It made me ponder, if you wanted to make a kid hate learning, how would you do it? Here are some ideas I had:

1. At a young age, take them out of their natural, home environment and put them in a group learning environment.
2. Make them sit for periods of time on hard chairs.
3. Restrict their access to nature.
4. Give them desk work they’d rather not be doing, and tell them that if they don’t finish, they will miss their outside play time.
5. Place them in a group so big they won’t be able to receive much individual attention.
6. Make them learn what someone else says they should be learning, not the things in which they are most interested.
7. Give them a teacher who’s not personally concerned about their feelings and happiness.

Yes, no? Does any of this sound familiar, bring back memories or seem unnatural?

These conditions happen often in public school, but can be present in other school settings and even in homes.

Learning is a choice, and if we force our children to learn only what we want them to, they won’t retain the information. Do you remember everything you learned in grade school? I know I don’t. I don’t remember a majority of what I learned in high school … and college also, because it wasn’t what I was passionate about.

The bottom line is, we need to love our children enough to hunt for whatever environment will be most nurturing and interesting for them. It may be in our home or in a school environment, even a public school environment. We just need to understand what goals exist in that environment and if that’s what we really want for our child.

Here is a chat I had with the mom who emailed me about her 6 year old son. He was struggling with the conditions outlined above. Luckily, this mother found a solution that worked for her son and ended up benefiting their whole family.

Interview with Samantha 9_22_11

We’ve got to be very careful about the things our kids don’t enjoy when it comes to learning. If we help them be able to pursue their interests the majority of the time, than they will be more willing to learn the essential things that they’re not so excited about. We need to be on the lookout for making those essential skills as fun as possible.

If something is not working for you or your child, it’s not going to significantly set them back if you pull them out of school OR put them into school when needed. We knew of a public school principle in Arizona that had his children go to school every other year, and home schooled them every other year.

A few months or even a year is not going to make or break anything in your child’s education in the long run. Giving them time or resources to pursue their own interests, allowing them a break, creating a new learning environment, or providing more nurturing at home may be exactly what they need to be balanced individuals with high self-worth in the long run.

If these ideas ring true to you, but you need to learn more, check out the freebies at tjed.org and especially look at the article on Leadership Education: Phases of Learning.

How do you help your children love learning?

She purchased all the supplies with her own money.

The candy contained white sugar and hydrogenated fat, stuff I actively avoid. I set a couple ground rules like, “please don’t eat much of this stuff yourself, and don’t feed it to our other children.” She agreed and I let her proceed.

She did almost everything herself with just a few suggestions from me.

She considered the project to fall under the category of art and it was also an entrepreneurial endeavor.

I guess I could agree with that.

I used to be a super-strict about sugar and unhealthy foods, but I eventually realized that relationships are much more important than dietary choices. I still try hard to avoid eating or having certain unhealthy things in my home, but I’ve realized that moderation is key. What you eat 90% of the time is what really determines your quality of health, and splurging here or there isn’t going to cause serious problems when that’s the case.

Raquel didn’t sell as many of these to her friends as she thought she would. She used them as party favors at her birthday party. And this was a two-time project. Don’t worry. She does plenty of reading, writing and arithmetic in addition to her sporadic, creative activities.

The lessons she is learning are more important than some of my personal preferences, within boundaries of course. I want her to love learning so I’ve decided I need to give her choice and freedom to experiment.

If our children are going to grasp the lessons of life, they need to have the freedom to make choices and make some mistakes. As they internalize these lessons when they’re young while the results are minor, they will understand that choices have consequences. Then they will use that freedom to choose appropriately in what they learn, watch, say, and do.

Sometimes all we need to do as parents is loosen up.

I’m trying.

Photo from Black Cat Pages

During my college years I developed the firm idea that I was not artistically inclined, and I shouldn’t even waste my time trying to do art.

When I began to home educate my children, I started understanding the power of my example in their eyes. Little by little my mindset changed, and I moved out of my comfort zone to do activities with my children. Sometimes I even take a class before they do, so I can teach them or at least inspire them.

So when my friend put together a watercolor paint class for a group of my daughter’s friends, I jumped on board. This was the first picture I painted, with a little help from the teacher. I had to look at her examples a lot as I did mine.

Next we traced a simple picture with carbon paper.

Then you paint a grey wash, leaving some parts white. After that dries you paint a darker coat on certain parts of the picture.

When that dries, you add more details. Each layer only takes a few minutes to dry.

Here’s Raquel’s. She wasn’t very pleased with her work, but I thought she did a fine job.

Then we made color wheels, which helped us learn to mix the colors correctly.

Here’s my finished wheel.

Then we tried a few more exercises and ended with a couple harder projects. We drew a scene of fruit.

Then painted it. I didn’t quite finish this one. I probably should have done a cream background wash first.

Here is our teacher, Jennifer Lineweaver’s painting. I love it!

Then we drew candy and painted it. This is Raquel’s painting.

She got frustrated a few times and probably would have quite the class if I wasn’t doing it with her.

Here’s mine and it’s pretty much finished. It could probably use a bit more background color.

I’m a perfectionist when it comes to art projects so I’m inclined not to do them, but when I do finally try I usually enjoy myself. And I create something beautiful in the process.

I like being able to say, “I can do that.” It’s empowering.

I’m so grateful for the way that home educating my children has changed my own perspective on learning. It’s made my life much richer and educating my kids more fun.

When Mike was in medical school, I started having grand dreams of traveling the world doing service. We both wanted to expose our children to other cultures and the rich differences that existed in the world.

During Mike’s residency, I was thinking about signing up my son for an inexpensive preschool program offered at the nearby community center. I had heard that it was really just glorified babysitting for moms who needed a break from their kids. It sounded tempting.

I asked one friend if her son would participate. She responded that she wanted to enjoy her babies being with her as long as possible. She was busy with several children, and I hadn’t expected her to feel that way.

It caused me to ponder on the topic. I started asking myself some tough questions. How much did I really enjoy being around my children? Did I unconsciously consider them an inconvenience instead of the blessing I knew they were to me? Was I truly interested in what was best for them? Were my needs more important than theirs?

I had a paradigm shift. I knew I enjoyed being with my children and could relish it even more with the right frame of mind. I decided to be more careful about situations that weren’t necessarily in the best interest of my children, with people I didn’t necessarily trust. I committed myself to making whatever was best for them a higher priority in my life.

I became more purposeful in finding fun activities to do together. We lived in Tucson, AZ at the time. Once I started looking, I found there was no shortage of entertaining, educational things to do there. I even got together with some other moms I knew to do a preschool co-op group called Joyschool. I was having a fantastic time being more involved in the welfare of my children.

I started pondering again one day, after talking with my sister, Ami. She had a masters in social work and was working for a school district running some programs. She had a good friend, at the time, who had been homeschooled. She told me that when she had a family, she would probably homeschool.

This was a totally new thought to me. After I chewed on it for a while, I reflected on it in the context of my grand dreams. If we were going to travel the world, perhaps I should be prepared to educate my children at different seasons of time.

On one of our weekly library trips, I was browsing books and noticed one called The Successful Homeschool Family Handbook. It looked interesting, so I checked it out.

I read some of it to Mike. He was resistant initially. Both his parents were in public education. His father was a teacher in high school, his mother a counselor. He had had good friends and an enjoyable school experience.

But the more we read the book, the more ideas we found that rang true to us. It talked about how America has pushed its children, especially little boys, into academics before they’re ready. Europe on the other hand, waited until boys were age 7 or 8 to teach reading.

The book also talked about the negative socialization that takes place in public school settings. It talked about this in detail and was very persuasive. We decided that homeschool was a possibility we needed to investigate further.

We learned of a homeschool convention taking place in Utah. I knew the decision was so big we needed to make it together, so I begged Mike to go with me. Thankfully, he agreed.
The only thing I remember about the day’s lectures was being awestruck by Oliver DeMille. His speech greatly impressed us. We were thirsty for more. We bought his book, A Thomas Jefferson Education, and whatever other articles they had for sale. We couldn’t devour them fast enough.

Oliver’s educational philosophies rang strongly true to us. We both had university bachelor’s degrees, and by that time, Mike had also obtained a masters degree in molecular biology and his MD. We had some experience in the systems of education Oliver describes in his book.

As we read, we understood his descriptions and could relate them to our own experiences. We realized that after all our years of “quality” education, we had not yet obtained what he termed a “leadership” education. With freedom for all being the end goal, this method of education nurtures creativity in problem solving, morality in living, and freedom of thought. This is what we wanted above all else, for our children . . . and ourselves.

We didn’t know exactly how we were going to go about it. We only felt that it was completely right for our family, and that most of it would take place off the conveyor belt of the public education system. We determined to keep learning.

Thus, we made our decision to homeschool.

This comment came out of my husband’s mouth, the day I wrote this post:

“An oppression model of education will never end in freedom.”