Got off the phone with a good girlfriend and had yet another chat about a very familiar and always quite unresolved
oxymoron. School and what it is and what it is not and what is learning and what it is not. Here are some examples loosely quoted but oft heard and at times, spoken by me.
"Let's bag school and go play outside."
"We have not
done any school this week, I have to get back next week..
we are so behind."
"With the recent E.R. visit (illness, funeral, current event, etc.....you get the idea and can fill in the blank) we have not
done any school."
"No, we cannot go to the zoo, we are not studying animals this week!"
What?? (Does it have to be a unit study to learn it, remember it??)I have uttered or heard all of these and more as you dear reader could likely add to my list. Maybe it is because many of us attended institutionalized school and we are unlearning what learning is ourselves. Maybe it is a confidence problem on my part. Maybe it is strict demands of accomplishment and qualifying and measuring learning progress that can get in the way. Get in the way of just doing it...just learning, asking, seeking and growing. I know that with a book or curriculum and a plan to take the summer off, it is important to get through the book in a timely manner...I get that part, but I still question the value of it. Maybe we just forget to live in the moment. Stop what you think you should do and just do. I am hard on myself and I set my goals high for my children and myself. It does not matter what others think or what they are doing. What matters is what is happening right here.
Our biggest commitment seems to be, in my opinion, to remember to be open to questions at any given time. At any given time....stop what you are doing and make a thoughtful answer. Because your child asked it, he is likely never to forget what you reply...or much to your amazement, remember it for a very long time. To sit and read that book (or chapter) even though you should go get another load of laundry started and, it "is not literature time yet!!"...you say. To say "yes!" enthusiastically when your tot drags the learning tower across the the kitchen floor making all kinds of racket to
help you ( I use that phrase loosely...) with a meal. These, my friends are the real, remembered, often inconvenient, perfectly age appropriate things they need to learn now, want to learn and will retain. Not necessarily or, even one bit, the planned,
prod the kid along reluctantly lessons we painstakingly plan.
We must trust in each child's natural desire to learn. Perhaps this trust must first be developed in ourselves. We must value the talking through a tragedy like a death with our children and value what the experience is teaching. Death is not planned but a valuable learning experience to embrace that may not be quantitatively measured but rather an immeasurable opportunity divinely given to teach to our very own children. I don't mean to be too melodramatic as if we as parents are the biggest influence ever on our children but we are a large one, a huge one and, what we say and do in a serious circumstance does color our children's ideas and opinions especially while they are young and sometimes, forever. Sometimes their questions can be pointed and unwanted because we first must face things we ourselves either don't want to face due to the pain or we are simply disinterested. It is not easy but, this is real
learning on the job as my girlfriend said this morning.
I personally always have a plan and, I have a weekly planning journal for "school" in fact, but have learned with some humility, flexibility, grace from God and, just simply I cannot accomplish all that I have planned because I over planned, to roll with the flow more and more
and more. I am developing my sense of awareness of whom each of my children are growing into ....the person they are and are wanting to grow and fulfill...if that makes sense. I am learning to listen I think.
I know one thing for certain about my own learning/education, when I want to learn something, I do it. No one has to tease me, reward me or punish me to learn it. I learn it for its own merit...because I want it and I want the journey along the way. The good and the messy parts of the journey. They are mine. The result is that suddenly,
without effort, I can go deeper into a subject and have more knowledge than someone else who then thinks me more of an expert. An expert because I learned it and not for the money or the fame that come to some who are "experts" in something. I can read things with vocabulary that I understand and can translate. Isn't this the goal for our children? We want them to be on fire to learn about something? Isn't this the motivation that we want to encourage?
A wise woman once told me...."it does not matter how hard something is (to attain), what matters is how badly you want it" and I would add, what matters is how much struggle is too much to do it?...so true.
I hope that the skit from
SNL,
Deep Thoughts is not playing in your head after reading this...ha!! I meant to be serious anyway.
I have had more than one homeschooling mama pose this question lately and my own questions have been burning so I am seeking answers and have tried to share my impressions here. So what is 
