What Happens When Unschoolers Are 'Behind'

There's something I always say about homeschool:

There's no behind in homeschool; there's only where your child is at.

In homeschool, we have the luxury of teaching the child on their level, at all times. We can advance at their pace. We can teach the same thing over and over. We can slow down. We can stop. We can let it go for months or years and pick it up when they are ready.

In general, a lot of homeschoolers play more in the younger years than their classmate counterparts do. It's not that hard to "catch up" later. Especially because one-on-one learning is so efficient.

In unschooling, where the parent doesn't teach the child, and instead, the child learns what they want when they want, there is often a fear that the child will grow up and blame the parent for not forcing them to learn. After all, learning is unpleasant but needs to be done, and you should have made me do it, even though I fought it. And now I'm an adult and I don't know what I need to know and it's all your fault.

(Sure, homeschoolers worry about this too. But believe me when I say the fear is a little more stark when you've actually actively not taught your children [unless they asked] as a philosophy.)

I've written about "You Should Have Taught me X" at length (and it's worth rereading).

The more experience I have as an unschooler and as a parent, the more I realize that the unschooling philosophy of education is a radically different method of educating and is going to look very different. That's why testing doesn't actually give very good information about where an unschooler is educationally. 

Like if most kids (hahahaha as if) learn in a straight line, i.e. the older they get, the more math and reading they know

An unschooler can look like nothing, looks like nothing, looks like nothing, then BAM growth

the y-axis could be "math or reading"

Like a bamboo plant. 
A Chinese bamboo tree takes five years to grow. It has to be watered and fertilized in the ground where it has been planted every day. It doesn't break through the ground for five years. After five years, once it breaks through the ground, it will grow 90 feet tall in five weeks!

My point is that since unschoolers learn when they want to or when they feel they need to, they can often go for years without what society deems basic scholastic competency. (Or they work around it.)

But it's a mistake to think that they are "behind." They are actually perfectly aligned with the unschooling educational philosophy. Which says that the time to learn is when the child (person) wants to or feels motivated to because they need it for something they want. This could happen after childhood, once the person is an adult. 

I once heard my son explain: "Oh, you see, the way it works for us is that we learn it when we want to."

Unschooled children are never "behind." They are simply in a pre-state of "not knowing YET." And the happy state of "When I want to know it, I'll figure it out."

Update ADHD

E's been on a low dose of immediate release medication for 2 weeks. No negative side effects. The change in his ability to focus is remarkable. Instead of running out of steam after 2 lines of Hebrew reading, he can read the entire bentching and most of Ashrei. His reading ability has improved. His ability to keep the information in his head is remarkably improved. He's able to get through more of shemona esrei. 

After 2 weeks, we were going to tell the doctor that he will take it only "as needed" (which is really "as wanted" in unschool). The neurologist wants him on it another 2 weeks to make sure there are no negative side effects. 

After that, the plan is that E can choose if he wants to take it or not. The idea was mainly for him to see that his brain works differently on medication and he has no need to feel like he's lazy because he has trouble focusing. If he wants to do complicated math or science or gemara in the future, he has this tool in his toolbox.

I'm going to do as much Hebrew reading as he's up for while he's on medication this month. He hasn't been taking it on Shabbos and he said he is still able to read better now that his reading has improved. (He can't read as long or as much, but his reading ability has improved and he can read more than 2 lines now, even unmedicated.) 

Within 3 years of college, we'll aim for psychoeducational testing so that if there is a learning disability he can get student services in college. (But at this juncture it's looking to me like it's just a focus issue.)

E says ADHD is not a big deal in his life right now so he doesn't need or want medication.

A negative effect

A negative side effect of Elazar reluctantly practicing reading is that he no longer likes to do Mishna.  He feels "overloaded" from the 5-10 minutes.  (I've actually skipped learning the meaning of his parsha with him this week [which I'd been doing 2x a week, reading out loud to him and translating 3 or so pesukim] since he's been so unhappy and complaining about learning.)

This is a feature that his older sister had, too.  I wonder if it's an aspect of ADHD that they run out of steam so quickly learning things that are difficult for their brains and need the rest of the day or actual days or weeks to recover.  Her motivation and determination improved with age (and medication) but the mental exhaustion remains about the same.

Update

It went terribly.  E hates reading the same thing over and over and refuses to self rate.  He is bored out of his mind and won't even read it to fluency.  He's been reading one line, with complaining, 5-6 times.  He does not achieve fluency level (reading as quickly as speaking).  I figure he would need 10-15 tries to do that and he doesn't want to.

I tried to coax him into giving it a week.  I said it's a method I read about; can't we try it out?  He finds it excruciating.  I don't know if I should stick it out or if I should just try to have him read more.  That, too, isn't going very successfully. 

It may come to him actually not being able at bar mitzva age to read fluently, because he's so vehemently opposed to it.

hebrew reading fluency

The goal: To be able to read as quickly as speaking

E is pretty accurate at this point.  (Kaf and chaf, pey and fey, he still confuses.  And he doesn't ever use a shva nach yet.)  But I want him to be able to read more fluently.  Reading more doesn't seem to be picking up his pace (I've been trying that for the last month) and he doesn't like to read so much at once.

My friend told me about R' Jonathan Rietti's method to increase speed and accuracy:

Read a sentence.
Self assess how fast it was (assuming accuracy and fluency are already in place) on a 1-5 scale. Then decide if you want to read it again aiming for faster speed.
And we’ve done that repeating the sentence 5-6 times and speed does pick and AND it picks up globally not just for that sentence, if you keep up with it and practice.

I'll let you know how it goes!

here's how not unschooling goes

I told E I'd like to learn his parsha with him.  He said, "No, no, no" and curled up into a ball on the couch under a blanket.

I said to him yesterday, "Do you truly not want to learn your Parsha?" (This is me reading the pesukim out loud in Hebrew to him and then translating them.)

He said, "I know I have to, but I don't want to." 

Today was only 4 pesukim because he couldn't sit through what I had planned yesterday.  (I was trying to do one aliyah per sitting; he has a double parsha so that's 14 aliyos total.)  So he was dreading it but it wasn't so bad.

Then I spoke with him about wanting to improve his reading.  He was kind of dismayed at all the brachos he has to learn for the haftora.  I said reading fluently would help.  He said, "Noooooooo" it's difficult and he doesn't like it. I explained that if he would be able to read at the pace of talking, it wouldn't be hard to learn the brachos if he could read like that.  He said that he has trouble with the letters with the dagesh and without, being able to tell them apart. 

I asked him if he wanted to just work on knowing those first.  He said no.

He said he'd rather learn to read later.  I said I'd like to do it now.

I had him read a line from one of the haftora brachos.  I said only one line a day. 

He read it.  He started off very slowly with mistakes.  Got into a groove as he went.  It was a line with no tricky stuff.  He translated as he went.  (Score for speaking in Hebrew!)  The line finished and I said, "That's it."  And he said, "That wasn't so bad."

I'm glad it ended up not so bad.  I'm glad it's not torture.  I'm having some flashbacks to why I started this blog in the first place. 

I don't think I'm "ruining" him.  I often say in parenting (or homeschooling) there isn't "right" and "wrong" (aside from things that are harmful)(אין המקרא אומר אלא דרשני) as much as there are actions and consequences.  This action will lead to him having better reading.  It will also lead to unpleasant associations with Torah and learning.  Only time will tell if is worth it.  Plus there are so many factors we probably won't be able to tell which details contributed to a love/hate/indifference/passion for Torah and which factors opposed it.  Plus what works for one child does and does not work for others.  It's complicated.

I do my best and I daven.

The following is my probably inaccurate memory summarizing our conversation

This morning we had a little parent teacher conference about some aspects of bar mitzva readiness.  Ari was considering buying siddurim for each kid.  Notwithstanding that we already have 2 children's siddurs on the shelf (and boy #3 is often still asleep when I do tefila in the morning) that the boys already don't use, I didn't think it was a good idea to have the kids follow along while I daven.

Right now, I daven out loud.  They play video games and sing along when they feel like it.  I feel that having them follow along (or I even considered Elazar just standing next to me for shemona esrei and me being motzi him that way) would be excruciatingly boring for them and not confer any actual benefit.  I suggested that during Avos U'Banim, when Ari has the kids for learning, he work on reading Shema, Shemona Esrei, bentching and other brachos achronos. (And Asher Yatzer, which I forgot to mention.) 

The question is, will E be able to daven 3x a day with a minyan and a full davening?  If not, what is the bare halachic minimum?  Ari asked what about birchas Kriyas Shema.  I am singing them out loud to Elazar every day. (Not maariv, but shacharis.)  So he is becoming familiar with them.  I don't know that making him sit with an open siddur would help, and it can definitely pain him and make him miserable.  And if, at bar mitzva age, E finds he cannot focus on the whole thing and have kavana, and he hates it, then what do we recommend for him?  Just Shema and Shemona Esrei 2x a day.  Mincha just Shemona Esrei.  Bare minimum halachic requirements. 

Ari wants to make sure that E can count at a minyan.  To that end, he will need to know how to respond (amens, kedusha, kaddish, etc).  I suggested Ari go through that with him.  Is it better to do that at the minyan or outside the minyan?  (As I don't know, I leave that to Ari's discretion.)

Ari also felt that he had pushed E too much during Avos U'Banim.  I told him that I had discovered from my learning with E that he enjoys learning trope outside the context of reading and translating.  And he enjoys translating when he doesn't have to read (meaning you read the word to him and he translates) and he enjoys understanding the pesukim when you tell him the general translation but it loses enjoyment for him when he has to sit and decode a lot.  He'd rather each word or phrase in the pasuk be read to him, ask him what the words mean and have him answer/guess, then tell him generally as a whole what the pasuk means. 

I said that I think that not pushing reading and translating makes sense.  Because he enjoys other aspects of learning Torah.

• If you read it to him, he likes translating some of the words if he knows them
• If you sing him the trope, he likes learning and repeating the trope
• If you tell him what the pasuk means, he enjoys thinking about it

He does NOT like reading.  He does not like going slowly and translating it.  Will having him do that increase the likelihood that he will learn Torah in the future?

Will having him read and decode increase his future ability to learn Torah because he will have the skills?

These are important questions.  (Wish I knew the answers!)  It seems to me that focusing on the parts he enjoys and not pushing the parts that pain him will keep his learning positive and enjoyable.  This will increase the probability that he will learn Torah as an adult.

But what about his lacking skills?  Either he will be motivated to gain skills, or he will learn using translations.  My sense is that pushing the skills will more likely end up (in E's particular case) with him avoiding future Torah learning.

I said to Ari that I think focusing on the 3 types of learning that he enjoys above and avoiding what he dislikes will make him more likely to learn Torah by himself at age 25.  Ari said, "Really?"  

It's kind of scary to not do the "classic" educational stuff.  Will we be providing him with the education necessary to be a ben Torah?  

On the other hand, traditional education would be a disaster for this particular child.  We are already out of the box.  It's a tough line to figure out what is "pushing too hard" and what is "avoiding our responsibility to make sure he is capable of fulfilling his responsibilities."  What is he capable of and what is he truly not capable of?  What will foster a joy and love of Torah and what will push him away?  What can he really handle and what is a good idea for him to handle?

With so many kids who have gone through the school system being disinterested, not halachically observant, not having a strong emotional and spiritual relationship to Torah, and lacking skills, at least I feel I can't do worse than that with alternative education.  That's not a very high bar, though.

Aharon's First Torah

A couple of days ago, Aharon told me he doesn't like it when I speak in Hebrew. 

"Well," I said, "I speak in Hebrew so that when you want to read the Torah, you'll understand it.  Because the Torah is in Hebrew."

And he said, "But I can't read the Torah."

"Actually, I think you can," I said.  He hasn't been practicing his Hebrew reading very much (except once a week at Avos U'Banim), but like unschoolers usually do, he had practiced every day while he was interested in mastering it, then hit a level of proficiency and stopped working on it.  Last time I saw him read, I felt he was pretty fluent.  I had been thinking I should offer to work on davening with him, but as always, I vacillate between wondering if I should try to work with them and figuring it will be way more efficient and quick if they do it when they are motivated.

Aharon and Elazar began talking about how they actually knew a fair amount of what the words meant in the Hebrew reader.

[When I started unschooling, I had a fear that one day my kids would grow up, realize they have massive gaps in their education, and blame me for not forcing them to learn it.  But I then realized that a lot of unschooling is cheerfully talking about how when they want it and are interested in it, they'll learn it.  So they don't learn Torah inside right now, but when it comes up, we talk about how when they are interested and want to, they'll learn it.  It turns out that unschoolers happily and cheerfully learn new things and master new skills as they become relevant or interesting.]

Tonight, Aharon was wandering around, and I said, "Hey, want to try to read the Torah?"

He said okay.  I asked him which part of Torah is his favorite.  He said the part where Hashem turned the water into blood. 

No problem.  I pulled out Shmos and opened up the pasuk.  Aharon read המים and I repeated it after him and he said, "the water!"  Then he read אשר and didn't know what it was.  I said "that" and he said "אשר קדשנו במצותיו" and I said Yup. Then he read ביאור and I told him that was the Hebrew word for the Nile River.  Then he was getting antsy and I told him just one more word.  And I pointed to the last word in the pasuk and he read לדם.  And I repeated it and he didn't know.  And I said just "dam" and he said, "Blood!"  And he grinned.

****

An example of how halacha comes up naturally: Aharon wanted to eat his pizza bagel and I told him to make a bracha but he was waiting for the bagel to call off a bit.  Then he came over to me a minute later with a tiny bit of the cheese from the top and asked me if this was the same bracha as the bagel.  I said no, that's shehakol, and he should make that bracha and then a bracha on the bagel later when it cools down.

How is Unschooling Going? Age 11

I'm on a group and someone new asked: Does anyone have any ideas on how to motivate a 2e kid who isn’t?! 10 yo boy...

I wrote an answer and I figured I'd share here.

My 11yo is severe ADHD.  I've pretty much given up trying to teach him anything (he starts getting tics or destroying things if he sits for five minutes).

I give him unlimited video games--he learns a ton from there.  Access to youtube--he looks up lots of things he wants to know and watches a lot of science and social studies [and a lot of other 'nonsense' but he ends up being well "read" with a fantastic vocabulary].

I'm always hanging about if he wants to tell me things and discuss what he's watching, doing or thinking about.  A ton of his learning comes from me just sitting around doing my own thing and pausing when he comes over and being a person to bounce things off of or for him to share something he just watched that he's very enthusiastic about.

I daven out loud sitting next to him every morning while he plays video games.  Some mornings he sings along with me.  Very rarely.  Sometimes he hums the tunes to himself as I walk away.  Some mornings he decides he absolutely must go visit the neighbor right when I start davening.

I also have a ton of art supplies for him to tinker around with.  Glue gun.  Duct tape.  Paper, scissors, stapler, lots and lots of cardboard (he collects that himself on recycle day).  That's pretty much his day every day (we also do parkour outside the house 2x a week).

He's a happy kid and is thriving.

Also we eventually discovered that a mishna is great because it's very, very short.  He learns one mishna most nights but that's after years and years of really not doing anything official--and he chooses to do it.  If he's resistant, we don't do it.  He gets tics.

My husband takes him to avos ubanim motzei shabbos and he reads a page of reading and hears parsha.  He can still barely read hebrew.  His English he somehow learned (from minecraft) but he doesn't love to read.  Just enough to navigate the internet.

I have him read about 2 lines of bentching after bread if he doesn't scamper off too quickly.

Little bits, here and there, very relaxed.  Me always around for conversation.  We take walks where he asks deep philosophical Torah questions.  He asks halacha questions very very frequently.


All in all, seeing how much anguish parents go through when their kids have trouble in school.  And seeing how much the kids suffer--aside from the actual pain of sitting still, many of them suffer from anxiety and crushed self esteem.  I mostly feel a shaky sense of relief and delight that Elazar is a happy, thriving, confident kid who loves learning and loves his life.

Zos Chanuka

Aharon's burning desire to read has settled down.  He stopped dragging the reader in every night 4 minutes before the cutoff time (10:30pm).  Either he achieved a level of mastery that he is content with, or the urge that had been driving him just eased a bit.

I forgot about the rhythms of learning.  Back when I used to homeschool (not unschool), some weeks/months the kids would be raring to go, like their brains were extra nimble and they were super motivated.  Then other times they'd be like molasses, difficult to motivate and sluggish to work.  I learned many years ago to look out for the highs and grab them and get as much done as possible.  Because during the lows and dips they didn't want to work.

It was something I didn't know about from "regular" school.  Kids have to go by what the class is doing, and don't get to ride the waves of their own personal brain functioning and motivation and zip when they are uber efficient, and take it easier when they are more stagnant.  But I saw it a lot in homeschool when I taught other people's kids.  And I see it here again.

More Unschooling Magic

Aharon continues to drag the reader into my room every night at 10:24 or so, with just enough time before 10:30 to read.  Last night he read two pages.  His reading is not as fluent as a 2nd grader in "regular" school, but he's much faster than his older brothers.  The other day, while I was davening out loud, he came to look over my shoulder.  I slowed down and let him read the very last syllable, which he did.  He seems interested in getting his reading level to the point of being able to daven.

(Jack has stopped asking for Chumash, and Elazar and I are doing trup very spottily.)

Jack comes up for snuggle most nights in the early 10s, to get a snuggle before my 10:30 cutoff time.  Last night, I was hanging out in bed, talking to Chen, when he came in.  He asked what division was.

I explained it like I had explained it to Elazar about cookies and the amount of people who want cookies and to make it fair.  So we started with 15 and I said there are 3 people.  I gave him one of my hands so he'd have 15 fingers and could visualize it.

He spent a long time thinking.  A really long time thinking.  One might even say a ridiculously long time thinking. 

And he wasn't using my hand, and dividing into the obvious 3 equal parts.

What was he doing?

Eventually, he said "5."  That was right, and he was thrilled, and he asked for another.

Chen was extremely curious about how he had done it.  So we asked Jack to do the next one out loud, if he could.  To talk as he was doing it and to say what he was thinking. 

He was guessing what it might be, then counting by that number, to see if he ended up with the right answer.  So 24 divided by 6.  He guessed 4.  Then he counted.  4, 8, 12, 16, 20, 24.  That was 6 jumps of 4, ending with the right number.  Had he started with 3 it would have been: 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18.  Wrong.  We did a few more problems until Aharon came in to read.

A few things really struck me about this. 

• He LOVED it.  He got so much enjoyment from thinking about this and figuring it out.  It was something he was wondering, he came to me and asked me about it, and was rewarded with the pure joy of figuring it out, discovering it, thinking about it. 
  
• He took a really long time to think about it at every step.  He thought about what it means to divide.  He thought about how it might work.  He wrestled with how it works, and tried different things, and figured out a method of calculating it.
  In school, you don't have time to do that.  Firstly, you don't have time to wonder.  You are told what you are learning and that's that.  Secondly, you are told how to do it.  You aren't given the space and time to sit and really think things through.  You simply don't have the time to sit around thinking about how division might work.  You don't have time to play with it.
  
• Division is going to be really meaningful to him.  He will understand it on a deep, gut level.  It will be part of him.

Oh, and last night Aharon forgot the ך and I told him to practice the sofises, since he stumbles over them.  I know he works on them in his mind at random times during the day, because last week he came to me, eyes shining, and told me that he mastered nun sofis (ן).

I had stuck an aleph beis printout onto the fridge haphazardly a couple of years ago, because I felt that having it in sight might incline them to look at it, and definitely showed the kids that Hebrew reading is a value of ours.  Although the kids use the multiplication chart I have on the fridge frequently, I don't see the aleph beis chart getting a lot of use.

But apparently Aharon has been using it.  This morning he came over to me, and with his eyes glued to the chart, told me that he's working on the ך and the ף.

Decision

I decided to do it.  Chen is understandably trepidacious (it is a word) about doing anything for 1.5 hours a day.  Kal V'chomer something that is reportedly "grueling."  But she agreed to try it, mainly because of the seductive possibility that she'll be able to read without rereading 4-7 times, and the possibility that she won't be mentally exhausted from reading, and that maybe she might actually be able to go to college full time.

They agreed that I don't have to commit to the full six months, since they themselves are not sure she is a candidate.  The program manager sounded pretty excited and seems to think she is a good candidate, and is extremely interested to see if the program will help.

So here we go. 

I was thinking how homeschooling (and unschooling especially) tells parents to pay close attention to kids' cues and to adjust the learning to the child.  All these years that Chen has been refusing to read have not been stubbornness, was not a personality thing.  It's neurological. 

Chen wants to start in a couple of days.  Today, when the program manager called to speak to us, Chen was at Dance.  I arranged for her to call back later.  When Chen came home and I told her, Chen was upset because she wanted to take her medication immediately and have two solid hours to work on trigonometry. 

Can you believe that?  My unschooled child, who dropped math in 2009 or so and later told me not to get involved in high school math--she's handling it herself.  Everyone always thinks: If I unschool, they'll just play video games all day.  Even kids themselves think: If I unschool, I would watch youtube and play video games all day.

And yet that is not the case.  Chen, age 17, is raring to go and is so jealously guarding her math time that she was reluctant to interrupt it with a five minute conversation.  (Instead of waiting for the call, she called the program manager right then, and was pleased with the conversation.)

I never cease to be astonished at the magic that is unschooling.

To Do or Not to Do, That is the Question

In May, Chen (grade 12) got a psychoeducational evaluation.  She was diagnosed with severe ADHD.  She has some type of difficulty processing, but she can read letters and words easily.  It is only when they combine to sentences and paragraphs that she has trouble processing what she is reading.

She began medication, which helps tremendously on focus (she went from being able to focus for 15 minutes to being able to focus for 1.5 hours).  However, much to her disappointment, it did not help with her processing difficulties.  She still has to read things many times in order to understand.

I went back and forth with the evaluator, and she explained that this type of processing is a subcategory of ADHD.  It's not a separate processing disorder.  She said they are thinking of making it its own DSM disorder, but thus far have not done so.

In the meantime, last year, I had read about a woman who had designed a whole bunch of brain exercises involving a 16 hour clock and had trained her brain with neuroplasticity to be able to do things where before she had a learning disability.  I recalled this and wondered if Chen's brain could be retrained.  I looked in vain for that article or talk, but was unable to find it.

By coincidence, somebody posted a list of nonfiction books, and one of them was Brain That Changes Itself.  In it was the story of this woman!  It also discussed different neuroplasticity programs.  One is in Canada and another in Australia.  Then in another chapter, it discussed a program called Fast ForWord.  It is very expensive--over $2000.  It is considered a grueling program.  It claims to do brain exercises that will improve processing.  It is a 6 month program for 50-90 minutes a day.

After looking more closely, the main issues they help with are Auditory Processing Disorder, Dyslexia, Autism, and ADHD.  Chen only has ADHD.  But it may be that her particular issues are not what this program addresses.  Chen's Working Memory is average on her neuropsych eval.  This program strengthens Working Memory and auditory processing.  So will this program help?  If her Working Memory was abnormally low, then this program would certainly be suited.  But in this case...Her processing disorder is not a standard processing disorder.

She did the assessment and I spoke to them, and they said that if she hadn't been tested and found that her Working Memory is decent, they would have said that this program will certainly help.  However, knowing from testing that her processing issues are not exactly what this program does, they can't say it will be helpful.  So it is kind of a risk.

On the other hand, the thought that she might be able to read without re-reading and re-reading and growing mentally exhausted is just a wondrous thought.  Is it worth the gamble?

Here are some testimonials.

I am inclined to invest the money in the hope that she could train her brain to process reading more easily.  At the same time, I wonder if I am just one of those desperate people who will pay for hope and ultimately be paying for something that doesn't work.

If anyone has any experience or feedback for me, please reach out to help me make this decision!

Full Steam Ahead

Aharon, age 7, has been asking to read the aleph bina every night. He's making good progress. I think his motives are to catch up to or be ahead of his older brothers, who only read at avos u'banim. Elazar still dislikes reading at age 11. Moral of the story: unschooling seems to work if you are a little brother in competition. Can't speak about the rest at this time.

Feeling like a failure

I'm an experienced homeschooler.  I cannot emphasize just how experienced I am.  One of my kids finished college, another is almost done with high school.  (Actually, I'm not super experienced at boy homeschooling, considering my oldest boy isn't bar mitzva yet.)  I have been homeschooling for almost twenty years. 

Homeschoolers often find themselves against going against "common wisdom."  Kids need to know things or do things by a certain age.  Kids need to suffer certain things or they'll never be able to do it as an adult.  Kids need to [learn to sit for hours, tolerate boring learning for hours, be able to do hours of tasks that they hate, etc] so that they'll be able to function as adults.

It takes courage to keep walking a different path when people around you tell you that what you're doing is harmful.  Even if your own mind (and experience!) tell you that your path is a good path, it can be difficult.

I'm always amazed by how fragile my confidence is.  Years of positivity can be undermined.

Last week, one of my kids was at a birthday party and got into fights with the kids there.  I'm still feeling badly about that.  Worrying about his social abilities.  On one hand, I know that this is an issue (he's gotten into conflicts like this before) and I appreciate that homeschooling a) minimizes these situations and b) gives me the chance to walk him through these incidents while I'm on hand.
On the other hand, it is always disquieting to see your child be so miserable socially (tears, misunderstanding his contribution to the dynamic). 

Riding the coat tails of that, the boys started camp this week. 

I looked to see if I ended up discussing what happened with A last summer.  I can't find it at the moment.  I think it needs its own blog post.

But first let's discuss J, going into 4th grade.  His Rebbe called to discuss him after the first day.  Let's remember that J was homesick two years ago and didn't make it through the first week of camp.  He's been psyching himself up for two years now, and is trying it out for a week. 

I had told the boys that the way that we homeschool, the other kids are going to know things that they know, and that they will do that sort of thing closer to their bar mitzvas.

The Rebbe was perplexed that J couldn't do basic things like find the perek and the pasuk.  That during davening, he didn't turn the pages of the siddur.

I explained that homeschooling is a different educational approach and that most of their Torah at this age is Torah She-baal peh.  The Rebbe walked me through all the types of learning and davening and we came to agreements about what that would mean for J.  i.e. he would not call on J, would not ask him to write on the board, would visually keep an eye out in case J wants to participate but would not expect him to do the work.  It was a lovely conversation.

I explained to J that the Rebbe wouldn't call on him and he can turn pages in the siddur when he sees the other boys doing it and stand up and sit down when they do.

But J came home on the 2nd day of camp and said he just wants to go after davening and learning.  I said ok. 

I thought J would be ok for that part of camp, but it's ok if he doesn't want to.

This actually sparked a conversation between me and Ari.  Ari said, "Of course he doesn't want to sit there and learn.  It's boring." And we wondered whether the boys actually would ever be interested in learning Torah if we unschool it. 

I know that the unschoolers I've spoken to say yes.  And in my own heart, I believe that as teenagers, they can learn quickly and efficiently if they want to.  But it's definitely hard to feel comfortable when your almost 4th grader can barely read Hebrew and can't hack summer camp learning.

One thing I am realizing.  Everyone keeps saying that "camp is not school."  In the sense that camp is more relaxed than school.  Which is definitely true.  But when you unschool, camp is definitely longer and more structured than homeschool.  And when you have kids who are not used to doing activities that bore them, they don't have a high tolerance for it.

Another point I'm pondering is that maybe this camp is not best for my family.  They've been wonderful.  They are unbelievably flexible.  They are kind, considerate and thoughtful.  They are close--their playground is the playground across the street from my house, which helps my little ones feel they are in familiar territory.

But maybe a different camp with less learning would be better for them.

On the other hand, maybe being anywhere from 9:30-3:30 would make them unhappy, and I'd be paying more to have the same conflicts and arguments.

Onward to A's camp experience.

Unschooling Literature

Homeschoolers fret, if I'm any indication of the population.  I'm probably one of the most relaxed, calm, confident homeschoolers in existence, and I find thoughts drifting through my head about whether I'm doing right by my children.

I think "worry" plays a valuable role.  It keeps me on track.  It makes me evaluate what I'm doing to see if it's "best practice."

Sometimes I worry when my children aren't doing --insert whatever here-- and I think that maybe the answer is to coax them into doing whatever kind of work.

(Let me state here: Education where you strive to teach a curriculum that you find valuable and to do it in a way where it is as enjoyable as possible for the student can be a lovely and noble thing.  I'm presenting the unschooling POV here.  The great thing about homeschooling is the freedom to educate as you like.)

So naturally, when E (grade 5) was decidedly uninterested in the book I took out of the library for him (Ronia the Robber's Daughter) even though it was highly recommended and supposedly funny, we eventually decided to give up and return it without finishing it.  And in between, I worried.

But then, I took out Charlotte's Web.  And I don't have to think about reading it to him or finding time for it or scheduling it.  Because he keeps coming to me and asking me to read it.

And that is the difference between unschooling and schooling.  It's not on my head to manage it.  It's not on my head to plan it and it's not on my head to make sure it happens.  It's the kind of learning that is so thrilling and joyous and desirable that they come to me and ask me to facilitate it.  They want it, yearn for it, seek it out, beg me to do it.

He didn't find Charlotte's Web.  I did.  I am on the lookout for experiences and subjects and field trips that I think they will like, that will spark their interest.

And there are infinite things that they find to do, projects they want to make, places they want to go, that I can assist them with.

I see the difference in motivation, interest and love with Charlotte's Web vs. something I have to constantly pull him aside to do that he is reluctant about.  The difference in the amount of time and effort they put in.  The difference in how quickly and easily they learn.  And when I see that difference, it makes me want to abandon all attempts to cajole reluctant learners to learn things.  And to follow them passionately and help them learn whatever calls out to them.

Al Pi Darka

First a small update: Ari decided that he is going to focus on reading with the boys every day.  He's been reading a page in the Aleph Bina with them every day, and they've all been happily reading.  Elazar is still having trouble sitting for learning (even though he enjoys the Friday night Mishna very much), so Ari felt that getting him fluent in reading will be key to increased participation in brachos, tefila, etc.

Next up, Yom Kippur.  K was away for the three day yontif of Rosh Hashana, and on one of our beach walks leading up to the chag, we discussed themes of Rosh Hashana and how she was feeling about it.  It was uncanny how much she remembered from previous years.  All those years I fretted that I wasn't teaching her enough, and it turns out she has an incredible grasp of the basic and deeper ideas of the chag.

So I am trying to figure out how to make a meaningful Yom Kippur for her.  The boys are not really chinuch age for Yom Kippur just yet.  I can maybe go through some of the facts of the Yom Kippur avoda with them.  But for K, who strongly dislikes shul, we decided on one tefila.  She was indifferent as to whether it was mincha or Neila.  (I thought of Musaf, but it's very long, and as I discovered about Rosh Hashana, I don't have to push the themes so hard.)  So I will choose which tefila on the day, depending on everyone's mood and how the boys are doing.

She asked if it is allowed for her to socialize.  I said yes, but everyone will be in shul.  Although I appreciate the solemnity and awe of the day, my assessment is that taking that approach this year with this child would be counterproductive.  We will get books out of the library so that the boredom of the day will not be overly painful for her.  And she agreed to grant me one hour of learning.

I am thinking of learning the Rambam's Moreh Nevuchim with her On Evils (Friedlander pg 267) since that is something that has come up in conversation before and I hope she will find it interesting.  And if it works out, I'll turn next to Moreh Nevuchim about Iyov and his analysis of the book.  She has asked about that, too.

I'll let you know how it goes.  In my experience homeschooling, my plans and what ends up happening usually have very little in common.

Beginning of No School

Yesterday I finally filled out the paperwork for NYS and sent it in.  The 11th grade IHIP (individualized home instruction plan) was fairly simple--oddly, I find high school paperwork a lot easier than elementary school.  The boys all had previous year's paperwork that I could use except for 5th grade for Elazar.  I have done it 2x before with the girls, but apparently it was before things were in the cloud and so I had to make a new IHIP for him.  A tip that I use for Math and Language Arts is to google "5th grade curriculum" for the subject I want, and then copy the ones that are most likely to come up or that he already knows.
Excerpt from math:

- learn to choose, describe, and explain estimation strategies used to determine reasonableness of solutions to real-world problems.

- estimate quantities of objects to 1000 or more, justifying and explaining the reasoning for their estimates.

Examples from Language Arts:  

- Compare and contrast the varieties of English (e.g., dialects, registers) used in stories, dramas, or poems.

- Use context (e.g., cause/effect relationships and comparisons in text) as a clue to the meaning of a word or phrase.

- Use common, grade-appropriate Greek and Latin affixes and roots as clues to the meaning of a word (e.g., photograph, photosynthesis).

- Interpret figurative language, including similes and metaphors, in context.

- Recognize and explain the meaning of common idioms, adages, and proverbs.

- Use the relationship between particular words (e.g., synonyms, antonyms, homographs) to better understand each of the words.

Even though we unschool, Elazar is involved in these activities.  Mainly from youtube videos, which are pretty sophisticated and have introduced him to most of the above concepts.

Chana started college Russian.  Since she came home from Japan the day that class started and took a couple of days to recover, she only had about 3 days to do the first week's worth of work.  It was a bit overwhelming in addition to figuring out the online system but I think she got the hang of it.  She hasn't asked for any more help.  And yesterday she went to Gulliver's Gate Museum (#socialstudies) and there was Russian there and she was able to read it and look up some of it online.  So she's already happily using it.

I signed Jack up for engineering once a week and Jack and Aharon up for Science class once a week.  We also have parkour once a week.  Elazar adamantly refuses to go to science class (for the older grades there is more talking and sitting and less hands-on activity so I agree with him).  Chana started Gemara class 3x a week and has already asked me about Bahaaloscha and Dovid and Golyas in the last couple of days.  I also hope that she will continue her once a week math sessions with her friend.  The $200+ chemistry set that I bought at the beginning of the summer continues to be unopened.  I wonder if I should hire someone to do chemistry experiments once a month with her.  I'll ask her.

Aharon and I reviewed the aleph beis today and he only knows them in order.  When I pointed to them and asked him if he knew them, he doesn't know most of them.  He did not want to review nekudos and was not interested in learning more.  Aharon is somewhat unhappy socially.  This is not a new story and has been somewhat of an issue for years.  Because the boys are close in age, he doesn't have his "own" friends.  I would have sent him to preschool because of this except that he was a particularly aggressive toddler and I didn't want to send a biting and smacking preschooler to preschool.  Now that he has outgrown that, I did send him to camp this summer so that he could branch out on his own and make friends his own age.  But he wasn't happy in the second month.  And in fact, one of the boys in his bunk that he liked actually plays a lot with Elazar.  So I have to schedule separate playdates (because the boy only plays with Aharon if Elazar isn't there) and it often doesn't work out.  Elazar is extremely social and extremely proactive about making playdates.  So he often has already arranged a playdate before Aharon even thinks about playing.  So this is an ongoing issue that I am grappling with.  If I knew he would be happy, I would consider sending him to school.  But he was unhappy in camp.

I've been making some effort to daven out loud as many mornings as I can and sometimes I hear the boys humming the tunes.  

Overall, the boys are pretty proficient at English reading and doing basic math problems.  I want to learn with Elazar and start a daily seder with him but he is extremely uninclined.  As usual, I go back and forth between thinking I should just unschool and leave it all up to him.  And feeling concerned that I am not being mechanech him about how important Torah is by not doing it regularly when he is old enough.

Also, their playroom is utter chaos.  I think it's time to remove a lot of things that they aren't playing with anymore and revamp it.

That's my news.  Happy unschool!

unschooling reading and writing

It's really amazing how it works.  Aharon (age 5) wants me to sit next to him pretty much all day long so that he can ask me how to spell things.  All so that he can either play games online (he loves Roblox) or look up things on google.  This morning he woke me up to get help writing "pizza."  It's months of him asking and asking and then, when he's independent (like Jack, age 7), he'll be able to write most of the words he wants to use and only ask me a few times a day, instead of every 5-10 minutes.

unschooling reading/writing

Aharon age 5 has been reading for over a year already.  He is playing a game called Roblox "design it" and you have to dress up and people vote for you.  They give you a category and then you search for clothes in that category and dress your character.  They give you five minutes to dress your character.  So roughly every five minutes for the past three hours, Aharon has asked me how to spell something.  (I believe he is searching for categories of clothing--he asked for "wings" three times and he probably knows how to spell it by now).  In the beginning he was pretty intense and kept shrieking that he only has 4 minutes left and I have to help him RIGHT NOW!!!! (Which I did.)  I just noticed that in the last half hour or so, his requests are growing more spaced.  He must be learning to spell the commonly used words he needs.