Choosing Freedom Over Coercive Schooling

In the dead of winter, when too many indoor days string together and our creativity begins to wane, homeschooling can feel a bit daunting. It can feel so much easier to have the kids join our neighbors on the yellow school bus rather than muster the energy and drive to spend another day inside or wade through snow drifts to another homeschool activity. That's when I think of the truth in Cevin Soling's quote from the recent, Alternatives to Compulsory Education Conference: "We are incarcerating children for our own convenience." (The videos from the conference are now available on the conference website and are definitely worth watching.)

But then spring comes. The days flip from inside to outside and I feel grateful that my children have the freedom to explore empty beaches on bright, warm May mornings; to spend most of their days in the sunshine exploring their world, discovering on their own terms, revealing their true passions without coercion or predetermined agendas; to enjoy their wide open time with other children who learn and explore in similar ways, guided by their powerful curiosity instincts.

This is freedom to learn. It's not always easy, it's not always simple and straightforward--especially in the middle of a New England winter--but it always feels right. It always feels right that children should be granted freedom over coercion, autonomy over control. It feels right that under these conditions of freedom and autonomy children--indeed all of us--learn best. It feels right that we grown-ups should sacrifice some of our own freedom and autonomy for the benefit of our children, and not the other way around.

Homeschooling is not always convenient. Sometimes it's downright tough. Just like parenting. But the good days always outweigh the bad, and I always choose education freedom over coercive schooling for my children. Always. But especially in May.  

Why I Don't Follow Screen-Free Week

Today is the start of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood's, Screen-Free Week, designed to get families to connect more in person and rely less on technology. While I can appreciate the initiative, especially in cases when technology may over-run a household to the detriment of human connection and creativity, I don't participate in screen-free week.

I think it's important to be aware of the role of technology in family life, and to be aware if technology is limiting other types of learning and interaction, but I don't think technology should be maligned as it so often seems to be. We got rid of our TVs and cable a few years ago, realizing that we could enjoy the same or greater access to information and entertainment without the commercialism, but we greatly value the role of technology in our living and learning. We see our computers, iPad, smart-phones as vital tools in our modern culture for information, communication, education, and entertainment.

In his talk at Saturday's "Alternatives to Compulsory Education" conference, and his new book, Free to Learn, Boston College psychology professor, Peter Gray, agrees strongly that technology, as our modern culture's most important tool, should necessarily be used by children in their play. In his blog, Gray writes: "Why would we want to limit a kid's computer time? The computer is, without question, the single most important tool of modern society. Our limiting kids' computer time would be like hunter-gatherer adults limiting their kids' bow-and-arrow time. Children come into the world designed to look around and figure out what they need to know in order to make it in the culture into which they are born." Now, as Gray pointed out at Saturday's conference, hunter-gatherer cultures made certain that poison arrows were out of reach of their children until they were old enough to understand their inherent dangers. Similarly, we grown-ups can ensure that certain technology programs or applications are out-of-reach of our children until they have similar maturity, but to prevent our children from using the vital tools of our culture, from becoming informed about and skilled in their use and power, runs counter to the practices of human evolution for thousands of years.

The powerful role of technology in learning, particularly in child-directed learning, is vividly highlighted in the award-winning work of Sugata Mitra. Many of you have seen his extraordinary Ted Talks in which he showcases how, by putting computers on the outside wall of his office building in the slums of New Delhi, India, illiterate, unschooled children worked collaboratively without adult supervision, teaching themselves--within weeks--how to effectively use computer programs they had never seen, create email accounts and send emails, search the Internet for information, learn to read, learn English, and learn all aspects of modern computing-- all on their own, all working together in multi-age groups, with no adult intervention. Extraordinary.

Technology and computers and screens-- all of it-- are critical to our modern culture's ability to learn, to share, to communicate, to progress. I want my children to respect and value these important tools and become skilled in their use and power. So, I'm not following screen-free week. But then, I suppose if you're reading this, neither are you.

Taking Action: Insights from the "Alternatives to Compulsory Education" Conference

 

"There's hope for those of us who want to shift the paradigm of compulsory schooling." -Peter Bergson

It's been a dozen years since I was a student at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), studying education administration, planning, and social policy, and utterly baffled by the lack of meaningful conversation on alternatives to the modern education model. Today I enthusiastically returned to the school's Gutman Library for the fascinating and thought-provoking conference, "Alternatives to Compulsory Education," sponsored by the Cultural Studies Club, not HGSE.

With passionate speakers and an audience full of colleagues who are forging new pathways for living and learning without conventional schooling, I couldn't help but be energized, and motivated, and re-committed to the important work of showcasing alternatives to compulsory education. I listened to "War on Kids" documentary filmmaker and HGSE student, Cevin Soling, discuss why we need to "transform," and not just "reform," education away from the compulsory school model, that defies our supposedly democratic ideals of freedom and autonomy. I heard Pat Farenga discuss John Holt's legacy and advocacy of unschooling. Peter Gray presented the tenets of his new book, Free To Learn, discussing the necessity of allowing children unfettered, self-directed time and space to learn. Finally, Peter Bergson shared his model for an alternative to compulsory education, combining a bit of homeschooling with an off-site, independent learning center for children of all ages.

What struck me most about this conference, however, was organizer Cevin Soling's call for action: urging those of us present to be more vocal, more visible, more committed to sharing both the need for and the alternatives to compulsory education.

It got me to thinking.

For the most part, I have kept this blog rather quiet and simple, sharing glimpses of what alternative education looks like for our little family. I will continue to do that, but after today's conference, I feel a stronger need to be more assertive, more impassioned about why compulsory education doesn't work and why we need to explore and support alternatives to this obsolete model.

Let us not forget that while Horace Mann pushed valiantly for Massachusetts to become the first state in 1852 to introduce compulsory education, he and his wife happily homeschooled their three children with no intention of sending them to the schools he was creating. If the proclaimed "father of American public education" didn't think the compulsory education model was good enough for his children, why on earth should we?

Finding Calm in Nature

After a very long and trying week for all of us in the city, including the revelation on Friday that the alleged marathon bombers lived and learned mere blocks from our home in Cambridge, we decided that the best place to spend much of the weekend was outside, surrounded by nature. We needed--the grown-ups especially--to breathe deeply, reflect, rejuvenate, and be thankful.

I recently read an article in last month's The Atlantic, entitled: "How Nature Resets Our Minds and Bodies." It did just that this weekend, helping to relieve the stress and anxiety that enveloped us in the city this week. We roamed and dug, observed and discovered, surrounded by the peacefulness of woods and water. When we returned to the city, proud of its strength and solidarity, we took a bit of nature's calm with us for the start of another week.

Wishing you all a peaceful, joyful, uneventful week!

Moving Forward

I admit that I have been lingering close to home these past couple of days, keeping a more vigilant eye on my little ones as they play happily outside oblivious to my worries, constantly checking online news sources for any updates or information, thinking about the many victims of Monday's attack, wondering where we go from here.

Amid the constant whir of helicopters and the steady stream of sirens that has filled my city these past few days, it felt safe to be at home. But it also felt a bit cowardly, a bit like allowing the evil perpetrators to win: to cause us to curtail our freedoms, our typical ways of living and learning, and be consumed by fear.

As a city, as a country, we have long refused to live in fear, refused to let evil prevail over goodness.

So tonight, even as those helicopters whirred and those sirens streamed, my family walked through Harvard Square to enjoy an early dinner at one of the many local restaurants offering to donate a percentage of their proceeds to help Monday's victims.

It was a small act, but oh so important as we move forward, into the light and away from the darkness.

When Bad Things Happen

Bedtime took a bit longer tonight, at least for my six-year-old. There were more questions, more snuggles, more reassurances. The tragic events across the river today seeped into our home as we watched live streaming Internet coverage that filled us with anger and sadness, hope and inspiration. Typically I would prevent images of tragedy from entering my home, but this was just too close by.

My little ones were easily distracted from the news we grown-ups so needed to monitor, but at six, my daughter is aware of what's going on and wanted to see for herself clips of the news coverage we were watching. She is at that special age when fantasy and reality become increasingly distinguishable, when the villains she reads about in her superhero books can often seem too similar to the reality of the evil-doers in our world.

But as the League of Justice always prevails, and good always triumphs over evil, we focused on all the goodness we saw today. Specifically, we spent a lot of time talking about the scenes we saw in the seconds after the explosions: when everyone else was running away from the smoke, we watched the many police officers and marathon officials and other volunteers who were running right into the thick of it, with courage and hope and an unrelenting drive to help and to save. That is the goodness that always emerges, that always prevails, when bad things happen.

We talked a lot about those initial helpers and the many other helpers that emerged today: the nurses and doctors and emergency response workers, the police and intelligence personnel, the soldiers and military heroes, the governor and the president--all the many good people who are working hard to keep our city safe and free and inspiring us to spread goodness and courage. While I answered questions as simply as possible about why there was a bomb and why would someone want to do harm, I focused mostly on the fact that while evil does exist in the world--while there are those Lex Luthers and Jokers among us--most of the world is filled with good people doing good things, and that goodness always, always shines through the bad.

"When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.'" - Mr. Rogers

My thoughts are with those most affected by today's horrific events in Boston. May goodness shine through for them.

Leaning In To Motherhood

Recently I've been reading the reviews and articles related to Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg's new book, Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead. It highlights, among other things, the pivotal moments that women encounter in business, encouraging them to "lean in" to their careers.

It got me to thinking about the opposite: those pivotal moments when women choose to "lean in" to motherhood and opt-out of their career track.

If you had told me seven years ago when I was newly pregnant with my first child and running a successful, six-figure training consulting company that I would give it all up to be a stay-at-home-mom, I would have told you that you were crazy. In fact, I'm fairly certain that I said numerous times then that I would never give up the business I had worked so hard to build just because of a baby.

And then I had that baby.

I vividly remember three months into motherhood, staring at my beautiful baby girl as she nursed and napped contentedly in my arms, settling in to our new family rhythm, realizing that there was no way I could return to work. I leaned in to motherhood, transitioning all of my clients and devoting all of my time and energy to the important work of mothering.

In leaning in to motherhood, I have discovered the most challenging and rewarding and learning-intensive work I have ever known. Now, I realize fully that not all women have the luxury of choice in whether or not to "lean in" to either a career or motherhood. I was privileged to have those choices, and privileged to be able to choose stay-at-home motherhood.

For those of you who have also been granted these choices, what was your defining moment that spurred you to "lean-in" to stay-at-home motherhood?

On Health and Wellness

Earlier today we ventured out of the city and into the countryside for our annual wellness visit with our family doctor. This is our second time seeing her since I switched our family to her practice last spring. Early on in motherhood, I relied on a traditional pediatrician, but as my focus on natural parenting grew, I realized that a traditional practice was no longer a good fit for our family. We then switched to a more integrative, holistic practice, but it still seemed a bit too traditional, so we ended up expanding our scope and finding a doctor outside of the city who is just the right match for us.

A throwback to a different era, this doctor works out of her home, believes in holistic medicine and homeopathy, and recognizes family and home as the center of health and wellness. Visiting her reminds me of those times in our not-so-distant-past when doctors were used sparingly, when patients paid for a doctor's services directly without health insurance involvement, when natural remedies were the norm rather than the exception, and when mothers and grandmothers were considered the greatest healers for their family.

Most certainly, I am grateful that antibiotics and other medical advancements exist should my children ever need them, and am thankful to live near world-renowned hospitals if there were an emergency or serious illness, but along with this good progress has come an increasing reliance on "experts" for things that were once considered the sole domain of home and family. We now seem so often to look outside of the family and home for most of our health and wellness, relying on external sources to birth our babies, to heal illness, to raise, feed and educate our children. We rely on synthetic products and industrialized food to ever-greater degrees. And in so doing, we increasingly forget about the power of home and family, about the important and time-honored role of mothers in birthing, feeding, healing, raising, and educating their children. We forget about what it means to center health and wellness around family and home.

I am trying to remember.

***
Here are some of my favorite books on family health and wellness. What would you add to the list?

• Healing With Whole Foods: Asian Traditions and Modern Nutrition, by Paul Pitchford
• How To Raise A Healthy Child In Spite of Your Doctor, by Robert Mendelsohn, MD
• Homeopathic Medicine at Home, by Maesimund Panos
• Traditional Home Remedies: Time-Tested Methods for Staying Well- The Natural Way, by Martha White
• In Defense of Food, by Michael Pollan
• The Vaccine Book: Making the Right Decision for Your Child, by Robert Sears, MD
• The Baby Book, by William Sears, MD, et al
• Smart Medicine for a Healthier Child, by Janet Zand, et al
• The Holistic Baby Guide: Alternative Care for Common Health Problems, by Randall Neustaedter
• The Vaccine Guide: Risks and Benefits for Children and Adults, by Randall Neustaedter
• Spiritual Midwifery, by Ina May Gaskin
• The Other Baby Book: A Natural Approach to Baby's First Year, by Megan McGrory Massaro and Miriam Katz

My Gateway To Natural Parenting

While out for a walk this afternoon, I ran into the Lactation Consultant I greatly relied upon in the early days with my first-born. If it wasn't for her, I am quite certain, I would not have succeeded at breastfeeding, and if it wasn't for breastfeeding, I am quite certain, I would not have journeyed down the natural parenting path that has brought me so much personal joy and reward.

For me, breastfeeding was the gateway to a natural parenting lifestyle. When my older daughter was born, I didn't know much about anything except that I wanted to breastfeed. I didn't know anyone who breastfed, none of my family members had ever attempted it, and I was overwhelmed. As a result, I believed the silly advice from doctors suggesting that babies should only need to nurse every two hours and therefore I must have a low milk supply because my daughter seemed to want more. When she was sluggish in gaining weight in the first few days, there was talk about supplementing with bottles. Why, I wondered, would the feeding practice that sustained the human race be failing me? It didn't seem right to me, but I had no answers.

Until I met Jenny. A fabulous Lactation Consultant who believes strongly in natural parenting and listening to our babies and our bodies, she guided me to realize that babies should eat whenever they are hungry, even if it seems continuous in those early days, and that I should trust my instincts. I started bringing my baby into bed with me, nursing whenever she wanted. I started sleeping better, relaxing more, trusting more. I wore my baby everywhere I went so that she could easily nurse on-demand. As months went by and our breastfeeding relationship flourished, I realized that I was practicing what was known as Attachment Parenting. It felt right, good, natural, and I started to think that if it wasn't for Jenny and the time and nurturing she offered to help me learn how to breastfeed, I might never have discovered this special style of parenting.

Beginning with breastfeeding and Attachment Parenting, I gradually started to trust my children and parenting to ever greater degrees, moving along the natural parenting continuum. I committed to homeschooling when my children were very young, recognizing that natural learning and a family-centered lifestyle seemed to fit with our values and hopes for our children's education. Later, I learned that birthing at home would be the best place for me to ensure a safe, natural, intervention-free birth for me and my baby.

After my daughter's homebirth, I became increasingly committed to natural, organic, homemade living, focusing much more on things like buying fresh foods directly from local farms, avoiding packaged foods and making more from scratch, embracing alternative healthcare and questioning one-size-fits-all public health policy. And, for me, it all leads back to breastfeeding. That one, simple act had a profound effect on propelling me to trust my instincts, question mainstream thinking, and focus on cultivating a family life that is as natural and holistic as possible.

Breastfeeding was my natural parenting gateway. What was yours? What launched you down this joyful parenting path?

Trustful Parenting

"Trustful parents trust their children to play and explore on their own, to make their own decisions, to take risks, and to learn from their own mistakes…They support, rather than try to direct, children's development, by helping children achieve their own goals when such help is requested." (Peter Gray in Free to Learn, p. 210) 

Once in a while a book comes along that inspires and affirms, supports and encourages. This weekend, I finished psychology professor, Peter Gray's, new book, Free To Learn, and am left with a heightened passion for unschooling and self-directed learning and trustful parenting.  As much as I try daily to follow my children's lead, to provide them with enough unstructured time and space to learn and grow, to allow the necessary conditions for their natural spirit and passions to emerge, I realize there is still so much more I can do to deepen my trustful parenting instincts.

According to Gray, trustful parents "provide not just freedom, but also the sustenance, love, respect, moral examples, and environmental conditions required for healthy development." (p.210)

Lately, my six-year-old and four-year-old have been extremely passionate, among other things, about baking and building, respectively. They have, independently and of their own accord, sought out information and materials to help them to explore and expand these interests, and I provide help and resources where necessary. But I have also been analyzing how I can better create the trustful "environmental conditions" to help them pursue their passions.

For my baker, that means allowing her full and unfettered access to the kitchen for the baking she wants to do. It means that she pores through cookbooks and iPad applications in search of recipes, watches cooking and baking demonstrations on YouTube, reads cooking magazines that I have collected for her, learns about famous cooks and bakers, and gathers as much information as she can to help her in her craft. It means spending time at the King Arthur Flour headquarters in Vermont, watching and learning and imitating. It means recognizing that she is responsible and capable enough to do her own measuring, cutting, prepping, mixing, scooping, testing, and monitoring. It means watching quietly as she tweaks recipes, learns from mistakes, experiments with new ideas, and, happily, treats us with her delicious creations.

For my builder, it means recognizing his clear passion for building, constructing, fixing, and all areas of home improvement--despite having parents who can barely change a lightbulb. It means providing him with access to real tools and helping him to use them safely. It means providing access to books and videos about these topics for him to explore as he wishes, and welcoming opportunities to talk to people who know more about building and maintenance than we do.

At its heart, trustful parenting is about freedom and choice, allowing our children to fully explore their world, build their own skills, pursue their own passions--in the absence of adult coercion and limitations. It is about believing that learning isn't about outcomes; it's about living a happy, full, productive life--now and in the future. As Gray states: "The world is full of unhappy lawyers, doctors, and business executives, and many clerks and janitors are happy, fulfilled, and decent. Career success is not life success. You can be happy or unhappy in any profession, but you can't be happy, at least not for long stretches, if you feel that your life is not yours" (p.222).

Freedom, choice, trust--these are the conditions under which children--and indeed all of us--learn and flourish.

Trusting Natural Learning

I scurried to my local bookstore yesterday to grab a copy of Boston College psychology professor--and avid unschooling supporter--Peter Gray's, new book: Free to Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Life. Now, I can't put it down.

Offering both a personal and provocative analysis of the potential consequences of today's predominantly super-charged, over-scheduled, adult-driven, institutionalized childhood, this book is a must-read for those of us choosing a different way:

"We are pushing the limits of children's adaptability. We have pushed children into an abnormal environment, where they are expected to spend ever greater portions of their day under adult direction, sitting at desks, listening to and reading about things that don't interest them, and answering questions that are not their own and are not, to them, real questions. We leave them ever less time and freedom to play, explore, and pursue their own interests." (p.5)

Much of Gray's book focuses on trust. We must trust our children, trust our parenting, trust the evolutionary foundations of natural learning, trust that children have the innate capacity to seek and to know, to engage and collaborate and resolve conflict--if we grown-ups just get out of their way. So much of childhood today seems to be focused on the opposite of trust--on control and orchestration. 

"Over the past half century or more we have seen a continuous erosion of children's freedom to play and, corresponding with that, a continuous decline in young people's mental and physical health. If this trend continues, we are in serious danger of producing generations of future adults who cannot find their own way in life." (p. 6)

Many unschooling and homeschooling and other alternative-schooling families witness first-hand the results of more trust in the natural learning process. We see our children thrive in wide-open, child-directed, play-based environments that allow them the time and space to reveal their true gifts and passions, and allow them to naturally develop essential cognitive and interpersonal skills. We see them learn to walk and climb, to read and write, to discover and synthesize, to question and wonder--without being told or directed. We see the results of trusting natural learning. Now, how do we show others?

"It is time for people who know better to stand up and move against this terrible tide. Children do not need more schooling. They need less schooling and more freedom." (p. 20)

Oh, March

Last March was so hot we were at the beach in our bathing suits. And here we are this year on the last day of winter sloshing through another city snowstorm. New England weather certainly keeps things interesting. Unlike snowstorms in January and February that nudge us to stay inside, cozy in our blankets, a March snowstorm lures us out to say a final farewell to the wintry season. 

After a prolonged negotiation with my two-year-old, who has decided that she has had enough of snowpants and mittens this year, we walked to our neighborhood coffee shop for breakfast and tea, then stomped our way to the nearby library, all the while wondering how those little crocuses are faring underneath that snowy blanket.

As the snow turned to sleet, we returned home to books and board games, naps and slippers, and those last lingering reminders of a cold New England winter before the new season springs.

An Irish Toast

Reposting this poem in celebration of this merry Irish day. Cheers!

An Irish Toast
by Kerry McDonald

May your home be filled with laughter,
Far more than sorrow;
May you live for today,
And not for tomorrow.

May your children know joy,
And little of strife;
May they welcome good friends,
To share a good life.

May your wisdom grow deeper,
Your ignorance shed;
May you find you are leading,
Much more than you're led.

May your days be full,
And your hearts even fuller;
May you find moments of still,
And make space for the stiller.

May you enjoy this journey,
Till the end of your days;
May your spirit be lifted,
While your memory stays.

Teaching 911 To Kids

Welcome to the March 2013 Carnival of Natural Parenting: Tough Conversations
This post was written for inclusion in the monthly Carnival of Natural Parenting hosted by Hobo Mama and Code Name: Mama. This month our participants have spoken up about how they discuss complex topics with their children. Please read to the end to find a list of links to the other carnival participants.
***

 

Like many parents of young children, I have touched on the topic of 911 and emergency preparedness, but the concept was always presented in the abstract and with a slightly muted tone: "Don't worry, this would likely never happen, but if Mommy was ever hurt…or if there was a fire…. or if someone was trying to harm us…you would need to call 911 for help." I wasn't sure exactly how to approach this potentially scary and vague topic with little children, and so we didn't spend much time on specific 911 scenarios and hadn't talked much about 911 lately.

Then recently a friend of mine, a mom with young children herself, tripped and fell on a toy car, fainted, and broke her elbow. Luckily, her husband was home at the time and was able to call 911 (she is just fine now), but I saw it as a great opportunity to resurrect the 911 conversation in a much more concrete and meaningful way. This is a situation that could very easily happen to any mom, and we're often alone with our children, so I found using this scenario to be a very gentle, accessible, practical way of teaching about 911 and emergency responsiveness.

I told the kids the story, indicated that our friend is fine and her elbow will heal quickly, and dedicated a recent morning using this scenario as the foundation for a conversation on when and how to use 911. I printed out this workbook for kids on 911 as a discussion guide. We talked about instances when it would and would not be appropriate to call 911. We reviewed address and telephone information and who our emergency contact people are, practiced what we might say to the 911 dispatcher, and talked about staying calm in scary situations. Then we practiced using the phone. I made certain that the kids knew how to make outgoing calls on both our home phone and my cell phone (calling phone numbers other than 911), and then we practiced calling 911 on a disconnected play phone.

This experience reminds me that topics such as 911 and emergency preparedness, as seemingly challenging as they might be for us to discuss with our children, are extremely important. We should be having these conversations with our children regularly, conjuring up child-appropriate scenarios if we need to, to make these conversations less intimidating and more understandable for children. 

My new plan is to discuss 911 on a more regular basis, and also to carve out time to use this coloring book from FEMA to discuss broader emergency and disaster preparedness. Incorporating practical, hands-on, age-appropriate conversations about safety and emergency response into our family learning is an important way of protecting everyone's well-being.

***
Visit Hobo Mama and Code Name: Mama to find out how you can participate in the next Carnival of Natural Parenting!
Please take time to read the submissions by the other carnival participants:
(This list will be updated by afternoon March 12 with all the carnival links.)

• A Difficult Conversation — Kellie at Our Mindful Life is keeping her mouth shut about a difficult topic.
• Discussing Sexuality and Objectification With Your Child — At Authentic Parenting, Laura is puzzled at how to discuss sexuality and objectification with her 4-year-old.
• Tough Conversations — Kadiera at Our Little Acorn knows there are difficult topics to work through with her children in the future, but right now, every conversation is a challenge with a nonverbal child.
• Real Talk — Jennifer at Hybrid Rasta Mama explains why there are no conversation topics that are off limits with her daughter, and how she ensures that tough conversations are approached in a developmentally appropriate manner.
• From blow jobs to boob jobs and lots of sex inbetween — Mrs Green talks candidly about boob jobs and blow jobs…
• When Together Doesn't Work — Ashley at Domestic Chaos discusses the various conversations her family has had in the early stages of separation.
• Talking To Children About Death — Luschka at Diary of a First Child is currently dealing with the terminal illness of her mother. In this post she shares how she's explained it to her toddler, and some of the things she's learned along the way.
• Teaching 9-1-1 To Kids — Kerry at City Kids Homeschooling talks about the importance of using practical, age-appropriate emergency scenarios as a springboard for 9-1-1 conversations.
• Preschool Peer Pressure — Lactating Girl struggles to explain to her preschooler why friends sometimes aren't so friendly.
• Frank Talk — Rosemary at Rosmarinus Officinalis unpacks a few conversations about sexuality that she's had with her 2-year-old daughter, and her motivation for having so many frank discussions.
• When simple becomes tough — A natural mum manages oppositional defiance in a toddler at Ursula Ciller's Blog.
• How Babies are Born: a conversation with my daughter — Justine at The Lone Home Ranger tries to expand her daughter's horizons while treading lightly through the waters of pre-K social order.
• Difficult Questions & Lies: 4 Reasons to Tell The Truth — Ariadne of Positive Parenting Connection shares the potential impact that telling lies instead of taking the time to answer difficult questions can have on the parent-child relationship.
• Parenting Challenges--when someone dies — Survivor at Surviving Mexico writes about talking to her child about death and the cultural challenges involved in living in a predominantly Catholic nation.
• Daddy Died — Breaking the news to your children that their father passed away is tough. Erica at ChildOrganics shares her story.
• Openness — sustainablemum prepares herself for the day when she has to tell her children that a close relative has died.
• Embracing Individuality — At Living Peacefully with Children, Mandy addressed a difficult question in public with directness and honesty.
• Making the scary or different okay — Although she tries to listen more than she talks about tough topics, Jessica Claire of Crunchy-Chewy Mama also values discussing them with her children to soften the blow they might cause when they hit closer to home.
• Talking to My Child About Going Gluten Free — When Dionna at Code Name: Mama concluded that her family would benefit from eliminating gluten from their diet, she came up with a plan to persuade her gluten-loving son to find peace with the change. This is how they turned the transition to a gluten-free lifestyle into an adventure rather than a hardship.
• How Does Your Family Explain Differences and Approach Diversity? — How do you and your family approach diversity? Gretchen of That Mama Gretchen shares her thoughts at Natural Parents Network and would like to hear from readers.
• Discussing Difficult Topics with Kids: What’s Worked for Me — Deb Chitwood at Living Montessori Now shares parenting practices that enabled discussions of difficult topics with her (now-adult) children to be positive experiences.
• Tough Conversations — Get some pointers from Jorje of Momma Jorje on important factors to keep in mind when broaching tough topics with kids.
• Sneaky people — Lauren at Hobo Mama has cautioned her son against trusting people who'd want to hurt him — and hopes the lessons have sunk in.
• Mommy, What Does the Bible Say? — Amy at Me, Mothering, and Making it All Work works through how to answer a question from her 4-year-old that doesn't have a simple answer.
• When All You Want for Them is Love: Adoption, Abandonment, and Honoring the Truth — Melissa at White Noise talks about balancing truth and love when telling her son his adoption story.

The Spring Tilt

As the Equinox nears, and the light lingers longer, and the city's crocuses and forsythia begin to bloom, we notice our own springtime tilt: the gradual shift of more outside time than inside time each day. With milder temperatures and melting sidewalks, bikes and scooters emerge once again from the basement for trips to homeschool art class or rides around Harvard Square.

It seems we all feel the draw outside at this time of year, seeking more time to dig in the soil, to climb trees, to find rooftop snow seeping through the gutters for the perfect mud pies--the kids happily digging and climbing while I enjoy a few moments of quiet reading in the fading sunlight on the deck before dinner.

We have seen and heard the signals of spring over the past couple of weeks: the returning birds, the buds and shoots, the flowing sap, the melting and splashing. But today, I told the kids, today I could smell spring for the first time. 

Living in New England for all of my 36 years-- even with much of that time in the city--I find that the start of each season has a distinct scent, and spring's is unmistakable: crisp, earthy, sweet, fresh, intoxicating--it lures us from our winter dens and keeps us lingering longer in its grasp each day. 

Battered winter coats are cast off, lost mittens are not replaced, wet winter boots finally get a chance to dry, and we once again welcome days tilted toward fresh air, bright sunshine, and long hours outside.

Homeschooling and Life Events

One of the very special characteristics of the homeschooling lifestyle is that it allows for life and learning to be fully interconnected. As life happens, so does learning. It means that everything about the life experience--the good and the bad--is part of the learning experience. Births and deaths, sickness and healing, achievements and failures, times of strength and vulnerability--all of it--is part of family living and learning.

My friend Patti at Canadian Unschooler, who is a former teacher, wrote an excellent post awhile back in which she talks about how we often seem to value routine and normalcy over the comfort and security of home--particularly when life events change things up unexpectedly. She cites an example of a child who was quickly sent back to school following her father's untimely heart attack death so that routine could be restored, rather than allowing the child to fully grieve with family, visit with caring relatives, soak in the magnitude of this tragic life event, and begin the healing process together.

The homeschooling lifestyle can gently make room for these life events, slowing down and speeding up depending on a family's circumstances. In addition to sad times, the homeschooling lifestyle helps families to fully celebrate the joyful times, like a new baby, when loved ones gather together, when new rhythms are created, when adjustments are often made. This family togetherness can reduce childhood feelings of jealousy or displacement and deepen sibling attachment.

Embracing the homeschooling lifestyle, in many ways, means letting go, allowing life and all of its experiences to wash over a family together. It means recognizing that routines and rhythms will change as life's changes occur. It means that some days may be faster and some may be slower, some may be orderly and some may be messy. It means that the full life experience will be shared together as a family, in all of its joy and sorrow, and together a family lives and learns its way through.

March Madness: Considering the Homeschooling Option

Every March in my city, many parents eagerly await word from both public and private schools about where their young child may enroll come fall. City lottery decisions are mailed indicating the public school to which a kindergarten-age child has been assigned, and private school admission decisions are mailed for urban preschools and elementary schools.

It is this time of year, as schooling choices are being mulled, that I urge parents to consider the homeschooling option as part of their complete decision-making process. And here's why:

1. Focus on Family

Homeschooling centers a child's life and learning around family, creating a slower, simpler pace to childhood in which children naturally reveal their true talents in their own time and in their own way. Given the unhurried time and space to grow and discover, children are able to move through their childhood at their own speed, surrounded by the security and comfort of family members guiding their way. Homeschooling shifts a family's entire focus as family life and learning become intimately intertwined, and learning and doing together evolve into a natural part of a family's daily, weekly and seasonal rhythms. Family bonds are strengthened, sibling attachment deepens, and learning emerges as a seamless component of ordinary family life.

2. Focus on Community

As the ranks of homeschoolers grow nationally, to well over two million children, the homeschooling community expands and strengthens. Urban areas throughout the country have diverse and vibrant homeschooling networks, offering ample opportunities for meaningful friendships, and provide a solid base for a wide array of activities, ranging from park meet-ups, to museum classes, to co-op opportunities and resources for almost any interest or need. Homeschoolers are also perfectly positioned to take full advantage of the abundant resources available in their communities, including the people, places and events that surround them. Libraries, museums, universities, nature and cultural centers become prime learning spaces for homeschoolers, and many cater to the homeschool community with customized programs. Community classes in art, music, athletics, and many other interests abound, and homeschoolers are able to integrate these classes into their week. Learning from neighbors, friends, community members, shopkeepers by simply going about a family's daily life is a satisfying reward of homeschooling.

3. Focus on the Natural World

For many homeschoolers, and certainly for our family, a big draw to homeschooling is the opportunity to spend much of our time outside, exploring nature, noticing seasonal shifts and signals, learning from the world around us. With so much of childhood now focused on structured, scheduled, indoor activities, homeschooling provides an alternative, valuing the natural world as a child's great classroom. As Last Child in the Woods author, Richard Louv, states: "Children need nature for the healthy development of their senses, and, therefore, for learning and creativity." Homeschooling allows ample space and opportunity for exploring outside, in nature, surrounded by community, and alongside loving and engaged family members and friends.

Homeschooling is a practical and rewarding educational option that growing numbers of families are considering as they weigh their choices for fall.

What might you add as some additional reasons for families to consider the homeschooling option for their young children?

How To Foster Sibling Attachment

In my earliest days of deciding to homeschool, with just a two-year-old and her infant brother, I spent a good deal of time talking to and reading about other homeschoolers. Certain common themes began to emerge from these conversations: children who retained their natural curiosity and zest for learning well into adolescence and beyond; abundant opportunities to allow children to develop and pursue their own interests and reveal their true gifts; a slower pace to learning and living in an otherwise super-charged childhood. But the theme that really stood out for me, as I watched and read, was the strength of family togetherness and sibling attachment. 

Venturing to local homeschool park days in those early days of homeschooling, I would see older siblings happily including their younger brothers and sisters in their play. I would see natural, multi-age play among all of the homeschoolers in the park, and a broad imagination as the group would conjure elaborate play scenes of pirates and princesses. 

I began to wonder what it is about homeschooling that fosters this natural, multi-age, imaginative play. As my children and I have grown throughout our homeschooling journey, I now see first-hand how it happens: many homeschooled children are with their brothers and sisters of different ages most of the time. This constancy requires them to work out their disagreements early and often to continue their play, and causes them to see multi-age play as not only enjoyable but expected. They learn to help each other, to watch out for each other, to guide and follow. They learn to include and rely on each other for the benefit of their play, and this behavior carries over into the classroom and playground as they interact with other children of different ages and abilities.

It also seems to me that, while sibling spats certainly occur, they are more muted and less long-lasting. Homeschooled siblings learn quickly to solve disagreements and restore affections if they want to continue their play, and there is less vying for mom's or dad's attention because we are so often together. As they learn and play together so frequently, sibling affections for each other grow deeply. I see this strong sibling attachment in my own children and in that of our homeschooling friends, and it is one of the greatest rewards, I think, of homeschooling. 

We talk a lot about the importance of family, and center our lives around each other, recognizing that a strong, attached family is the linchpin for meaningful child development. It's only natural, then, that what we value most--family attachment--is reflected in our children's play and in their interactions with each other. And yet, just as the Attachment Parenting philosophy maintains that close parent-child bonds lead to greater childhood independence, confidence and adaptability, I find that strong sibling bonds lead to greater independence, confidence and adaptability as the children forge their own distinct paths and interact with others in the community.

FOSTERING SIBLING ATTACHMENT

1. Position family as the centerpiece of a child's life, prioritizing family relationships above all others.
2. Become actively engaged in activities together with your children as a cohesive family unit, modeling family togetherness and positive interactions.
3. Ensure that siblings spend more of their time together than apart each week, engaged in meaningful, open-ended play and natural conflict resolution.

These actions can help to create healthy, enduring sibling bonds, deep family relationships, positive interactions with non-family members in the larger community, and a more peaceful home.

March and Maple Sugaring

I get giddy every time I visit a farm--but especially so at the launch of a farm's maple sugaring season. Today in Vermont, we visited a friendly nearby farm on its very first day of tree-tapping.

Hiking through the maple woods, watching the steam billow from the sugarhouse, chatting with the farmers about expectations for this season, munching on their farm-fresh cheeses, visiting with the horses and other farm animals--it was a special welcome to New England's maple sugaring season and a marker of the coming spring.

Before our farm visit, we read a bit about maple sugaring and watched a host of YouTube videos on the topic, learning more about the process and product. (We found this video particularly helpful in showing the process from start to finish.) 

This time of year in New England can be messy and unpredictable. Since discovering the many child-friendly maple sugaring resources and events in the area, we have found great enjoyment in this in-between season, celebrating this special harvest with local, hard-working farmers, learning new things, and enjoying the unmatched taste of pure maple syrup.