Comments on Yarns of the Heart: Reflections of an Unschooler in a 4th Grade Classr...

What a great chance for him to see what he "missed...

2009-03-23T11:22:00.000-05:00

What a great chance for him to see what he "missed" in public school!

Thank you, Jena--this post and the "Battleship" on...

2009-03-22T11:50:00.000-05:00

Thank you, Jena--this post and the "Battleship" one are so encouraging to me!!

~Jeanne

Hi Kaya, thanks for making me realize that it's no...

2009-03-21T20:52:00.000-05:00

Hi Kaya, thanks for making me realize that it's not just moms who can homeschool! Sorry about that. I'll edit the post to say "a parent." :)

i also love the idea of paying parents to stay hom...

2009-03-21T16:03:00.000-05:00

i also love the idea of paying parents to stay home with their kids, but with one difference. i think that dad's should have the option of being the stay at home parent. i don't hate kids, but i'm a unschooler, not a mom so i just dont have any bias.

With all the money spent on testing, tons of textbooks and school buildings that would probably be a feesable situation. But first we have the huge job of making unschooling generally known and understood.

Dream on about that!

I like the way Peter thinks! I need to be paid fo...

2009-03-20T16:20:00.000-05:00

I like the way Peter thinks! I need to be paid for keeping my kids at home! Yea, like that's ever going to happen!
In all seriousness, he gets it. That is exactly what needs to change in our schools.

opening night is tonight, so we're really looking ...

2009-03-19T14:44:00.000-05:00

opening night is tonight, so we're really looking forward to it! I'll have lots of pictures from dress rehearsal when I get back in town.

Maybe I should put a poll on my blog seeing how ma...

2009-03-19T10:24:00.000-05:00

Maybe I should put a poll on my blog seeing how many of us want to get paid to stay home and homeschool. :)

Jamie--Good point. I've always thought book reports and comprehension questions killed the fun of reading! But you know, I was always interested in what they were reading, so I'd ask questions and hey--I was checking comprehension, but in a relaxed, natural way. And if I read aloud to them, I'd stop and point out setting, characterization, etc. and ask what they thought would come next or if they agreed with the author's choice of plot elements. That's treating your child like an intelligent fellow-human, and in return, they act like one. :)

Love the encouragement of what Peter did "without ...

2009-03-19T09:44:00.000-05:00

Love the encouragement of what Peter did "without any comprehension sheets!"

I was just wondering yesterday if the ones that came with our literature curriculum are really needed. Why can't we just read the books?

Jamie

By the way, the pic of Peter is great. Such a cu...

2009-03-19T09:41:00.000-05:00

By the way, the pic of Peter is great. Such a cutie.

Yes, I vote for getting paid to stay home and educ...

2009-03-19T09:39:00.000-05:00

Yes, I vote for getting paid to stay home and educate my girls. Where do I sign up for that?

I think that our society has long neglected the value of stay-at-home-moms!

Thanks for all your great comments, but what about...

2009-03-19T08:38:00.000-05:00

Thanks for all your great comments, but what about that 4th grade picture? Isn't he CUTE?

abba12--I like your idea about personality assessment for teachers. I think that's a great idea. Now that I'm older, I can see that being in a classroom full of kids all day would have been incredibly stressful and I wouldn't have made it.

Heather--hating school from 1st grade is just torture. I'm glad you came out of it in one piece!

Crunchy--I have the typical scrapbooking MO--the first child has a really good one, the next child a little less elaborate, and the third child has none (but she does have a book with lots of loose things stuck inside). Blogging is my new scrapbook. :)

When I was in college I did part of my student tea...

2009-03-19T07:39:00.000-05:00

When I was in college I did part of my student teaching in a 1st grade classroom. There were 30 kids over half of them with siblings in the special ed program and destined themselves to be there (low income school district with very high level of inbreeding--really.) The 1st grade teacher HAD to use the new reading curriculum but preferred the old one and so she made the kids do BOTH--I spent most of my time correcting 30 worksheets per child per day. The other part of the time I tutored the ones who were behind (I was a sp. ed./el. ed. major and did half sp. ed. and half elem. ed. for student teaching) more often than not the kids--1 month into 1st grade, didn't even bother trying to figure things out themselves. In 1 month they had lost their love of learning (the kindergarten was a "play" style kindergarten where they got to be kids so they hadn't lost it there.) It was that experience and then my experience teaching when I graduated that made me want to home school my own--I DID NOT want my kids to deal with that (I had a very similar 1st grade teacher and because of her I HATED school.)

LOL about Stone Age parenting. Fortunately, I left...

2009-03-18T22:37:00.000-05:00

LOL about Stone Age parenting. Fortunately, I left the Stone Age after my first kid. Unfortunately, that means he's the only one with a real life scrapbook! LOL.

And yeah, I think education dollars should be given to moms to stay home with their kids, too!!

Having been to public school, government structure...

2009-03-18T17:53:00.000-05:00

Having been to public school, government structured homeschooling and full homeschooling with intrests in unschooling I hope that I've developed a similar perspective. One of the big helps would be smaller class sizes yes. Another would be teachers having to prove some personality traits first. In my time at public and private schools there were some teachers that loved kids and loved teaching and look extra time out of their day for individuals. There were others that yelled at students until they did as the teacher said, and were out the door faster than the kids were. These teachers shouldn't be allowed in, these are the reason some children fall so far behind and we have 12th graders graduating not knowing how to read.

I love hearing his perspective on education. I al...

2009-03-18T16:30:00.000-05:00

I love hearing his perspective on education. I always find it interesting how kids who have never been to school see the world. (maybe much better than the rest of us).

Imagine getting paid to be the best mom you can be...

2009-03-18T15:56:00.000-05:00

Imagine getting paid to be the best mom you can be- how fabulous! Something's got to give- until then I am just thankful for these I can have them at home with me. :)