today was one of those days that makes me think that unschooling is not the answer. we spent a week by my parents and chana asked if she could have a vacation from chumash (according to unschooling philosophy, if the child needs a "vacation" then we're approaching it wrong..). i acceded.
so today we got back into it. i asked her if she wanted to do it now or later. she chose now and finished up what she was doing. she chose to chazer shlishi (i let her choose which aliya), and did it herself, asking for 2 words. then we went over the beginning of revii together. (she started doing it herself, but soon needed me to sit next to her and provide word translation and also general phrase translation.) after barely remembering the new pesukim from last time (probably because it had been so long since we did them and she didn't have any review of them at all soon after she learned them) and the new pasuk being complicated, i told her to just do those 2 pesukim again and we wouldn't do any more. 2 pesukim (or really just one new one) is rather sparse compared to how much she usually covers.
one thing i have to watch out for is that if she gets too emotionally overloaded during pshat, she doesn't have mental energy left for rashi. and we've been doing a LOT of rashi.
so even before we started she was getting whelmed. (i was going to say overwhelmed, but i must admit that she's come a long way in mastering herself, and while she was whelmed, she wasn't overwhelmed.)
i said, coaxingly, "just do as much as you can do." and she insightfully said, "that means just keep going til i finish it all!" i laughed because that's true, and that lightened the atmosphere.
so she was doing rashi, but complaining about it, but doing a really great job. she was kvetching, but she was right at that point in education where i could see she was stretching, but not being pushed too hard. exactly what good education is supposed to be. exactly what is emotionally satisfying for the child.
it turned out, about halfway through (i can't remember how long--probably about 20 min of intense reading and translating where she can usually do 40+ min), i judged that she really was hitting an emotional limit. so we stopped, and either we'll pick it up tonight if it's quiet (hahahahahaha though a girl can dream) or tomorrow.
i feel like she's really making great strides in skills.
i think about how all the rest of our lives is seamless, pleasant and relaxed (and chumash is, too) but she dislikes chumash and wishes she didn't have to do it, and i wonder if unschooling would provide that joy towards learning. but i also love the day in day out learning and the gaining of skills and knowledge.
this is why, even though i love unschooling and it calls me, i also do not feel compelled to promote it. for parents who like structure and for kids who respond to it, structured schooling that still pays attention to the individuality of the child (and most homeschoolers, no matter how structured, do come to that, because the individualized attention demands it) is wonderful.
then again, the older i get, the less i feel compelled to promote anything. you do what you want and i'll do what i want. just don't kill me or legislate against me. and we shall reap the consequences of our choices. but i digress. i just wanted to say that when you can hit that "sweet spot" in structure, where the child is being stretched but not painfully, structured education is a glory to behold.
Showing posts with label whining. Show all posts
Showing posts with label whining. Show all posts
Monday, September 3, 2012
Monday, August 13, 2012
what if we only did chumash when it was an optimal time?
in case anyone was wondering, chana is up to shlishi in bo and so far we have done 12 rashis. elazar mostly forgets to wear his kippah and i mostly forget to remind him. he's very busy playing outside. our conversations have been including more halacha and parsha and hashkafa, but he hasn't asked to learn inside.
i was discussing with my friend channie about the conflict of doing chumash when it isn't really a good time, and then being less than patient and relaxed because it's not a good time (like before we have to go out, or when the little ones are awake). the other option is to only do it when it's a good time, but that sort of ends up being... well, close to never. for example, we've done 2 navi stories this summer. if that gives you a feel (which is what i always worry unschooling will turn out to be--basically no skills).
(though i must interject that the theory is that at a certain point, they become motivated, and then BOOM they work hard at it.)
anyway, we were wondering is there any happy medium? we don't feel like we can wait until it's convenient, because it rarely is a good time. but if we do it when it's a terrible time, that is a recipe for conflict and anger and negativity. and even if we skip it when it's a terrible time, well, we might be skipping it 4x a week..
i've learned by now that certain things should be avoided at all costs with chana. do not do chumash while she is hungry. do not do chumash when we have to leave the house soon. do not get all blame-y that we haven't finished yet when someone wakes up from a nap in the middle of chumash (i obnoxiously still have trouble with that one, but luckily, chana calls me on it, so i'm improving). chana is pretty good about doing it the night before or the night after or double the next day if we aren't going to make it. it's just that I find it exhausting to do it at night like that.
channie suggested doing it when it's not a good time, but being super nice with lots of love and hugs and play. naturally, although i wholeheartedly agree, i've found that in practice, it is difficult to dredge up love and hugs and playfulness when you are feeling on edge because you are being torn in different directions.
but i feel it really negatively impacts giving over a love for learning when i am teaching with gritted teeth and impatience and radiating stress and wanting to be done and, horror of horrors, exuding disappointment that she didn't remember something or couldn't translate something.
so, in looking for a happy medium, i'm thinking about the following solution. during times when things are really busy, i don't want to skip chumash because i want to convey that it is a priority-והגית בו יומם ולילה--that we immerse ourselves in it daily. but precisely during those times when i'm feeling a time crunch, i'm going to try to set aside only 15 minutes for chumash. and during that 15 minutes, i'm going to have only 2 goals. 1. to do a "mashehu" of chumash. a smallest amount. 2. to have it be an enjoyable learning experience.
will i be able to do this? we shall see. if it doesn't work, then i'll do what i always do: look at what happened, look at what i did, look at the result, reevaluate, form a new approach, and try again.
i was discussing with my friend channie about the conflict of doing chumash when it isn't really a good time, and then being less than patient and relaxed because it's not a good time (like before we have to go out, or when the little ones are awake). the other option is to only do it when it's a good time, but that sort of ends up being... well, close to never. for example, we've done 2 navi stories this summer. if that gives you a feel (which is what i always worry unschooling will turn out to be--basically no skills).
(though i must interject that the theory is that at a certain point, they become motivated, and then BOOM they work hard at it.)
anyway, we were wondering is there any happy medium? we don't feel like we can wait until it's convenient, because it rarely is a good time. but if we do it when it's a terrible time, that is a recipe for conflict and anger and negativity. and even if we skip it when it's a terrible time, well, we might be skipping it 4x a week..
i've learned by now that certain things should be avoided at all costs with chana. do not do chumash while she is hungry. do not do chumash when we have to leave the house soon. do not get all blame-y that we haven't finished yet when someone wakes up from a nap in the middle of chumash (i obnoxiously still have trouble with that one, but luckily, chana calls me on it, so i'm improving). chana is pretty good about doing it the night before or the night after or double the next day if we aren't going to make it. it's just that I find it exhausting to do it at night like that.
channie suggested doing it when it's not a good time, but being super nice with lots of love and hugs and play. naturally, although i wholeheartedly agree, i've found that in practice, it is difficult to dredge up love and hugs and playfulness when you are feeling on edge because you are being torn in different directions.
but i feel it really negatively impacts giving over a love for learning when i am teaching with gritted teeth and impatience and radiating stress and wanting to be done and, horror of horrors, exuding disappointment that she didn't remember something or couldn't translate something.
so, in looking for a happy medium, i'm thinking about the following solution. during times when things are really busy, i don't want to skip chumash because i want to convey that it is a priority-והגית בו יומם ולילה--that we immerse ourselves in it daily. but precisely during those times when i'm feeling a time crunch, i'm going to try to set aside only 15 minutes for chumash. and during that 15 minutes, i'm going to have only 2 goals. 1. to do a "mashehu" of chumash. a smallest amount. 2. to have it be an enjoyable learning experience.
will i be able to do this? we shall see. if it doesn't work, then i'll do what i always do: look at what happened, look at what i did, look at the result, reevaluate, form a new approach, and try again.
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
lot's daughters
so we are doing the story of lot's daughters. it's always a question whether to skip this or not. the schools do. my approach tends to be to go through pshat from beginning to end. it did make chana uncomfortable. i explained it using the pshat that they thought they were the only ones left in the world (she asked if lot thought they were the only ones left, too). we haven't even had the sex talk yet, so maybe this story was a bit premature. but i agreed with her that it is an uncomfortable story. and she felt that the name "moav" was a weird thing to do.
i looked at the new pesukim for today, and felt that she could easily do 5 new pesukim. she flipped out (surprise, surprise). i got annoyed. i said only the first one will be difficult for her, the rest are easy. (which they were).
as usual, i wonder if this is her personality or if i'm doing something wrong educationally. when i think about it, i feel like she is making progress and not being traumatized in terms of attitude. but then i think fondly of alfie kohn, who somehow thinks there is a way to do this without screaming? or maybe he never says that--he just says don't reward her. which she's not doing it for the reward. she's doing it because i say she has to do it.
she requested a 20 min--no, 30 min--no, 50 min break until we do chazara. and we have to do rashis 2x today because i let her play with a friend last night instead of doing rashi.
i looked at the new pesukim for today, and felt that she could easily do 5 new pesukim. she flipped out (surprise, surprise). i got annoyed. i said only the first one will be difficult for her, the rest are easy. (which they were).
as usual, i wonder if this is her personality or if i'm doing something wrong educationally. when i think about it, i feel like she is making progress and not being traumatized in terms of attitude. but then i think fondly of alfie kohn, who somehow thinks there is a way to do this without screaming? or maybe he never says that--he just says don't reward her. which she's not doing it for the reward. she's doing it because i say she has to do it.
she requested a 20 min--no, 30 min--no, 50 min break until we do chazara. and we have to do rashis 2x today because i let her play with a friend last night instead of doing rashi.
Friday, April 1, 2011
one day she'll thank me
as usual, i'm thinking about pushing vs not pushing. about unschooling and the theory that one day they'll do it on their own with vigor and joy, vs the concern that i'm not willing to leave chumash skills up in the air with "maybe they'll pick it up one day."
am i really killing her joy in chumash by forcing her to work on skills? it seems like every day is at loggerheads. she started revii happily enough. she did 2 new pesukim. she asked a question on pshat. (it says hashem remembered avraham, so he sent lot out of the city when he destroyed the city lot was living in. what does remembering avraham have to do with lot? was lot in the city when he destroyed it? why does it make it sound like he was).
sigh. now chazara. i wanted to go back to lech lecha because i see she's not remembering it so much. oh, the kvetching and complaining and whining. i finally whined back at her that i simply cannot listen to her doing 12 pesukim in this tone of voice. she stomped off in a huff.
then she does chazara and says, 'see? i know it.' i'm very happy she remembers the content. she doesn't quite remember it attached to the words when the phrases are hard or some the vocab. it's a back and forth of arguing and whining.
and we still have rashi to do. and the rest of chazara.
i do think that she won't really remember how painful she is finding the skill work, and she'll be happy she has the skills. i don't think it will affect her love of learning, because she's not really learning now. she's pre-learning. she's acquiring the skills she will need to learn, really study, the torah in the future.
am i really killing her joy in chumash by forcing her to work on skills? it seems like every day is at loggerheads. she started revii happily enough. she did 2 new pesukim. she asked a question on pshat. (it says hashem remembered avraham, so he sent lot out of the city when he destroyed the city lot was living in. what does remembering avraham have to do with lot? was lot in the city when he destroyed it? why does it make it sound like he was).
sigh. now chazara. i wanted to go back to lech lecha because i see she's not remembering it so much. oh, the kvetching and complaining and whining. i finally whined back at her that i simply cannot listen to her doing 12 pesukim in this tone of voice. she stomped off in a huff.
then she does chazara and says, 'see? i know it.' i'm very happy she remembers the content. she doesn't quite remember it attached to the words when the phrases are hard or some the vocab. it's a back and forth of arguing and whining.
and we still have rashi to do. and the rest of chazara.
i do think that she won't really remember how painful she is finding the skill work, and she'll be happy she has the skills. i don't think it will affect her love of learning, because she's not really learning now. she's pre-learning. she's acquiring the skills she will need to learn, really study, the torah in the future.
Monday, March 28, 2011
whoops! we've been busy a lot, so i haven't been blogging. we finished shlishi and started revii. chana is not fluent with the end of shlishi yet. last night, for the entire chumash, i think she whined the whole thing and didn't say anything in a normal tone!
i did tell her that i understand she is frustrated and having strong feelings. but i don't like it when she makes strong statements like "this pasuk isn't important." ok as i'm reading that, it doesn't seem so terrible and does seem like just emoting. but she gets into this groove where she speaks very negatively about the torah or rashi. so i asked her to confine her angry comments to things that are not outlandish, such as "this rashi should be erased and never read ever again! it doesn't help anybody and will never help anybody!"
she's been graciously working on that.
i had her do 3 old rashis yesterday. it's been a while and i was pleasantly surprised. although she didn't remember the accurate pronunciation of a lot of the words, she did remember a few that i didn't think she would, and she did remember the general idea of the rashi. not bad.
i'm on bedrest now. luckily, homeschooling can be done pretty easily on bedrest (at least the part where your kid sits next to you with the books).
so back to the whining. it is pretty unpleasant to go through all of chumash when she whines. otoh, it is much more pleasant than doing chumash through tantrums. as always, the line is a little complicated between her expressing her feelings and working through them, vs her just being indulged by me when it would be better for both of us if i put a stop to it. i tend to rely on my subjective feelings, and i tend to notice the whining when it's already past the point where i should have stopped it.
it's also hard to know for sure whether i'm pushing her up to or beyond her capacity, or whether it's just a matter of her getting used to working a little harder. so hard to know.
anyway, i see that she's in a mode now where she's feeling negative about it, and feels like it's too hard, but i'm going to see if i can coax her to do it without whining.
i did tell her that i understand she is frustrated and having strong feelings. but i don't like it when she makes strong statements like "this pasuk isn't important." ok as i'm reading that, it doesn't seem so terrible and does seem like just emoting. but she gets into this groove where she speaks very negatively about the torah or rashi. so i asked her to confine her angry comments to things that are not outlandish, such as "this rashi should be erased and never read ever again! it doesn't help anybody and will never help anybody!"
she's been graciously working on that.
i had her do 3 old rashis yesterday. it's been a while and i was pleasantly surprised. although she didn't remember the accurate pronunciation of a lot of the words, she did remember a few that i didn't think she would, and she did remember the general idea of the rashi. not bad.
i'm on bedrest now. luckily, homeschooling can be done pretty easily on bedrest (at least the part where your kid sits next to you with the books).
so back to the whining. it is pretty unpleasant to go through all of chumash when she whines. otoh, it is much more pleasant than doing chumash through tantrums. as always, the line is a little complicated between her expressing her feelings and working through them, vs her just being indulged by me when it would be better for both of us if i put a stop to it. i tend to rely on my subjective feelings, and i tend to notice the whining when it's already past the point where i should have stopped it.
it's also hard to know for sure whether i'm pushing her up to or beyond her capacity, or whether it's just a matter of her getting used to working a little harder. so hard to know.
anyway, i see that she's in a mode now where she's feeling negative about it, and feels like it's too hard, but i'm going to see if i can coax her to do it without whining.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
oh the whining
unbelieveable whining today. oops as i sat to write this i remembered that i was supposed to tell her not to whine. i must remember that. simple, straightforward request. i think it's my guilt that makes me forget. i feel like i'm torturing her, so she has the right to whine...
so i'm torturing her so she can torture me and now we're even? far better for me to make sure i'm confident in my choices, and be firm in requesting that she speak in a normal tone of voice!
to be a bit fair to me, i'm pretty sure i requested no whining a few times but she kept lapsing into it, and towards the end she had so many complaints i was fielding them and forgot to take a stand on the whining.
the review part went fine. i graduated her 2 more pesukim, to be reviewed on monday. (today is wednesday). so for tomorrow, she has one tricky pasuk (14) that she's getting a nice handle on, and pasuk 15 that is pretty easy to translate but i want her to read it again because although she knows "ama" (cubit), length, width, and height from context, i want her more familiar with the words. definitely an advantage to her reading and reviewing it with the hebrew, even though she is violently opposing it. (point: she doesn't use the words length, width, and height; she uses "longness, wideness, and tallness.")
so the review went fine, and then she requested a 20 min break, which i granted, even though i was all revved up to go. then we had one new pasuk for today. (party time--the next 6 are MUCH simpler, back to what we were doing in bereshis). the words were not terribly complicated in this new pasuk, but stringing them together to make sense is. so her translation came out: window (precious jewel) you will make for the boat and to a foot you will finishe her (it) from the top. and door of the boat in her side you will put. under, 2nd, and 3rd (floors) you will make. so we discussed that. and in the middle of translating, she realized i was going to make her do it more than once. (so peeps, i guess we're making progress because she realized it herself which means she's coming towards accepting this as the way we are doing it--with chazara). and then the tantrumming began. the idea of chazara is totally overwhelming still. i guess eventually she will get more used to it and it won't be so overwhelming. so she whined while she translated coz she was thinking about chazara. then she whined before starting chazara, until i became firm. (lesson to me: confidence and non-angry firmness is key). so before i had her chazer it, i read it twice with hebrew, then english. she cried that she didn't hear it or remember it, so i did it again. then she started saying pieces from memory, kind of half joking. anything so she didn't have to read the hebrew and then say the english. finally, i insisted. and she did it. decently. (why oh why does she make such an issue and does it feel so overwhelming to her when in actuality she's very decent, it's not too hard, and it doesn't take so much time??? do i do this too? do we all do this??)
so tomorrow we will review pesukim 14, 15, and 16.
after that i'd love to zip through the pesukim like we used to, but i do think it's a better idea to stick with this chazara. hopefully it will go easier with the easier pesukim... we will see.
we still have rashi to do today. (i had her read the rashi on the window, just the words "window" and "precious jewel/good stone" but i don't think i'll chazer it w/ her).
so i'm torturing her so she can torture me and now we're even? far better for me to make sure i'm confident in my choices, and be firm in requesting that she speak in a normal tone of voice!
to be a bit fair to me, i'm pretty sure i requested no whining a few times but she kept lapsing into it, and towards the end she had so many complaints i was fielding them and forgot to take a stand on the whining.
the review part went fine. i graduated her 2 more pesukim, to be reviewed on monday. (today is wednesday). so for tomorrow, she has one tricky pasuk (14) that she's getting a nice handle on, and pasuk 15 that is pretty easy to translate but i want her to read it again because although she knows "ama" (cubit), length, width, and height from context, i want her more familiar with the words. definitely an advantage to her reading and reviewing it with the hebrew, even though she is violently opposing it. (point: she doesn't use the words length, width, and height; she uses "longness, wideness, and tallness.")
so the review went fine, and then she requested a 20 min break, which i granted, even though i was all revved up to go. then we had one new pasuk for today. (party time--the next 6 are MUCH simpler, back to what we were doing in bereshis). the words were not terribly complicated in this new pasuk, but stringing them together to make sense is. so her translation came out: window (precious jewel) you will make for the boat and to a foot you will finishe her (it) from the top. and door of the boat in her side you will put. under, 2nd, and 3rd (floors) you will make. so we discussed that. and in the middle of translating, she realized i was going to make her do it more than once. (so peeps, i guess we're making progress because she realized it herself which means she's coming towards accepting this as the way we are doing it--with chazara). and then the tantrumming began. the idea of chazara is totally overwhelming still. i guess eventually she will get more used to it and it won't be so overwhelming. so she whined while she translated coz she was thinking about chazara. then she whined before starting chazara, until i became firm. (lesson to me: confidence and non-angry firmness is key). so before i had her chazer it, i read it twice with hebrew, then english. she cried that she didn't hear it or remember it, so i did it again. then she started saying pieces from memory, kind of half joking. anything so she didn't have to read the hebrew and then say the english. finally, i insisted. and she did it. decently. (why oh why does she make such an issue and does it feel so overwhelming to her when in actuality she's very decent, it's not too hard, and it doesn't take so much time??? do i do this too? do we all do this??)
so tomorrow we will review pesukim 14, 15, and 16.
after that i'd love to zip through the pesukim like we used to, but i do think it's a better idea to stick with this chazara. hopefully it will go easier with the easier pesukim... we will see.
we still have rashi to do today. (i had her read the rashi on the window, just the words "window" and "precious jewel/good stone" but i don't think i'll chazer it w/ her).
Sunday, May 30, 2010
the neverending battle
sometimes i think every homeschooling teacher must ask herself at one point: what am i doing wrong? she would NEVER carry on like this at school in front of a bunch of her peers and a different adult.
so as per plan, i was doing one pasuk today. with 5 new words. so we started off amiably enough. i told her i wanted to do a pasuk, she picked a time, we started. i got out the dictionary because there were a couple of nouns i had the gist of, but didn't know specifically, and figured i'd see what would happen if i had the dictionary out and i didn't know the word either.
so we hit the first new word. i wrote it in hebrew and left a blank. she wanted me to tell her. i said, let's do the rest of the pasuk and then you should be able to guess from context. she started whining that she wanted me to tell her. i said i want her to guess. she started crying that she never guesses right (which is not true). i said let's wait and see and then i'll tell you if you don't guess right. then we got to the first verb i didn't know. i said there are 2 i don't know, so you do one and i'll do one. she agreed. she decided to do the first word (ably remembering the prefix "i will"). so i wrote down שית on the white board. she asked me to open the dictionary. i said nope. she opened it to shin. interestingly, she didn't look for shin yud, but turned to the end of the shins. i scanned the page and saw that שת was there, and had the right definition. great. i said, oh, there it is! this was a mistake. she then wanted me to point out the column. i said no, which was perhaps another mistake coz why the heck do i need her to be able to use the dictionary? i thought i decided a month or more ago that all adults can pretty much use a dictionary, so why torture her now?
anyway, she went into full blown tantrum. literally lying on the floor and rolling around crying. seriously. she's going to be 9 in a few weeks.
the new me, confident that asking her to do this amount of work is reasonable, said, "here's the white board and the marker. when you find the word, write it on the board." and i left the room.
do all homeschoolers tantrum? coz i have taught in school. they don't do this.
soon i hear her calling me, that it's all shins and no sins. then i realize that she misread the yud that i put for the shoresh as a dot on the left side. i called back that it's a shin; check the pasuk. she does, and begins berating me for writing a sin. i told her it's a shin and a yud in the shoresh, and show her in the dictionary how the shoresh is written with a yud. she says she thought that one was it. and how come i wrote a sin. and how come i wrote a yud looking like a dot. ya know what? next time i'll have her write the shoresh.
she did nicely on the rest of the prefixes and suffixes, but the whole thing was a nonstop whinefest. i could tell she was strongly controlling herself, because she was softly whining instead of screaming, like she wanted to. so i didn't call her on it. because from experience i know that if i told her she's whining, she'd start crying harder about how upset she is. so i let it go but it was pretty unpleasant.
the pasuk says "between you and between the woman, and between your seed and between her seed." chana felt all those betweens were annoying. i felt happy that it was repeated so much and maybe she'll learn the word.
she found confusing the translation "he will crush you head" meaning "he will crush you (on the) head."
after translating the pasuk, she didn't want to read the whole thing to see if she could get that first word from context. again she cried.
(and she was away for shabbos and surely did not get enough sleep, but again, if i would wait for the perfect storm conditions she'd be grown w/ no education).
i was planning to walk away again until she calmed down but she grabbed onto me, so i asked if she wanted to read it while i sat next to her. she did. she read it, and it was tricky enough to follow everything and figure it out so i did tell her the word.
the end.
i'm wiped. why is this so hard? why so much energy? why so much unhappiness? what am i doing wrong? i am NOT doing things beyond her capability.
maybe i'm doing nothing wrong. maybe translating is hard work. maybe i'm guiding her through the frustration of putting in hard effort for a valuable goal.
there were a lot of days like this with sarah, too. and we survived. and she can translate chumash.
so as per plan, i was doing one pasuk today. with 5 new words. so we started off amiably enough. i told her i wanted to do a pasuk, she picked a time, we started. i got out the dictionary because there were a couple of nouns i had the gist of, but didn't know specifically, and figured i'd see what would happen if i had the dictionary out and i didn't know the word either.
so we hit the first new word. i wrote it in hebrew and left a blank. she wanted me to tell her. i said, let's do the rest of the pasuk and then you should be able to guess from context. she started whining that she wanted me to tell her. i said i want her to guess. she started crying that she never guesses right (which is not true). i said let's wait and see and then i'll tell you if you don't guess right. then we got to the first verb i didn't know. i said there are 2 i don't know, so you do one and i'll do one. she agreed. she decided to do the first word (ably remembering the prefix "i will"). so i wrote down שית on the white board. she asked me to open the dictionary. i said nope. she opened it to shin. interestingly, she didn't look for shin yud, but turned to the end of the shins. i scanned the page and saw that שת was there, and had the right definition. great. i said, oh, there it is! this was a mistake. she then wanted me to point out the column. i said no, which was perhaps another mistake coz why the heck do i need her to be able to use the dictionary? i thought i decided a month or more ago that all adults can pretty much use a dictionary, so why torture her now?
anyway, she went into full blown tantrum. literally lying on the floor and rolling around crying. seriously. she's going to be 9 in a few weeks.
the new me, confident that asking her to do this amount of work is reasonable, said, "here's the white board and the marker. when you find the word, write it on the board." and i left the room.
do all homeschoolers tantrum? coz i have taught in school. they don't do this.
soon i hear her calling me, that it's all shins and no sins. then i realize that she misread the yud that i put for the shoresh as a dot on the left side. i called back that it's a shin; check the pasuk. she does, and begins berating me for writing a sin. i told her it's a shin and a yud in the shoresh, and show her in the dictionary how the shoresh is written with a yud. she says she thought that one was it. and how come i wrote a sin. and how come i wrote a yud looking like a dot. ya know what? next time i'll have her write the shoresh.
she did nicely on the rest of the prefixes and suffixes, but the whole thing was a nonstop whinefest. i could tell she was strongly controlling herself, because she was softly whining instead of screaming, like she wanted to. so i didn't call her on it. because from experience i know that if i told her she's whining, she'd start crying harder about how upset she is. so i let it go but it was pretty unpleasant.
the pasuk says "between you and between the woman, and between your seed and between her seed." chana felt all those betweens were annoying. i felt happy that it was repeated so much and maybe she'll learn the word.
she found confusing the translation "he will crush you head" meaning "he will crush you (on the) head."
after translating the pasuk, she didn't want to read the whole thing to see if she could get that first word from context. again she cried.
(and she was away for shabbos and surely did not get enough sleep, but again, if i would wait for the perfect storm conditions she'd be grown w/ no education).
i was planning to walk away again until she calmed down but she grabbed onto me, so i asked if she wanted to read it while i sat next to her. she did. she read it, and it was tricky enough to follow everything and figure it out so i did tell her the word.
the end.
i'm wiped. why is this so hard? why so much energy? why so much unhappiness? what am i doing wrong? i am NOT doing things beyond her capability.
maybe i'm doing nothing wrong. maybe translating is hard work. maybe i'm guiding her through the frustration of putting in hard effort for a valuable goal.
there were a lot of days like this with sarah, too. and we survived. and she can translate chumash.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
musings
as i write this, i have to question the poor choices i make regarding chumash.
pros:
jack was in bed
i was ready to do chumash
cons:
i was trying to wait for chana to finish what she was doing, she wanted 2 more minutes, and jack was stirring, and i was getting antsy wanting to do it before i had to attend to him, and i finally abruptly told chana that jack was stirring and i wanted to do it NOW.
chana was hungry, and food was almost ready
elazar was jumping around and on top and wanting things and attention
result:
chana was whiny, i was tense, and i was not as nice about handling elazar as i could have been. add jack starting to whimper a bit on the monitor (btw, he has settled back into his nap and i haven't even taken him out after all), and chana saying "i don't understand" in a particular whine, i started having that bursting angry feeling inside my chest.
a result of my choices.
i think in homeschooling it's a common mistake for me to want to get things accomplished or done, without thinking about how they are getting done and at what price. granted, i have to have that mental taskmaster over me, to make sure i keep my long term goals in mind and we are setting up learning to achieve that.
but after a learning session like this, i often think it might have been better to lose a day rather than have it go like this, with me having that tense need to get through it, whimpering chana and elazar craving attention. (bear in mind, this was under 5 minutes. probably not a major part of their day).
but when homeschooling with young children, you have to balance that with the knowledge that if you let a day slide by because of that sort of situation, soon the majority of them slide by and then you lost a bunch of years...
one of my homeschool friends said the year she had a baby was always a lost year. she has a lot of children...
anyway, specifically, chana couldn't remember zahav. she couldn't remember "haaretz hahi" was "this land" even though when i said it verbally, she understood. it did not help that elazar was literally bouncing off of us.
thankfully, it was only 4 words, all of them known the chana, and she knows that the gold in that land was good. (really, why is the torah telling us this?)
pros:
jack was in bed
i was ready to do chumash
cons:
i was trying to wait for chana to finish what she was doing, she wanted 2 more minutes, and jack was stirring, and i was getting antsy wanting to do it before i had to attend to him, and i finally abruptly told chana that jack was stirring and i wanted to do it NOW.
chana was hungry, and food was almost ready
elazar was jumping around and on top and wanting things and attention
result:
chana was whiny, i was tense, and i was not as nice about handling elazar as i could have been. add jack starting to whimper a bit on the monitor (btw, he has settled back into his nap and i haven't even taken him out after all), and chana saying "i don't understand" in a particular whine, i started having that bursting angry feeling inside my chest.
a result of my choices.
i think in homeschooling it's a common mistake for me to want to get things accomplished or done, without thinking about how they are getting done and at what price. granted, i have to have that mental taskmaster over me, to make sure i keep my long term goals in mind and we are setting up learning to achieve that.
but after a learning session like this, i often think it might have been better to lose a day rather than have it go like this, with me having that tense need to get through it, whimpering chana and elazar craving attention. (bear in mind, this was under 5 minutes. probably not a major part of their day).
but when homeschooling with young children, you have to balance that with the knowledge that if you let a day slide by because of that sort of situation, soon the majority of them slide by and then you lost a bunch of years...
one of my homeschool friends said the year she had a baby was always a lost year. she has a lot of children...
anyway, specifically, chana couldn't remember zahav. she couldn't remember "haaretz hahi" was "this land" even though when i said it verbally, she understood. it did not help that elazar was literally bouncing off of us.
thankfully, it was only 4 words, all of them known the chana, and she knows that the gold in that land was good. (really, why is the torah telling us this?)
Sunday, March 21, 2010
i don't even care if she does work today because it's sunday...
so chana asked to do chumash because she wants to earn money. alfie, i'm coming around to your way of thinking...
she started off gung ho because she needs 2 more dollars to earn club penguin membership. we start on a new paskuk (1:30). she plans to do 3 pesukim because she wants money. i know that this is unrealistic for her, so i say, let's start and go as much as you want, and we'll see how it goes.
i tell her she doesn't need to read the pasuk on its own first because she said last time that she didn't want to read and then go back and translate, because she reads the word right before she translates.
she realized she wants to read because that earned her a "check" of which 3 earns her a dollar. so now she wants to do work that isn't useful just to get the check (i get it, alfie, i get it...).
i tell her no problem, she can read from the siddur and earn those checks just as easily.
she reads the word "uv'chol" and screams that she doesn't know what it is. i point to "u" and she says "and." "v" she says "in." "chol" i say "kol" and she says "all." then she screams she can't understand the next word.
i say read it. she says she read it in her mind. i'm not sure what expression i had on my face, but if it was anything like my thoughts, it said "gimme a break--are you kidding me." then she started crying that she's so thirsty and we are out of water bottles.
i offered her tap water and seltzer. no.
then she asked daddy if he would do reading with her. i said chumash has to be done before other work (another alfie no-no, i'm sure). she started crying how thirsty she is.
she will not drink.
she started off gung ho because she needs 2 more dollars to earn club penguin membership. we start on a new paskuk (1:30). she plans to do 3 pesukim because she wants money. i know that this is unrealistic for her, so i say, let's start and go as much as you want, and we'll see how it goes.
i tell her she doesn't need to read the pasuk on its own first because she said last time that she didn't want to read and then go back and translate, because she reads the word right before she translates.
she realized she wants to read because that earned her a "check" of which 3 earns her a dollar. so now she wants to do work that isn't useful just to get the check (i get it, alfie, i get it...).
i tell her no problem, she can read from the siddur and earn those checks just as easily.
she reads the word "uv'chol" and screams that she doesn't know what it is. i point to "u" and she says "and." "v" she says "in." "chol" i say "kol" and she says "all." then she screams she can't understand the next word.
i say read it. she says she read it in her mind. i'm not sure what expression i had on my face, but if it was anything like my thoughts, it said "gimme a break--are you kidding me." then she started crying that she's so thirsty and we are out of water bottles.
i offered her tap water and seltzer. no.
then she asked daddy if he would do reading with her. i said chumash has to be done before other work (another alfie no-no, i'm sure). she started crying how thirsty she is.
she will not drink.
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