, but you are the expert on your child.  They have a job to do, but so do you, and you are the most qualified to make important decisions about your children.  Is there really need for her to wear the prosthesis?  Will NOT wearing it have some sort of long-term degenerating effect?  Will it cause her to lose strength, mobility, or dexterity?  Would she be able to do more if she wears it and uses it?  If the answers are Yes, then she has to wear it, and your job is to try to help her understand, and to make her adjustment as positive as possible.  If the answer is No, then my inclination would be to back off.  If she is happier without it, if she feels she can do more without it, if it frustrates her, if it is uncomfortable, if forcing her to wear it is taking its toll on the rest of the family as well as on her, then why put yourselves through it?  The disability itself causes enough fear, guilt, sorrow, worry about the future, pain , anxiety - why add to the emotional baggage everyone must already carry?

As your daughter gets older, she may decide that she wants to wear a prosthesis -either for its functional or cosmetic value.  At that point she will be self-motivated, and you won’t have a problem.  My daughter was perfectly happy to crawl for the first 6 years of her life.  It was fast, effective, required no equipment and had no negative social implications in our family.  About two weeks before her 6th birthday, she decided she wanted to walk.  We went to the orthopedist, got crutches, and spent some extra time with the physical therapist (mostly because she was teaching me how to help Jessica).  In less than a week she had pretty well mastered it…  We could have spent five frustrating years on gait training - instead we spent one exciting week.  As John has often said, when a person needs to know, for their own reasons, how to do something, they will learn quickly and well.

…I think it is important that your daughter wears the prosthesis or not for her own reasons, and not because of some outside pressure.  I worry about the unspoken messages we all send to handicapped people.  I think that in requiring people to do things to make them appear more normal (prosthesis, sunglasses for the blind, etc.), we are sending the message, "You are different, inferior, and unacceptable.  You have to do these things to look and be like everyone else, because to be like you really are would make the rest of us feel uncomfortable and guilty, and it’s your duty to not remind us of our own anxieties and fears."  I’m sure that at her young age, your daughter is safe in the security and lover of her own family and probably hasn’t had much experience with the harsh and cruel world.  Probably it has never occurred to her that others may feel uncomfortable because of her appearance.  I don’t think it should be the responsibility of the handicapped person to make others comfortable.  However, if she feels secure and comfortable  with her own body, with or without the prosthesis, others will feel comfortable with her.  If she never comes to the point where she feels the need of the prosthesis, then she doesn’t HAVE a need…

HITCHING, TRUCKING, BIKING

From Dick Gallien of the GWS TRAVEL NETWORK

…I scan GWS in search of interesting people with attitudes and values similar to mine…  Penny Barker’s (OH) writing revealed enough.  Her kids were the age of mine; she and Richard had totally supported themselves for 10 years by providing a country experience for 6- to 12-year -olds on their 4-acre homestead, and she mentioned having no more interest in institutionalized religion than institutionalized education.

I wrote - she answered - I sent pictures of son John (13) swimming at Galveston, TX with the tractor parked on the beach and she sent pictures of her kids on the rafts they built.  Writing and pictures might be all right if you are in school or prison, but we aren’t, so we took a truck trip to Akron, OH and spent 1 1/2 days with the Barkers.  John and Dan (11) got along especially well, so they invited John back for the first week of their summer program.

How to get John 750 miles to Barkers at 9 AM Monday and pick him up Friday?  Before I could call the trucking company, they called and asked if I would pick up one that broke down in PA.  I told them I’d get the truck if they’d get a load heading back this way so I could pick up John on Friday - they agreed.
To ride out with another company truck would have been too dull, so we hitch-hiked.  I’ve learned more about people from hitch-hiking than I ever did sitting in school, but at 54 I seldom find reasons or excuses to get out on the road.  On a Saturday afternoon, with packs and sleeping bags, I didn’t think John and I looked very threatening, but we stood 1 1/2 hours before a Hmong refugee, only six years in this country, had the courage or whatever to pick us up.  Then came a friendly visit with a local cop, two more rides of 150 miles each, and we unrolled our sleeping bags south of Chicago.

My ticket for hitch-hiking is a jack knife for cutting pieces of cardboard and a magic marker.  For this trip, "OHIO" got us to the toll roads which are easy thumbing.  From Rockford, IL to Philly or NYC you can pick your rides from one service area to the next, any time of day or night.  I watch the license plates and ask only those who are alone.  Sunday, on the Indiana Tollroad, I told a dignified gentleman that my son and I were hitch-hiking from MN to OH and did he have any room.  He said, "Sure, jump in."  He was driving a polished ‘51 Pontiac with white side walls…  As we cruised smoothly along, this man told how his love affair with antique cars began when,  as a young boy, his family would visit the Studbakers and he would sneak off to their garage.  He told of a 10-year-old neighbor boy who is watching and helping him restore cars…  As he told of the 17 years he spent restoring three 1908 "Something-or-other Underslungs" that were now worth $250,000 apiece, I was thinking what a perfect example of one interest which covers nearly every academic area and if done well, can provide a livelihood.

Noticed a trucker smiling at us checking our map at a service area on the Ohio Pike - asked him if he could get us down to where I-71 intersects the Pike, and we were off with another interesting person.  Out on the interstate for a couple minutes with "WOOSTER" and a woman from there delivered us to a restaurant where we pretended we were aristocrats and then went to a motel and turned on the tube, since we don’t have one at home.

Our "MILLERSBURG" got us a quick ride Monday morning…  From there, a van of Amish were very interested in our non-schooling and lived just over the hill from the Barkers and were gathering to prepare for a wedding and wondered if we had ever seen one.  I’m sure they would have invited us, but we took a quick trip up over the hill and came in the back way just as the more traditional campers were being welcomed by Penny at the front driveway.

I regret watching a country which claims to be so strong and free become a nation of fearful, unfree, inward-looking people…  Today, people are having fewer primary experiences to counteract the negative secondary experiences they receive through the media.  If the Pilgrims could have checked the evening news as to what might have been in store for them, they would never have left the ship..  We can find ways that are cheap and safe to provide our older kids with first-hand experience and confidence so they will look forward to exploring life alone or with a few friends.  Anyone for a Boundary Waters canoe trip?
We were gone seven days on each Ohio trip.  During that time Kirstin (9) and Glenn (11) did all of the milking, cleaning of the barn and equipment, and caring for 15 small calves.  The 35 Holsteins averaged over 2000 lbs. of milk a day at $12.75 cwt., if you want to figure that out.

On the way home with the repaired truck, we took Vanessa Keith (17), who is totally homeschooled - lives in New Hampshire where she has done a lot of apple picking and pruning and has also lived with an aunt in France for five months - from the Barkers, where she had been an intern, to Ft. Wayne, IN to visit a friend.

In October, when coming from somewhere out east, we’ll pick up most of the Barkers, minus Britt (18) who will be traveling alone in Europe after spending two weeks studying wolves in Northern Italy, and for over 15 rumbling hours they’ll be truckers, listening to the CB and bird dog (radar detector) as we cover the flat states, roar through Chicago, head north into rolling Wisconsin and finally cross the Mississippi River at LaCrosse and head north into the clear, cool air of Minnesota.  On the farm they’ll be milking the cows with my kids, canoeing on the river and lake, and enjoying the good feeling of being with others who are free to work and play hard during the fall, when the rest of the world is in school.

…Just got a call from Linda Salwen of New York.  She had just heard of the GWS Travel Directory.  Her homeschooled 14-year-old son found the money, which included $500 from the local paper, to fly with his bike to CA where he has started biking alone back to NY to raise money for either peace or world hunger.  Linda wanted names of those along the way he might stay with - she was especially concerned about someone in the desert area between Reno and Salt Lake.  Next year he is planning on biking in Russia, which is something I plan to do, but I must wait a couple of years until my kids are older…  Not one local kid showed any interest in going with him, but even more significant, they all were negative - figuring he would be murdered, etc.  The gap between traditional kids and some of ours is growing - as Linda said and I have always felt, they are like totally different species…
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[DR:]  Dick is anxious to have as many people as possible see the GWS Travel Directory and to list themselves as hosts; when he took over the list this spring, he found that fewer than 100 families had ever seen it to receive a copy, send him $2 plus a long SASE with two stamps.  If you’re willing to be a host, send him your name, address, children’s names and birthdates, phone, and self-description (interests, occupations, preferences, etc.).

LIVING IN SPAIN

From Suzanne Alejandre (Spain):

Jan. 27  …When people ask me how much Spanish I have learned since I have moved to Spain I always have difficulty answering…How can you say how much of a language you can speak?  Because when you are learning a foreign language there is so much to learn.  I think it is easier to answer the question - How often is your communication with someone successful?  That question I can answer easily because I can see improvement since we first arrived in Spain.  When we first came I would communicate with one word sentences.  I remember being down in the subway station, lost, but I went to a ticket booth and said one word ("La Bonanova" - which was my intended destination).  It worked!  The woman pointed me in the right direction.  Since then I have gone through varying degrees of lengthening my sentence, but the information received has remained the same…
Many of my students ask me, "When will I be able to really speak English?"  When they ask that question, I know that they are on the wrong track and I try to make them see that they should use learning English as a communicative tool and not for quantifying and marking down how much they know.  the people who score the highest on the silly tests they give here are the people who say the least.
…Ages ago, while we were still living in Germany, I wrote and told of having made a cross stitch project for Niko.  I think he was 6 at the time.  After I finished making the design for him, he didn’t work on it, but a few months later I showed how and he did some… When we unpacked here he put it up on his shelf and may have worked on it once or twice.  One of these times Lee asked to have a project and I designed a canvas for him also.  Well, I bought a standup hoop (it even has a little case to hold the extra thread and scissors) and Niko has been working steadily on his project.  Lee now has the hoop that Niko had, but I am going to buy another standup hoop this week so that he can have one too - they make the work so much easier since both - hands are free to work.  I will let you know any further developments…

March 13 …No official seems to care what we are doing in Spain!  I think the reason is that private schools are still flourishing here, in fact, private schools are it for those who want a "good" job.  So, there is no check of who is enrolled in the public school and who in the private school.  The bureaucratic system is such a mess in Spain (completely disorganized) that, by the time they got around to sending you a notification of matriculation, your child would already have children!  The people that we have told about homeschooling have never batted an eye as long as they know that they are "enrolled" in a correspondence school.  The "diploma" is like a ticket to heaven her  - overwhelmingly important…

Lately, Lee has been translating things he says.  For example, he was looking for his slippers the other day and he said to me, "I can’t find them .  No puedo encontrarlos.  I cant find them."  He likes the sound of the Spanish but usually he says the English too - sometimes with Richard he only says the Spanish but with me it is usually both.

And I learned the word "ensaimada"  Many people learn vocabulary words by memorizing lists or dialogues or whatever.  Since I live here I don’t have time for such things and I insist on learning by experience and necessity.   An ensaimada is a kind of pastry treat - as far as I know there is nothing comparable in the States.  For the year and a half that we have lived here I have always resorted to pointing at the bakery, but suddenly I got tired of doing that (they always say the name of what I am asking for but for some reason I can’t make the name stick in my memory).  Anyway, every Saturday Niko has a soccer game (he joined a sports club and loves it) and Lee and I go to watch, but we always stop and buy some buns on the way.  (We watch the game eating ensaimadas and drinking English tea!  - fun, fun.)  So, since this was becoming a tradition I figured it was time to learn the name of those silly buns.  On a Friday, I had class with a young woman who is now more of a friend than a student and I asked her what the buns were called in Spanish - I had her write the name and I memorized it.  But it wasn’t really fixed in my memory until the following day when I asked for them by name in the bakery.  It just so happened there were none to point at in the glass case that day - they were hidden behind the counter and I confidently asked for them!  It was such fun and such a feeling of success - I’ll never forget the word, either!…

Another word that I recently learned was "escaparate."  This word I have not actually used yet but it keeps coming up at Berlitz.  In the picture book that we use there is a picture of a woman looking in a shop window and as long as I remember, Spanish students have always stumbled at this point.  I had often wondered why.  Suddenly, it dawned on me - their word for window is not the same as shop window - so that when I tell them "window" they have a harder time accepting it because they differentiate that from a shop window.  And once I realized that, I realized why shop clerks always looked at me strangely when I talked about something I had seen in their "ventana."  For me a ventana was any old king of window, but the correct word is "escaparate" - I still have to test it out, though - we shall see if I actually remember it!

Niko has started reading in Spanish - with that amazing expression on his face - absolutely sparkling.  A neighbor boy comes to play here regularly (we schedule him in! it is the only way that he can come to play - he is so busy with other activities) and sometimes the boys go up to play in his apartment, and every time they do, they bring back something they have "borrowed."  Two days ago it was a book (in Spanish, of course).  And today, Niko started reading parts to Lee!  He has read only two word combination s so far, "Mire, jefe," etc., but he is enjoying himself.

…I overheard Niko and Lee talking the other day.  Niko was explaining the difference between AM and PM to Lee.  I had no idea that Niko knew the difference, but at some time he picked it up…

April 3 …GWS #49 must have some interesting comments by me in it!  We probably won’t receive it for another month or two, but we have received a lot of letters from other GWS readers lately…  One woman who wrote just wanted information and tips for living and working in Germany.  She and her family are considering such a short term stay (3 months) that I don’t think anything that I wrote to her will really be of any help.  Three months is not long enough to live in a foreign country.  From our experience and from other ex-patriots who we have talked to, three years is about the minimum.  The first year is for orienting oneself, the second year is for some experimentation, and the third year is for relaxing and appreciating everything (or hating it and trying to plan how to move!).
…Niko and Lee are writing letters right now, also.  Niko recently celebrated his 9th birthday and he has some thank-you notes to work on.  About a month ago he wrote one letter by carefully copying what I had printed from his dictation.  It took him two days but he was very pleased with the results.  First, he copied it in pencil and then he went over it all in black pen.  Niko hasn’t thought yet that he can spell, even though he can read everything that I wrote down for him.  His reading has continued to progress (he is reading some in Spanish now, also) but he has shown no interest in writing or trying to write by sounding things out.  Knowing him as I do, writing any less than an adult just wouldn’t do.  So, I had to think of a way that he could write and it would satisfy him - the copying routine does.

So, the first letter he wrote easily.  He dictated a second letter, however, and it has been sitting on his desk for about three weeks.  Tonight I told him to do it.  Rarely do I insist on any type of academic work but, for me, writing thank-you notes is part of good manners.  And if he doesn’t write the thank-you note I have to and why should I, since it was his gift.  So, one of those instances where more than just Niko is involved arrived and I told him - go!  And work on your letter while I do mine.  I told him to write at least one line - I have a feeling he will finish, though.  This time he has skipped the pencil stage and he is starting right off with pen.  He has been in here three times already for me to help fix up the mistakes - I got four kisses - one for fixing each mistake and one extra for the next mistake!

Lee, meanwhile, is also writing a letter.  He is copying the same letter that Niko is - thanking grandma for a present that Niko received!  Lee is a nut sometimes - so innocent and happy.

For the last two days we have been playing "school."  I have had some free time in the early afternoon and for some reason I asked the boys if they wanted to do that.  All it means is that we write problems or words or something on their chalkboard and then they solve them or copy or read or whatever.  One time long ago we started the "game" because I told them I could show them what "real" school was like.  I told them to sit at their desks.  I told them they couldn’t talk, couldn’t chew gum, etc. - they laughed and laughed because I did it all in my old "teacher" voice.  So, from time to time we have done it again, but by now it is more for practicing things than for the boys to hear by old teacher voice.
Today we did addition, subtraction (including borrowing) and the beginning of multiplication plus a little fractions.  Lee watched it all, but his problems included one digit addition and subtraction.  Yesterday, after doing addition and subtraction, I asked Niko if he wanted to see something new - usually that is a tense time.  When he sees something new and unfamiliar it makes him nervous, but as he gets older he can handle it more and more (or maybe I have learned to be extremely casual).  So I made a chart from 1 to 5 across and 1 to 5 down (multiplication chart) but I didn’t fill in any of the numbers.  As soon as I started writing, Niko said, "Oh, I know that already!"  He was thinking of the addition chart.  But I pointed to the x and then he saw that it might be different.  I asked him if he wanted to fill it in or should I.  he said that he would.  After a few examples (which he thought were stupid, but helped him think of the answer - for example, there are 3 boys with 2 legs each - I knew he knew that because about two years ago he voluntarily made that observation to me while he was looking down at some kids from atop a jungle gym), he was able to fill in all the answers.  After that I showed him a problem with 2 digits times 1 digit and then we stopped.  So, today I mixed in some 1 digit x 1 digit problems with the same numbers but addition (2 x 3 and also 2+3) and he had no problem.

Niko just came in and used up that fourth kiss and claimed that writing the letter was easy and he is planning to just finish it so that he can mail it tomorrow!  Lee stopped writing to play Legoland and I am going to stop typing to go and make dinner…

HOSTING AN EXCHANGE STUDENT

From Toots Weier (WI):

…We applied to host an AFS student for the upcoming school year.  We thought we would be readily accepted as there are no other families in the area interested.  We met and spoke with a couple of members of the adult AFS chapter, who became very interested and impressed with our homeschooling - although at first they were horrified!  They gave us very good recommendations as a host family.

From there it went to the school board - and that’s where things started to stir!  The school board did not approve, and it was suggested another family to be found to host.  I was sure the reason was because we are homeschooling, although I could not seem to find this out from anyone.  Certainly, the AFS student would have to attend the local public high school, but I did not see any reason we should be discriminated against, just because we homeschool!
After a couple of phone calls, we chose to meet with the principal.  He was very cordial and not at all antagonistic about homeschooling as I was expecting.  He barely mentioned it (and so all my preparation to answer questions were unnecessary!).  He relayed the concern of the school board, which basically was "if we were not involved in the public schools, how supportive would we be of our AFS student being involved in such things as extra-curricular activities."  We assured him of our sincerity in wanting to host an AFS student, as well as encouraging the student to be involved.   Just because we want to have our children home, does not mean we would discourage our AFSer from being involved in the community!  I expressed my personal feelings, such as, "Just because we homeschool does not mean that we are oddballs, or that we can’t or shouldn’t fit into society."

Once we expressed our sincerity to the principal, he was satisfied and the meeting was very brief.  (I was doing most of the talking or we could have been in and out of there in about two minutes!)  As we left his office, he was again very cordial, spoke to our children very kindly and welcomed us to look around the school, which we did.  The next day I received a call stating that the school board had met the night before, and accepted the principal’s recommendation.
We have since heard from the national headquarters that we have been "accepted" as a host family, and we are looking forward to having a foreign student in our home…
[DR: for info on hosting an exchange student, contact AFS INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE PROGRAMS http://www.afs.org/AFSI/.

LANGUAGE TUTOR FOR YOUNGSTERS

Jo-Anne Beirne of Australia sent us an article she wrote for the New South Wales Homeschooling Newsletter, 5/86:

…From the age of 18 month we have had our children taught languages by a foreign native speaker. I would highly recommend it to anyone thinking of doing the same.  They have learned to read and speak German and Cantonese.  Ideally I would have chosen Mandarin and Arabic because of the completely different writing and speech skills involved.  However, it was more important that they liked the person who taught them, so that the language learning would not  be a chore.  It was also very important that the teacher be open to my recommendations in respect to my children.

When to start?  Anytime you feel  happy enough to let someone else become good friends with your child.  (I often used to be quite jealous when I saw their eyes light up at the arrival of Angelika.)  I found it really helps to show how interested you are by sticking around and at least attempting the language yourself.

…How to start?  Advertise in your local paper….  All the universities have work notice boards.  You can ring them up, word you ad over the phone, and they will place it for you.  I had 20 replies to my first such ad.  (Not all good.)  Even the supermarket notice-board should be considered.  The ad could say:  "Wanted - special, warm, loving person who relates well to children.  Must be native born speaker (still speaking own language regularly) who speaks any of these languages: (list).  Aim: To help children (list  ages) to enjoy your language through reading, singing, talking and playing in my home, supervised by me."

…Ask questions such as 1) "Can you sing, and do you know lots of your childhood nursery rhymes?" (Kids seem to love these in any language.)  2)"Where were you born?" (Have a map handy.)  3) "Tell me more about yourself." (University degree, number of children, etc.) 4) "These are the hours that suit me, can you come then?"
Don’t be despondent at first if they all seem awful, just keep trying.  Be prepared to accept your second or third language choice (any language is better than none).  Don’t be intimidated by the pushy ones, and if the first question they ask is "What is the remuneration?" hang up, from experience they are hopeless.

Have at least one interview with each one and even a try-out with your kids, remembering that the kids will take about six lessons to really settle in.  When deciding, go with your heart every time.

How does a lesson work?  They should be hoarse when they leave, from talking as often as possible (the teacher that is), not just pointing things out but just generally talking about everything continually and singing so the child gets an ear for the sound of the language.  They shouldn’t just say "nouns" e.g., cat, dog, but rather "It has black fur," "See the green eyes!"  Colorful, simple storybooks should be read to them often, same as you do yourself.
They say a child hears "Mummy" 500 times before s/he ever says it.  So don’t expect results too quickly.  However, I can speak from the very personal experience of the past four years when I say it has been a most memorable and enjoyable experience.  It’s great when Germans mistake your child as coming from Stuttgart (the birthplace of their teacher).  Better than that, I am vaguely understandable in both languages myself…

FRENCH IMMERSION SCHOOL

From Maureen Parker (BC):

1985:  Our school district offers a French immersion program which I have heard is very good.  We know a little girl in the program and I’m very impressed with her vocabulary and accent.  I believe the ability to speak another language would be an invaluable skill, especially in a bilingual country like Canada.  I worry that by keeping the girls out of school I may be depriving them of an enjoyable experience…

1986:  I asked teacher friends of mine what they thought of French immersion.  Both replied that they would not put their own children in such a program.  One remarked that French immersion was beneficial to only a very few students - those who received a lot of enrichment at home.  For the average 5-year-old in kindergarten the new and stressful experience of school and the frustration of suddenly having to learn a new language were too much.  Discipline problems are rampant, according to these teachers.  The children vent their frustrations on each other and the teacher.  Furthermore the kids are being turned off French and most do not speak it at all once they have left the classroom.  One friend substituted in a French classroom and finally in desperation asked the students to settle down, in English.  The kids taunted her, chanting "You spoke English."  Hardly a healthy situation for learning to love and appreciate another language.  I do know a little girl in the French immersion program who seems to be doing well (her French is lovely) but this is not without a price.  Her mother tells me she comes home tired and irritable most days.  She also gets teased a lot for bringing nutritious food for her lunch.  I have ruled out French immersion for my two girls…

SIGN LANGUAGE FOR EVERYONE

From Alison Parra in Mexico:

…Stephanie Judy (BC) wrote in GWS #48 about her use of American sign language with her daughter…  I was really pleased to read her letter, as it echoes a strongly held belief of mine that all of us as parents should be doing the same with our children.

…I really believe the world would be a lot better place if hearing children automatically learned some sign so that they, as adults, could accept and discover their Deaf neighbors…  Having worked for the past seven years as an interpreter and educator to the Deaf, I see clearly that their biggest obstacle is the attitude of the majority of hearing people towards them.

…I will never forget when, at two weeks old, our daughter first caught sight of her father signing to me.  She literally tracked his hands with wide eyes, craning her neck as he walked around the room signing.  This was my first baby, and I had believed all the books that said "By six weeks you can put up a mobile over the crib for baby to begin focusing on."  The intensity with which she watched our signs from the start proved our hands to be as fascinating (and much more portable) a focal point, and that she was seeing much earlier than I’d been lead to believe…  I believe babies’ desire to know and intelligence are already fully functioning from birth; so why not make our language that much more accessible from the start?

…My husband is deaf and I am not.  Our baby was also born hearing.  In our home she was, naturally, always exposed to both Sign and Voiced language.  She signed her first words a few weeks before she spoke her first words, and words have been tumbling off her fingers and lips ever since.  It was after watching her I began to realize the advantages in access to language she had.  And how she enjoys it!  By age 2 her tiny hands were fingerspelling the alphabet as well as being able to sign most of her verbal vocabulary.  By age 3 she could write on paper, read and sign the full alphabet, numbers 1 to 10, and spell small words - cat, van, friends’ names, etc…

SESAME STREET SIGN LANGUAGE FUN  was our daughter’s favorite book from age 15 months on.  It includes lots of drawings of Sesame Street characters, and photos of a real person making the signs…
THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF THE DEAF publishes several colorful children’s posters of the Manual Alphabet featuring animals and objects (whose name begins with the corresponding letter) demonstrating each sign. http://www.nad.org/site/pp.asp?c=foINKQMBF&b=91587

MIQUON MATH CHART USEFUL

In an article about math that Susan Richman wrote for Western PA Homeschoolers, #16:

…At times we’ve used the "Miquon Mathlab Materials" just as another resource, one choice among many.  Jesse (8) would dip into them as he pleased, not worrying about doing the work "in order."  This was fine for a while, but left him unable to understand some ideas that had been built up over time.  Sometimes I’d suggest specific pages to him, either because I thought he’d find them especially intriguing or because they covered something I felt he ought to be learning about.

At first we didn’t notice or use a nice feature about the books.  There’s a chart on the back cover listing all the pages in the book by categories - multiplication, addition, inequalities, fractions, mapping, etc., with little boxes for each page number.  I realized that Jesse might work with more concentration in the books if he could mark in on the hart which pages he’d completed.  It would be a way for him to keep track of his own progress, give him a graphic picture of where he’d been and was going, and what to expect ahead.

Using the charts has been a real turn-around.  Jesse loves seeing the boxes get filled in, even began inventing little games about armies advancing and conquering all the new territories as his yellow crayon filled in the boxes for pages completed.  We also began setting goals - I asked Jesse when he hoped to have one book completed, and then to figure out how many pages he’d need to complete daily (not counting weekends) to reach his goal.  For the third book, Jesse set March 1st as his completion goal, found he’d need to do two pages a day for the next month and a half to finish up - and then proceeded to choose on his own to work even on weekends to that he’d surprise us all by finishing up early!  he sometimes decides to do more than two pages if he gets particularly excited by something, but doesn’t use that as a reason to not do math work the next day, although he knows that would be OK by me.  When Jesse completed his book two weeks early he immediately wanted to dive into the next, and is now zooming along in the fourth book (correction - as I’m retyping this he’s finished the fourth book, early, and has begun the fifth).  He is still free to choose which sections of the books he works in, although he is now very diligent about being thorough and doing everything eventually.  He explains that these out of sequence blocks on his chart are surprise raids into enemy territory - we’ve been reading lost of books about the Civil War lately, so you’ll have to excuse the battle imagery!  I do think that his "playing" with the chart shows that he’s found a way, on his own, to transform what might have been dull work into quite exciting play - and his play makes the work his own.
Carol Wilson of Pittsburgh tells me her son, Luke, also enjoys this goal setting, chart-filling with the Miquon books.  They seem to like perhaps, having everything out in the open, a clear agenda they can understand, and have a share in shaping and pacing.  I know, too, it helps Jesse to know that a number of our homeschooling friends also use these books.  He likes hearing how other kids are doing with them…

MATHEMATICIAN KNOCKS SCHOOLS

From "Learning Math By Thinking" by Fred M. Hechinger, the New York Times, 6/10/86:

…Dr. Hassler Whitney, a distinguished mathematician at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, says that for several decades mathematics teaching has largely failed.  He predicts that the current round of tougher standards and longer hours threatens to "throw great numbers, already with great math anxiety, into severe crisis."

Dr. Whitney has spent many years in classrooms, both teaching mathematics and observing how it is taught, and he calls for an end to what he considers wrongheaded ways.

Long before school, he says, very young children "learn in manifold ways, at a rate that will never be equaled in later life, and with no formal teaching. " for example, they learn to speak and communicate, and to deal with their environment.  Yet the same children find much simpler things far more difficult as soon as they are formally taught in school.

Learning mathematics, Dr. Whitney says, should mean "finding one’s way through problems of new sorts, and taking responsibility for the results."
"This has been completely forgotten" in most schools, he finds.  "The pressure is now to pass standardized tests.  This means simply to remember the rules for a certain number of standard exercises at the moment of the test and thus ’show achievement.’  This is the lowest form of learning, of no use in the outside world."

Dr. Whitney, in a recent report in the Journal of Mathematical Behaviour recalled an experiment begun in 1929 by L.P. Benezet, then superintendent of schools in Manchester, N.H.  Mr. Benezet was distressed over eighth graders’ poor command of English and their inability to communicate ideas.
"In the fall of 1929,"  he wrote in 1935, "I made up my mind to try an experiment of abandoning all formal instruction in Arithmetic below the seventh grade and concentrate instead on teaching the children to read, to reason and recite" by reporting on books they had read and incidents they had seen.  The children were no longer made to struggle with long-division.  "For some years,"  Mr. Benezet went on, "I had noticed that arithmetic had been too dull and almost chloroform the child’s reasoning faculties."

Over the years numbers crept into children’s experience, Mr. Benezet said.  They learned to deal with "halves" and "doubles," with estimates of size, with a natural development of multiplication tables and slowly, with formal arithmetic.
Mr. Benezet concluded that children who had not been dragged into early but only dimly understood mathematics eventually outdistanced those who had.  Literacy in English and a capacity to think independently and to speak and write clearly helped may to do well in mathematics, too.

…In the traditional school climate, Dr. Whitney writes, children’s natural thinking "becomes gradually replaced by attempts at rote learning, with disaster as a result."  In high school, students increasingly say "Just tell me which formula to use," a way of saying "Don’t ask me to think."
Because teachers must "cover the material," Dr. Whitney adds, there is less time to think.  When students are called on , they must answer instantly.  Wrong answers are not discussed.

"Students and teachers are all victims" as national commissions clamor for more mathematics without realizing, Dr. Whitney warns, that they may create less knowledge and more anxiety.  He says it is crucial to stop just learning the rules…

TEACHING THEMSELVES MATH

Lillian Sly (BC), writes:

…I’ve never worried about whether my kids would read; books are too much a part of our life…  The subject that has always given me qualms is math.  I’d never done well in math myself and doubted that I could lead my kids through its tangles.   Basic skills we’ve worked on by playing and scoring scrabble, Gin Rummy, Black-jack, Yahtzee, and Cribbage.  This has worked fairly well, but whenever I’ve tried to explain anything new to Andrew (8), he would get upset.  "That makes no sense!"   He’d refuse to listen to further explanations, becoming more upset, to the point of tears if I persisted.  I didn’t know if he was incompetent, or I was.  He does understand more than he did a year ago, but I don’t  think I can take much credit.  He definitely is not up to grade standard.
A few days ago he picked up one of our unused math texts and opened to some problems on area and volume.  "How do you do this stuff?" I kept my mouth shut expecting his usual angry and disgusted reaction.  Imagine my please surprise when he turned to the first page and started working.  He was up past eleven that night and finished the work on area and volume - 29 pages!  I had read of such things in John Holt’s books, but never thought one of my children would show such initiative.  I was astounded and very proud of Andrew.

This morning I suggested doing a bit more.  He got the text and sat at the table with me.  He hadn’t done one page before the anger showed up.  "There’s no sense in this!"  I tried to explain.  "I can’t understand it!"  The book got put away.
He’d done fine when the only prompting was his own curiosity and desire to learn.  As soon as I stepped in to direct and help him he resented my interference and it became impossible to do any math.  (Andrew has continued to work on his own and is up to page 73.)

Matthew (6) has a good head for numbers and understands more than I give him credit for.  The last time we played Yahtzee he added the column of two-digit numbers one at a time; "22+25=47, 47+15=62, 62+31=93, etc."  It took awhile, but he did it.  He ended with two three-digit numbers to add, 108+156.  He started to write a 2 in the hundreds column.  I jumped in, "No.  Add the ones first and carry, like this…"  "I don’t understand.  Isn’t the answer 264?"  I apologized for butting in and kicked myself.  When he had competently added the two-digit numbers this way, why had I thought the three-digits would be too much for him?…

COMPUTER CAUSES TENSION

Last year we bought our children Scott (16) and Mandy (10) a Commodore Computer.  They set it up in the living room, and from that day forward we never had another peaceful moment.  Scott copied about 20 games from his friend’s computer, and their lives now revolved around the computer games; they had no interest in programming.

My children usually get along very well with one another; rarely do they get into a heated argument.  However, once the computer arrived they argued constantly.  They screamed at one another, called each other names, and even began hitting and kicking.  It was an appalling state of affairs.  Scott would refuse to allow Mandy her turn.  We had them sign agreements stating when and how long their turn would be.  This was a miserable failure because they borrowed each other’s time and Scott even paid Mandy for the use of her time.  Then they would fight over how much time they had borrowed or paid for!
Whenever Scott was using the computer he was completely mesmerized as he sat in front of it.  He heard nothing that was said to him.  His whole focus of existence was what was happening on that monitor.  Nothing else existed for him.
Life went on this way for several months.  My life was filled with tension and anxiety as I spent every waking moment trying to arbitrate the increasingly angry disagreements.  I got caught up in their  fighting and found I was yelling right along with them.  Then one day I asked myself what had become of our peaceful home life and what did I want to do about it?  In a fit of anger I pulled all the plugs out of the wall, put the computer back into the cartons and put everything under my bed, out of sight.

I was not prepared for the response I got from the kids.  I thought they’d beg and cry and plead to have it back.  They never even missed it!  They each asked what I had done with it and then forgot about it.  It was as if I had lifted a burden from them; they seemed relieved that it was gone.
I haven’t been able to put this into perspective.  I would appreciate hearing from anyone who has experienced this problem and any solutions they might suggest.–MARY MAHER

LIVING IN SPAIN

From Suzanne Alejandre (Spain):

Jan. 27  …When people ask me how much Spanish I have learned since I have moved to Spain I always have difficulty answering…How can you say how much of a language you can speak?  Because when you are learning a foreign language there is so much to learn.  I think it is easier to answer the question - How often is your communication with someone successful?  That question I can answer easily because I can see improvement since we first arrived in Spain.  When we first came I would communicate with one word sentences.  I remember being down in the subway station, lost, but I went to a ticket booth and said one word ("La Bonanova" - which was my intended destination).  It worked!  The woman pointed me in the right direction.  Since then I have gone through varying degrees of lengthening my sentence, but the information received has remained the same…
Many of my students ask me, "When will I be able to really speak English?"  When they ask that question, I know that they are on the wrong track and I try to make them see that they should use learning English as a communicative tool and not for quantifying and marking down how much they know.  the people who score the highest on the silly tests they give here are the people who say the least.
…Ages ago, while we were still living in Germany, I wrote and told of having made a cross stitch project for Niko.  I think he was 6 at the time.  After I finished making the design for him, he didn’t work on it, but a few months later I showed how and he did some… When we unpacked here he put it up on his shelf and may have worked on it once or twice.  One of these times Lee asked to have a project and I designed a canvas for him also.  Well, I bought a standup hoop (it even has a little case to hold the extra thread and scissors) and Niko has been working steadily on his project.  Lee now has the hoop that Niko had, but I am going to buy another standup hoop this week so that he can have one too - they make the work so much easier since both - hands are free to work.  I will let you know any further developments…

March 13 …No official seems to care what we are doing in Spain!  I think the reason is that private schools are still flourishing here, in fact, private schools are it for those who want a "good" job.  So, there is no check of who is enrolled in the public school and who in the private school.  The bureaucratic system is such a mess in Spain (completely disorganized) that, by the time they got around to sending you a notification of matriculation, your child would already have children!  The people that we have told about homeschooling have never batted an eye as long as they know that they are "enrolled" in a correspondence school.  The "diploma" is like a ticket to heaven her  - overwhelmingly important…

Lately, Lee has been translating things he says.  For example, he was looking for his slippers the other day and he said to me, "I can’t find them .  No puedo encontrarlos.  I cant find them."  He likes the sound of the Spanish but usually he says the English too - sometimes with Richard he only says the Spanish but with me it is usually both.

And I learned the word "ensaimada"  Many people learn vocabulary words by memorizing lists or dialogues or whatever.  Since I live here I don’t have time for such things and I insist on learning by experience and necessity.   An ensaimada is a kind of pastry treat - as far as I know there is nothing comparable in the States.  For the year and a half that we have lived here I have always resorted to pointing at the bakery, but suddenly I got tired of doing that (they always say the name of what I am asking for but for some reason I can’t make the name stick in my memory).  Anyway, every Saturday Niko has a soccer game (he joined a sports club and loves it) and Lee and I go to watch, but we always stop and buy some buns on the way.  (We watch the game eating ensaimadas and drinking English tea!  - fun, fun.)  So, since this was becoming a tradition I figured it was time to learn the name of those silly buns.  On a Friday, I had class with a young woman who is now more of a friend than a student and I asked her what the buns were called in Spanish - I had her write the name and I memorized it.  But it wasn’t really fixed in my memory until the following day when I asked for them by name in the bakery.  It just so happened there were none to point at in the glass case that day - they were hidden behind the counter and I confidently asked for them!  It was such fun and such a feeling of success - I’ll never forget the word, either!…

Another word that I recently learned was "escaparate."  This word I have not actually used yet but it keeps coming up at Berlitz.  In the picture book that we use there is a picture of a woman looking in a shop window and as long as I remember, Spanish students have always stumbled at this point.  I had often wondered why.  Suddenly, it dawned on me - their word for window is not the same as shop window - so that when I tell them "window" they have a harder time accepting it because they differentiate that from a shop window.  And once I realized that, I realized why shop clerks always looked at me strangely when I talked about something I had seen in their "ventana."  For me a ventana was any old king of window, but the correct word is "escaparate" - I still have to test it out, though - we shall see if I actually remember it!

Niko has started reading in Spanish - with that amazing expression on his face - absolutely sparkling.  A neighbor boy comes to play here regularly (we schedule him in! it is the only way that he can come to play - he is so busy with other activities) and sometimes the boys go up to play in his apartment, and every time they do, they bring back something they have "borrowed."  Two days ago it was a book (in Spanish, of course).  And today, Niko started reading parts to Lee!  He has read only two word combination s so far, "Mire, jefe," etc., but he is enjoying himself.

…I overheard Niko and Lee talking the other day.  Niko was explaining the difference between AM and PM to Lee.  I had no idea that Niko knew the difference, but at some time he picked it up…

April 3 …GWS #49 must have some interesting comments by me in it!  We probably won’t receive it for another month or two, but we have received a lot of letters from other GWS readers lately…  One woman who wrote just wanted information and tips for living and working in Germany.  She and her family are considering such a short term stay (3 months) that I don’t think anything that I wrote to her will really be of any help.  Three months is not long enough to live in a foreign country.  From our experience and from other ex-patriots who we have talked to, three years is about the minimum.  The first year is for orienting oneself, the second year is for some experimentation, and the third year is for relaxing and appreciating everything (or hating it and trying to plan how to move!).
…Niko and Lee are writing letters right now, also.  Niko recently celebrated his 9th birthday and he has some thank-you notes to work on.  About a month ago he wrote one letter by carefully copying what I had printed from his dictation.  It took him two days but he was very pleased with the results.  First, he copied it in pencil and then he went over it all in black pen.  Niko hasn’t thought yet that he can spell, even though he can read everything that I wrote down for him.  His reading has continued to progress (he is reading some in Spanish now, also) but he has shown no interest in writing or trying to write by sounding things out.  Knowing him as I do, writing any less than an adult just wouldn’t do.  So, I had to think of a way that he could write and it would satisfy him - the copying routine does.

So, the first letter he wrote easily.  He dictated a second letter, however, and it has been sitting on his desk for about three weeks.  Tonight I told him to do it.  Rarely do I insist on any type of academic work but, for me, writing thank-you notes is part of good manners.  And if he doesn’t write the thank-you note I have to and why should I, since it was his gift.  So, one of those instances where more than just Niko is involved arrived and I told him - go!  And work on your letter while I do mine.  I told him to write at least one line - I have a feeling he will finish, though.  This time he has skipped the pencil stage and he is starting right off with pen.  He has been in here three times already for me to help fix up the mistakes - I got four kisses - one for fixing each mistake and one extra for the next mistake!

Lee, meanwhile, is also writing a letter.  He is copying the same letter that Niko is - thanking grandma for a present that Niko received!  Lee is a nut sometimes - so innocent and happy.

For the last two days we have been playing "school."  I have had some free time in the early afternoon and for some reason I asked the boys if they wanted to do that.  All it means is that we write problems or words or something on their chalkboard and then they solve them or copy or read or whatever.  One time long ago we started the "game" because I told them I could show them what "real" school was like.  I told them to sit at their desks.  I told them they couldn’t talk, couldn’t chew gum, etc. - they laughed and laughed because I did it all in my old "teacher" voice.  So, from time to time we have done it again, but by now it is more for practicing things than for the boys to hear by old teacher voice.
Today we did addition, subtraction (including borrowing) and the beginning of multiplication plus a little fractions.  Lee watched it all, but his problems included one digit addition and subtraction.  Yesterday, after doing addition and subtraction, I asked Niko if he wanted to see something new - usually that is a tense time.  When he sees something new and unfamiliar it makes him nervous, but as he gets older he can handle it more and more (or maybe I have learned to be extremely casual).  So I made a chart from 1 to 5 across and 1 to 5 down (multiplication chart) but I didn’t fill in any of the numbers.  As soon as I started writing, Niko said, "Oh, I know that already!"  He was thinking of the addition chart.  But I pointed to the x and then he saw that it might be different.  I asked him if he wanted to fill it in or should I.  he said that he would.  After a few examples (which he thought were stupid, but helped him think of the answer - for example, there are 3 boys with 2 legs each - I knew he knew that because about two years ago he voluntarily made that observation to me while he was looking down at some kids from atop a jungle gym), he was able to fill in all the answers.  After that I showed him a problem with 2 digits times 1 digit and then we stopped.  So, today I mixed in some 1 digit x 1 digit problems with the same numbers but addition (2 x 3 and also 2+3) and he had no problem.

Niko just came in and used up that fourth kiss and claimed that writing the letter was easy and he is planning to just finish it so that he can mail it tomorrow!  Lee stopped writing to play Legoland and I am going to stop typing to go and make dinner…

HOSTING AN EXCHANGE STUDENT

From Toots Weier (WI):

…We applied to host an AFS student for the upcoming school year.  We thought we would be readily accepted as there are no other families in the area interested.  We met and spoke with a couple of members of the adult AFS chapter, who became very interested and impressed with our homeschooling - although at first they were horrified!  They gave us very good recommendations as a host family.

From there it went to the school board - and that’s where things started to stir!  The school board did not approve, and it was suggested another family to be found to host.  I was sure the reason was because we are homeschooling, although I could not seem to find this out from anyone.  Certainly, the AFS student would have to attend the local public high school, but I did not see any reason we should be discriminated against, just because we homeschool!
After a couple of phone calls, we chose to meet with the principal.  He was very cordial and not at all antagonistic about homeschooling as I was expecting.  He barely mentioned it (and so all my preparation to answer questions were unnecessary!).  He relayed the concern of the school board, which basically was "if we were not involved in the public schools, how supportive would we be of our AFS student being involved in such things as extra-curricular activities."  We assured him of our sincerity in wanting to host an AFS student, as well as encouraging the student to be involved.   Just because we want to have our children home, does not mean we would discourage our AFSer from being involved in the community!  I expressed my personal feelings, such as, "Just because we homeschool does not mean that we are oddballs, or that we can’t or shouldn’t fit into society."

Once we expressed our sincerity to the principal, he was satisfied and the meeting was very brief.  (I was doing most of the talking or we could have been in and out of there in about two minutes!)  As we left his office, he was again very cordial, spoke to our children very kindly and welcomed us to look around the school, which we did.  The next day I received a call stating that the school board had met the night before, and accepted the principal’s recommendation.
We have since heard from the national headquarters that we have been "accepted" as a host family, and we are looking forward to having a foreign student in our home…
[DR: for info on hosting an exchange student, contact AFS INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE PROGRAMS http://www.afs.org/AFSI/.

LANGUAGE TUTOR FOR YOUNGSTERS

Jo-Anne Beirne of Australia sent us an article she wrote for the New South Wales Homeschooling Newsletter, 5/86:

…From the age of 18 month we have had our children taught languages by a foreign native speaker. I would highly recommend it to anyone thinking of doing the same.  They have learned to read and speak German and Cantonese.  Ideally I would have chosen Mandarin and Arabic because of the completely different writing and speech skills involved.  However, it was more important that they liked the person who taught them, so that the language learning would not  be a chore.  It was also very important that the teacher be open to my recommendations in respect to my children.

When to start?  Anytime you feel  happy enough to let someone else become good friends with your child.  (I often used to be quite jealous when I saw their eyes light up at the arrival of Angelika.)  I found it really helps to show how interested you are by sticking around and at least attempting the language yourself.

…How to start?  Advertise in your local paper….  All the universities have work notice boards.  You can ring them up, word you ad over the phone, and they will place it for you.  I had 20 replies to my first such ad.  (Not all good.)  Even the supermarket notice-board should be considered.  The ad could say:  "Wanted - special, warm, loving person who relates well to children.  Must be native born speaker (still speaking own language regularly) who speaks any of these languages: (list).  Aim: To help children (list  ages) to enjoy your language through reading, singing, talking and playing in my home, supervised by me."

…Ask questions such as 1) "Can you sing, and do you know lots of your childhood nursery rhymes?" (Kids seem to love these in any language.)  2)"Where were you born?" (Have a map handy.)  3) "Tell me more about yourself." (University degree, number of children, etc.) 4) "These are the hours that suit me, can you come then?"
Don’t be despondent at first if they all seem awful, just keep trying.  Be prepared to accept your second or third language choice (any language is better than none).  Don’t be intimidated by the pushy ones, and if the first question they ask is "What is the remuneration?" hang up, from experience they are hopeless.

Have at least one interview with each one and even a try-out with your kids, remembering that the kids will take about six lessons to really settle in.  When deciding, go with your heart every time.

How does a lesson work?  They should be hoarse when they leave, from talking as often as possible (the teacher that is), not just pointing things out but just generally talking about everything continually and singing so the child gets an ear for the sound of the language.  They shouldn’t just say "nouns" e.g., cat, dog, but rather "It has black fur," "See the green eyes!"  Colorful, simple storybooks should be read to them often, same as you do yourself.
They say a child hears "Mummy" 500 times before s/he ever says it.  So don’t expect results too quickly.  However, I can speak from the very personal experience of the past four years when I say it has been a most memorable and enjoyable experience.  It’s great when Germans mistake your child as coming from Stuttgart (the birthplace of their teacher).  Better than that, I am vaguely understandable in both languages myself…

FRENCH IMMERSION SCHOOL

From Maureen Parker (BC):

1985:  Our school district offers a French immersion program which I have heard is very good.  We know a little girl in the program and I’m very impressed with her vocabulary and accent.  I believe the ability to speak another language would be an invaluable skill, especially in a bilingual country like Canada.  I worry that by keeping the girls out of school I may be depriving them of an enjoyable experience…

1986:  I asked teacher friends of mine what they thought of French immersion.  Both replied that they would not put their own children in such a program.  One remarked that French immersion was beneficial to only a very few students - those who received a lot of enrichment at home.  For the average 5-year-old in kindergarten the new and stressful experience of school and the frustration of suddenly having to learn a new language were too much.  Discipline problems are rampant, according to these teachers.  The children vent their frustrations on each other and the teacher.  Furthermore the kids are being turned off French and most do not speak it at all once they have left the classroom.  One friend substituted in a French classroom and finally in desperation asked the students to settle down, in English.  The kids taunted her, chanting "You spoke English."  Hardly a healthy situation for learning to love and appreciate another language.  I do know a little girl in the French immersion program who seems to be doing well (her French is lovely) but this is not without a price.  Her mother tells me she comes home tired and irritable most days.  She also gets teased a lot for bringing nutritious food for her lunch.  I have ruled out French immersion for my two girls…

SIGN LANGUAGE FOR EVERYONE

From Alison Parra in Mexico:

…Stephanie Judy (BC) wrote in GWS #48 about her use of American sign language with her daughter…  I was really pleased to read her letter, as it echoes a strongly held belief of mine that all of us as parents should be doing the same with our children.

…I really believe the world would be a lot better place if hearing children automatically learned some sign so that they, as adults, could accept and discover their Deaf neighbors…  Having worked for the past seven years as an interpreter and educator to the Deaf, I see clearly that their biggest obstacle is the attitude of the majority of hearing people towards them.

…I will never forget when, at two weeks old, our daughter first caught sight of her father signing to me.  She literally tracked his hands with wide eyes, craning her neck as he walked around the room signing.  This was my first baby, and I had believed all the books that said "By six weeks you can put up a mobile over the crib for baby to begin focusing on."  The intensity with which she watched our signs from the start proved our hands to be as fascinating (and much more portable) a focal point, and that she was seeing much earlier than I’d been lead to believe…  I believe babies’ desire to know and intelligence are already fully functioning from birth; so why not make our language that much more accessible from the start?

…My husband is deaf and I am not.  Our baby was also born hearing.  In our home she was, naturally, always exposed to both Sign and Voiced language.  She signed her first words a few weeks before she spoke her first words, and words have been tumbling off her fingers and lips ever since.  It was after watching her I began to realize the advantages in access to language she had.  And how she enjoys it!  By age 2 her tiny hands were fingerspelling the alphabet as well as being able to sign most of her verbal vocabulary.  By age 3 she could write on paper, read and sign the full alphabet, numbers 1 to 10, and spell small words - cat, van, friends’ names, etc…

SESAME STREET SIGN LANGUAGE FUN  was our daughter’s favorite book from age 15 months on.  It includes lots of drawings of Sesame Street characters, and photos of a real person making the signs…
THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF THE DEAF publishes several colorful children’s posters of the Manual Alphabet featuring animals and objects (whose name begins with the corresponding letter) demonstrating each sign. http://www.nad.org/site/pp.asp?c=foINKQMBF&b=91587

MIQUON MATH CHART USEFUL

In an article about math that Susan Richman wrote for Western PA Homeschoolers, #16:

…At times we’ve used the "Miquon Mathlab Materials" just as another resource, one choice among many.  Jesse (8) would dip into them as he pleased, not worrying about doing the work "in order."  This was fine for a while, but left him unable to understand some ideas that had been built up over time.  Sometimes I’d suggest specific pages to him, either because I thought he’d find them especially intriguing or because they covered something I felt he ought to be learning about.

At first we didn’t notice or use a nice feature about the books.  There’s a chart on the back cover listing all the pages in the book by categories - multiplication, addition, inequalities, fractions, mapping, etc., with little boxes for each page number.  I realized that Jesse might work with more concentration in the books if he could mark in on the hart which pages he’d completed.  It would be a way for him to keep track of his own progress, give him a graphic picture of where he’d been and was going, and what to expect ahead.

Using the charts has been a real turn-around.  Jesse loves seeing the boxes get filled in, even began inventing little games about armies advancing and conquering all the new territories as his yellow crayon filled in the boxes for pages completed.  We also began setting goals - I asked Jesse when he hoped to have one book completed, and then to figure out how many pages he’d need to complete daily (not counting weekends) to reach his goal.  For the third book, Jesse set March 1st as his completion goal, found he’d need to do two pages a day for the next month and a half to finish up - and then proceeded to choose on his own to work even on weekends to that he’d surprise us all by finishing up early!  he sometimes decides to do more than two pages if he gets particularly excited by something, but doesn’t use that as a reason to not do math work the next day, although he knows that would be OK by me.  When Jesse completed his book two weeks early he immediately wanted to dive into the next, and is now zooming along in the fourth book (correction - as I’m retyping this he’s finished the fourth book, early, and has begun the fifth).  He is still free to choose which sections of the books he works in, although he is now very diligent about being thorough and doing everything eventually.  He explains that these out of sequence blocks on his chart are surprise raids into enemy territory - we’ve been reading lost of books about the Civil War lately, so you’ll have to excuse the battle imagery!  I do think that his "playing" with the chart shows that he’s found a way, on his own, to transform what might have been dull work into quite exciting play - and his play makes the work his own.
Carol Wilson of Pittsburgh tells me her son, Luke, also enjoys this goal setting, chart-filling with the Miquon books.  They seem to like perhaps, having everything out in the open, a clear agenda they can understand, and have a share in shaping and pacing.  I know, too, it helps Jesse to know that a number of our homeschooling friends also use these books.  He likes hearing how other kids are doing with them…

MATHEMATICIAN KNOCKS SCHOOLS

From "Learning Math By Thinking" by Fred M. Hechinger, the New York Times, 6/10/86:

…Dr. Hassler Whitney, a distinguished mathematician at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, says that for several decades mathematics teaching has largely failed.  He predicts that the current round of tougher standards and longer hours threatens to "throw great numbers, already with great math anxiety, into severe crisis."

Dr. Whitney has spent many years in classrooms, both teaching mathematics and observing how it is taught, and he calls for an end to what he considers wrongheaded ways.

Long before school, he says, very young children "learn in manifold ways, at a rate that will never be equaled in later life, and with no formal teaching. " for example, they learn to speak and communicate, and to deal with their environment.  Yet the same children find much simpler things far more difficult as soon as they are formally taught in school.

Learning mathematics, Dr. Whitney says, should mean "finding one’s way through problems of new sorts, and taking responsibility for the results."
"This has been completely forgotten" in most schools, he finds.  "The pressure is now to pass standardized tests.  This means simply to remember the rules for a certain number of standard exercises at the moment of the test and thus ’show achievement.’  This is the lowest form of learning, of no use in the outside world."

Dr. Whitney, in a recent report in the Journal of Mathematical Behaviour recalled an experiment begun in 1929 by L.P. Benezet, then superintendent of schools in Manchester, N.H.  Mr. Benezet was distressed over eighth graders’ poor command of English and their inability to communicate ideas.
"In the fall of 1929,"  he wrote in 1935, "I made up my mind to try an experiment of abandoning all formal instruction in Arithmetic below the seventh grade and concentrate instead on teaching the children to read, to reason and recite" by reporting on books they had read and incidents they had seen.  The children were no longer made to struggle with long-division.  "For some years,"  Mr. Benezet went on, "I had noticed that arithmetic had been too dull and almost chloroform the child’s reasoning faculties."

Over the years numbers crept into children’s experience, Mr. Benezet said.  They learned to deal with "halves" and "doubles," with estimates of size, with a natural development of multiplication tables and slowly, with formal arithmetic.
Mr. Benezet concluded that children who had not been dragged into early but only dimly understood mathematics eventually outdistanced those who had.  Literacy in English and a capacity to think independently and to speak and write clearly helped may to do well in mathematics, too.

…In the traditional school climate, Dr. Whitney writes, children’s natural thinking "becomes gradually replaced by attempts at rote learning, with disaster as a result."  In high school, students increasingly say "Just tell me which formula to use," a way of saying "Don’t ask me to think."
Because teachers must "cover the material," Dr. Whitney adds, there is less time to think.  When students are called on , they must answer instantly.  Wrong answers are not discussed.

"Students and teachers are all victims" as national commissions clamor for more mathematics without realizing, Dr. Whitney warns, that they may create less knowledge and more anxiety.  He says it is crucial to stop just learning the rules…

TEACHING THEMSELVES MATH

Lillian Sly (BC), writes:

…I’ve never worried about whether my kids would read; books are too much a part of our life…  The subject that has always given me qualms is math.  I’d never done well in math myself and doubted that I could lead my kids through its tangles.   Basic skills we’ve worked on by playing and scoring scrabble, Gin Rummy, Black-jack, Yahtzee, and Cribbage.  This has worked fairly well, but whenever I’ve tried to explain anything new to Andrew (8), he would get upset.  "That makes no sense!"   He’d refuse to listen to further explanations, becoming more upset, to the point of tears if I persisted.  I didn’t know if he was incompetent, or I was.  He does understand more than he did a year ago, but I don’t  think I can take much credit.  He definitely is not up to grade standard.
A few days ago he picked up one of our unused math texts and opened to some problems on area and volume.  "How do you do this stuff?" I kept my mouth shut expecting his usual angry and disgusted reaction.  Imagine my please surprise when he turned to the first page and started working.  He was up past eleven that night and finished the work on area and volume - 29 pages!  I had read of such things in John Holt’s books, but never thought one of my children would show such initiative.  I was astounded and very proud of Andrew.

This morning I suggested doing a bit more.  He got the text and sat at the table with me.  He hadn’t done one page before the anger showed up.  "There’s no sense in this!"  I tried to explain.  "I can’t understand it!"  The book got put away.
He’d done fine when the only prompting was his own curiosity and desire to learn.  As soon as I stepped in to direct and help him he resented my interference and it became impossible to do any math.  (Andrew has continued to work on his own and is up to page 73.)

Matthew (6) has a good head for numbers and understands more than I give him credit for.  The last time we played Yahtzee he added the column of two-digit numbers one at a time; "22+25=47, 47+15=62, 62+31=93, etc."  It took awhile, but he did it.  He ended with two three-digit numbers to add, 108+156.  He started to write a 2 in the hundreds column.  I jumped in, "No.  Add the ones first and carry, like this…"  "I don’t understand.  Isn’t the answer 264?"  I apologized for butting in and kicked myself.  When he had competently added the two-digit numbers this way, why had I thought the three-digits would be too much for him?…

COMPUTER CAUSES TENSION

Last year we bought our children Scott (16) and Mandy (10) a Commodore Computer.  They set it up in the living room, and from that day forward we never had another peaceful moment.  Scott copied about 20 games from his friend’s computer, and their lives now revolved around the computer games; they had no interest in programming.

My children usually get along very well with one another; rarely do they get into a heated argument.  However, once the computer arrived they argued constantly.  They screamed at one another, called each other names, and even began hitting and kicking.  It was an appalling state of affairs.  Scott would refuse to allow Mandy her turn.  We had them sign agreements stating when and how long their turn would be.  This was a miserable failure because they borrowed each other’s time and Scott even paid Mandy for the use of her time.  Then they would fight over how much time they had borrowed or paid for!
Whenever Scott was using the computer he was completely mesmerized as he sat in front of it.  He heard nothing that was said to him.  His whole focus of existence was what was happening on that monitor.  Nothing else existed for him.
Life went on this way for several months.  My life was filled with tension and anxiety as I spent every waking moment trying to arbitrate the increasingly angry disagreements.  I got caught up in their  fighting and found I was yelling right along with them.  Then one day I asked myself what had become of our peaceful home life and what did I want to do about it?  In a fit of anger I pulled all the plugs out of the wall, put the computer back into the cartons and put everything under my bed, out of sight.

I was not prepared for the response I got from the kids.  I thought they’d beg and cry and plead to have it back.  They never even missed it!  They each asked what I had done with it and then forgot about it.  It was as if I had lifted a burden from them; they seemed relieved that it was gone.
I haven’t been able to put this into perspective.  I would appreciate hearing from anyone who has experienced this problem and any solutions they might suggest.–MARY MAHER

CHARADES INSTEAD OF T.V.

Also by Jo-Anne Beirne:

…Having read several of Ivan Illich’s books including DESCHOOLING SOCIETY, I have become more aware of the amount of what he calls processed communication in our lives.  Everything we see on television, hear on the radio or stereo, or even read in a book has been processed for the medium by others apart from the originator.  Unprocessed communication is personal conversation, a letter, making music together, etc.  I thought that my children indeed are surrounded by a good deal of processed communication.  They watch television, listen to tapes, and read or are read to.

So, as I had three children staying for a fortnight besides my own, I thought I’d try these well-established television addicts on a game of Charades.  This game, for those of you who have forgotten or never knew, is a pantomime game where individuals act out words, phrases, proverbs, or nursery rhymes and the audience guesses what it is.  As thinking what to do can be the hardest part of charades, I made about 50-60 slips of paper with proverbs, etc., on them and the children picked them out of a bowl.

The children really enjoyed it and wanted to keep playing long after I was sated with the game.  Something I noticed was the lack of ideas when they first started playing.  One of the children would do one action for his word over and over again, all the while shaking his head as we futilely tried to guess what he was doing.  When he finally had to tell us, he did so with triumph, and one of the other kids said, "We are supposed to guess." Anyway, despite this, it was fun and the television addicts decided to skip "Neighbors" and "It’s a Knock-out" to play…

THINKING ABOUT TESTS

People often call us about the subject of standardized tests.  Sometimes they are looking ahead to the time when their children may be tested; or, more sadly, they may find themselves in the middle of a dispute with their local school officials about the matter.  Based on these conversations, I’ve jotted down a list of questions that any homeschooling family should be prepared to think about and find answers to.

Legal requirements.  What do the laws and regulations of your state say, if anything, about tests required of homeschoolers?  Get a copy of the actual law to read for yourself, through a library, the state government, or homeschooling group.  Anything that is not specifically required by law is open to negotiation between you and the officials.

Preparing for the tests.  What is the brand name of the test that will be used?  For what subjects?  Will the school give you a sample of the test beforehand, or whatever other preparation materials that are available to classroom teachers?  Can you get samples or copies elsewhere, such as through test preparation books, test supply catalogs, university curricula libraries, homeschooling programs?
Testing conditions:  Exactly where and when is the child to be tested?  At home, at a school?  In what room?  Will s/he be tested individually or in a group?  What distractions are present?  Who is to administer the test?  If not the parent, must it be a school employee, or can it be an agreed-upon third party (former teacher, psychologist, etc.)?  Can the parent be present, and if so, under what restrictions?  Who else is to be present?  How long will testing sessions last?

Results:  When will the test results be available?  Can parents see the actual scored test or will they just get a number?  Is the score a percentile or other measure?  What will be done with the results?  Will the school keep them on record?  What is to be done if the child scores low?  How is "low" defined, and what constitutes "progress"? - DR

UNSUPERVISED ART

Still more from Jo-Anne Beirne:

…I always wanted my kids to be able to draw and paint.  It always seemed to me to be a most enjoyable way to relieve stress and tension and express oneself.  it’s had to pick this skill up as an adult, and it was becoming hard for them to pick it up as kids with me around.  I used, reluctantly though dutifully, to get out the large tubes of paint, raincoats, paper, etc., trying to limit the "On the paper" warnings, etc., but it never worked.  They ran out of energy before I did, even the muddle-puddle messes of finger painting, and they probably hated the clean up.

So for nearly 12 months I didn’t do anything, while feeling more and more guilty.  They didn’t draw much on their own accord and my encouragement seemed to result in backward steps, so without knowing it I did a "John Holt" or just let them go.

Then, on purchase of a new large set of Derwent pencils and finding a palette box of all color poster paints, their interest raised of its own accord.  Becky (4) was extremely satisfied with the people she was able to draw.  They had everything she had noticed on people, and she pick up much confidence from drawing dozens of them which  became mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters, depending on the size of the circle she drew for the head.

Gregory (6), on the other hand, only wanted to draw knights on horses; a tall order for a novice!  The frustration he felt in not getting the picture in his head on to the paper was unable to be met by any suggestions from me; tears and anger were his main reactions.  After a while though, with all the blank paper and the 16 choices of colors, he just found how much he enjoyed it.

It took two minutes to put palettes, water, brushes, and cloth on the table, and I was able to shut the door for an hour and go away leaving the two to paint in peace.  It seems to add to their independence, enjoyment, and naturalness.
The results of these unsupervised forays into art still delight and amaze me.  Each child produces perhaps ten paintings each and seems to refine and add to his own repertoire each time.  Gregory went from crowns, swords, armor (no body), to knights and now knights on horses jousting from many angles.  Rebecca’s people now have clothes and eyebrows with the body first drawn underneath.  They set themselves tasks, advancing from easy to hard and achieve satisfaction from their own actions…

HOW TO MAKE BOOKS

[DR:]  Andrea Kelly-Rosenberg (ME) asked, "Do you have any information about how to make nice sewn books at home; something a step above the stapled variety?  I remember seeing a book years ago about how to do it very nicely, but I can’t find anything about it now, and I know both Noah and Laura would enjoy having their words and pictures bound."

I sent her question to the Kent family (TX) who have been printing and making books for some years now.  Carol Kent replied:

…The best book we have found is by Harvey Weiss, HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN BOOKS     (Crowell: New York, 1974; 71pp illus.), which is a juvenile book held by most public libraries.  Aside from a small book press, we don’t use any equipment that you wouldn’t find around the house or in a crafts store.  I wrote out a description of some simple books for you, which we use a lot.  You can either make books for children to write in, or make a stack of folded papers to put together after the child is finished.

Harvey Weiss shows simple sewing.  Putting together books with sewn signatures is pretty complicated and time-consuming.  The quickest book you can imagine and a delight for tiny children is to take a piece of cloth or colored paper, stack a few sheets of paper on top of it, sew it down the middle with a longstitch on the sewing machine and fold it in half…
Two more simple books:
(1)  Fold a strip of paper like an accordion.  Wrap a heavier piece of paper around it, and paste the flaps so the cover won’t slip off.

(2)  For a book with more pages, cut many sheets of paper the same size and fold them in half:

Hold the stack together with rubber bands and squeeze it between a couple of bricks with the folds up:

Pour Elmer’s glue thickly over the folds, so that all the folded edges will be glued together.  Make a jacket of heavy paper, or cut three pieces of light cardboard or index cards the right size to cover the book:

Glue the boards on a piece of colored paper with about 1/8" between them:

cut down the colored paper, trim the corners, and glue the edges over the cardboard:

Fold the cover around the book and paste it to the first and last page.

DICTATING STORIES

From Susan Stickney:

…I can’t say enough in favor of writing down stories John (6) dictates to me.  We have been doing this for a couple of years now and his creativity is truly amazing!

I do not correct his grammar when he dictates to me.  Sometimes when he tells me a sentence or two the idea will be just forming in his mind, and the sentence will not be very clear or grammatically correct.  I have found if I write and say aloud what he has said, and then pause at the spot which could be clearer, he will volunteer a better way of saying what he has in mind.  It is amazing to me how this works.  He knows it takes me a little while to write what he is telling me, and he can get ahead of me with his sentences, and as far as he is concerned I am pausing because I can’t remember exactly what he has said.  So there is never negative feedback when his ideas are flowing.

It is so rewarding to resist with all your might the temptation to suggest ideas or directions for the story.  The reward is seeing how 6-year-olds look at things, think about things, and put them together, in their own (or as my son says, "very own same") way…
_____

[SS:]  This reminds me of the time I spent two years ago with a four-and-a-half year old boy, L., a very strong-willed and angry little boy generally considered "difficult" by the people around him.  He loved to tell stories about his stuffed bear, Pandy, and would tell them to anyone who would listen.  (Most people wouldn’t.)

One day when his mother was busy packing boxes for their upcoming move and he was being particularly irritating, I said, "come upstairs with me. "  "What for?" he asked.  "Come with me and see," I suggested.  As soon as we were upstairs I took out a piece of paper and said to him, "OK, tell me a Pandy story and I’ll write it down."  A strange look of fascination came over his face.  Did I really mean I would write down whatever he said?  I did.  He proceeded to tell me a long, detailed story, spilling out words faster than I could get them down.  When I had to I’d stop him and say, "Wait, writing takes longer than talking."  He’d be respectfully silent until I said ready.  He tested me by saying "dirty" words and I put them in the story like any other.  I was determined to show him that I’d write down whatever he said.

When he was finished I said, "Should we type it now?" and pointed to the typewriter in the corner.  I learned later that he’d never seen a typewriter before, but he agreed immediately.  I let him turn it on, roll the paper in, set the margin.  Then I said, "OK, do you want to type the story or should I?"  Again the look of amazement .  I could almost see him realize that somehow, in some way he could only just barely glimpse, we were going to put his words onto that paper by pressing those buttons.  He said "Me."

So I held the sheet with the handwritten story in front of us, and pointed to the first letter, "T."  He pushed it.  And so we continued for a full paragraph.  Each time I asked him if he was growing bored or wanted me to do it he shook his head, no.  I was amazed - would I have the patience to do something which was for me so tedious?  L. did not, at that time, know the names of the letters or even, I don’t think, that they stand for sounds (though he may have inferred this from our work, I’ll never know) so there was really no way for him to gain typing speed - he was thoroughly dependent on me to tell him which letter to push next.  And yet he kept at it, and pushed each key ever so gently, with such respect, even grace.  I noticed that after a while he began to be aware of pushing the same key repeatedly - to notice they more frequent letters.  He said, "Why are we pushing these so much?" and I told him, "Because your story uses those letters a lot."  I wanted to keep him aware of the relationship between his story and what we were doing.

When he finally did grow tired asked me to type a bit, I said aloud what I was typing, also to keep this relationship in our minds.  At one point he said, "How come I can’t do it that fast?" and I replied, "Well, you haven’t worked with these letters as long as I have."  There was no way to disguise how much faster I was able to type and no way to pretend I wasn’t the one with the mysterious knowledge of which letter to push, but I tried to make it seem like this was a simple thing he too could learn.  From then on he asked me if we could go type every time he saw me.  If I said I didn’t feel like it then but would do it at a particular late time he’d remember to ask me at exactly that time.

Once we went for a walk and when he grew tired of walking, I said we could look at all the things around us and maybe get an idea for something to write about.  He didn’t say anything for a while but then said, "I know what my next story will be about."  "What?" I asked.  "A duck and a baby duck."   I said, "Oh, how did you think of that?"  He answered, "Because I saw a duck once and I thought that I would write about it."

INTERESTED IN CURSIVE

From Gloria Harrison (Spain)

…According to Montessori, the sensitive period for learning handwriting occurs around ages 4 1/2 to 5 1/2.  At the time, the child will WANT to learn to write, because he sees adults around him doing so.  And if the adults around him are writing in cursive, that is what he will want to learn.  I would like to illustrate this with my own personal experience:

When my first daughter, Elizabeth, was 4 1/2, we were in England at the time, and she was attending infant school (kindergarten)…  The school was starting to teach the children to print.  Elizabeth was uninterested, but demanded of me that I teach her to write cursive.  I blithely obliged, and she enthusiastically started writing short notes in cursive to me and everybody.  Two weeks later, I received a short, terse note from her teacher, informing me almost rudely that cursive was NOT to be taught before 3rd grade, and would I please refrain from confusing my child.  In those days, I thought that "teacher knows best," so I explained to Elizabeth that she had better abandon cursive for a while and learn to write the way her teacher wanted.  From that day onwards, Elizabeth gradually lost interest in writing.  Her handwriting became messy and careless, and later, when we moved to the States and she learned cursive in 3rd grade, it was practically illegible.  Even now, although much improved after 3 years of homeschooling , it is still erratic.  However, I have told her that as long as it is legible and reasonably neat, I don’t mind how she shapes her letters.
With my second daughter, Antonia, things turned out differently.  When Antonia also showed a desire to write at around age 4 1/2 or 5, I provided her with the D’Nealian workbooks from Scott, Foresman (GWS #23).  She loved them.  She whizzed through the Kindergarten and 1st grade books in order to start on the 2nd grade workbook, where cursive proper starts.  What she and I liked so much about the D’Nealian books is that they start out by teaching a form of printing which makes the transition to cursive effortless.  All the lines are smooth, easy curves.  No "circles and sticks."  The cursive is simple and pleasant to the eye.  Antonia is now 8, and loves to write, because at the appropriate moment, when SHE requested it, she was given a tool - handwriting - which enabled her to put her thoughts down on paper…

Incidentally, my almost 2-year-old twins love to scribble.  But they prefer to scribble on paper that already has writing on it rather than blank paper, almost as if they want to copy the writing (is that perhaps why toddlers love to scribble in library books?)  So I give them used exercise books that have been discarded by my older daughters.  I attribute this interest in the written word so early in life to the fact that all morning long, they see their older sisters writing and reading…

READS - WHEN NO STRESS

From a Florida reader:

…A year and a half ago when we spent two months in England, we lived with my mother and it just seemed that life was too interesting so spend several hours a day doing Calvert and the stress on us became too great so we shelved it!  That was when Daniel’s (8) reading really took off.  One morning he wouldn’t budge from a Secret Seven book by Enid Blyton (similar to Hardy Boys, I think, but perhaps a little younger in style), we called and called him but he was so immersed in his reading that he couldn’t even stop for breakfast or anything!  I felt it was a true breakthrough and it was brought on by a lack of stress in any form…

THE STAGES IN READING

[DR:]  Recently in a conversation with Kit Finn (VA), I said that some parents feel their child "can’t read" even when the child can read something.  Kit later sent her thoughts about the stages of learning to read:

…First the child has to know what reading is all about.  The schools don’t pay any attention to this generally.  But if the skill is to have any meaning at all, this has to come.  And obviously it will come first if the learning is self-directed.

Then there comes a point where the child knows most or all of the alphabet and can recognize some words - names, signs, labels.  This produces a lot of excitement from the parent if the kid is young.  As you said, the child is reading.  This is where Corries (4) is now.  The child is also likely to be very excited and sure they can read.  Nothing on the page looks unfamiliar and mysterious any more.  However, it is also indubitably true that the child hasn’t yet broken the code.  It’s all memory work.  So other parents will react with a more cautious announcement that the child is learning to read.  And if the child is older, his accomplishment may very well be totally discounted with an "all he can do is …"

A later stage is when the child can read the very easy books.  At this point the child has broken the code and will be admitted to be reading by everyone except possibly himself.  Bridget (6) still categorizes herself as learning to read and will point out firmly that she still can’t read a lot of the stuff she’d like to.  And again the adult reaction will range all the way from excitement and pride to an admission that he reads very badly, all depending on the age of the child and the expectations of the adult.
The last stage is fluency.  At this point everyone will agree the child has done it.

children can stall on any stage for a long time.  This can result in a number of excited announcements.  As the child hits each new level of skill, everyone gets excited but then later it doesn’t look so impressive any more and the emphasis gets put on what he can’t do yet.

The late reader can be seen to be in a good deal of danger.  Even if his parents manage to avoid putting on a lot of pressure and wait, they can give away the whole show by reacting with a sigh of relief and "finally."  First of all, an accomplishment is an accomplishment whenever it comes.  The child deserves a little praise.  Also, I don’t know anyone who wouldn’t get discouraged if every new accomplishment was greeted with disappointment.  Who wants to be not good enough all the time?  It takes a lot of determination to keep going in the face of that.

The school authorities will be quite satisfied if the child gets to the point where he can read.  Parents are often more interested in whether the child will read.  It isn’t the same thing.  Michael was 10 or so before he would read anything other than his schoolwork.  he got good grades but we worried because he was still functionally a non-reader.  Now, at 13, he reads for information - computer manuals and science books - but never reads for pleasure.  Danette (7), who learned to read because she wanted to, loves to read and spends hours at it.  She does not read for information.  She reads stories and only stories.  When she wants information she asks questions.  Since both the older two will still listen, we do a lot of reading out loud.  Informative books for Danette, biographies and novels and stories for everyone…

MORE ON READING DRAWBACKS

Penny Barker (OH) sent these quotes from THE DISAPPEARANCE OF CHILDHOOD by Neil Postman:

…But with the printed book another tradition began: the isolated reader and his private eye.  Orality became muted, and the reader and his response became separated from a social context.  The reader retired within his own mind, and from the sixteenth century to the present what most readers have required of others is their absence, or, if not that, their silence.  In reading, both the writer and reader enter into a conspiracy and consciousness.  Reading is, in a phrase, an antisocial act.

[Postman quoted Lewis Mumford:]
"More than any other device, the printed book released people from a greater impression than actual events…  To exist was to exist in print: the rest of the world tended gradually to become more shadowy.  Learning became book-learning…"

[Postman continues:]  …Since the school curriculum was entirely designed to accommodate the demands of literacy, it is astonishing that educationists have not widely commented on the relationship between the "nature of childhood" and the biases of print.

It is sometimes overlooked that booklearning is "unnatural" in the sense that it requires of the young so high a degree of concentration and sedateness that runs counter to their inclinations.  In a world without books and schools, youthful exuberance was given the widest possible field in which to express itself.  But in a world of booklearning such exuberance needed to be sharply modified.  Quietness, immobility, contemplation, precise regulation of bodily functions, became highly valued…  The natural inclinations of children began to be perceived not only as an impediment to booklearning but as an expression of an evil character…
_____

Gretchen McPherson (CA) writes:

…I encourage the kids to do something besides reading in their free time, because although they have many interests they tend to just settle down with a book since it’s easier than getting started on a carpentry or cooking or building project.  One thing that has helped them is my telling them to make a list of their plans for the day.  Then they had some goals to work toward, goals such as "work on dollhouse furniture" or "sail boats in the ditch."  I know that for myself, reading can be an escape from other things which I should or would be doing but which are just more challenging.  I want the children to have a lot of different experiences besides vicarious ones…
[More on "The Drawbacks of Reading" in GWS #38 & #41.]

MOM’S ROLE IN MUSIC LESSONS

From Amy Barton (IL):

…I’m concerned that people reading GWS will get the impression that all formal music training is bad, and that "good" homeschooling parents studiously avoid involvement with their children’s musical explorations.  We’ve had our share of controlling, authoritarian teachers over the years (only last year did we find the "perfect" teachers, so I could write along letter about teachers!).  And our practicing relationship has been evolving over the years.  But I am happy to report that a child can control her own musical life, can own her music, and simultaneously be involved with a structured music program and have an active practicing Mom.

Lots of things that children "learn on their own" are learned because the child is surrounded by people doing those things; so they have plenty of opportunities to observe and imitate.  We are not surrounded by musicians in my household, however, since we are neither gypsies nor court musicians like the Bachs and Mozarts.  So in our circumstances, it makes sense to me to seek out music schools and teachers and to have structured lessons.
…I was a partner in everything they did.  For example, walking - they’d grab my thumbs and take off.  Eventually they dropped those things, of course.  And it was different than making (or trying to make) them walk.
So I assumed we’d share the adventure when the violin came into our home.  First of all, I was the interpreter between the teacher and Rachel ("Rachel wants to know if you mean X,"  "Chris is saying do Y").  Second, just like I provided thumbs for walking, I became Rachel’s spare memory, her extra hands, eyes, and most important, ears.  I was interested to read last year Ivan Galamian’s idea that very gifted musicians need feedback, because their emotional involvement with their music and their internal singing of their desired performance drowned out hearing their true output.  I used to say, "You sing in you head so loud you don’t hear your violin!" and I still constantly say, "That bit was lovely, did you hear et?" or "Did you hear the scratch?" or just, "Do you hear?"
I never felt that I was interfering, because Rachel wanted me there.  And I am still her extra ears, though I haven’t monitored memory, etc., for a long time.  I offered to hold down fingers, to warn of upcoming dynamics, whatever, and Rachel accepted or not, or came up with strategies of her own that included me or not.  No one ever accused the young Rachel of docility!  So everything that happened with the violin happened because she thought about it and decided.  I wasn’t the boss, but I wasn’t a passive observer either - I very actively sought ways to help her understand, to get her past snags, to increase her sense that she could control her violin in ways she wanted.

An example that might make sense to people not doing music:  When Sarah was 18 months old she announced firmly "No more diapers, baby wants underwear!"  So into underwear she went.  I knew her well enough to know she’d be devastated by an accident, however, so I rearranged our lives so we were home by the toilet for the next few days, and I contrived to keep the subject on top of her mind by cheerfully and frequently commenting on her nice dry underwear!  (Which is different from frequently and anxiously asking "Do you need to go?" or ordering that she try).  So, who was in control of that episode?  I contend that we were a team, with a common goal, and I know that my baby felt in control and was extremely pleased with herself…

NEW BOOKS
ANNE OF GREEN GABLES by L.M. Montgomery In this classic children’s novel, the reader meets and "adopts" 11-year-old Anne Shirley.  Anne, through either fate or mistake, has been sent to live with Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert, a middle-aged sister and brother who have decided to adopt a nice sturdy orphan boy to help with the many chores around their farm.  Matthew Cuthbert is surprised, and Marilla dismayed, when the orphanage sends Anne, an enthusiastic, red-haired chatterbox, instead of a boy.

The quiet and kind Matthew finds an immediate rapport with the talkative Anne.  It takes Marilla a little longer to realize that Anne belongs with them at Green Gables.  Once Marilla decides she wants Anne to stay she sets about Anne’s "bringing-up" often with funny and disastrous results.  Marilla’s practical view of life, filled with maxims for sensible living, does not suit the spirited and spontaneous Anne.  Anne is not a sugar and spice little girl, she is full of vinegar and often because of her temper, pride or imagination finds herself in situations that have quite different endings than the ones she had planned.
Anne is also capable of deep loyalty to her friends.  Many of her adventures involve her best friend Diana.  the following passage will give the reader an idea of Anne’s incredible ability to talk, question and imagine:

"Well, did you find Diana a kindred spirit?" asked Marilla as they went up through the garden of Green Gables.

"Oh, yes," sighed Anne, blissfully unconscious of any sarcasm of Marilla’s part.  "Oh, Marilla, I’m the happiest girl on Prince Edward Island this very moment.  I assure you I’ll say my prayers with a right-good-will tonight.  Diana and I are going to build a playhouse in Mr. William Bell’s birch grove tomorrow.  Can I have those broken pieces of China that are out in the woodshed?  Diana’s birthday is in February and mine is in March.  Don’t you think that is a very strange coincidence?  Diana is going lend me a book to read.  She says it’s perfectly splendid and tremenjusly exciting.  She’s going to show me a place in the woods where rice lilies grow.  Don’t you think Diana has soulful eyes?  I wish I had soulful eyes.  Diana is going to teach me to sing a song called ‘Nelly in the Hazell Dell.’  She’s going to give me a picture to put in my room; it’s a perfectly beautiful picture, she says - a lovely lady in a pale blue silk dress.  A sewing machine agent gave it to her.  I wish I had something to give Diana.  I’m an inch taller than Diana, but she is ever so much fatter; she says she’d like to be thin because it’s so much more graceful, but I’m afraid she only said it to soothe my feelings.  We’re going to the shore someday to gather shells.  We have agreed to call the spring down by the log bridge the Dryad’s Bubble.  Isn’t that a perfectly elegant name?  I read a story once about a spring called that.  A dryad is a sort of grown-up fairy, I think."
"Well, all I hope is that you won’t talk Diana to death," said Marilla.

The author of the book, L.M. Montgomery, spent her childhood on Prince Edward Island, Canada.  She lived with her grandmother in an old farmhouse and as a child wrote poems and stories.  At the age of 12 she won a short story contest sponsored by the Montreal Star.  Her first novel, ANNE OF GREEN GABLES, was published in 1908.  In reading the book, you feel that the author lived through many of the feelings and adventures of the fictional Anne.
Anne, like the best of fiction children, meets life head-on and turns it into an adventure.  She has the spunk of a Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn and the same curiosity Alice had as she followed the white rabbit into wonderland. — CONNIE BERNHARDT

ISHI IN TWO WORLDS by Theodora Kroeber . When Yankee settlers in California repeatedly shot or hanged every Indian they could find, a tiny band, determined not to give up their way of life completely, decided they had only one way to survive.  They had to make the whites think they were dead.  For years, they hid in the mountains, hunting and working in secret.  After the last of his relatives died or disappeared, the lone survivor found he could no longer manage on his own and in 1911, he wandered, near death himself, into a small town.  The sheriff contacted the Museum of Anthropology in San Francisco, and a scholar came who managed to identify Ishi’s language, and who invited him to go to the museum, where Ishi lived for the next five years.

Half of the fascinating book ISHI IN TWO WORLDS describes Ishi’s encounter with the modern world: how it looked to him, what he could accept and not accept, how he made a home for himself there.  he was a gentle and cheerful man, appreciative of matches, unimpressed by machinery, amused by feet deformed by shoes.   Because his anthropologist friends kept detailed records, Ishi has provided our civilization with an unusual opportunity to see ourselves as others see us, as well as a glimpse of the past.

The first half of the book, after Ishi is introduce, traces the history of his people, the Yahi Indians, and how they were forced into hiding - a bitter and bloody story.  You might want to skip this, and read the second half of the book first, about Ishi in San Francisco.  But once you’ve made his acquaintance, you really should go back and read the earlier chapters, and you will appreciate all the more what Ishi went through.  The callousness of the whites, who appeared to think of killing Indians to be the same as killing wild animals, is beyond belief.  Just one example of this attitude.  In 1908, long after the Yahi Indians were presumed dead, a surveying party stumbled across their secret cave, where an ill and elderly woman (Ishi’s mother) lay.  They didn’t kill  her, but they took every scrap of food, tools, basket, etc.,  In the cave - the livelihood of four people - an let the woman there alone.  I grew up in California, and I can tell you that this kind of state history was not taught in school.

The book’s author, Theodora Kroeber, was the wife of the Museum’s curator, Arthur Kroeber, and they were among Ishi’s closest friends.  I can’t resist adding an interesting side note about this family.  Besides Ishi, Arthur and Theodora Kroeber and their four children came to know many other Indians, some of whom visited the family in their Berkeley home.  As the postscript of another book by Theodora Kroeber tells:

    These Indians worked with Mr. Kroeber, dictating to him the words of their language, and telling him the Way of Life of their people.  Many returned year after year to spend some weeks - perhaps their vacation - with the Kroebers.  When work for the day was done, then children and grown-ups played shinny in the old Indian way; or they practiced shooting the bow; or they went swimming; or played croquet.  And in the evening, they sat around the fire and talked and told stories.  Sometimes they sang songs and danced an Indian dance to the accompaniment of a gourd rattle.

How did this mixing of work and play affect the Kroeber children?  Well, I don’t know about the other three, but one grew up to be Ursula K LeGuin!  We carry many books by this award-winning fantasy and science fiction writer in our catalog.

And I’m sure its no coincidence that so often LeGuin writes about living in harmony with nature, or about gentle, vanishing people being conquered by ruthless invaders. - DR

MY FAMILY AND OTHER ANIMALS by Gerald Durrell.  This is another wonderfully funny book by the author of a ZOO IN MY LUGGAGE (available here).  This is an account of five years his family spent on the Greek island of Corfu in the late 1930’s, starting when Durrell was 10 years old.  He tells of his rather wacky family and of his early work in natural history.  In the introduction (he calls it "The Speech for the Defense), he says:

I made a grave mistake by introducing my family into the book in the first few pages.  Having got themselves on paper, they then proceeded to establish themselves and invite various friends to share the chapters.  It was only with the greatest difficulty, and by exercising considerable cunning, that I managed to retain a few pages here and there which I could devote exclusively to animals.

He goes on to say that, as well as he could, he has been accurate - he describes people and events as he saw them then.  he also says that it is of course condensed and perhaps not totally chronological.  From a fairly recent magazine article I read about Durrell, I would say he has indeed been pretty accurate - and his family is indeed wacky.  The article also mentioned that when his father died (before the Corfu trip), he left the family quite a lot of money.  That explains they could move from a small villa in Corfu to a larger one simply because his oldest brother had invited too many guests at once; and why they could move again (to a smaller villa, this time) to avoid a visit from an aunt.
One of the greatest things bout this book is the picture we see of a homeschooled child allowed a great deal of freedom.  Durrell never went to school.  He did have tutors off and on, some helpful, some only to be tolerated.  The tutors soon learned that the only way to get anything across to Gerald was to involve animals: his studies of history included learning the names of all of Hannibal’s elephants; in mathematics, he figured out how many leaves caterpillars might eat; in geography, he made maps with pictures of animals native to each area.  And at one point, when something outrageous had happened with one of his pets and his brother said they should just get rid of all of the animals, since Gerry was probably just "going through a stage," their mother replied that if this was a stage, Gerald had been in it since he was a very tiny child and there were no signs of it letting up, so she supposed he had better be allowed to keep them.

Even when Gerald was studying formally, his exceptionally tolerant mother allowed him time to explore the island, and space to keep quite an array of animals in the house - turtles, lizards, bird, etc.  He describes some very interesting experiences:  catching snakes, recapturing dozens of baby scorpions that got loose during a dinner party, and a gripping battle between a gecko (lizard) and a praying mantis, to name a few.  Durrell was lucky enough to meet up with a naturalist who helped him organize his nature studies and who went out exploring with him.
MY FAMILY AND OTHER ANIMALS is bound to be a favorite - an entertaining book about a homeschooled child and his family (and other animals).

This archive is presented as a service to the homeschooling community by the editors of  Home Education Magazine © 2006 and is reprinted with permission of Holt Associates, Inc., © 2006. (All rights reserved)