Home Educating and “Good parenting”

Apologies to all those who read my daughters’ first attempts at blogging!  Here’s some more from How Children Learn at Home, by Alan Thomas and Harriet Pattison.

Thomas and Pattison look at a study by Desforges and Abouchaar on how parenting influences academic achievement. They found that

Home background is crucial to educational achievement in school… “good parenting” is uniquely influential on children’s achievement even when all other factors, such as socio-economic status, are taken out of the equation.

“Good parenting” in this case meaning

• provision of a secure and stable environment
• intellectual stimulation
• parent-child discussion
• good models of constructive social and educational values
• high aspirations relating to personal fulfillment and good citizenship

 

From all their time spent with home-educating families, Thomas and Pattison conclude:

By the nature of the task which they have undertaken, home-educating families are almost guaranteed to fulfil the greater part of Desforges and Abouchaar’s “good parenting” ideals. In fact the interviews showed parents providing these factors in abundance. In this sense, what home educating parents do with their children is not so much a radical departure but simply an extension of what is considered to be good parenting anyway… Remarkably it seems that parenting, rather than teaching, is sufficient to enable children to learn. (pp70-71)

Which is nice!

Aw W’s defrtgyh

Reading Job

I haven’t been blogging recently, because as you can probably tell from my last post, I really don’t feel like I have anything productive or interesting to say! It’s a hard time at the moment.

But one thing that has been going well, that I have been enjoying and getting a lot out of, is reading my Bible. I wrote about this a little while ago, and have since tweaked the way I do Bible study having read Sweet Journey by Terri Maxwell.

I use a Bible, notebook and pen (allowing me to indulge my stationary fetish!). I’m reading the King James Version at the moment, which I haven’t before. The language is gorgeous and extraordinary, but sometimes hard to understand, so to clarify I sometimes look up those verses in different translations. BibleGateway.com or the Online Parallel Bible (bible.cc) are good for that.

I’m reading Job at the moment – chosen deliberately, for no matter what I’m going through I haven’t lost all my children, livelihood, possessions, and been inflicted with painful sores from head to toe! I write the date and chapter at the top of the page – the date helps keep me accountable so I know if I’ve missed too many days. I’m reading one chapter at a time which works well with longer Old Testament books, but with shorter New Testament letters, maybe even just a few verses a day would be good.

I write a short summary of the chapter at the top of the page. It is important for Job because the chapters are either Job or his friends speaking. At the end of the book, God proclaims “My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two friends, for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath.” (Job 42:7, KJV.) Writing it down helps keep straight in my head whether what is being said about Job’s situation is right, or just SOUNDS right.

I then copy down a verse that jumps out at me from the chapter, either one that summarises the content nicely, or that applies to me personally. I end with a couple of sentences about what I have learnt from the passage, and a prayer that I may be able to apply anything gained to my own life.

From somewhere in the depths of my memory, probably remembered horribly incorrectly, there’s this little rhyme which comes to mind when thinking about a verse or passage:

What have I learned about Jesus and God?
What have I learned to cause shame?
What have I learned about following good?
Is there a promise to claim?

This all sounds like a lot, but really only takes around 15 minutes and one small (less than A5) notebook page. I haven’t read Job like this before, and it has been so interesting looking at what a worldly view of a situation can be, explanations which sound like truth and wisdom, as opposed to what God has to say about it. And of course there is the example of Job’s legendary faith and righteousness which shines through under enormous trial. It is so good that at the moment, despite everything else, reading the Bible is a real privilege and a pleasure and the more I do it, the more it feels like that.

Frustrated

I want to be drawing up and implementing a schedule, with the help of Managers of Their Homes. I want to be encouraging my children to help out more, a la Managers of Their Chores. I want to be cleaning my house with Flylady, organising my days with Large Family Logistics, and schooling with Ambleside Online.

I have books and ideas coming out of my ears, and I can do nothing, because for this whole year so far I’ve been ill. I’ve just got home from 4 days in hospital. I tidied up my bedroom and did some laundry today, was about to do the dishes but had to go back to bed because I felt sick and dizzy. The children have spent most of their time at my mum’s, or being looked after by Andy. I am SO FRUSTRATED!

That’s it really. Happy 2012 everyone! (Grr.)

Advent Bible Studies and Activities for Children

Thought I should follow the previous post up with a nice one pretty quickly!

I’m sorry not to be more organised with this, as I know Advent has started. But if you are still looking for something to do with your children, this is a lovely free resource:

Family Inductive Bible Study Guide for Advent

It has coloring sheets for little ones (mine are enjoying them) and word games and activities for older children. You light a candle and say the memory verse, then read a passage from the Bible (starting with Old Testament prophecies about Jesus). You look at the same passage for a couple of days so it’s easy to catch up

Also Rainbow Books have a lovely inexpensive resource if you were wanting to do a Jesse Tree (following the lineage of Jesus throughout the Old Testament):

Rainbow Books Jesse Tree

Happy Advent everyone

In a funk.

Funk (n): Informal chiefly Brit
Etymology: perhaps from obsolete Dutch dial. (Flanders) fonck
Date: 1743
1. Also called blue funk, a depressed state of mind (esp in the phrase “in a funk”).
Manifestations: a pessimistic sense of inadequacy and a despondent lack of activity.
Synonyms: despondency, gloom

More often than not I wake up and I am like a bear with a sore head. I have no temper, and my days feel like I am wading through thick sludge. I feel heavy, and I am so, so tired.

But when I feel like this, I know I am not alone. Even the great men of God, like David, who had God’s Spirit mightily upon him, had times when they cried out to Him. We read Psalm 42 in Bible Study today.

Psalm 42

1 As the deer pants for streams of water,
so my soul pants for you, O God.
2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When can I go and meet with God?
3 My tears have been my food
day and night,
while men say to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”
4 These things I remember
as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go with the multitude,
leading the procession to the house of God,
with shouts of joy and thanksgiving
among the festive throng.

5 Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and 6 my God.

My soul is downcast within me;
therefore I will remember you
from the land of the Jordan,
the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
7 Deep calls to deep
in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
have swept over me.

8 By day the LORD directs his love,
at night his song is with me—
a prayer to the God of my life.

9 I say to God my Rock,
“Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
oppressed by the enemy?”
10 My bones suffer mortal agony
as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
“Where is your God?”

11 Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and my God.

I know that this is just for a season. I know that there will be times again when my heart feels light and I, like David, will go with the multitude with shouts of joy and thanksgiving to the house of God. And I know that, no matter what happens, I will yet praise Him. For (as Paul says) our troubles are light and momentary, and the eternal glory that awaits us far outweighs them all!

The advantages of an informal education: let children think for themselves.

From How Children Learn at Home by Alan Thomas and Harriet Pattison, p32 (emphasis mine).

Children learning [informally] do not think of themselves as ‘learning’ in the sense that they do in school. Nor do their parents think of themselves as teaching. People just live and learning is part of that. This is completely at odds with the professional belief that cultural knowledge needs to be harnessed and pre-digested within a set instructional framework before being presented to children. The idea that such knowledge can be picked up haphazardly in the chaos of everyday existence or left to the whim of child interest is almost laughable. Yet the chaotic nature of the informal curriculum does not appear to be a barrier to children organising it into a coherent body of knowledge. In fact, in some ways it may be an advantage because rather than presenting knowledge in neat packages, the informal curriculum forces learners to become actively engaged with their information, to work with it, move it around, juggle ideas and resolve contradictions far more so than in formalised learning. In her seminal study of children’s thinking, Donaldson (1978) put forward the view that learning which derives from everyday life, which makes ‘human sense’ to children, may demand higher levels of cognitive engagement. In her study of young children’s problem solving abilities she found that tasks that come embedded in day-to-day practical experience, as they are likely to be at home, elicited a higher order of thinking than those that are posed in more abstract terms or are contrived as they are in school… The point is that the real-life informal curriculum offers a consistently meaningful context. It is not a static thing contained in a series of educational folders. It is alive and dynamic.

This reminds me of one of Charlotte Mason’s main conclusions about education: that it is the Science of Relations. She would not go as far as to say throw out a curriculum altogether, but she did think that teachers, through putting huge amounts of work and effort into producing contrived “unit studies”, were in danger of doing all the thinking for the children. Through presenting facts and ideas in pre-digested, neat packages, the connections are already made and the children have nothing to do but sit back and be spoon fed.

The conscientious, ingenious and laborious teachers who produce these ‘concentration series’ are little aware that each such lesson is an act of lèse majesté [injured majesty]. The children who are capable of and eager for a wide range of knowledge and literary expression are reduced to inanities; a lifelong ennui is set up; every approach to knowledge suggests avenues for boredom, and the children’s minds sicken and perish long before their school-days come to an end.

From A Philosophy of Education, p116. Read more about Miss Mason’s views on this at Afterthoughts: on Herbartian Unit Studies. What is the remedy? Present children with ideas, twaddle-free living books, a feast for the mind and the imagination – but do not force feed!

Our chief concern for the mind or for the body is to supply a well-ordered table with abundant, appetising, nourishing and very varied food, which children deal with in their own way and for themselves. This food must be served au naturel, without the pre-digestion which deprives it of stimulating and nourishing properties and no sort of forcible feeding or spoon feeding may be practised. Hungry minds sit down to such a diet with the charming greediness of little children; they absorb it, assimilate it and grow thereby in a manner astonishing to those accustomed to the dull profitless ruminating so often practised in schools. (A Philosophy of Education, p72.)

Home Education on the Wright Stuff

Some HE peeps were discussing this on twitter this morning. Unfortunately I couldn’t watch it (too busy “socialising” – HE swimming sesh) but recorded it for later. The general consensus was “lightweight, simplistic and predictable” (@frockery).

When I did watch it, the main message the programme managed to convey was how ill-informed and prejudiced the presenter Matthew Wright was on the subject. So biased, in fact, that he was almost putting words into the callers’ mouths.

MW: so do you have any friends?
JOSIE (age 13, HE for 2 years): I didn’t have any friends at school, but I have loads of friends now.
MW: NO friends now? Mmm.
Everyone in the studio: she said LOADS of friends!

Wright obviously heard what he wanted to hear, that HE kids have no friends and are missing out on loads of opportunities, and their parents are “mad and arrogant” to think that they could do a better job than teachers. He carried on in this vein with every caller (some of whom, to be fair, did their best to get across the positives of HE) – anything negative about HE met with a resounding “I’m with you on that!”, anything positive with “with all due respect” (of course they’re completely wrong) after the caller had hung up.

Fortunately the section finished with Jane, who called in because she had taught at a Saturday school and met a home-educated boy there who confounded all her expectations/preconceptions: “he was smart, witty, sociable, mature and very very likeable.” She then went on to educate her disabled son at home for three years, and he is now at University. Jane ended with a plug for Education Otherwise, and a warning that HE can be exhausting.

My experience of home educated children so far has been much closer to Jane’s – it was through getting to know HE families and their kids that we decided it would be a great thing to do for our family.

In Wright’s own words: “I obviously can’t understand home education in any shape or form…” No one is asking you to understand it Matthew. Just please don’t spout off about something you know nothing about, and are not prepared to listen to people who do.

But what about socialisation? Or, our week.

One of my least favourite things about home educating is having to explain myself to everyone. We’ve been under the radar so far, with just the usual “got your hands full!” since having three children age 4 and under. But now Jude looks old enough to be in school, everyone, the postman, receptionists, builders, well-meaning people on buses, want to know what’s going on.

And of course, everyone asks that bread-and-butter question of the HE debate: “but what about socialisation?” I imagine by this the people I talk to mean, but if you shut them up at home all day, how will they make friends? In answer to this question I thought I would post a brief run down of our week, from 10-16th November.

I’m sure the postman isn’t reading this. Indeed, if I did answer in this way to everyone who asked, I probably would be letting down the cause of home-educators-are-normal-people-too quite spectacularly. So unfortunately you, dear readers, are the recipients of my venting. You have my thanks and my apologies Anyway, here goes:

THURS Bible Study. Children in creche with several toddlers and babies. Jude (6) helps out with them. The children have lunch with Grandma S and spend the afternoon and teatime with Grandma J.

FRI morning playing with siblings. Friends G, S and L (age 2) over for lunch, then meet up with Grandma S and other friends S and N (also age 2) for a trip on the DLR to the Museum of London.

SAT Jude and Andy go to a football session in the park in the morning, with about 25 other kids. Grandma S’s for lunch then back home for the football. Andy’s best friend from school, Uncle P, plays with them all afternoon.

SUN church, Jude goes to Sunday School (Andy stays with girls who sleep in). We don’t see anyone other than the 100 or so people who go to our church after we get home though. Oh no, wait, DS goes to play with friends N, J and N (age 8, 5, and 6) from church for a couple of hours after we get back from a walk in the forest.

MON lunch again with Grandma S (what would we do without her?!), and our friends S and H (age 3). Think that’s it.

TUE Grandma S takes girls to toddler group. Jude goes to Beavers in the evening.

WED we see lots of our HE friends at swimming. Jude has a dentist appt then we go to a cafe for tea and cakes. He makes friends with another 6-year-old in the park afterwards, they play for about an hour. When we get home X, age 8, who lives next door comes over. The evening is spent playing with Lego in the front room and watching Octonauts.

In brief, probably over 80 different children played/interacted with over the course of the week, as well as numerous adults. Not too bad for kids kept in a cupboard

Home education in the news and on Mumsnet

Lovely positive coverage of a home educating family by the Yorkshire Post.

More parents are at home with the idea of teaching children themselves

Ok, I’ve just got the title. Ha I got the link through the Mumsnet Home Education Facebook group. Do have a look – it has over 50 members now and looks like a great source of advice and encouragement.

The Home Ed section of Mumsnet talk is a great place too, but unfortunately threads like this one tend to get hijacked by people who want to argue about socialisation, registration, compulsory visits and educational/social welfare checks for HE children (sigh). It’s important to debate these topics in public, to put our arguments and points of view across, and try our best to rectify misconceptions and mistakes. It’s important to engage, to communicate, and there are some people who do a brilliant, tireless job of that on the HE board.

But often in the midst of all of that, the original post asking a question gets lost. And that’s why it’s good to belong to Facebook and email groups as well. Because if there’s one thing you can’t get enough of when you are home educating, it’s support.