Grounding the Helicopter

I made a startling discovery this week. I am a helicopter parent. It pains me to even write that down but it's true. I've always had a certain level of contempt for helicopter parenting, and have congratulated myself more than once on my laid back parenting style. I can let my children play in our woods alone for hours, I very rarely complain about them getting dirty or spreading their toys and projects all over the house, and I allow them a good deal of freedom in choosing their study topics, but I had an experience last week that opened my eyes to other ways that I hover.

Last Monay I started doing "dots" this idea from Kari Brimhall basically involves drawing 5 circles on a piece of paper, each with a different responsibility written (or drawn) in it. You place a penny or other small object on each "dot" (we use flat marbles). When a child has completed that activity they put the marble in a jar. When the jar is full we get to do a fun family activity together. Each of my children earns an extra dot if they finish their chores before 9:00 am. The first morning was AMAZING. The kids got up, and did all their chores without me saying a single word, which made me realize just how much I had been saying. That morning instead of spending an hour running around the house calling out, "go get dressed", "unload the dishwasher", and "did you feed the chickens?" I exercised, read and SAT DOWN to eat my breakfast! It was such a revelation to me that all my hovering was not only unnecessary but a total and complete waste of my time.

I think one of the greatest challenges of being a homeschool mom is not hovering. After all you know exactly what your children are supposed to be doing every hour of the day. You know what chores they need to take care of, what lessons they need to work on and what they were suppose to learn from those lessons. You also know if they're wasting time, and nothing's more infuriating then watching your children waste time! However, letting our children become indendent, responsible people is also one of the greatest gifts we can give them.

I can establish expectations and consequences but I cannot MAKE my children be responsible. Responsibility only comes when there is space to make one's own decisions and learn from the results. That is a hard concept for me to implement, but I am really trying to keep this parenting helicopter grounded!

The Important Things

My neighbors' house burned down today. They spent 3 years building it themselves while they lived in a travel trailer, they finished it a mere three years ago. No one was home, so fortunately there were no injuries. However, she's 8 and 1/2 monthes pregnant with their fourth. My heart ached for them as we watched the smoke pour out.

There's nothing like an unexcepted trajedy to open your eyes to what the important things in your life are. Just last night my husband and I were stressing out about vacation plans. I made the comment, "you know, some people have real problems." How clear that is today.

So now I'm wondering, am I teaching my children the most important things? Am I teaching them everything they need to deal with their own trials? Am I helping them build strong characters? Am I preparing our family to deal with whatever life might send our way? I hope I am, but it's certainly a lot to think about.

An Unexpected Lesson

Organic eggs are expensive. So in an effort to eat healthier and save money I decided we needed to raise our own chickens. My husband wasn’t wild about this idea, but I talked it up all winter. In early spring my daughter and I were at the farm store when we heard a chorus of tiny chirps. We made our way to the back of the store, where we discovered hundreds of tiny chicks. Baby chickens are irresistibly adorable! Next thing I knew we had seven baby chickens in a box on the front seat of the van. The trunk was loaded with feed, chicken grit, animal bedding and a heat lamp.

Impulsive? Maybe a little, but what a great learning opportunity! We learned about the laying qualities and diverse personalities of the different breeds before we left the store. (Some of our chicks will even lay green eggs!) We also discovered first hand where the term “pecking order” comes from. But one of our hardest lessons came shortly after the boys constructed a cardboard brooder in the laundry room. All of the chicks settled into their new home except one. She continued to chirp loudly all day. The next day she wouldn’t open her eyes and she stumbled about on wobbly legs. A call to the farm store confirmed what we feared: that she probably wouldn’t make it. Neither my husband nor I had the nerve to end the chick’s life quickly, so we watched it die slowly over the next couple of days. That was a heartbreaking experience, but high chick mortality rates were only the beginning of all we’ve learned in the last month.

We’ve learned about chicken health, and all about coop design and construction. However, the most unexpected lesson was more personal. I learned that while raising chickens may be common and easy for some people, it was totally overwhelming for me. I read books, consulted friends, talked to experts and searched the Internet, but I still struggled to figure out what I was supposed to do with all these baby birds.

Watching the chicks was so much fun but I muddled my way through much of this experience. As I’ve struggled, I’ve reflected on my children and their own learning process. How many times have I dismissed their complaints about the difficulty of learning something new? Sometimes as an adult it’s hard to remember that long multiplication wasn’t always easy, and writing a five paragraph essay can be very challenging. I’m fairly certain that not everyone needs to get their own chickens, but I do think everyone should try something new and challenging. We all need to be reminded occasionally that learning can be joyous, and it can be difficult!

Taught to Learn

Krystal here. The other night my husband Aaron was telling me about an interesting conversation he'd had with his brother. I invited him to share his thoughts. Here's Aaron:

Early in the morning on New Year's Day, I was taking Kelly, my twin brother, home after he'd celebrated New Year's Eve with us, and we got into a conversation. As we drove, Kelly started telling me about a conversation he'd had with a Mongolian friend. To give a little more background to the conversation, Kelly spent two years abroad in Mongolia where he learned to speak the language. His friend had asked him if he thought he could be of some particular profession (Kelly couldn't recall which), and after thinking for a second, Kelly replied that he could. Thinking that his friend was just curious, Kelly responded with the same answer when the question was repeated with a few different professions. Finally, his friend said, a little exasperated, "You just think you can be anything." To which Kelly replied, a little surprised, that he probably could.

After relating the story to me, Kelly said, "I was thinking, isn't it amazing that our parents have prepared us to become whatever we want to be." Kelly and I are both university students, and Kelly recently put dozens of hours of work into a project for a construction managment competition team. He added, as we were driving, that he was currently in a position to become a construction manager, contractor, architect, industrial designer, graphic designer, or a number of other things. I'm in a similar position, having just finished a Bachelor's degree and currently pursuing a Master's degree in electrical engineering.

It was easy for me to see the same conclusion. With some minor exceptions, I have been given the confidence and education to pursue whatever I choose, and to be succesful at it. I believe I owe that foundation to the many many hours of work my mom put into being our primary educator up through 8th grade, and her continued interest in our educational and professional pursuits.

I think the most important idea is that we were taught to learn; we were shown the value of learning, and now there is no limit to our potential. Krystal and I have the goal to pass this type of educational foundation on to our kids.

Problem Solving

Today a friend, who has kids about the same age as mine, gave me something new to think about. She was telling me how her oldest son (two and a half) is afraid of the dark. When he walks into his room and it's dark and he starts crying, instead of just flipping the light on for him, she goes and stands by him in the dark and calmly asks him what he needs to make it not dark. He thinks, and then says, "Light!" and she says, "Good, now what do you need to be able to turn your light on?" Again he thinks for a minute, and then says excitedly, "Stool!" And runs to get his stool and turns on the light. I assume that eventually he'll be able to think for himself to get his stool to turn on the light, without her guiding him every step.

It had never consciously occurred to me to create or allow opportunities for simple problem solving before. But it makes sense. In some of my readings recently, I've come across a few ideas from Lev Vygotsky, a Russian psychological theorist, who said that the highest levels of learning occur when students are in what he calls the "Zone of Proximal Development" The ZPD is defined as "the zone above the most difficult task the person can do alone and below the most difficult task they can do with help". I'll try to clarify a little using the example of my friend. A two and a half year old is not able to comprehend on his own that when he walks into a dark room and gets scared that he needs to go find a stool and turn the light on. But with the help of his mom walking him through it, he is able to think about going to get the stool and turning the light on. At that point he is in the ZPD, and according to Vygotsky, that is when he will learn the most.

I think what I like most about the idea of giving our children opportunities to practice problem solving is that it doesn't just solve the problem for the kids, but it gives them experience solving their own problems. Which, in turn, will give them confidence to solve bigger problems in the future. If the kids can make it to adulthood with good problem solving skills, they will be so much better off. Trust me, I manage an apartment complex, I deal with plenty of adults who have zero problem solving capabilities. It's sad.

So, I think my new goal is to keep my eyes open for those little opportunities where I can help Scientist to solve his own problems. Wish me luck!

Learner's Block?

Is there such a thing as learner's block? If there is, I feel like my family has a very bad case of it right now. Maybe it’s the cold weather/snow we’ve had recently that’s kept us cooped up in the house (we live in a 900 sq ft apartment, being in the house for consecutive days is enough to drive anyone crazy). Maybe it’s that Sponge has been sick. Maybe it’s that Aaron has been spending a lot of time doing school work to gear up for finals. Maybe it’s because we’ve been swamped with apartment complex business. Or maybe it’s some combination of all of the above. I don’t know. But we’re stuck.

Scientist and Sponge are still really young, so we don’t have a “curriculum” that we follow with them. But we do try to include learning into our everyday routine. Reading stories together tops our list of most popular educational activities; at least until recently. And maybe this is what’s frustrating me the most, and why I feel like we aren’t getting anywhere. Scientist has decided to assert his two year old independence and now insists that HE be the one to read when we do stories. He wants to read, fantastic! Only one problem…he can’t. Which results in the three of us sitting somewhere, with Scientist holding the book turning random pages in any order, and me trying frantically to remember the story, even though I can’t see the page to read it, and all of us getting frustrated, bored, or both within minutes and story time coming to an abrupt halt. We’re having similar experiences with coloring, play dough, and singing songs.

My more optimistic self tells me that this is just a cycle. That at some point things will pick up again, or something new will come along. While I “wait it out”, I’m keeping my eyes open for new activities, or a twist on some of our old activities. Something. Any ideas?

Two Hours With Sponge

A few weeks ago when we changed over to daylight savings, our regular nap schedule got off track. Because of this I was able to spend about two hours alone with Sponge, while Scientist was sleeping.

Sponge has mastered crawling. He even managed to pull himself up onto our toy basket in order to get something in there that caught his fancy. He’s getting so big so fast. As I watched him play on the living room floor, going back and forth from one toy to the next, I began to think about all the things he is learning and doing, how different he is from Scientist. My thought process continued along the lines of all the things I want Sponge to know, and how I would teach it to him. Eventually, it occurred to me that I have probably only really taught him one thing in his eight months of life so far. And that thing is trust.

Aaron and I have created an environment for our children where they feel safe and loved, and because of that they have trust. They trust that their needs will be met, that people are kind, and that life is good. I can pretty confidently say we have taught them this. I am starting to think this might be the only thing they learn that I have control over.

Have you ever tried to teach a baby to roll over? You can encourage, and coax, and exemplify all you want, but the baby won’t roll over until the baby is ready. The same goes for walking, talking, eating solid foods, and I assume potty training (I’ll let you know when we venture into that realm with Scientist). Maybe the same is also true for other types of learning.

I feel like it is still my job to create a learning environment, to encourage learning, to be an example of learning, and to provide opportunities for Scientist and Sponge to learn. But at the same time I need to be very conscientious that they will learn when they are ready, that they will learn differently from one another and from other kids, and that they are on their own timetable. This is going to be a challenge, but hopefully, it’s also what makes it fun.

One Small Step For Mom...

Like many young families in our area, we attend story time at the library about once a week. Both Scientist and Sponge seem to enjoy it, and if nothing else it gets us out of the house for about an hour. One thing I enjoy about story time is watching the various ways parents interact with their children.

I’ve noticed at story time, and in other play group settings we’ve been involved in, that some parents choose to try and force their kids to participate in the activities, sing the songs, or do the hand motions, etc. that are a part of the story time entertainment. Phrases like, “We’re here for you, if you don’t want to participate then we’re going home.” or, “They put a lot of time into preparing this, now you need to sit here and sing along.” are the kinds of things I’ve heard.

I decided early on, that I was not going to require Scientist (or Sponge after he came along) to do anything at story time but be nice to the other kids. If he wanted to participate, great; if he wanted to just sit there and watch, great. I also decided that I would participate (sing the songs, clap my hands, and so on) and be excited about story time, to see if my enthusiasm would rub off.

Scientist, although pretty outgoing, gets really shy at the library. He mainly chooses to sit there, and I choose to let him. Then, yesterday for the very first time, without my doing anything differently, Scientist stood up when they started to sing the songs. He clapped his hands, stomped his feet, jumped up and down, at the right times. He went down and sat on the magic story blanket for the story. And he watched the puppet show all the way through. It occurred to me that sometimes, maybe a lot of the time, the things we help our kids learn will be through the example we set, and not what we nag, push, and prod them to do against their will. And also that kids have their own timetable for things and they’ll do them when they're ready.

Ownership

I made an important discovery this summer about robbing children of their learning opportunities. In June we moved into a house that sits on the edge of the woods. I mentioned in passing that it would be cool to know what plants were in our backyard. Soon plant identification was a bit of an obsession. I bought several identification books to support their interest and before long the boys knew the difference between a lady fern, a maiden fern and a sword fern. They knew which berries were edible and exactly what a stinging nettle looked like. I frequently saw them coming out of the woods munching on “apple leaves,” an edible clover. (We have a strict rule about not eating anything until mom confirms your identification).

When we went camping or hiking there were actual fights about who got to collect which plants. There wasn’t enough room to press all the specimens in the guide books so we bought a small flower press. I was blown away by the extent of their interest and budding knowledge. Then September came and with it my stress about school and documentation of the learning process. So I decided to turn their interest in plants into a school “project.” I had this great idea to make a chart of all the different plants and their properties and to make photo albums of the different species. The only problem was, as soon as I took ownership of their interest, it was mine and not theirs.

Almost instantly the guides were shelved, and they couldn’t care less about the plants surrounding them. I realized very quickly what I had done but it’s very hard to give ownership back after you’ve so rudely taken it. So I’m leaving the books on the shelf and hoping maybe with time they’ll come back to it. In the meantime I’m encouraged by their new interest in wild mushrooms!

Coming Out of Our Comfort Zones

Mad Scientist has inherited a new bed. He’s been in his crib up until this point. Although he could climb out of the crib, he only did so in the mornings and after nap time. This, and the reassurances of a few friends that their same-age toddler transitioned no-sweat, gave me hope that learning to sleep in a big boy bed would be a piece of cake.

Scientist was excited for his new bed, right up until it was time to sleep in it, that is. He’d sit in the bed for story time and songs, and then we’d kiss him good night and he’d ask to be in the crib. After a few days, he’d go to sleep in the bed, but come morning he would be in the crib. After about a week of this, he’s about 50% for staying in the bed all night. And I begin to wonder.

Why is this transition so hard? Is learning to sleep in a bed so much more difficult or different than sleeping in a crib? In my adult mind, the answer is obviously no. But what about in the mind of Scientist? Maybe in his mind, he sees the new bed as a big unknown. Unknowns—whether they be fractions, speaking in public for the first time, starting up a conversation with a stranger on an airplane, learning to play the piano, or sleeping in a big boy bed— are intimidating, simply because they are unknown. We get excited about the idea of a new thing, but putting it to practice can be a little scary. We have to come out of our comfort zones in order to learn, but we tend not to like coming out.

What I am learning from this experience is that you can’t force someone out of their comfort zone, at least not if you want positive results. But I do think we can provide opportunities for our kids to come out, and then give them the time they need to decide to do it on their own. If we want to be involved in lifelong learning, I think we also need to get comfortable coming out of our comfort zones. The only way to do that is to practice. We can help our kids (and ourselves) practice by creating an environment where they feel safe. Scientist knows that he’s not going to have any negative consequences if I come in in the morning and he’s slept in his crib that night. That will give him the confidence he needs to test out the bed, because he knows if he tries it and isn’t comfortable with it, he can always go back to where he is comfortable. By practicing coming out of our comfort zones and having positive experiences with it, we will build the confidence we need to come out in situations where the “risks” may be a little greater.

Passion leads to learning

This week we learned about M.C. Escher. I was gathering information for a lesson on tessellations but I learned more than I bargained for! M.C. Escher failed high school after he failed his final exams in 4 subjects. He admits that he was poor at arithmetic and algebra and never understood abstract mathematical concepts. He went on to trade school and decided to become a graphic designer. Almost 2o years later he was inspired by the patterns on a Moorish castle and became fascinated by the idea of regular division of a plane. He wrote, "It remains an extremely absorbing activity, a real mania to which I have become addicted, and from which I sometimes find it hard to tear myself away." This passion lead to writing a book on plane symmetry and to becoming an accomplished research mathematician, as well as a famous artist.

I think his life is a profound lesson. I think it's important to teach my children basic concepts, but I can't expect them to excel in any subject until they feel a passion for that subject. So how do I make my children feel passionately about a subject? Honestly, I don't think I can. It's like trying to make my children like a new food. I can introduce the food, I can make them try a little but ultimately they have to decide if they're going to love it. Last week I finally convinced Princess to try soup for the first time in two years and her response was positive (thank goodness). When we had soup again last night she said she needed more because she loves soup!

I've been beating Thinker over the head with fractions for years. This year I finally decided enough was enough. I told him he could decide if and when he was going to study math. Well, there was no studying for several days but then this morning he covered three sections. Now don't get me wrong, I believe parents are responsible for giving their children the building blocks of an education. Children need to be taught to read, write and do basic arithmetic but sometimes it takes stepping back and letting go to let them discover their own abilities and passions.