Children and the Future

When my son was very young (between his birth and one year of age), I did an extraordinary amount of research on different parenting styles and techniques.  I did this because I wanted to be the best mother possible.  And part of the reason for this desire is the fact that since I was eight years old, I've never dreamed of a career as anything BUT a mother.  Being a mother and homeschooling my child has been my plan since age eight, and nothing I've seen since then has encouraged me to deviate from that goal.

But, for some reason, I did not begin the research until after my son was born.  Until his first birthday, I followed more traditional methods of parenting (something I now regret, though I'm thrilled I learned as early as I did).

Anyway, I did lots of research.  I did web searches and followed links.  I borrowed books from the library.  I can't remember the exact paths I followed, but I wandered and read and pondered and considered and eventually found myself aligning to a concept of unschooling (and more specifically radical unschooling) as being closest to what I wanted for me and my son.

It's not the easiest path to follow, because it's not the path followed by the majority of the world.  It's hard for those who haven't done the research to see the benefits to this path.  It's hard to encourage some of those closest to my son that despite the fact that I don't push, he's learning all the time, every day.  He's just doing it at his pace.  He may not start reading at the age those in more traditional school do, but he will also not be taught that reading is a chore, is difficult, requires instruction, must be taught, or any of the other false "facts" that most schooled children learn.

My son reads.  He may not sit down and read a book, but he most certainly reads.  He may not know how to sound out every word he comes across, he may not recognize every word he sees, but that's not all that reading is.  Reading is pattern recognition.  It's recognizing symbols and interpreting their meaning.  He's done that since he first saw the "golden arches" and called it "McDonald's."  But this isn't reading enough for more traditionally minded people.  Additional aids have been acquired, and he is free to pursue them at his interest, but I will NOT require his use of them, as that is counter to everything I believe.  And even without them, his reading has improved to the point that most would recognize it as early reading.

My son does math.  He was refilling the soda section of the refrigerator (which has eight spots), counted out six cans and then stated that he needed two more.  That's subtraction.  We got a box of ice creams with six treats inside.  He was able to figure out that if we two shared it we'd get three each, but if we included his father, we'd only get two each.  That's division.  He may not do math the way the kids in school do, but he's not lacking for math ability.  In fact, this method of learning math may very well leave him without the math anxiety that plagues many people (myself included).  Because instead of something that's artificial and difficult, math is a part of his daily life.

My son has passions and focus.  He can spend hours playing with his LEGOs or exploring our yard (we live on 22 acres in a very rural part of Virginia).  He is completely fascinated with Star Wars, and has established at least one acquaintance on that basis (someone he can call to ask a Star Wars question when I don't know the answer).

My son is very helpful and sweet.  He may not always do exactly what's asked of him (he's not expected to, it's his life, after all), but more often than not, he's willing to help out when he's asked.

My son is curious and expressive.  His pronunciation may not always be perfect, but it is improving.  He asks great questions (though at times a bit too many for my personal preference).  He is able to express his feelings, though not always in ways that most people would prefer, still in ways that do no harm to those around him.

In all, I'm thrilled with how well unschooling is working for me and my son.  I just wish that those around him could see that it's not just him alone that makes him the person he is (though that's certainly a part of it), it's also the freedom and support that he's been given.  I doubt any other parenting style would have led us to the person he is today.  And I'm completely unwilling to take the chance that I'm right by trying more traditional methods.

As for me and my family, we unschool.  And that means that my son has the freedom to learn at his own pace.  My job is to be there to provide whatever support he desires and to make sure he's aware of just all that the world has to offer.  I provide opportunities, show possibilities, and allow him to accept or reject them as he chooses.

The advantage of this parenting method is that by the time my child is an adult, he's already been making his own decisions, responsible for his own actions, and confident of his abilities for a very long time.  He won't be suddenly thrust from having all his decisions made for him and being required to follow instruction to being allowed to choose for himself.

He may not follow the path that I would in his position.  In fact, I'd be astonished if he did.  He may not follow anyone's specific idea of what they consider "success" to be.  But I have no doubt that he'll be successful in whatever he chooses to do, as he is today.  I've heard it said that he needs to be prepared for the "real world."  I disagree.  He already lives in the real world.  There is no portion of the real world that cannot be handled with a combination of cooperation and choosing consequences.  He may choose a traditional job and follow the rules of the office (choosing consequences).  He may choose a traditional job and work with his boss to find creative solutions that meets both his and the boss's needs (cooperation).  He may work for himself.  He may decide not to work at all, but to travel and explore and do without material things.  But regardless of the path he chooses, it'll be his path.  He'll know what the options are, and he'll be able to follow his heart.  And that's all I ask for his future.

Nose Bleed

Last night we had a bit of excitement.  Tre fell asleep on the floor in front of the TV (a place he often choses to rest).  We were watching a movie and planned to move him to bed when the movie was over.  However, about a half-hour after he fell asleep, we looked down to see that Tre's face, arms, and the floor around him are covered with blood from a nose bleed.  I got him into the shower to clean him up, his nose started bleeding again, and it took a while to stop.

He's had quite a few nose bleeds this summer, though prior to this summer, I don't think he had any.  So, we're heading to the doctor soon (probably Wednesday, due to scheduling conflicts tomorrow) to see if there's any particular problem that might be causing this recurring problem.  I don't think the house is excessively dry, but that is something we've considered.  He's had the nose bleeds both here at home and in Tennessee visiting his grandparents, so it doesn't seem that dry air is very likely, though we're not ruling it out.

I hate it when something is bothering my son and I have no way to fix it right away.  It makes me feel a bit more powerless than normal.

Change

As of this past Wednesday there's been a fairly major change in my life. My sister-in-law stopped working for my mother's company, so I stopped watching Andy. All by itself, this doesn't sound like much of a change. However, Andy's absence from my childcare plans means that I'm much more able to follow a path of consensual parenting with Tre and Wyatt. So, even though Andy was a MAJOR challenge all by himself, I've found that my work has INCREASED since I've stopped caring for him.

If this doesn't sound right to you, then you probably don't know just how much work is involved in consensual parenting. When things are going smoothly, it can seem incredibly simple. In fact, it can seem an awful lot like "un-parenting" (or letting your child parent themselves, something very akin to neglect). Nothing could be further from the truth. The groundwork that must be laid to make this smooth sailing possible is extremely time intensive and requires a lot of creativity. Plus, problems are much more difficult to solve when you can't revert to the "do what I say because I told you so" method of traditional parenting.

It isn't until I discovered that Andy's absence has actually increased my workload that I realized just how far away from consensual parenting I had slipped. He's been so difficult to work with, and reverts to violence so quickly, that I had basically fallen into a pattern of solving problems by separating the kids (a solution none of them was very happy with). Now that I am actually working on helping Tre and Wyatt solve their disagreements through consideration of each's position and looking for a mutually acceptable solution, it's not so easy.

But despite this fact, I'm absolutely thrilled. I know it's not easy now, but it should get easier as Wyatt and Tre develop more tools for solving disputes (which at the moment seem near constant, though I'm sure it's not as bad as it seems). The time I spend now in helping them learn how to work together consensually will pay off in their future well-being, and this goes for Wyatt too, even if his mother doesn't fully follow the same parenting standard.

And Then

The last few days have been busy, but uneventful.

Friday I was watching Andy and Wyatt (a friend's son, same age as Andy). Rich had off work, so he took Tre out in the mid-afternoon. Most of the day, the kids played in Tre's room with LEGOs and Thomas trains. I spent a great deal of time in with them, trying to keep fights from errupting.

Yesterday was quieter. We ran errands in the morning ending in lunch at CiCi's pizza (an extremely reasonably priced all-you-can-eat pizza buffet we love). Then I came home and Beth (Wyatt's mother) came over and I spent some time helping her with her homework. While I was helping Beth, Wyatt and Tre played together until Tre got frustrated (in part because he was so tired) and we set them both down in front of a movie. After the movie was over, Beth and Wyatt went home and we watched Hancock as a family... Tre fell asleep part way through.

Today Beth is coming back over with Wyatt for more homework help. Rich is back at work, so it'll just be us ladies and the kids. I expect it to be fairly similar to yesterday, so unless something major happens, I'll leave it at that until tomorrow.

Side Note

By the way, I just want to make it clear from the get go, that though I am absolutely convinced that the method of parenting I have chosen (radical unschooling, consensual parenting) is the best possible and I can't imagine trying to go down a different path, that does NOT mean that I am perfect at following the path I have chosen. I try, but I also fail.

I think maybe that putting it out here and holding myself accountable for both success and failure may make the failures happen less often.

Also, though I have decided to use this method to raise my son and have done the best I could to follow that path since he was about one year old, my brother and sister-in-law have NOT done so with their son, Andy, who I watch frequently. He has not been taught that violence is not the solution to problems, and it is usually his first solution (even his "dancing" is very violent motions). I am not at all sure how well I will be able to handle this, and I know that my interactions with him are significantly subpar compared to my interactions with my son, Tre. As I can't convince his parents to put in the effort required to raise him in a consensual manner, I don't know how far down that path I can go with him. I guess we'll all just have to watch and see how it all plays out.

Try, Try Again

I'm going to try to be a bit more regular about updating this blog. There are a variety of reasons I want to keep a better track of what goes on in our lives, but the topmost consideration is that I plan to unschool Tre, and keeping track of what happens each day on a blog seems a bit easier that just about any other form of recordkeeping.

In that regard, today I was watching Andy for the afternoon. We got a bit of a late start, but Tre was feeling sociable, so he invited Andy to come "visit" early (I was supposed to start watching him about 2:30pm and Tre invited him back about noon.

They played some LEGO Batman until Tre got ridiculously frustrated by Andy not doing what he wanted him to do (he was trying to accomplish a particularly difficult goal and Andy was making it more difficult). Tre and I had a conversation about the fact that when working cooperatively with others, we can't always make all the decisions as if we were playing alone. Tre seemed to understand, but it didn't ease his frustration any. He decided he wanted to cry loudly (seconds after giggling, he made this decision in a calm tone of voice). I told him that was fine, but I'd need to close the door between him and us (Andy and me). He agreed, and went back to crying for a minute or two more.

After that drama, they played happily for a while, playing with Tre's Thomas wooden train set. That lasted an hour or two until they decided that it made more sense to jump on each other. Tre got tired of that well before Andy did, so I decided to come up with another form of entertainment.

So, we all three got into swimsuits, I figured out where I could find an outside water spigot I had some reasonable access to, and I started filling up water balloons. The boys had a blast. They each tossed about 10 baloons at each other, only two actually hitting their targets. (One of those two was caught, undamaged.) They retrieved the broken balloon pieces in order to get their next balloon, so there was little to no trash left in the yard. Then we just took turns spraying each other with the hose.

After that, we came back inside, changed into regular clothes, and watched some TV until Andy fell asleep. His parents came home within minutes of him waking up from his nap.

This afternoon and evening, Tre has mostly spent playing LEGO Batman on his own. He's doing a great job, which is pretty impressive given that he's only five years old.

And Then Got Better

So, after a night of scheming (with very little sleep) and a day of hectic phone calls, the light is back at the end of the tunnel, an escape route is hypothesized for the group as a whole as well as an alternate for our family (though neither are actually planned as of yet), and the stress levels are way down.

Still, the trip to New Hampshire that was supposed to happen the end of this month is off, and that makes me sad.

It Hit the Fan

So, I've been tooling along, minding my own business, living in the status quo for quite a while now. We haven't been making progress toward our goals, but we do know where we're heading and are on the same page in that regard. Then today the bombshell drops.

Our housing situation is now in flux. We could need to refigure very quickly, and at the moment, we have no easy answers. The only decision that is "easy" is that the trip I've been looking forward to for the last year is off.

Tempers are short, accusations and guilt-trips flying, and the light at the end of the tunnel has gone out.

Busy, Busy

So, today we're working on moving everything. Thankfully it's only a 12 minute drive from our current residence to our new one, so nothing spectacular is needed. Also, though we need the bulk of the move done before the 16th (that's when the electricity gets turned off, and no sense paying them if we're moving and going bankrupt anyway), we probably don't have to be 100 percent done by that point. Unfortunately, this is the only day prior to the 16th that Rich has off work, so it's really pretty much today or bust, but not quite.

Amid all of this, I'm still trying to eat as well as I can so as to not lose ground on the weight loss thing.

Changes, Changes

Well, our financial situation just reached up and bit us on the ass. Our landlord has tired of being gracious and has told us we really need to pay up or ship out. Of course, if we could afford to pay up we wouldn't be in this situation in the first place.

So, we're moving back into my mother's house. Not ideal, but the financial picture shouldn't change much and it's only temporary until we can pull together the money for the trip to New Hampshire.

Will be BUSY moving everything tomorrow.

Craptastic Day

So, it should have been a fairly average day. I got up, had some breakfast, got Tre dressed and went to run some errands. I had a check at the post office (yay!) which should have given us a bit of breathing room.

So, I go to the bank to deposit it and get back a little bit of money for our "special drinks" (Tre likes the orange blended creme drink at Starbucks), and find that we're overdrafted by almost $200, enough that my check won't even bring us even. This is where my bad day really starts.

So, I talk to Rich and he says that the problem is that he forgot to mentally adjust for the car insurance auto-deduct (he won't use a register, no matter how often I encourage him to or how many overdraft charges he gets). But he gives me some money for Starbucks, so I head on, but now I'm feeling a bit down.

At Starbucks, they've got a new employee that I haven't seen before. He's friendly and outgoing and really helps to cheer things up a bit. I also listen to some of my favorite songs while drinking my coffee on the way home, but I'm still in the dumps. I raid Tre's halloween candy, making it the second day this week I've completely disregarded my Weight Watcher's points, fiddle around a bit, and try to get some work done.

Then it's 4 o'clock and time for me to help out at Mom's farm. Now, my mother is paying me to take care of her farm while she's traveling to Michigan and Ohio to see her mom and Dad's dad (my two remaining grandparents). She's got four cows, about 10 bunnies, one duck, and five dogs (she's taken a couple of dogs with her) that I'm taking care of for her. I get over there determined to make the best of it.

The weather is decent (after being too cold the last few days), the sun is about to set, and I'm out "communing" with the animals. But the cows are running low on hay. There's a round bale just outside their fence, and I figure I'll give it a shot to see if I can push it through the gate. I get it rolled over twice (once to the fence, once through) and it stops. No matter what I do it won't budge. But the fence won't close, so I'm really screwed. I push and I shove but it won't move. I move the cows to the dog yard (leading them with their grain), and then I get my car and bump it into the hay... no luck. So, now I've got to go back over there with the truck when Rich gets home from work to try to push it with that. My wrists are both very sore. I'm covered with hay... it's just been a very craptastic day.

Weird Stuff

My father has always been a source of pride and frustration for me. He is incredibly smart, knows an amazing amount of trivia, and is pretty well informed about most everything (except pop culture). However, his people skills are and have always been somewhat lacking. The biggest area where this shows would be in the general area I term "weird stuff".

Weird stuff includes everything from crop circles and the shroud of Turin to kambucha and keifer. It's the stuff that isn't generally thought well of by mainstream America. And Dad loves it. He's constantly coming up with new theories and concepts off the internet, and he often doesn't seem to exercise much judgment before running with the idea.

Worse yet, he likes to mention these things to every visitor we have... and Mom loves to have company. So, I grew up being embarrassed by my father seeming to shove this weird stuff down the throats of everyone who walked in the door.

Recently, however, I've been following a path that's led me to find and try out some weird stuff of my own. My path doesn't follow my father's, but is still similar enough to draw the comparison. I'm now looking into "No Poo" a method of hair washing that doesn't strip the natural oils out of the hair. I've just ordered and plan to begin using a deoderant stone instead of standard deoderant. And most would probably say that my interest in unschooling, libertarianism/anarcho capitalism, and paganism would be somewhat down the weird path as well. The big difference between me and my dad (hopefully) is that though I do mention the concepts when opportunity presents, I think I'm better at listening to people when they lose interest in a topic.

Anyway, I thought it was interesting and figured I'd share.