I thought this was going to be an exciting landmark year for me where I get to be in shul the whole time. The littles are finally old enough to run around and play and take care of themselves!
But I overlooked the need to give my teen a meaningful yom tov. What to do with a teen who is inclined against davening?
I'm thinking about Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur separately. Rosh Hashana she agreed to come hear shofar. (I just paused to message her the Rambam on shofar, which I'm sure I've taught her in the past.) I'd like her to read and think about some of the musaf, but odds are unless it comes up as a discussion, she will not be inclined to read the machzor. This is one of those times that the more my mind is engaged in the themes of Rosh Hashana, the more likely that there will conversations with my children about it.
For Yom Kippur, I asked her what she'd like her Yom Kipput to look like. She mostly evaded the question but did mention a song that she likes to hear in shul. So we will try to figure out around what time that will occur. We still have to think about a way to make the day pass in some sort of not painful and possibly meaningful manner. This may mean me just going to shul for shacharis and spending a great deal of the day in conversation with her.
Thursday, August 30, 2018
Monday, August 27, 2018
Unschooling Ivrit
Something that is one of the zanier things I've done is chosen to speak to my kids in Hebrew despite it not being my native language. I don't know some words, my grammar (though improved) is nowhere near perfect, my accent is atrocious, I don't use idiomatic expressions, I speak very slowly, and have trouble conveying sophisticated concepts to them. They have difficulty understanding Israelis.
On the plus side, they are all comfortable with basic Hebrew. They will probably easily be able to speak in Israel. My older two are comfortable in Israel and understand it (though my oldest hesitates to speak). When they start Chumash, they are familiar with a great deal of the words. They have a fairly decent basic Hebrew vocabulary that they learned with no pain.
My three little ones can barely read Hebrew yet, so they haven't started skills work inside. We will see how that emerges. They are 6th, 4th, and 2nd grade. My 4th grader has expressed an interest so I hope to try to get started with him.
My second child is something of a polyglot. She asked for Japanese lessons, which I acquired for her via skype for 3 years, then she asked me to buy her a Japanese textbook, which I did, and then she traveled to Japan twice. She took a college course in Russian (got an A, her first college course), and she is teaching herself Dutch.
My oldest (married already) started teaching herself Korean using dualingo and seems to be getting fairly fluent.
I've always kind of wondered how Hebrew language unschooling could work. Bear in mind that it might work "better" in the case I'm describing because this child has a natural aptitude for and enjoyment of languages.
We put Hebrew font on all of her devices and I text and chat in Hebrew as much as possible.
I bought her Harry Potter in Hebrew at her request and I bought her R' Winder workbooks for older kids at her request. To my knowledge she has not used them whatsoever.
I did read about some book which was supposed to be AMAZING about acquiring language by an opera singer who needed to learn German and Italian for operas or something like that. I bought her the book and she did read a lot of it and said it was incredibly helpful.
She went to a Zionist camp with actual Israelis and she joined their whatsapp group and they were thrilled that she can communicate in Hebrew.
She started translating songs they shared with her. Many times a day she asks me what phrases mean.
She joined something called discord which has sections for all sorts of interests and went into the languages section and into the Hebrew section and is chatting with people there.
What is interesting from the standpoint of unschooling is that language acquisition looks NOTHING like it does in an academic setting. You can be "behind" for years and then quickly spend hours and months on it and acquire tremendous skills. The acquisition is fun and exciting. There is a risk it will not be acquired to the level the parent would wish for. But in unschooling, we have trust that knowledge is fun and useful and able to be acquired at any time, at any age, as needed or wanted.
On the plus side, they are all comfortable with basic Hebrew. They will probably easily be able to speak in Israel. My older two are comfortable in Israel and understand it (though my oldest hesitates to speak). When they start Chumash, they are familiar with a great deal of the words. They have a fairly decent basic Hebrew vocabulary that they learned with no pain.
My three little ones can barely read Hebrew yet, so they haven't started skills work inside. We will see how that emerges. They are 6th, 4th, and 2nd grade. My 4th grader has expressed an interest so I hope to try to get started with him.
My second child is something of a polyglot. She asked for Japanese lessons, which I acquired for her via skype for 3 years, then she asked me to buy her a Japanese textbook, which I did, and then she traveled to Japan twice. She took a college course in Russian (got an A, her first college course), and she is teaching herself Dutch.
My oldest (married already) started teaching herself Korean using dualingo and seems to be getting fairly fluent.
I've always kind of wondered how Hebrew language unschooling could work. Bear in mind that it might work "better" in the case I'm describing because this child has a natural aptitude for and enjoyment of languages.
We put Hebrew font on all of her devices and I text and chat in Hebrew as much as possible.
I bought her Harry Potter in Hebrew at her request and I bought her R' Winder workbooks for older kids at her request. To my knowledge she has not used them whatsoever.
I did read about some book which was supposed to be AMAZING about acquiring language by an opera singer who needed to learn German and Italian for operas or something like that. I bought her the book and she did read a lot of it and said it was incredibly helpful.
She went to a Zionist camp with actual Israelis and she joined their whatsapp group and they were thrilled that she can communicate in Hebrew.
She started translating songs they shared with her. Many times a day she asks me what phrases mean.
She joined something called discord which has sections for all sorts of interests and went into the languages section and into the Hebrew section and is chatting with people there.
What is interesting from the standpoint of unschooling is that language acquisition looks NOTHING like it does in an academic setting. You can be "behind" for years and then quickly spend hours and months on it and acquire tremendous skills. The acquisition is fun and exciting. There is a risk it will not be acquired to the level the parent would wish for. But in unschooling, we have trust that knowledge is fun and useful and able to be acquired at any time, at any age, as needed or wanted.
Sunday, August 19, 2018
Unschooling and Judaic Studies
I've had some things on my mind regarding Elazar's education. He recently turned 11, which felt to me like he was "getting bigger" and could maybe have the maturity of starting to work up to things he is going to need for his bar mitzva.
Earlier this year, he wanted to learn how to read hamapil and has been happily practicing a line a day. I'm trying to think how long it's been since we started--maybe a few months. He still isn't quite finished. In fact, it's taking him a lot longer to get fluent at reading than I thought it would. I believe it's because he isn't all that motivated.
I think that I'm doing him a disservice by asking him to read a bit every day. He doesn't object, but he doesn't love it and he's not picking it up nearly as quickly as I thought he would. (I believe this is because he doesn't enjoy it very much and also because he is lacking fire to badly want to read/be a literate Jew/daven.) I do think he'd be better off if I left it alone and waited until he was interested. When would he be interested? 12? 13 before his bar mitzva? 16? 25?
I simply don't have the guts to wait it out. Ari has expressed that he thinks he will never do it if we don't nudge him. I really don't believe that. Deep in my heart, I believe that Torah is good, that it is enticing, and that he would turn to it eventually to discover what it's all about, and at that time, he would learn to read and translate very quickly.
But alas. He is our first son, and we don't have the courage.
I'm hopeful that our youngest might be left alone for longer, that we will have more trust in unschooling by then, and that he will have the pleasure of picking it up quickly and smoothly when he wants to. (However, as we were blessed with sons with very little spacing, I'm not sure how much time we'll actually have to actually let that play out.)
*****
We looked up Elazar's bar mitzva parsha, and it's the longest leining. The. Longest. Leining. Not great for an ADHD child. I have a fantasy that my sons will lein the whole parsha, the whole haftora, and daven musaf, just like my brothers did. Well, Ari didn't grow up that way, and thinks that puts insane and unnecessary pressure on bar mitzva boys. Good thing he's in charge.
I feel that in the birthdays before bar/bat mitzva, children have an awareness that halachic adulthood is coming up. They are excited about it and excited to embrace some of their halachic responsibilities. To me, it's a good time to harness that excitement and get on the chinuch bandwagon to gently introduce things they'll have a chiyuv for after bar mitzva.
I thought maybe Elazar could start going to mincha. I wouldn't ask him to do shacharis. He still can't sit for five minutes. But I thought mincha is short. I asked him how he felt about that, and we discussed upgrading his computer if he went for 3 or 4 months, and he didn't seem opposed.
However, he really is having difficulty reading. If he could read and follow along, it might make sense. But it seems that having him go to mincha would merely be an exercise in discipline and self control for him. And not a spiritual activity. And while I think he's old enough to be capable of that and capable of tolerating the discomfort that would cause him, since it wouldn't actually be a meaningful davening experience, I don't quite see the point. (I was looking to see if I ever wrote about it but I can't find it. How I've seen Elazar spontaneously take 3 steps and bow and ask Hashem for things in his own words.) It might regulate him to davening and it might get him to feel part of the community. But it also might be unnecessarily painful and be one of the reasons he eventually doesn't daven.
*****
So, in summary, Elazar's getting closer to bar mitzva. I'm simultaneously thinking that emotionally he's getting into a mindset where he is receptive to chinuch. AND that educationally (ADHDwise) he is still incapable/unmotivated regarding the academics required for swathes of that chinuch. Which leaves me wondering how much to nudge and how much to wait and see.
I'm definitely in a different parenting place than I was with my older children. With them, it would have been unthinkable for me to not be firmly emphasizing how it all has to be done in time for bar mitzva.
But I've been through two teenagers and have the battle scars. ברוך שפטרני Baruch Shepetarani (the blessing the father makes at bar mitzva: blessed that I am now no longer obligated) may happen at bar mitzva but parenting still happens through the teen years. And I am definitely approaching the teen years differently (and less stridently) now that I'm more experienced.
As always, I do the best I can with the information I have at the time, and hope that I can continue to learn, continue to adjust to new information, and to be receptive to what my child is telling me about his needs.
Earlier this year, he wanted to learn how to read hamapil and has been happily practicing a line a day. I'm trying to think how long it's been since we started--maybe a few months. He still isn't quite finished. In fact, it's taking him a lot longer to get fluent at reading than I thought it would. I believe it's because he isn't all that motivated.
I think that I'm doing him a disservice by asking him to read a bit every day. He doesn't object, but he doesn't love it and he's not picking it up nearly as quickly as I thought he would. (I believe this is because he doesn't enjoy it very much and also because he is lacking fire to badly want to read/be a literate Jew/daven.) I do think he'd be better off if I left it alone and waited until he was interested. When would he be interested? 12? 13 before his bar mitzva? 16? 25?
I simply don't have the guts to wait it out. Ari has expressed that he thinks he will never do it if we don't nudge him. I really don't believe that. Deep in my heart, I believe that Torah is good, that it is enticing, and that he would turn to it eventually to discover what it's all about, and at that time, he would learn to read and translate very quickly.
But alas. He is our first son, and we don't have the courage.
I'm hopeful that our youngest might be left alone for longer, that we will have more trust in unschooling by then, and that he will have the pleasure of picking it up quickly and smoothly when he wants to. (However, as we were blessed with sons with very little spacing, I'm not sure how much time we'll actually have to actually let that play out.)
*****
We looked up Elazar's bar mitzva parsha, and it's the longest leining. The. Longest. Leining. Not great for an ADHD child. I have a fantasy that my sons will lein the whole parsha, the whole haftora, and daven musaf, just like my brothers did. Well, Ari didn't grow up that way, and thinks that puts insane and unnecessary pressure on bar mitzva boys. Good thing he's in charge.
I feel that in the birthdays before bar/bat mitzva, children have an awareness that halachic adulthood is coming up. They are excited about it and excited to embrace some of their halachic responsibilities. To me, it's a good time to harness that excitement and get on the chinuch bandwagon to gently introduce things they'll have a chiyuv for after bar mitzva.
I thought maybe Elazar could start going to mincha. I wouldn't ask him to do shacharis. He still can't sit for five minutes. But I thought mincha is short. I asked him how he felt about that, and we discussed upgrading his computer if he went for 3 or 4 months, and he didn't seem opposed.
However, he really is having difficulty reading. If he could read and follow along, it might make sense. But it seems that having him go to mincha would merely be an exercise in discipline and self control for him. And not a spiritual activity. And while I think he's old enough to be capable of that and capable of tolerating the discomfort that would cause him, since it wouldn't actually be a meaningful davening experience, I don't quite see the point. (I was looking to see if I ever wrote about it but I can't find it. How I've seen Elazar spontaneously take 3 steps and bow and ask Hashem for things in his own words.) It might regulate him to davening and it might get him to feel part of the community. But it also might be unnecessarily painful and be one of the reasons he eventually doesn't daven.
*****
So, in summary, Elazar's getting closer to bar mitzva. I'm simultaneously thinking that emotionally he's getting into a mindset where he is receptive to chinuch. AND that educationally (ADHDwise) he is still incapable/unmotivated regarding the academics required for swathes of that chinuch. Which leaves me wondering how much to nudge and how much to wait and see.
I'm definitely in a different parenting place than I was with my older children. With them, it would have been unthinkable for me to not be firmly emphasizing how it all has to be done in time for bar mitzva.
But I've been through two teenagers and have the battle scars. ברוך שפטרני Baruch Shepetarani (the blessing the father makes at bar mitzva: blessed that I am now no longer obligated) may happen at bar mitzva but parenting still happens through the teen years. And I am definitely approaching the teen years differently (and less stridently) now that I'm more experienced.
As always, I do the best I can with the information I have at the time, and hope that I can continue to learn, continue to adjust to new information, and to be receptive to what my child is telling me about his needs.
ADHD and medication
Half days of camp worked out very well for Aharon. He had a great time after some adjustment.
Chen has been doing Bio every day. I don't know if I updated about Chen. I got her a psychoeducational evaluation because she was having trouble even with time and a half for testing and wanted double time. It turns out she has severe ADHD, both in terms of hyperactivity and inattention. She also has trouble processing. It's not one of the usual processing disorders. I did a bit of research and most types of visual processing are related to the inability to make sense of the letters or to decode words. Chen can see all the letters and read words very quickly. But when the words are strung together, by the time she gets to the end of the sentence, she has lost the thread of the beginning of the sentence. So then she has to reread it. The evaluator said she watched Chen read some things SEVEN times before she understood it enough to move forward.
I was actually pretty shocked about the hyperactivity. Yeah, sure, I knew she was "active." Lots of the kids in my extended family for generations are "active." But since she has always had freedom of movement and didn't have to sit for extended periods of time and has always been able to take a break when she needs to, I never experienced her as hyperactive. Also, compared to Elazar, who actually starts literally climbing things and breaking things if forced to sit still, Chen being a bit wriggly or needing to quietly pace never struck me as "hyperactive."
The inattention I was well aware of. Chen has never been able to concentrate for more than 15 minutes. In unschool, we addressed this by stopping when she wanted to stop. She took and takes a lot of breaks. (Obviously this became an issue for testing, which is why I ended up taking her to evaluated.) I had always thought that this would be the kind of thing she would either outgrow or work around with maturity as she grew older.
As she took college courses last year, one per semester, and was able to get As in them, I felt she was maturing into college level work but not at the pace that I had hoped for. It seemed possible that in 2 or 3 more years (she's heading into senior year of high school now) she would be able to take more than one college course without being wiped out emotionally for the rest of the day. But maybe not.
Chen urged me to take her for ADHD medication. I was hesitant but felt that at 17, she was old enough and mature enough to make that kind of decision and felt that if she wanted it, she deserved to give it a try.
As she fought through the side effects to find a pill that had the least side effects for her, it became clear that it helped her markedly. She is so thrilled to have something that allows her to concentrate for a couple of hours a day (she's taking a low dose of immediate release, so she gets a short burst for just a few hours, which is all you need in homeschool to accomplish a lot).
I wondered if maybe I was wrong all these years to not have her evaluated earlier and not have her on medication earlier.
But I don't think so. As I spoke with the evaluator about recommendations for students with Chen's level of learning disability, it turns out that intuitively I have been giving her all of the recommended accommodations. Because she has been able to choose her studies and when and for how long, and because she has had the time to read and reread as much as she needs, she has been happily and excitedly learning, with none of the stress, pain, self-doubt, anxiety or frustration that often accrues to students suffering from ADHD. Her education has been a beautiful, fruitful, and fascinating adventure.
Regarding whether or not she would have been better off starting medication earlier, I think it makes sense that she started it when she herself was feeling the frustration of not being able to concentrate and when she herself desired the ability to focus for longer.
Might she have accumulated more knowledge and information had she been on medication earlier? Maybe, maybe not. She has learned a lot and a lot of very unusual things. One of the tenets of unschooling is that there is a trust that a person can always find a way to learn something they are interested in learning, at any point that they want to learn it. So there is no rush to "get it in." If you don't learn math and then at age 35 you become interested in math, then you find a class or a person or a book or a website to help you learn math.
The only way that this has altered my plans for Elazar (whom I'm sure has ADHD) is that I'll be more forceful in trying to get him an IEP when he gets to high school (I tried with Chen, but because she was always doing grade level work, she didn't qualify). And he will be aware of how medication is helping Chen, so we will pursue that when he becomes interested, if he becomes interested. I believe that we will continue the same path of unschooling for him and not medicate him so that he can sit and focus for the classic high school curriculum. Unless he asks for that.
Chen has been doing Bio every day. I don't know if I updated about Chen. I got her a psychoeducational evaluation because she was having trouble even with time and a half for testing and wanted double time. It turns out she has severe ADHD, both in terms of hyperactivity and inattention. She also has trouble processing. It's not one of the usual processing disorders. I did a bit of research and most types of visual processing are related to the inability to make sense of the letters or to decode words. Chen can see all the letters and read words very quickly. But when the words are strung together, by the time she gets to the end of the sentence, she has lost the thread of the beginning of the sentence. So then she has to reread it. The evaluator said she watched Chen read some things SEVEN times before she understood it enough to move forward.
I was actually pretty shocked about the hyperactivity. Yeah, sure, I knew she was "active." Lots of the kids in my extended family for generations are "active." But since she has always had freedom of movement and didn't have to sit for extended periods of time and has always been able to take a break when she needs to, I never experienced her as hyperactive. Also, compared to Elazar, who actually starts literally climbing things and breaking things if forced to sit still, Chen being a bit wriggly or needing to quietly pace never struck me as "hyperactive."
The inattention I was well aware of. Chen has never been able to concentrate for more than 15 minutes. In unschool, we addressed this by stopping when she wanted to stop. She took and takes a lot of breaks. (Obviously this became an issue for testing, which is why I ended up taking her to evaluated.) I had always thought that this would be the kind of thing she would either outgrow or work around with maturity as she grew older.
As she took college courses last year, one per semester, and was able to get As in them, I felt she was maturing into college level work but not at the pace that I had hoped for. It seemed possible that in 2 or 3 more years (she's heading into senior year of high school now) she would be able to take more than one college course without being wiped out emotionally for the rest of the day. But maybe not.
Chen urged me to take her for ADHD medication. I was hesitant but felt that at 17, she was old enough and mature enough to make that kind of decision and felt that if she wanted it, she deserved to give it a try.
As she fought through the side effects to find a pill that had the least side effects for her, it became clear that it helped her markedly. She is so thrilled to have something that allows her to concentrate for a couple of hours a day (she's taking a low dose of immediate release, so she gets a short burst for just a few hours, which is all you need in homeschool to accomplish a lot).
I wondered if maybe I was wrong all these years to not have her evaluated earlier and not have her on medication earlier.
But I don't think so. As I spoke with the evaluator about recommendations for students with Chen's level of learning disability, it turns out that intuitively I have been giving her all of the recommended accommodations. Because she has been able to choose her studies and when and for how long, and because she has had the time to read and reread as much as she needs, she has been happily and excitedly learning, with none of the stress, pain, self-doubt, anxiety or frustration that often accrues to students suffering from ADHD. Her education has been a beautiful, fruitful, and fascinating adventure.
Regarding whether or not she would have been better off starting medication earlier, I think it makes sense that she started it when she herself was feeling the frustration of not being able to concentrate and when she herself desired the ability to focus for longer.
Might she have accumulated more knowledge and information had she been on medication earlier? Maybe, maybe not. She has learned a lot and a lot of very unusual things. One of the tenets of unschooling is that there is a trust that a person can always find a way to learn something they are interested in learning, at any point that they want to learn it. So there is no rush to "get it in." If you don't learn math and then at age 35 you become interested in math, then you find a class or a person or a book or a website to help you learn math.
The only way that this has altered my plans for Elazar (whom I'm sure has ADHD) is that I'll be more forceful in trying to get him an IEP when he gets to high school (I tried with Chen, but because she was always doing grade level work, she didn't qualify). And he will be aware of how medication is helping Chen, so we will pursue that when he becomes interested, if he becomes interested. I believe that we will continue the same path of unschooling for him and not medicate him so that he can sit and focus for the classic high school curriculum. Unless he asks for that.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
