Learning Alongside

Last night, I was priviledged to watch an amazing display of Native American dance at my husband's annual company party. It might seem an unlikely pairing -- Native dance at an office party for mostly Caucasian engineers? -- but one of their employees is Native American. His grandfather worked for the Wild Bill West Show, and it was there that his grandfather learned whip tricks, Native dance and showmanship. He passed those skills down to his sons...who taught their sons...who are now teaching their children.

He stood up, in full regalia, and introduced his family -- brother, 2 sons and a daughter. He explained some of the history of the dances, and said that his youngest son, age 3, might be joining him as he danced. The child has never been "taught" dance; there are no dance classes for Native children, he said. Instead, they learn by coming out and mimicking their elders.

Exactly!, I thought. I've been reading a book, The Minds of Boys: Saving Our Sons from Falling Behind in School and Life. And in this book, author Michael Gurian talks about how boys used to be educated:

"Until about a hundred years ago, in all parts of the world, our sons' primary teachers were not lone individuals in schoolrooms but families, tribes and natural environments...Right up into the nineteenth century, most boys still learned what they needed to know mainly from their mothers, fathers, mentors and hands-on work. They imitated their elders, they practiced, they learned by doing."

This little boy, three years old, stepped out beside his father in full confidence, but with the eyes of a child. While his father was intense, clearly into the dance, the child danced beside, equally on the moves, but with eyes darting around the room. Never once did I see the father whisper instructions to his child or interfere with the child's moves; he simply danced, and the child followed along. At three years old, he was learning by doing, at his father's side.

Such a simple approach, yet one so many of us have forgotten. As the line between adult and child has become ever wider, and as life becomes increasingly specialized, too many parents assume they aren't capable of teaching their children what they need to know. But I encourage you to invite your children into your life anyway. Let them watch and help you as you bake, garden, write, play sports or do whatever it is you do. Invite them to be a part of your daily life, and you may be surprised what they learn.

Now, just for fun -- a Native American hoop dance. One of the dancers performed a similar dance last night, and it was amazing!

Obsessions

Life Learning Family posted about obsessions this week. Reading her post gets me thinking about all the fasicinating ways our individual interests have enhanced our collective lives.

We've been through the dinosaur stage -- and because of that, everyone in our house knows how to say "pachycephalosaurus." (Granted, we say it without the English accent!) We all learned about prehistory and fossils and evolution and anatomy and the differences between carnivores and herbivores, and spent many happy hours visiting dinosaur exhibits in both Wisconsin and Arizona.

The boys also, as I've mentioned below, have been through and are re-visiting a YuGiOh obsession. Butterflies were another fascination. We all got interested in the delicate creatures when Boy #2 spent two summers chasing and collecting the critters -- a fascination that led us to hatch our own monarchs...which required us to learn how to identify milkweekd...which led us to correspond with Mexican schoolchildren.

The latest fascinations in our house are:

• Boy #1 -- fishing
• Boy #2 -- coin collecting
• Boy #3 -- making and creating his own cookies
• Boy #4 -- construction equipment and tractors

All of us, in some way, have learned something from each obsession. Thanks to the fishing fascination, I can now identify almost all native Wisconsin freshwater fishes. Coin collecting was a fun way to reinforce United States geography (I found a neat coin map to display that state quarters he was collecting), and we all learned, just the other night, that FDR is the president displayed on the dime. (Did you know that the March of Dimes took its name from FDR's call to contribute dimes to fight polio?)

The cookie making obsession is messy, to say the least, but is teaching me to be more creative in the kitche; not everything, I'm learning, has to come from a recipe.

And as for the construction equipment/tractor obsession...let's just say I'm a little sick of that one. I'm the child of an excavator, for goodness sake! I GREW UP with backhoes and bulldozers in my backyard. Between that kind of exposure and the fact that he is my SECOND child to exhibit a prolonged and very intense fascination with all things equipment (see point #2 on my post, "You Know You Have Boys When"), I am simply tired of reading the same old machine books over and over and over again. I swear, some of those books have logged more days at my house than at the library over the past 10 years!

How about you? What's the latest obsession at your house? And what are YOU learning from your kids?

Marble Run

Marble runs were all the rage at my house yesterday.

We got the idea a year or so ago, when my two older boys took a "Rollercoaster" class at Discovery World. Using simple foam pipe insulation, tape and marbles, the boys were able to explore the rules of physics. And have fun!

In their class, the divided up into teams and competed to see which team could build the most complex, most successful rollercoaster. Points were given for the length of the "coaster" and the amount of time the marble stayed on the track, with extra points awarded for each successfully navigated loop-de-loop.

They enjoyed it so much that I ran out to Home Depot to purchase a bunch of pipe insulation. Since then, they've periodically pulled out the supplies and spent hours experimenting with angles and loops.

Cheap, easy, entertaining and educational -- my favorite kind of activity!

But I don't WANT to be Drawn In!

This story just strikes me the wrong way.

I get the school administration's point, I really do. For each child they get enrolled in the district, they get cash, plain and simple. And let's face it: local school districts are facing financial difficulties, so every dollar counts.

But the mere proposal also points to the fact that those same administrators really don't get my point, which is that I DON'T WANT SOMEONE ELSE DECIDING WHAT MY KIDS NEED TO LEARN (and when and where and how...). It clearly shows they don't understand that some of us, anyway, value independence and personal freedom far, far above "instructional materials and....other supplementary materials."

For me, homeschool isn't simply about being home, about keeping my boys in the same physical space as me. Homeschooling is about tailoring their environment to them. Homeschooling is about nurturing and supporting my boys' development, in whatever ways fit at the time. Homeschooling means my son can learn science and geography while fishing. That physics can be explored rolling marbles down the stairs. And that my sons and I can move forward or back -- or leap ahead bounds at a time -- if it suits our needs.

I, for one, do NOT want my sons to have to adhere to the one-size-fits-all public school curriculum. That, dear school administrators, is why we're homeschooling in the first place.

YuGi Returns

My boys have rediscovered their YuGiOh cards.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with YuGiOh, it's a trading card game, kind of like Pokemon. Each card has a character with attack and defense points, or else is a spell or trap card that can inhibit or enhance the character cards. Players "duel" each other and the object of the game is to win by taking your opponent's life points down to zero.

Personally, I'm glad I could explain that much to you! The game is COMPLEX, and my boys (even my five-year-old) play it way better than I do.

My second son (pictured) is the one who got us into the game. He's always been a collector, and after he saw a friend's cards, he started collecting Yu-Gi-Oh. That led to a world of discovery: YuGiOh books and movies from the library. A YuGiOh computer game. And so, so much more.

Their dad collects football cards, so the boys are well-aware that cards have value.

They spent hours pouring over online sites such as this, researching the value of their cards and inadvertently improving their computer, math, typing, spelling, reading and writing skills. One son would meticulously type in the names of his cards, letter-by-letter, and then record their value on a sheet of paper. All of them mentally tallied life points every time they dueled.

Money skills were involved as well, as each child had to save up and make his own decisions about which packs of cards to buy when. YuGiOh also enhanced their social skills. The boys connected with other boys who played YuGiOh and dueled as often as possible.

But they wanted more; they wanted to enter a REAL YuGiOh tournament! So they went online and researched options. Turns out, a hobby shop half an hour away hosts a tournament every weekend.

We went, and it was WONDERFUL! There's nothing better than seeing a room full of boys (and some girls) of all ages -- ranging from my five-year-old to fathers in their 40s -- actively involved and having fun. These kids were animated. They were excited. They were intense. And I couldn't help wondering -- how many of these boys feel like losers at school? How many of these boys are labeled "slow," "destructive," or "unmotivated?" Because in that room, all I saw was opportunity.

Sometimes, all it takes is the right spark to light a boy's mind on fire. And if that spark comes in the form of a multi-colored trading card, I'm all for it.

You Know You Have Boys When....

• You have 2 laundry piles -- dark, and underwear
• You spend hours watching tractors and machines on YouTube
• Wrestling is a typical after-dinner activity
• Your home resembles an ammo depot -- in small scale plastic, of course
• Your couch cushions are off more than on
• You can mark the 4 seaons by the debris on your kitchen floor: mud (Spring), sand (Summer), leaves (Autumn) and slush (Winter)

Care to add to my list??

Enjoy the Game!

My boys aren't (yet) big football fans -- although being in Packer Country, they all avidly followed the Brett Favre retirement/un-retirement saga with interest. But they all know who's playing in the Big Game today (go Arizona!), and I'm sure they'll sneak a peek while their Dad watches the game.

And who knows? Just like their uncles, my brothers, they might learn to multiply by watching football. My brother, Doc, had his 7 times tables down by 2nd grade, thanks to football!

For an example of some more football math, check here and here.