Possible Route

Leaning toward an option: local school district offers two half-days of on-site classes per week paired with home study using their curriculum. When I first looked into this I think there were some small differences in how the program was worded that made me close the window without further thought. This week when I re-read the description the wording enticed me and I saw that we are personally acquainted with one of the school's key people. We can get some insight from someone we know regarding the teachers and nuances of the classes.

• The most compelling factor here is the ease of the class time. I have always said that my kid needs some structured group learning time - whether it be one or two days a week in a school setting or multiple specialty classes that I choose and take him to on my own. Charter schools with such offerings are a drive; private schools with such are a drive and a lot of money. With the second option, there's cost and to have much variety, there's a drive. The route here proposed is a five minute drive and free. 
• Is it homescholing? No. It's learning at home. It's designed by someone else, overseen by someone else, and simply carried out by me. However it is ME for the equivalent of four school days a week. It is me deciding what approach and perspective to take, where and how to cover the material, how much we sit down, the daily schedule, etc, etc, etc and maybe more, I don't have all the details yet. I was looking at declaring myself a credentialed tutor and homeschooling 100% independently, that's the opposite end of the spectrum from this route. The lack of drive time, drive money, and class money are pro's here. Other definite pro: he is not one in 20 or 30. It is me focused on him; knowing what motivates him, what his strengths and weaknesses are, and caring very much.
• It is not the ultimate idealistic picture of homeschooling I have held in my mind. It is not everything I REALLY want to do that I really think is the best, but it may be very doable and doable counts for a lot - doable through thick and thin, consistent. Also, maybe I will be able to work in an awful lot of mentors and classics and Charlotte Mason; I bet I will. I probably won't be able to work in a lot of delayed academics and we'll just see how that part goes. If my kid is ready for the academics as they come, that's one thing; if not, it may do more harm than good . . . . and . . . . we can always try another route.
• Furthermore, academic concepts need not equal hours on end in a seat with "seat work." This option will hopefully still allow a five-year-old boy plenty of time to do things that I think are crucial - key words are dirt, play, experimenting, family, sunshine, running, climbing, thinking, problem-solving, imagining . . . .
• After spending months feeling a little crazy over kindergarten plans, I have total peace with this possibility. I still have legwork to do and details to learn; decision is not yet made but I have peace and peace counts for a lot. If we choose this route for kid #1's kinder year, that doesn't mean we are locked into this route forever. There are more school-aged kids and many more years of educating them on the horizon. This may be something we try and move away from or we may love it and be settled for a long time.
  

"You are worried about seeing him spend his early years in doing nothing.

"What? Is it nothing to be happy?

"Nothing to skip, play and run around all day long?

"Never in his life will he be so busy again."
--Rousseau

I started my blogging journey with a great deal of tension inside of me . . . . as evident in many of my previous posts. Tension between my untested beliefs/ideals/hopes/etc and actually, personally, homeschooling and facing the pressures and expectations of both the outside world and my own years in the educational system and then the realization that finding some way to succumb to some normal route of schooling would be easier in every imaginable way - from actual hard work to time and space management in a little home to dealing with all the pressures.

I think the tension's gone! Not that it won't return or be an ongoing part of my journey, but the initial roadblock is gone. I am relaxed in that part of my brain and questioning whether or not it is laziness and apathy but am pretty confident that it is not. I embrace Rousseau's words above. I full-heartedly believe that nothing is to be lost by not intentionally striving after academic skills right now. I believe everything is to be gained by embracing play, fresh air, good books, God, and learning the content of the child's world that is naturally set before him each day (for now, not forever).

This article fits nicely with what I've always believed and now am ready to do without worrying.

This quote gives simplicity and focus to my world of academic learning:

What we need to improve education is not more curriculum, but better education, and that comes from classics and mentors. With young children you do two things: read them the classics—things at their level like Black Beauty, Charlotte’s Web, the Little House on the Prairie series, fables and rhymes—then talk about it with them, teach them lessons.~A Thomas Jefferson Education p. 49

Core Phase

A Thomas Jefferson Education is a book that grabbed my attention and has significantly impacted my ideas about education. I have since read other books by the same author (DeMille) and attended several related seminars. The educational philosophies put forth by the Thomas Jefferson Education (TJ Ed) model deal more with the how and why questions of education and not directly with the what or specific content questions. I think it is easy to get too focused on the whats and neglect the weighty aspects of the hows and whys.

TJ Ed divides childhood into various phases, the first being Core Phase. Phases are not strictly related to physical age but Core is generally early childhood through age six or so. By age six a person's basic framework about life is formed - ideas about good/bad, right/wrong, true/false. TJ Ed says these core issues should be the focus of learning during early childhood and are the foundation for all else.

The acquisition of "scholarly" skills is not as important as these lessons during this phase. Ample research supports the position that later readers are life-long readers . . . . A child who plays at and practices learning through the Core Phase will approach skills acquisition at the self-appropriate time and pace with relish and self-confidence as her aptitude increases and the meaning of the tasks gains context through her experiences.

The culture and values of the family are learned through work and play together, with a parent or as a family. Good/bad, right/wrong, true/false are discussed at every real opportunity or example found in literature. Life, based upon family belief system, is lived out in the home environment authentically day in and day out. Children are a part of reading, prayers, work, everything. Culture is transmitted to the next generation "when you lie down and when you rise up."

My children are still young and Core Phase should be my current focus and it is definitely something I do not want to fail to be diligent in even as concerns about schedules, academics, and a messy house compete for my attention. As the speaker at one of the seminars I attended cautioned us, "if you haven't taught your kids Core Phase, please don't educate them. Smart evil people are worse than dumb evil people." I want my kids' hearts to be foremost. I want them to do good, love justice, and walk humbly with their God. It is in His light that we see light. This is the core; this is the beginning.

DeMille says "greatness isn't the work of a few geniuses, it is the purpose of each of us." There is great and divine purpose and potential in each life. Academic skills may be useful in carrying out God-given purposes and potentials but academics certainly will never be the cause or zest. Like I noted earlier, DeMille's model addresses the whys of education.

Our purpose is to train thinkers, leaders, entrepreneurs and statesmen - individuals with the character, competence and capacity to do the right thing and do it well in business, government, church, school, family, entertainment, research and other organizations . . . . to perpetuate freedom, to prepare people who know what freedom is, what is required to maintain it, and who exert the will to do what is required. These two goals are accomplished by the third: teaching students how to think.

I want my children to read, write, do math, and in all ways excel academically. I believe they will. I do not see them doing these things in their early years because this is not my first priority nor my starting point. My kindergartener will study letters and numbers but it is my hope that by six(-ish), it will in his his heart that a foundation has been built with the regular school skills of the mind to come alongside later. It is my hope that he will first understand that there is a mission and calling of paramount importance upon his life. That he will know he was created for a purpose and will then be compelled to prepare himself in every way, including academically, to walk out that purpose. In whatever realms my children serve in their adult lives, may they be people who serve and lead with great effort, compassion, vision, selflessness, and character because right now, before they turn six, they get straight concepts about good/bad, true/false, right/wrong.

What happens when a society does not prepare leaders? We get managers and professionals leading in areas they have no training for, such as government, and we get a nation of followers who see no problem with that because they have no experience with anything else. In a nation where the government is supposed to be the servant of the people, it is easy to see that our traditional form of government and its cultural underpinnings will deteriorate beyond repair if the citizen neglects to fit himself for leadership; eventually the result is widespread specialization complemented by arrogance, pride and general ignorance. This was the legacy of Germany in the 1930s - a highly trained but uneducated people easily swayed by Hitler.

Now how I'd love to go right into the root word liber and how liberty and learning are connected and how the voting citizens of Ancient Greece were the liber class because they were educated in the original sense of a liberal arts education and were prepared to be a free people who could govern themselves . . . . This post is already too long I am sure and it is not as cohesive as I wish. The point of my blog is to motivate ME and to make my mind re-examine things and this post may wander but it is all connected in my mind and there is so much more but the time changed this week and my kids wake-up time didn't and I am tired. I need inspiration and direction to put into practice my Core Phase aspirations. This has been a tough week at home with the kids!

Attention

Today we painted using fall leaves, went the park and the library, read books, and built things using a given number of legos. Except for a few books read at bedtime, all of this great stuff happened before about one in the afternoon. After which I was exhausted and by three or four I was counting the minutes until bedtime. While trying to make dinner, Luke's questions and comments on everything I was doing were non-stop. I finally said, "Stop! Just relax and be quiet for a minute! My brain is going to explode!" About 10 minutes later, with genuine concern, the poor kid asked if my brain really might explode and if it was better now. Oh man!

One other interesting thing today, I read an article, "Attention Span: Our National Education Crisis" by Oliver DeMille. (http://www.tjed.org/2011/09/attention-span-national-education-crisis/) It's a good read. It talks about the attention span of the general public during the time of Abraham Lincoln and the attention span that dominates our present society. Entertainment, computers, television, and prevailing attitudes about work and fun are all implicated. Attention and focus are definitely traits I want to be a key part in the education of my children. In my disorganized notebook of things I want to remember about education, I found scribbled notes about Socrates, Plato, and Charlotte Mason that relate to ideas in the article I read today.

Socrates said, "wisdom begins in wonder." Plato was student to Socrates and had a school in Athens. The word school comes from Ancient Greek and meant leisure. Plato's school had a garden and the purpose of the garden was to provide a tranquil place for deep thought, pondering, wondering. Real thinking is hard work and it requires time, leisure time. Dictionary.com defines leisure as "time free from the demands of work or duty." Ancient Greeks valued leisure time as purposeful time for valuable activities, such as thinking. Charlotte Mason wrote about the importance of teaching children to really see things, to observe and focus. She said this comes naturally to young children who see a new bug or something else in nature for the first time and are completely engrossed. As adults we are often too quick to rush children along because after all, the new discovery is something commonplace in our minds. We should take advantage of and nurture this intent focus and curiosity. Back to Socrates' quote, this wonder is how true learning happens. Cultivate that attention span; point out details or relationships; let children develop a habit of observation and deep thought. I hope that my children will not be afraid of hard work (mental or physical) because they experience a joy that comes with it. I hope that keen skills of observation grow out of time spent watching a butterfly or walking through a field that will one day benefit all of their studies. And I hope for more book time, less screen time, and attention spans of Lincoln's day. And none of this sounds easy to me! I read it all and love it but it is not the habits my mind has been trained in and I have a big aversion to hard work!