tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8332996898748164252024-03-14T06:40:16.734-07:00Sesat SchoolThe blog of Sesat School, a microschool in San Francisco, and all over the world. We're participants in the homeschooling community and will share our stories here. Thanks for reading!Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger26125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-44005138520488544492020-03-27T12:05:00.000-07:002020-03-27T12:05:07.428-07:00<div id="w3Tfxy3R6">
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<span class="ui_content_title unstyled_ui_title" style="user-select: text;"><span class="ui_qtext_rendered_qtext" style="font-weight: normal; tab-size: 4; word-break: break-word;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Since COVID-19 hit, and schools across America closed, I've been asked a lot of questions about homeschooling. Some parents are finding it wonderful, others hate it, and there are a lot of new converts to homeschooling out there. Lots of people are realizing what a lot of homeschooling parents have long known: that in many, or even most schools only, say, 20% of the time is spent learning, and 80% of the time is spent babysitting. Schools mostly exist to permit parents to work. Harsh, but true. I decided to excavate some of my old blog posts about homeschooling on this blog, which we had started in 2013-2014, but later moved to another blog which is currently offline. So, to start, here is the answer I gave to one of the most frequently asked questions about homeschooling: </span></span></span></div>
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<span class="ui_content_title unstyled_ui_title" style="user-select: text;"><span class="ui_qtext_rendered_qtext" style="tab-size: 4; word-break: break-word;"><span style="font-size: large;">"Are home educated children as socialized as publicly educated children?"</span></span></span></h2>
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<span class="ui_qtext_rendered_qtext" style="tab-size: 4; word-break: break-word;">Naturally this depends on what you mean by "socialized", and this is one of the most common questions and concerns regarding homeschooling. I am not sure how this could be researched, however. Number of friends? Hostile or amicable relationship with parents? Hostile or amicable relationships with peers? Frequency of contact with members of the community? Volunteerism rate? Suicide rate of homeschooled vs. traditionally schooled? Violence and bullying in traditional schools vs. homeschool groups?<br /><br />However, here are some differences I've noticed, as a homeschooling mother:<br /><br /><b>Age Cohort & Peer vs. Family Orientation</b><br />Most schooled children spend most of their time with children their own age, usually within a year of their age, with a few adults teaching or supervising. Homeschooled children tend to spend more time with their families, siblings and children of different ages. Typical homeschool groups include kids of a variety of ages, from newborns through teenagers, and often you see four-year-olds working side-by-side with 10-year-olds. Related to the age cohort difference is the result of that stratification by age. The tendency for schooled children is to be primarily peer-oriented vs. parent or family-oriented (see below). There was a study done which indicated that mixed-age groups of children were significantly less likely to exhibit bullying behavior. Children interacting with other children at least 3 years younger saw themselves as protectors and role models, rather than as competitors or rivals. The younger children saw older children as guides and leaders.<br /><br />Personally I believe our society is broken, in that people mainly associate with people their own age. My relatives in the Philippines, if they threw a party, would include everyone -- babies, kids, teenagers, people in their 20s, 30s, 40s -- and grandmas in their 80s. This was not unusual, and I think, the mark of a healthy society. However I rarely see this kind of intergenerational mixing in the States, except with first generation immigrants.<br /><br /><b>One-on-one attention</b><br />Parents also know their children, and can adapt the pace of learning, the subjects taught to the individual child. Traditionally schooled kids have to keep to the 2nd grade, 3rd grade, etc curriculum as taught, whereas homeschooled kids can go faster or slower as needed. As has been noted in the recent article regarding Khan Academy in Wired (<span class="qlink_container" style="direction: ltr; unicode-bidi: isolate;"><a class="external_link" data-qt-tooltip="wired.com" href="http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/ff_khan/all/1" rel="noopener nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: url("//qsf.fs.quoracdn.net/-3-images.new_grid.external_link.svg-26-7f84ed22dfd7e97b.svg"); background-origin: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; background-size: 10.5px; color: #2b6dad; padding-right: 15px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">http://www.wired.com/magazine/20...</a></span>) and in the work of 826 Valencia (<span class="qlink_container" style="direction: ltr; unicode-bidi: isolate;"><a class="external_link" href="http://826valencia.org/about/" rel="noopener nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: url("//qsf.fs.quoracdn.net/-3-images.new_grid.external_link.svg-26-7f84ed22dfd7e97b.svg"); background-origin: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; background-size: 10.5px; color: #2b6dad; padding-right: 15px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">http://826valencia.org/about/</a></span>) among many others -- kids thrive when given one-on-one attention, learn more, gain confidence. <b><br /></b><br /><b>Community participation</b><br />We are able to spend time every week at a nursing home, in conversation with the elderly residents (we visit one resident in particular that we have a close relationship with, but have <a href="http://sesatschool.blogspot.com/2014/02/valentines.html">adopted the whole place</a>). Children and the elderly are almost never seen in our daily lives and are missing from civil society. As such their needs are not taken into consideration in many decisions we make regarding public life.<br /><br /><b>Closeness to Family</b><br />After "better education" the reason most frequently cited for why parents homeschool their children is in order to have a closer family. Peers, media, and other influences commonly drive a wedge between children and parents and homeschooled children tend to have a closer relationship with parents and siblings.<br /><br />I study communities, especially online communities, so I have thought a lot about the subject of communities and socialization. Here are some of my notes from <a href="https://caterina.net/2010/12/09/notes-from-dumbing-us-down-by-john-taylor-gatto/">John Taylor Gatto's book </a><i><a href="https://caterina.net/2010/12/09/notes-from-dumbing-us-down-by-john-taylor-gatto/">Dumbing us Down</a> </i>too, which makes some similar points.<br /><br />Determining who in our society is 'well socialized' is subjective. But a friend of mine in the tech industry asked me "Why is it that homeschoolers are so much better socialized than other people?" He mentioned a woman at his company who was always sent out to talk to new employees, meet new customers, talk to "problem" clients. "She can talk to anybody," he said. It might just have been the woman's personality, but one of the reasons I decided to homeschool was I met a friend's 13-year-old daughter, who spoke to me without fear or contempt, as to another person, and not as an adult, as many preteen and teen kids do. She was talking about the radio show that she DJ'd on a local station and knew so much about music, which she clearly loved. She was empowered to pursue this interest by her parents, as a homeschooler.<br /><br />There is a book called The Well-Adjusted Child, about homeschooling and socialization which I reviewed on GoodReads with some notes from the book. <span class="qlink_container" style="direction: ltr; unicode-bidi: isolate;"><a class="external_link" data-qt-tooltip="goodreads.com" href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/71138966" rel="noopener nofollow" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: url("//qsf.fs.quoracdn.net/-3-images.new_grid.external_link.svg-26-7f84ed22dfd7e97b.svg"); background-origin: initial; background-position: 100% 50%; background-repeat: no-repeat; background-size: 10.5px; color: #2b6dad; padding-right: 15px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">http://www.goodreads.com/review/...</a></span> </span></div>
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<span class="ui_qtext_rendered_qtext" style="tab-size: 4; word-break: break-word;">As there are books about this topic, and this answer is becoming one, I'll wrap it up here, as I could go on.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-11724411845092980422017-10-24T13:20:00.000-07:002017-10-24T13:20:54.992-07:00Self-Directed Learning<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , "dejavu sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">Many homeschoolers have read the articles by Peter Gray, who blogs at Psychology Today in <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn">Freedom to Learn</a>. He wrote an article on the differences between Progressive Education and Self Directed Learning, which I thought was a useful distinction, and wanted to note here that Self Directed Learning is an environment in which the child:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , "dejavu sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">1. has unlimited time and freedom to play and explore</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , "dejavu sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">2. has access to the most useful tools of the culture</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , "dejavu sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">3. is embedded in a caring community of people who range widely in age and exemplify a wide variety of skills, knowledge, and ideas</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , "dejavu sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">4. has access to a number of adults who are willing to answer questions (or try to answer them) and provide help when asked</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , "dejavu sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">He writes, further, Education, in this view, is not a collaboration of student and a teacher; it is entirely the responsibility of the student. While progressive educators continue to see it as their responsibility to ensure that students acquire certain knowledge, skills, and values, and to evaluate students’ progress, facilitators of Self-Directed Education do not see that as their responsibility. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , "dejavu sans" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br /></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-49252053041710701822017-07-20T05:21:00.000-07:002017-09-13T12:53:38.533-07:00Yousician for Ukulele<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKtz4AVxuZ7GufxuNbmNviKQT_XUHod52SVVMl2G0e0PExB2Aq7dAqmHnfn2T_LPyDnX_0LV-ZNHoew5ItGyzP33tMRPLHFvoZNTmK4aOTxG5bbbjRiLbBuIWPgFbDgGO6Cr8tl_zvPl4/s1600/maxresdefault.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKtz4AVxuZ7GufxuNbmNviKQT_XUHod52SVVMl2G0e0PExB2Aq7dAqmHnfn2T_LPyDnX_0LV-ZNHoew5ItGyzP33tMRPLHFvoZNTmK4aOTxG5bbbjRiLbBuIWPgFbDgGO6Cr8tl_zvPl4/s400/maxresdefault.jpg" width="400" /></a><br />
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Our friend Chris here in Helsinki started a company a few years back called Yousician. They develop software that teaches people how to play ukulele, guitar and piano, and we've found it to be excellent. We started out learning piano and are now subscribers. You can see a screenshot of how it works...you play along with a kind of tablature, seen above, at a tempo that you can speed up and slow down as you wish. It works well.<br />
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At Slush last year we received a Yousician ukulele, which we hadn't been using, but which we picked up and started playing this spring. We've used Yousician to learn piano, and ukulele was just as easy.
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-3384222093857436692017-04-30T12:43:00.000-07:002017-09-13T12:47:20.371-07:00A Trip to Japan<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvMWyKRtpF6PtxQHw5PgxfUK5EByb9P7ebV5R5m18h1Ufdw8qP1tdBtYJwDe1Q5A0pODVK2tHtzMDvHG97tScxuftnGWVm5ML2jqdyFADIWKcySbt3Drx9JD9aYSOSkQl4KxfYKWtdy28/s1600/17663277_624001384463036_6087510744964792320_n.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvMWyKRtpF6PtxQHw5PgxfUK5EByb9P7ebV5R5m18h1Ufdw8qP1tdBtYJwDe1Q5A0pODVK2tHtzMDvHG97tScxuftnGWVm5ML2jqdyFADIWKcySbt3Drx9JD9aYSOSkQl4KxfYKWtdy28/s320/17663277_624001384463036_6087510744964792320_n.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
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Being able to travel off peak travel times is one of the best things about homeschooling. We managed to get ourselves some last minute tickets to Japan in April, and were able to take a quick trip there. Cherry Blossoms were blooming and Sakura Day happened while we were there, and we walked on the grounds of the Palace in Ueno Park to see the blossoms falling from the trees.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbVdBdkw0oPovTl2wV0NfpSqZ4iZqd0nB-lYbgWpEY6nR2QOg3isEDJE6d1NP2RaJTfKGLcWZJps7EaiboKnXDoERJ6zXOgd9GnEW_v49plYU5FPKKR7esdd4dIxmcyMD0r8BjoUZMMqM/s1600/17818059_1825569924430712_4644417504628703232_n.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbVdBdkw0oPovTl2wV0NfpSqZ4iZqd0nB-lYbgWpEY6nR2QOg3isEDJE6d1NP2RaJTfKGLcWZJps7EaiboKnXDoERJ6zXOgd9GnEW_v49plYU5FPKKR7esdd4dIxmcyMD0r8BjoUZMMqM/s320/17818059_1825569924430712_4644417504628703232_n.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
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Japanese culture is very different from ours. As a writing and research project, our daughter was assigned the project of taking photos of, and writing an essay about, all the differnt and novel kinds of food she encountered there. We took a few trips to the grocery store, ate at a variety of restaurants, including a ramen place, a shabu-shabu restaurant, a sushi restaurant, a bakery and a yakitori place. Tokyo is full of amazing restaurants.<br />
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We organized for a local teenage girl to show our daughter to all the special "cafes" with animals that are all over Tokyo--the Cat Cafe, the Hedgehog Cafe, the Bird Cafe. There is a huge kawaii culture in Japan--the culture of cute! Even the dogs in Japan are cuter than dogs anywhere else.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7UHytaAqEP8bhhxEUE89SNIWCLwj8Woyzev7YLzMBTJ1CeNzyW97wBsChS5ooGAV47cDtg4cgaToofuafjK5paDPT86GlmOOszMU2stJrMQ_IRboo9s0Qurgw7ybikzOaMtQKUfgkF6Q/s1600/17818552_280212635756346_3542366073712017408_n.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7UHytaAqEP8bhhxEUE89SNIWCLwj8Woyzev7YLzMBTJ1CeNzyW97wBsChS5ooGAV47cDtg4cgaToofuafjK5paDPT86GlmOOszMU2stJrMQ_IRboo9s0Qurgw7ybikzOaMtQKUfgkF6Q/s320/17818552_280212635756346_3542366073712017408_n.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
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I want to go back next year! our daughter exclaimed.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-4194833036743016522017-03-21T16:17:00.000-07:002020-03-27T15:35:22.403-07:00Setting Goals<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQPLb_1yO1HaldWcMkRG1raJgv94VACTxYxC1hWl0IARmo5ggwXfdBLcq7H9f9nBgDUeG_qukdVxbRFquKVx1DXtxPAGgcqv1NwsOOn3Ygxc5vFCh3bmawrQg6oZ1qA4ZEp5UuEaRA7nY/s1600/goals.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQPLb_1yO1HaldWcMkRG1raJgv94VACTxYxC1hWl0IARmo5ggwXfdBLcq7H9f9nBgDUeG_qukdVxbRFquKVx1DXtxPAGgcqv1NwsOOn3Ygxc5vFCh3bmawrQg6oZ1qA4ZEp5UuEaRA7nY/s400/goals.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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This week we are learning about setting goals, and how it is that people achieve the things they set out to do. We talked about how without setting goals you don't have a road map of where you are going and could end up just anywhere.<br />
<br />
We talked through our goals for Sesat School this year, which are:<br />
<ul>
<li>Mastery of Fourth Grade Math</li>
<li>Speak Basic Spanish</li>
<li>Reading 200 books this year (then we discussed whether or not this was possible, or even desirable!)</li>
<li>Play 6-8 songs on the piano with two hands</li>
<li>Finish writing a story and Submit to Stone Soup</li>
</ul>
Then we set 15 year goals, 10 year goals and 1 year goals. These were fun! Dreaming about what could be, where we'd want to live, who we'd have in our lives. Do we want to have a lot of friends, or just 2-3 really good friends? Do we want to live in the country or the city? Where do we want to travel?<br />
<br />
We've been continuing today with more learning about goal setting, and how you achieve things a little bit at a time, by working every day. We watched this video about this:<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8cCiqbSJ9fg" width="560"></iframe><br />
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Then, to really drive the point home (and because my daughter has expressed an interest in learning how to play the violin) we watched these videos from a Norwegian woman who taught herself to play the violin, and videotaped her progress as she improved. She went from being a complete beginner to being able to play extremely well in two years. It is quite impressive!<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/DaugRxMz7tw" width="560"></iframe><br />
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We wanted to learn more about how she had done it, how much she had practiced, so we watched her follow up video. Turns out she practiced sometimes an hour a day, sometimes 15 minutes, and sometimes, not any practice at all. She took a total of 8 lessons during the two years, and taught herself to play by watching videos on YouTube. But she kept at it day after day.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YShcSU3cxgc?list=RDYShcSU3cxgc" width="560"></iframe><br />
<br />
This has been a really great area of study for us! And it's only been two days. Looking forward to the rest of this week as we work more on goal creation, and getting closer to them every day.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-5614939948370119622017-03-21T12:32:00.002-07:002020-03-27T15:34:50.813-07:00Goals<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQPLb_1yO1HaldWcMkRG1raJgv94VACTxYxC1hWl0IARmo5ggwXfdBLcq7H9f9nBgDUeG_qukdVxbRFquKVx1DXtxPAGgcqv1NwsOOn3Ygxc5vFCh3bmawrQg6oZ1qA4ZEp5UuEaRA7nY/s1600/goals.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQPLb_1yO1HaldWcMkRG1raJgv94VACTxYxC1hWl0IARmo5ggwXfdBLcq7H9f9nBgDUeG_qukdVxbRFquKVx1DXtxPAGgcqv1NwsOOn3Ygxc5vFCh3bmawrQg6oZ1qA4ZEp5UuEaRA7nY/s400/goals.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
This week we are learning about setting goals, and how it is that people achieve the things they set out to do. We talked about how without setting goals you don't have a road map of where you are going and could end up just anywhere.<br />
<br />
We talked through our goals for Sesat School this year, which are:<br />
<ul>
<li>Mastery of Fourth Grade Math</li>
<li>Speak Basic Spanish</li>
<li>Reading 200 books this year (then we discussed whether or not this was possible, or even desirable!)</li>
<li>Play 6-8 songs on the piano with two hands</li>
<li>Finish writing a story and Submit to Stone Soup</li>
</ul>
Then we set 15 year goals, 10 year goals and 1 year goals. These were fun! Dreaming about what could be, where we'd want to live, who we'd have in our lives. Do we want to have a lot of friends, or just 2-3 really good friends? Do we want to live in the country or the city? Where do we want to travel?<br />
<br />
We've been continuing today with more learning about goal setting, and how you achieve things a little bit at a time, by working every day. We watched this video about this:<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8cCiqbSJ9fg" width="560"></iframe>
<br />
<br />
Then, to really drive the point home (and because my daughter has expressed an interest in learning how to play the violin) we watched these videos from a Norwegian woman who taught herself to play the violin, and videotaped her progress as she improved. She went from being a complete beginner to being able to play extremely well in two years. It is quite impressive!<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/DaugRxMz7tw" width="560"></iframe>
<br />
<br />
We wanted to learn more about how she had done it, how much she had practiced, so we watched her follow up video. Turns out she practiced sometimes an hour a day, sometimes 15 minutes, and sometimes, not any practice at all. She took a total of 8 lessons during the two years, and taught herself to play by watching videos on YouTube. But she kept at it day after day.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YShcSU3cxgc?list=RDYShcSU3cxgc" width="560"></iframe><br />
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This has been a really great area of study for us! And it's only been two days. Looking forward to the rest of this week as we work more on goal creation, and getting closer to them every day. Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-48501240226436611182017-03-07T00:17:00.001-08:002017-03-07T00:20:26.119-08:00Non-Stop Reading: The Land of Stories<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipq_Rnx3CQ7wQkeDnMEb_DE1j11WLBNte6qln9k0Hsepv-dwP3o7Fhyphenhyphen1sB2TUhq0QwOiIJbB6bsU0Xw1MXL8vlUlnmhNsfJfOpFqU-Jd8MMUjEQTNtXKjwhXW2sbhrui7Vq-QjBUwD-7s/s1600/ae76213ec4682c030139ef5b0277ec9a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipq_Rnx3CQ7wQkeDnMEb_DE1j11WLBNte6qln9k0Hsepv-dwP3o7Fhyphenhyphen1sB2TUhq0QwOiIJbB6bsU0Xw1MXL8vlUlnmhNsfJfOpFqU-Jd8MMUjEQTNtXKjwhXW2sbhrui7Vq-QjBUwD-7s/s400/ae76213ec4682c030139ef5b0277ec9a.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Well, we're on to the fifth book in <a href="http://amzn.to/2mgC127">The Land of Stories</a> series, and it looks like there is a sixth and final book on its way. Maybe after she reads that I'll see my daughter again? She was introduced to this series by one of her friends in Language Arts and Book Club.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-80387647609198285842017-03-06T22:19:00.002-08:002017-03-06T22:19:44.986-08:00Book Club: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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For book club this month my daughter mistakenly started reading The Black Stallion. But that was not the book this month! So we got started reading <a href="http://amzn.to/2mgsYxV">The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe</a>, and finished it just in time.<br />
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I was never a fan of fantasy books when I was young--that was my sister's domain. I didn't like The Hobbit, or any of the Lord of the Rings (though I read them all!). I got into science fiction as a teenager, but not for long. And fantasy never took hold. I remembered starting this book, and got as far as Lucy meeting the faun, and visiting his house, and coming back through the wardrobe and her siblings not believing her when she told of her journey. But I never got any further. I am a new convert!<br />
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It was not my daughter's favorite, though she said as she was nearing the end, "This is a REALLY good book." It is.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-77945067483875842892017-03-03T21:48:00.000-08:002017-03-06T22:20:51.854-08:00A love of writing<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj52HwtJn-rlC8ZS_WkBginyIe4ujtguMKkhVqcybIZZ5A5BGShy4QYtM7gJqIXiLA0M-NsE56-npHsnTzXwmM6DFw0i3cbwwtn_kc26x1x64OJCs0RKaRYIXEgPCVQBEfY1eNdjUUXDKQ/s1600/15048190_1676984292612116_1835540856191320064_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj52HwtJn-rlC8ZS_WkBginyIe4ujtguMKkhVqcybIZZ5A5BGShy4QYtM7gJqIXiLA0M-NsE56-npHsnTzXwmM6DFw0i3cbwwtn_kc26x1x64OJCs0RKaRYIXEgPCVQBEfY1eNdjUUXDKQ/s400/15048190_1676984292612116_1835540856191320064_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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One of the things I had hoped to instill in our children is a love of reading, and a love of writing. We've been studying writing with our groups of homeschool friends using the <a href="http://iew.com/">Institute of Excellence in Writing</a>, and the results have been amazing. Her vocabulary has grown tremendously and her sentence structure has become wonderfully complex. She has learned to express herself in different voices, different tones, different moods. She elaborates and simplifies. So good!<br />
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Another workbook we have been using for vocabulary building is <a href="http://amzn.to/2mdlAlj">Wordly Wise</a>, which also seems to be working well.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-49824398316675395862017-03-02T21:11:00.000-08:002017-03-06T22:20:06.026-08:00Class outside<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ3Nb4c_uWmJXpgJaNRN1dO7zfZBN0p8u_255tY9ZnnWdKIsxvtOFcywc_a41pU1MKnE0SqR1-HyAeaqIUpQ9Xix1-d2AT3Upi_JoCbb2K-vyGKGlAcUI02Fzw6fP2b3-QuYHm-XapGSM/s1600/16908831_111152402746441_4466826061547569152_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ3Nb4c_uWmJXpgJaNRN1dO7zfZBN0p8u_255tY9ZnnWdKIsxvtOFcywc_a41pU1MKnE0SqR1-HyAeaqIUpQ9Xix1-d2AT3Upi_JoCbb2K-vyGKGlAcUI02Fzw6fP2b3-QuYHm-XapGSM/s400/16908831_111152402746441_4466826061547569152_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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It has been raining in San Francisco for the past five months, with barely a break. So when the sun came out, it was almost impossible for Lisa to keep the kids inside and focused on learning the lines in their scripts. So they took class outside.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-44637999629602619032017-02-28T03:12:00.000-08:002017-03-06T22:20:38.081-08:00Learning Languages<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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We already speak two languages at home, and recently have begun adding a third. We chose Spanish, because it is a language I already speak passably well, because it is one of the most widespread languages in the world, and because it has always seemed to me to be one of the easier languages to learn.<br />
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I recently read <a href="http://amzn.to/2mg54Ta">Fluent Forever,</a> an excellent book about learning languages, which recommends learning pronunciation first, getting in the habit of daily practice, even in small amounts, using flashcards, specifically the Anki app (which repeats words at intervals shown to be the most effective).<br />
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I have used <a href="https://www.italki.com/home">iTalki </a>to learn Finnish, but I found an even more effective route for learning Spanish, the <a href="https://spanish.academy/">Homeschool Spanish Academy</a>. It has been great! Every morning we speak to a native Spanish speaker from Guatemala for a half an hour. The prices are affordable enough to schedule a daily lesson--$9 a class, and $6.50 if you buy classes in bulk. We have had a different Spanish teacher each day, but they stick to a consistent course, and so it is not an issue.<br />
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There is homework to review. but there is nothing like a private 1:1 lesson to get you speaking the language quickly and easily.<br />
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Learning a language is most easily done in where it is spoken, so we hope to travel and enroll in a language school in Spain or somewhere in South or Central America. But until then this is a great way to learn.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-43693790999178808552017-02-24T20:41:00.000-08:002017-03-06T21:31:10.248-08:00I love a good planetarium<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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While we were in Salt Lake City, we visited the Clark Planetarium, and the kids loved it. There was an exhibit where you could construct your own rockets and see how they fared after launch -- if they were able to get into orbit, or break free of Earth's gravity. Another exhibit was a scale that you could stand on and see what you weighed on various planets.<br />
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We had originally come to see a movie about extreme weather, which was so-so, but stayed to experience all the interactive exhibits.<br />
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We spent several hours there.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-9480341861126399522017-02-21T20:13:00.000-08:002017-03-06T21:34:16.934-08:00Phys Ed, Homeschool Style<div style="text-align: center;">
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Oh how I dreaded Phys. Ed. when I was a kid. I hated everything about it: changing my clothes in the locker room, being the least athletic kid in the class, coming last in the foot races, and even though I had always been the best kickball player during recess, and could chase the boys faster than any other girl, I never excelled in anything in Phys. Ed. After school sports I liked: tennis, ski team, even archery and dance class. But ugh, Phys Ed.<br />
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So as a homeschooler, there are both fewer and more chances to engage in physical activity. You can run around outside all the time, even take your classes outside, or learn while walking (which we adapted from our grown-up "walking meetings"). Hikes are doable during the weekdays, even. Dancing class happens. And whenever you want you can go skiing.<br />
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We just took a week and went skiing in Utah. We skiied and skiied as much as we could. Our legs were sore. We learned to keep our skis parallel. We graduated from Green slopes to Blue (with the grownups and the more adventuresome kids breaking off to do the occasional black diamonds.) The best kind of physical activity: fun, exhilarating, exhausting.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-28446180750453892442017-02-02T20:19:00.000-08:002017-03-06T21:30:22.940-08:00Llamas in Washington<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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We went up to Washington earlier this week to visit Rachel, who had been, until a couple years ago, our childrens' beloved nanny, and teacher. She was my daughter's first teacher, starting from birth. So warm and loving and thoughtful and kind and full of life and wisdom and sweetness. The very best kind of teacher to have.<br />
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We were lucky enough to stay in the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/Arcadia-Farm-and-Inn-829360893742384/">Arcadia Farm and Inn</a> in Port Angeles, where there were dozens of animals--7 dogs, 2 llamas, 2 horses, 16 sheep, chickens, about a dozen goats--baby goats, even!--cats. It was wonderful. The llamas even came to our window looking for snacks, and we were allowed to help out in the barn, feeding and caring for the animals.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-33277320465877859072016-12-20T20:28:00.000-08:002017-03-06T21:30:51.617-08:00Theatre practice<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Theatre class is a wonderful way of learning to work together, to collaborate and create something with others. Many people say team sports are a good way to do those things, but for those not thusly inclined, plays are a great way to accomplish many of the same things.<br />
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Lisa Townsend is a gifted theatre teacher in Bolinas and the kids have been learning the words, music, script and dances of Matilda, a play based on the book by Roald Dahl.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-28930522911154846452016-10-21T20:50:00.000-07:002020-03-27T16:23:44.256-07:00Oakland Zoo Visit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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A spontaneous visit to the Oakland Zoo with some of our homeschool friends. We met this delightful turtle, and saw for the first time actual hyenas! Our daughter has been studying and admiring hyenas for a while, and I'd been promising her we'd visit this zoo in Oakland where we'd see some.<br />
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We also heard the lion roar.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-31850493968763838282016-10-01T22:33:00.000-07:002017-03-06T22:35:05.592-08:00Book Club: Five Children and It<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The first book of our homeschool book club this September was <a href="http://amzn.to/2n8Z2Bs">Five Children and It,</a> by E. Nesbit. We've read so many excellent books this past year, and this one wasn't one of my favorites, or my daughter's. But for each book club we have a project, based on the book. Some of the kids make dioramas of certain scenes, others make games based on a books' themes, and once one of the girls wrote an entire rap, which she performed, called The Rap of Nimh. It was so good.<br />
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My daughter made a model in clay of the "it" in the book, the sand-fairy. It was an ugly little thing, but the sand fairy was not meant to be pretty. He was grumpy, reluctant and scowling.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-64861221130513432652016-08-30T21:15:00.000-07:002017-03-06T21:26:20.530-08:00Astrup Fernley Museet, Oslo<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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We really enjoyed our visit to the <a href="http://afmuseet.no/en/hjem">Astrup Fearnley Museum</a> in Oslo when we were passing through. There are dozens of outdoor sculptures around the museum, and a guide to them made for children to find them--it was quite a game to find them all, especially the Gormley sculpture attached to the side of the building. We learned about sculptures of Louise Bourgeois, Udo Rondinone, Paul Kelly, and even Damien Hirst, whose sliced up cows were not particularly appreciated by this one art lover. We talked about all the art we saw--we spent hours there--and what they could mean, what the artist could be trying to tell us, what we saw in them ourselves. A perfect day of art.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-5463450578150465492016-08-04T00:30:00.000-07:002017-03-06T21:29:36.255-08:00Big Tables<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsLotiV-pQEUIDKxhzCny_Vo3HhAc_ornwjgTzvVPfcaooiYcCgqtn1NELkFwJZSSQePW-p8Ixyf9Z4wpg9sgnVGsRHNx7ECK1ouQQbaRfbNscVdTprUnMVIMiIBuxbdReebPwPur8I3w/s1600/13703100_1824443147774963_515888355_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsLotiV-pQEUIDKxhzCny_Vo3HhAc_ornwjgTzvVPfcaooiYcCgqtn1NELkFwJZSSQePW-p8Ixyf9Z4wpg9sgnVGsRHNx7ECK1ouQQbaRfbNscVdTprUnMVIMiIBuxbdReebPwPur8I3w/s400/13703100_1824443147774963_515888355_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<h1 style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-family: proxima-nova, "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I love big tables, much needed for <a href="https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/homeschooling/" style="border: 0px; color: #003569; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">homeschooling</a>. In this picture you can see our workbooks, handwriting practice, my Roberto Bolaño and I Ching, storyboards for a proposed vampire movie starring child vampires, drawings inspired by our latest reading about London evacuees from WWII, and a diagram of the parts of a mushroom.</span></h1>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-7553834214782231402016-07-01T02:00:00.000-07:002017-03-06T21:31:47.761-08:00Visiting the Peruskoulu in Helsinki<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAUOeKTw50oV0fz5FVHw1INmrQ0kkYxqpuRD6juBvVi4QK_kRs72JVfH8nSGKjS1hWpNkhzto9lRyxlr_XLsKGn7LBuAKM4ZanA8W2aQW8ZOzHXmn6UR2Nv1DeTmG3zFHh2XaT_BT7E1M/s1600/13183450_1747843418784551_1061619463_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAUOeKTw50oV0fz5FVHw1INmrQ0kkYxqpuRD6juBvVi4QK_kRs72JVfH8nSGKjS1hWpNkhzto9lRyxlr_XLsKGn7LBuAKM4ZanA8W2aQW8ZOzHXmn6UR2Nv1DeTmG3zFHh2XaT_BT7E1M/s400/13183450_1747843418784551_1061619463_n.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Our daughter's friend Kerttu invited her to join her for a day in the Finnish elementary school she attended, so she went. School only lasted half a day, for about 4 hours, had lots of breaks to go outside and play and involved a lot of art projects, such as finger-weaving. The teacher was friendly and welcoming.<br />
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Finnish schools don't have iPads, or smart boards or anything our 'advanced' schools in the US have--and yet they are famous for being the best-ranked schools in the world. This classroom could have been set up in the 1960s: not a computer in sight!Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-84716498894994685422016-03-13T09:53:00.000-07:002017-03-13T15:22:25.582-07:00String Figures<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKbPdF27sFqjZDsE9MRGwmzQmVvdTq5f-5KLXXlCgTwlSi2mrTDDyPOto7Xr3aoC-s2lMCuhx0V3yLkWkOHUCq8vgPmz8IOj3nsGfd3i4Y5Ut7LEHAAdiYceU_sP1TvyLwK8sjxFOu4dg/s1600/L1006894.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKbPdF27sFqjZDsE9MRGwmzQmVvdTq5f-5KLXXlCgTwlSi2mrTDDyPOto7Xr3aoC-s2lMCuhx0V3yLkWkOHUCq8vgPmz8IOj3nsGfd3i4Y5Ut7LEHAAdiYceU_sP1TvyLwK8sjxFOu4dg/s400/L1006894.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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There has been a mania for string figures recently, with the kids mastering Jacob's Ladder, Cat's Cradle, the Witch's Broom, and even the dynamic Walk the Dog. You can learn most of them by using YouTube videos.<br />
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There is also a book about <a href="http://amzn.to/2mTPkpV">String Figures by Harry Smith</a>, the guy who created the amazing, weird, and wonderful <a href="http://amzn.to/2n2K5oi">Anthology of American Folk Music</a> and who served as Shaman-In-Residence at the Naropa Institute.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-53000238804522689422014-09-14T01:00:00.000-07:002017-03-06T22:44:01.282-08:00Playing Chess<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfkjhLPzbVEwbPDNWAFU08dWaNwHJnL80daOi-mbaBR9GunvqiQuA1Q_PWSqr1BfZrG1yaYGF_X7LvNtMoCu6diFMMYQEB9wqYmQn9qoJ1vZVevHiIs9g-znGeqSgxHQ8XEHjx85sDjeI/s1600/chess.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfkjhLPzbVEwbPDNWAFU08dWaNwHJnL80daOi-mbaBR9GunvqiQuA1Q_PWSqr1BfZrG1yaYGF_X7LvNtMoCu6diFMMYQEB9wqYmQn9qoJ1vZVevHiIs9g-znGeqSgxHQ8XEHjx85sDjeI/s400/chess.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.167em;">Clas Olson was having a sale on a 5 game set (chess, checkers, backgammon, five man morris, and dominoes) so I bought it, and the children wanted to learn to play chess. I taught them the basic rules, and they got the hang of it, playing many games over the summer.</span></div>
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I never was a very good chess player, but I remember wanting to play well, because the smart kids played chess. I even joined the chess club in 5th grade. It’s a great game.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-25700686798716048102014-02-27T22:57:00.000-08:002017-03-06T22:58:36.560-08:00Sir Ken Robinson's RSA animation<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #516064; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.167em; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
RSA Animate – in which a skilled illustrator draws images as a presenter presents a topic – has Sir Ken Robinson explain our dominant educational paradigm and why it must change in this 11-minute video.</div>
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Every country on earth at the moment is reforming public education. The problem is, they’re trying to meet the future by doing what they did in the past. And on the way they are alienating millions of kids, who don’t see any purpose in going to school.</div>
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Sir Ken is a British university professor and an advocate for the arts, known widely for his books on creativity and human flourishing. He’s a deeply human thinker and this is one of the finest videos in the series, well worth watching!</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-48341153662571435932012-03-28T22:48:00.000-07:002017-03-06T22:49:06.448-08:00The Continuum Concept<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1.167em; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="color: #516064;">Jean Liedloff’s 1975 book </span><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://amzn.to/2mgssA4"><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border-color: initial; border-image: initial; border-style: initial; font-size: 14.004px; outline-color: initial; outline-style: initial;">The Continuum Concept: In Search of Happiness Lost</span> </a></span><span style="color: #516064; font-size: 1.167em;">contrasts modern culture with the Yequana tribe of the Amazon.</span></div>
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Continuum is of an individual, as part of the continuum of his family, clan, community, species, life as a whole.</div>
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Early on in her life in the Amazon rainforest Liedloff noticed the natives had an unreal quality to them: an absence of unhappiness. “The ‘rules’ of human behavior did not apply to them.”</div>
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They did not frown at hardship and usually moved in groups with a “party mood” prevailing. She realized the Western value of saving labor was not shared by them. They did not judge or frown on others. The concept of competition was absent and in its place was a sense of shared camraderie.</div>
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She concluded that the high state of well-being of her savage friends compared to the civilized resulted from better alignment with the tendencies and expectations humans as a species have acquired through millennium-long evolution.</div>
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“We are living lives for which our evolution did not equip us.”</div>
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“The overprotected, weakened child is the one whose initiative has been constantly usurped by a (non-continuum) mother.”</div>
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Infants expect skin contact with their mother instantly after being born -*not to be washed, weighed, etc. first: “For millions of years newborn babies have been held close to their mothers from the moment of birth.”</div>
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Western babies get “wrapped in dry, lifeless cloth” when they expect near-continuous, year-round contact with their mother’s naked human body: “Nothing in his evolving ancestors’ experience has prepared him to be left alone, asleep or awake, and even less to be left alone to cry.”</div>
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“Small children, deprived in infancy, might benefit enormously from simply being held on a parent’s lap at every possible opportunity and being allowed to sleep in their parents’ bed with them.”</div>
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“If he feels safe, wanted, and ‘at home’ in the midst of activity before he can think, his view of later experiences will be very distinct in character from those of child who feels unwelcome, instimulated by the experiences he has missed, and accustomed to living in a state of want”</div>
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Later, when the child is growing up, the mother is always present but “she does not initiate the contacts nor contribute to them except in a passive way.”</div>
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Caretaking, like assistance, is by request only. Feeding (to nourish the body) and cuddling (to nourish the soul) are always available, simple and gracefully, as a matter of course; but “The object of a child’s activities, after all, is the development of self-reliance. To give either more or less assistance than he needs tends to defeat that purpose.”</div>
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“Ideally, giving the child an example, or lead, to follow is not done expressly to influence him, but means doing what one has to do normally: not giving special attention to the child, but creating the atmosphere of minding one’s own business by way of priority, only noticing the child when he requires it and then no more than is useful.”</div>
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Above all the child’s persona is respected as a good thing in all respects. There is no concept of a “bad child” not, conversely, any distinction made about “good children.” What he does is accepted as the act of an innately “right” creature.</div>
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“This assumption of ‘rightness’, or sociality, as an inbuilt characteristic of human nature is the essence of the Yequna attitude toward others of any age.”</div>
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“If there is anything fundamentally foreign to us in continuum societies like the Yequana, it is this assumption of innate sociality. It is by starting from this assumption and its implications that the seemingly unbridgeable gap between their strange behavior, with resultant high well-being, and our careful calculations, with an enormously lower degree of well-being, becomes intelligible.”</div>
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“The constant promise of a ‘better tomorrow’ is of no interest to the members of an evolved, stable, proud, and happy society. Their resistance to change preserves their customs and works to preclude innovation.”</div>
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“Our own unsatisfiability, founded in mass deprivation and alienation, on the other hand, overwhelms the cultural expression of our natural tendency to resist change and makes it imperative that we be able to look forward to ‘something better’ no matter what ‘advantages’ any of us may now have.”</div>
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“An unchanging way of life is called for which requires the work and cooperation of its members in amounts not excessive to their natures.”</div>
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“Families should be in close contact with other families.”</div>
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“The children’s place at the periphery, rather than the center, of adult concern will permit the youngsters to find their own interests and pace without pressure.”</div>
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“In a continuum-correct society the generations would live under the same roof, to the advantage of all.”</div>
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“We do not look upon happiness as a birth-right, nor do we expect it to be more than peace or contentment. Real joy, the state in which the Yequana spend much of their lives, is exceedingly rare among us.”</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-833299689874816425.post-49883991230131588742011-09-05T23:43:00.000-07:002017-03-06T23:45:34.079-08:00Horticulture Magazine Excerpt<div style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="background-color: transparent;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bill McElwain, a Harvard man who had taught French, run a laundromat, and become a discouraged farmer, moved to the prosperous town of Weston Mass, and saw a lot of fertile suburban land going to waste, on the way to and from his work in Boston (rehabilitating houses in the South End.)</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He saw suburban teen-agers with few alternatives to football, tennis, drama or boredom, and he saw poor city people paying more for food in Roxbury than he was in Weston. (Bill surveyed the cost of twenty-five identical items in both areas and counted a 13% difference).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In April 1970, Bill began with borrowed hand tools and donations of seed and fertilizer. With a handful of dedicated helpers, he cultivated almost an acre; the produce was trucked into Roxbury and distributed free to a children's food program and a housing project. There, residents collected donations that found their way back to the farm.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Within a year, Bill was hired as project director of the new Weston Youth Commission. In 1972, he convinced the town to buy the farmland. He ignited a small but dedicated cadre of supporters, including enough people in the volunteer government to insure the continued support of the town. More kids got involved with the farm, and with the proceeds from the vegetables (now sold in Boston for a nominal $1 a crate) he paid workers a minimum wage. The town put more money and equipment into the project, and by 1975 the farm was growing as much as 100 tons of produce a year. About 25% of this was sold locally; the rest went into Boston.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bill McElwain was 50 years old when the town bought the farm. He is still project director for the Youth Commission, despite his cavalier view of keeping fiscal records, and he still writes a column for the <i style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Weston Town Crier</i>, in which he proposes dozens of other activities for the young to take part in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One fall, for instance, Bill counted 600 maple trees along Weston roadsides. In a year and a half, he and a crew built a sugarhouse near the junior high school (using pine boards milled from local trees); scrounged buckets, taps, and evaporating equipment; and produce a cash crop of 250 gallons of grade A maple syrup. There was cider pressing, orchard reclamation, firewood cutting, crate making, construction of a small observatory, and an alternative course at the high school with regular field trips to Boston's ethnic neighborhoods, and to rural New Hampshire.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Virtually all his plans, large or small, have these common ingredients: they provide young people with paying jobs that are educational, socially useful, and fun; they operate on a small scale, need little capital, and use readily available resources, preferably neglected ones; and they bring a variety of people together to solve common problems in an enjoyable context. Building community is one of Bill's more crucial goals, and he'll seize any opportunity--planting, harvesting, "sugaring off", a woodcarving workshop, or May Day--to bring folks together for a festive occasion.</span></div>
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