[This is a blog post that I began a few months ago, but didn’t finish. The ideas are resurfacing, so I am leaving the beginning as is and updating on the end.]
As we are nearing summer, Emma has felt the pressure of her peers to be “finished with school.” I find the whole idea ridiculous. We are never finished. I am certainly not finished. I am always pressing forward, curious to learn more and more.
In the early years of homeschool, I felt a sense of starting and finishing a school year, normally by working through a scheduled curriculum with 36 weeks.
But when God turned our lives upside down with a few major upheavals, I learned quickly to hold on to my plans very loosely. Out of necessity, I had to change my outlook from an emphasis on checking off boxes in the teacher’s guide to one on forward motion. If we are learning — learning anything — then we are moving forward. And that is progress.
But my cover school requires some paperwork and letter grades to somehow assign a value to all we have experienced during the last nine months, and I will oblige. I learned a foreign language as an adult. I understand how to “translate” things into a language that the listener can understand. That’s all my paperwork is, really.
Now it’s the start of a new school year. With less than three weeks under our belt, I am amazed at how quickly the novelty wears off and Emma zeroes in on highlighting her completed assignments instead of enjoying learning.
I love to mark things off the to do list as much as anyone else. But if school is trivialized into a list of tasks to complete, then all the joy has been sucked out of it. This is not why we homeschool. She can do that at public school.
It is the difference between wolfing down a burrito supreme in the van and savoring a carefully prepared meal.
How can we encourage our children to savor instead of devour? How can we shift the focus to understanding and appreciation instead of completion?
I would love to hear your ideas in the comments. Do you see this conflict in your homeschool? How do you address it?
I’d love to write a follow up post in which I share my own ideas alongside yours. Let’s chat!
I can relate to what you say. The Board of Education that I report to does not ask for grades (as a matter of fact I was told we are not “qualified” to give grades) but we have to send in reports in January and June of each year. That is not a problem but I feel the pressure to be “finished” by June. It does not always happen and I have requested, and been granted, an extension. I agree with you in that learning in ongoing. I do not like to have an “end” date. It is so artificial. I would rather not even have grade levels. It would be great to have one long continuum from the earliest entrance in “school” to the final lesson learned. One could just identify where the child is on the continuum. Oh, well, one can always dream!
Ahhh….yes. The Harmony Art Mom short answer is: Divide the school day into structured (with a task list) and unstructured project time. This has been a wonderful way for my boys to take the reins and make learning a part of their life. Mornings are academic and afternoons are for learning of their design. I allow open ended courses that I can document like robotics, cooking, aviation, etc.
This way they get the basics under their belts and then they self-educate in the afternoons with help from me with resources and materials. I see my graduate continuing this kind of learning even now two years later (post high school graduation). It takes more work to document but I use HST and at the end I can gather up everything they did into a tidy course with a grade if I want.
It takes faith in your student.
You’re such an inspiration, Barb! This sounds exactly what I need to do at our house!
Wow! I struggle with this constantly. I’m a list maker and a product of public school. I still have the summer-brain problem. And somehow I am entrusted with inspiring a life long love of learning with my daughters. I’ve tried to battle this with substituting projects for some of the units on my list. As T gets older, I think I will work harder to do as Barbara suggested. It seems tougher to do during the foundation-laying elementary years. Each year I find myself growing in my flexibility as to what to turn in to our charter school for our units completed. And each year seems to get better and better. I think it’s good to keep that big picture goal of nurturing a life-long learner as you are fulfilling the paperwork requirements of homeschooling in your state.
I’ve experienced this too. Perhaps that explains why my methodology shifted from one end of the spectrum to the other! Now I’m seeking something in the middle, a combination of assigned or expected tasks and unschooling. I don’t know if this is possible! I like Barb’s comment above – divide the day. I love the idea of self discovery – to me this keeps the fire and excitement for learning alive! All my kids love art so I try to incorporate this into as many subjects as possible.
Carrie,
You might like to read about tidal homeschooling – a term coined by homescholling Mum and author, Melissa Wiley. If you google the term you should end up with links to various blog posts on the topic. Two books that have helped me better merge the structured Classical part of me with the unstructured unschooling part of me are Diane Lockman’s Trivium Mastery (her website Classical Scholar is very helpful too) and Oliver de Mille’s Thomas Jefferson Education. While I didn’t agree with everything these two gave me some good ideas for reframing things.
I don’t always know if they are savoring their learning or not while school is happening. Sometimes I roll my eyes at them, because something was wonderful and they just said, “What’s next, can I play outside now?” But weeks later they may mention the person from history in conversation, or ask for a book, movie or field trip to explore it further. I thought the daily reading of the Ambleside online monthly poetry suggestion was flopping, until M asked me to read some of the funnny ones to the neighbor kids.
Sometimes the fact that they have to do it makes it work, and that’s not always fun. But work can be appreciated later, and no one is excited about duty all the time.
Jimmie, this was a REALLY interesting thing for me to read today. We are so much alike. I’m a total list-maker-and-checker-off, but I don’t feel the need to be like that about education, just like you!
In our house, it depends on the “thing.” Since we don’t do a lot of formal stuff, we’re really good about rolling on a topic until we’re all feeling like we’re done – and that is usually a long process!
But when it comes to the rare written assignment (this most recently came in the form of the documentation required for Sarah’s 4-H projects), then it’s totally a case of her getting it done as fast as possible and wanting to move onto the next thing.
I’m TRYING (famous last words) to help with that this year by giving her plenty of time. Like, one of the projects she’ll probably enter next year has 21 questions that go along with it. We did 5 of them the other day, we’ll do a few more next week, etc.
That’s mostly work on my part, not to procrastinate and sit the kid down with a pencil two days before project roundup and say, “OK, here you go.”
But when it comes to your real question, which is HOW can you help your child savor what they’re learning, besides giving them plenty of time, which I know you do already, I think maybe the answer in our family has been to focus on the topic, not the piece of work related to it.
For example, cowboys and Indians have been a big focus for us. We just made a huge poster about famous cowboys. But we’ve also read a half-dozen books, fiction and non-fiction; we’ve watched movies; we’ve made plans to go to a museum dedicated to Jim Thorpe. The topic itself keeps going, long after any particular piece of it has been “checked off.”
And as the topic phases itself out, we’ll phase another one in. It’s not like a traditional unit study, where we end it and start another; it’s more overlapping, so when we finished our last fiction book about Native Americans, we picked up some reading about Shakespeare, and eventually I can see us doing more and more with that and less and less on the earlier topic.
That’s pretty long-winded, and not at all organized, but it’s the thought process I’ve been working through as I ponder your question! I’m looking forward to hearing more of what everyone thinks!
Oh, Jimmie, I can so relate! I think it could also be an “age and stage” thing. My daughter is the same age as yours and this year I feel robbed of the days of discovery, joy and exploration that made homeschooling such a wonderful journey in those early years. Even without an external pressure for grades, my daughter just wants to tick things off the schedule and “get through her work for the day”.
I am planning the new year with a completely new approach: Use the HST and schedule her reading and asignments so that she can work independently.
Barb, as always, your insights and advice are so encouraging! You certainly seem to have found a beautiful balance!
So, maybe our approach should be ~ tick the boxes” for the mornings, and “discover, develop and delight” in the afternoons?
Girl, that sounds like unschool-ish talk!
On the other hand, maybe it’s a stage of development. As an adult, you have to be focused on getting things done, and you are a lot more goal-oriented than you are as a child. There is a sense of satisfaction in completing tasks that is still very real. Perhaps Emma is just making another transition toward adulthood, and a balance will emerge after a while.
I think Barb is brilliant, and I love her ideas.
I am so relieved to read everyone’s comments. My daughter, who will be 13 next week, seems to live for just getting the work done. I have talked to her about loving the process and having curiosity about the world and life, but she just does not seem to have that same urge to know that I do and did as a child-I’m weird but I would always read ahead in the textbooks and read nonfiction and still do a lot. She has her hobbies, and I am glad for those passions, but if something seems remotely “school-ish”, forget it.
This is one of the reasons we are switching gears this year to a more project based homeschooling. Letting my kids choose their topics, do their own research and produce their own output. It’s not all or nothing. We still do math. They still read. We still have discussions. Anything I think they need to work on will have it’s place too. But a big chunk of time- 2 hours every morning- is for them. To learn on their own. To discover how to learn and the joy of it. Because that is the learning they will remember- the topics they become experts on because they want to know everything about it.
I’ve had this on and off with different kids over the years. Some more than others. I’ve tried to keep the required part of our day short enough that there is plenty of time and energy left for them to pursue their passions as much as they want. For three of my kids I’ve never put deadlines on their work but just asked to see it when either they wanted my input or they were satisfied with the final product. I also never graded – luckily I never had to. I asked my two oldest who are both at university what they wished I’d done differently. They both said “Deadlines and grades” ! However, they never struggled with meeting a deadline and have gained excellent grades so I haven’t been convinced to change my mind. Some of it is child/subject specific. For one of mine maths seems destined to always fall into the just get it done category despite all my efforts with games, living books, different programmes etc. Most other learning she loves though. Another one has always been like that with everything unless it is computer related. He does the bare minimum to get the box ticked. Big long term changes in approach did nothing to get him to savour learning. On the other hand this year was the first time I’ve ever seen my 20 yo fall into the go through the motions rather than love learning. We think he was utterly burnt out. Happily he is now back to his usual savouring learning self. Obviously I want my kids to love learning and. – most of the time – three of them do. I’m really frustrated that I can’t seem to get inside the head of the fourth to figure out what I can do to get him there.
Great topic , Jimmie. I’m looking forward to thinking more, reading more and discussing more.
First of all, I love that we can have the goal in homeschooling of teaching our children to savor learning. I have always loved learning – and while I was pushed by my parents to have great grades, I somehow managed to hold onto the learning itself has having value, even independent of the grade issued. That being said, I try to be realistic about how much my daughters (ages 8, 11 and 12) will savor some aspects of learning. My 12 year old will never, ever savor math. She can do it. She is capable. But it does not stir her heart. The 8 year old, on the other hand, will get in a groove and say, “I’m having a math day today!”
One way I try to encourage them to savor their learning is by giving them choice in it. I might give them set reading, but give them a choice about what they do with it – whether they summarize it in paragraph form, draw something to illustrate it or do something of their own invention.
My biggest hurdle to encouraging my children to savor learning is ME. I want the plan maintained. I want to have time for field trips. I feel high school looming on the horizon with a 7th grader this year. I feel pressure (from me) to make sure they are learning everything they should. So I get so focused on staying on track that I lose sight of the goal – to help them be life-long learners, to grow them into the women God made them to be, to enjoy this time with them before they are off to college and work and their own lives.
Thanks for getting me thinking about these things. I hope it will help me keep the most important things in mind as we continue with our year.
Oh yes the constant struggle, I have a similar half post done myself, directed learning vs natural learning. I think Barb has hit on the answer well. To be honest it used to worry me alot, I really wanted my children to savour learning for learnings sake, to enjoy, to be excited. I twisted myself into a pretzel for this to happen and in many ways they did enjoy, but then I discovered there were often times we were ‘playing’ at learning. Not actually accomplishing, some basic areas were being neglected, there is after all only so many hours and so much energy. So then we switched to accomplishing, and that has merit too, and through accomplishing they can feel a sense of achievement, not just in ‘ticking the boxes’ but in understanding and mastering the task/skill. However I was still unhappy, still hadn’t found the balance between the two, because I did come to realise both had a purpose in our home, but I wanted a more natural balance. Barb’s answer explains it well, slowly we are coming to that point. The secret there is to keep a bane on screen time, screens really inhibit creativity. Gee sounds like I just finished my post here;)
Hey Jimmie
I know that if I give them a list, then they work according to the list. When I don’t we savour! We do all of our savoring in the morning – we explore, investigate, discuss, and find ourselves enjoying a discovery of knowledge. I keep the list items for the afternoon. It also keeps them motivated to finish in time, yet not losing the time in the morning. And by doing it that way round, I often hear a child whistling while he’s doing his Maths because in his heart and mind there has been an awakening and so everything else that follows after that is done with a completely different attitude.
Another way that I get them to pause and enjoy is to grow a concept by coming at it from all sides – a You Tube video, a living book, a bit of notebooking, a discussion, some online research, journalling – the more opportunities they are given to interact with the information, the more exciting it becomes.
I’d just like to say “Thank You” to all the wonderful homeschooling moms that posted for this article. I have often felt a bit isolated because I don’t agree with a completely “school at home” environment. It seems that most homeschoolers I know personally seem to school out of fear and do their best to duplicate the standard school system. Yes, we live in the real world where grades and scores have their place, but to sacrifice true learning for a mere imitation would only be doing a disservice to our children. Even while doing research on homeschooling before making the leap five years ago, I never wanted to duplicate the traditional school methods. If that’s all I wanted, then why bring my kids home to begin with? I then stumbled upon books about Charlotte Mason and was totally amazed at the theories and philosophies behind it all. Finally, something real and true that made sense as well! The goal of education has got to be more than just scoring high on the SAT’s! I’ve heard too often that even transcripts don’t matter, it’s only the SAT’s and other tests of that genre that mean anything. Have we really boiled down a good education to just the scores on the SAT’s? I’m so glad that leaders like Lincoln, Washington, Edison, Einstein and many others weren’t subjected to such nonsense. True education implies and produces freedom.
This is a wonderful discussion. I’m loving all the comments from the moms!
My daughter is so bored in the summer even with tons of activities planned. She needs learning in her life and greatly enjoys it. BTW, it feels so weird that you’re not writing Sprite anymore!! 😉
I am so glad I read this today, Jimmie. Having two high schoolers this year has me checking boxes and looking for hoops to jump through like never before! I’m still not sure how I’ll handle that yet but just being aware of it helps. I do like Barbara’s idea of dividing the day, which we pretty much already do. Perhaps at this stage in the game that is the best that we can do. Great post – thanks!
You know, that’s one thing that has always intrigued me about Unschooling – that it’s really impossible to “check off” items learned, because the child is following her own passions to find out more. I’ve always been a big CM fan, but I wonder how I’ll feel about “assignments” 8 or 9 years from now. It seems like it must be a tough balance to keep older kids actually engaged in their learning.
I learning two years ago after the tornados came through and wiped out our community, that our list didn’t mean anything. After a week of no power, and a totally different way of life, I started to stress about “finishing school”-it was then that we knew learning had to be different. We had to end school in April. Our kids learned through helping ours. And it was good. I hope that my younger kids continue with the savoring the learning….
But, my high schooler just wants to get it finished and to be honest I just want to get it finished…there is no savoring this…. 🙂
Hmmmm… I’m trying to set the example myself by being more flexible. I have one that could care less about finishing and one that lives by finishing! This is such an interesting discussion. I don’t know that I have anything to add other than my own personal desire to not always get everything finished and just enjoy learning more.
Granted, my children are very young (oldest is 8), but I think the thing that helps me/us the most is that most of the materials we use are not textbooks. Even the curricula that are divided by lessons I still control, so they are less likely to even have any idea if they are or are not through.
I see by all the comments this resonated with so many HS Moms. I feel the same way. In fact I have told Keilee that I don’t want our days to consist of ‘checking off the list’. It just feels so forced that way. I want the ebb and flow of unstructured learning. Our cover does not expect anything like yours but still there are things that need to be completed. That being said I refuse to stop chasing the rabbit holes. I believe it is the ‘holes’ that stick with kids.
I wonder if some of the problem comes with what learning we count as school and what don’t. I realise that my son has a natural affinity with computers and that he has learnt a lot by experimenting, by teaching himself informally, by participating in online forums etc. But my attempts to legitimise that learning, to do something formal with it have mostly failed. I recently suggested a programming course which he agreed to and which he seems to be enjoying. But that is a rare exception. Photography is much the same – give him a camera and let him experiment and all is well. Suggest an online course and he will have nothing to do with it. So he does savour but on his terms. The big problems are with learning that I feel he needs to do (writing) but he doesn’t see the need for. Yes , he does write posts on forums but I’m wanting longer, more reasoned pieces. And for not everything to be computer related. I have tried linking their passions with what I consider essential learning but generally all it does is take away their enjoyment of what they love. It doesn’t help them savour the learning I think they need to do. Which brings me back to one of my recurring conundrums. I do believe it is unrealistic to expect our kids to savour learning topics which don’t interest them or skills which they find difficult and/or don’t see the need for (but I do sometimes still tie myself in knots trying to achieve this). On the other hand I can’t leave them to come to certain skills in their own time. Despite being attracted to unschooling in many ways, I’m obviously not an unschooler at heart. So maybe the best I can hope for is more or less what I have. Some activities that they just tick the boxes for (despite my efforts to make them as appealing as I can) while ensuring there is time and energy left for savouring the learning they love.
Thank you for writing about this. This has been a great discussion. Very rarely will I read through all the comments at any blog, but this has been so helpful. I thought it was just me! It may boil down to the fact that even home schooled kids are still kids! A CM education is hard work sometimes and they would rather be playing. My 12 yo loves reading and she enjoys learning for the most part, except for math, but she is still glad to be “finished” and play with her sister or whatever. I’ll take it as confirmation that she is somewhat normal. 🙂