I just read a really good post on how unschooled children teach themselves to read that I just had to share. I usually like his blog anyway, but absolutley loved this one entry particular.
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201002/children-teach-themselves-read
I loved the article in its entirety, but my favorite part has to be when he states that "Children learn to read when reading becomes, to them, a means to some valued end or ends." YES! YES! YES! People need to hear this more. I have said that same thing over and over and over again, and not just about reading, but about everything - math, grammar, writing, geography, history, EVERYTHING. A person will not truly *learn* something until they have a *reason* to do so.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Organic Sprouted Grain Kefir Brownie Recipe
Our new and totally AWESOME brownie recipe!! We at the whole pan in about two hours.
1/2 cup butter (preferably from grass-fed cows)
1/4 cup organic cocoa powder
1/2 cup water
1 cup organic sprouted wheat flour
1 cup organic unrefined sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp sea salt or Real Salt
1 egg, slightly beaten (ours came straight from our backyard chickens!)
1/4 cup dairy kefir (we make ours out of raw milk from grass-fed cows)
1 tsp organic, fair trade vanilla
Mix the butter, cocoa and water in a saucepan and bring just to a boil, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Stir together flour, sugar, soda, and salt. Mix egg, kefir, and vanilla, then add cocoa mixture. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry and mix well. Pour into a greased 9x9 pan. Bake for 20 minutes at 375 degrees.
1/2 cup butter (preferably from grass-fed cows)
1/4 cup organic cocoa powder
1/2 cup water
1 cup organic sprouted wheat flour
1 cup organic unrefined sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp sea salt or Real Salt
1 egg, slightly beaten (ours came straight from our backyard chickens!)
1/4 cup dairy kefir (we make ours out of raw milk from grass-fed cows)
1 tsp organic, fair trade vanilla
Mix the butter, cocoa and water in a saucepan and bring just to a boil, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Stir together flour, sugar, soda, and salt. Mix egg, kefir, and vanilla, then add cocoa mixture. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry and mix well. Pour into a greased 9x9 pan. Bake for 20 minutes at 375 degrees.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
My Son, the Writer
A few days ago I was just talking (typing?) on one of the unschooling lists about children what they need to learn, when they need to learn it, and about how there is no need to force them to learn certain subjects or study them on a regular basis. People, including children, really will learn everything they need to learn when they have a reason or desire to do so. My kids have given me lots of living examples of this over the years, but now my son has given me another BIG example for me to share with everyone. People seem to be able to grasp that younger kids can learn on their own without a curriculum or formal schooling, but they have trouble with the concept with older kids. If I had a dollar for every time I heard "But what about algebra/calculus/chemistry/high school?" I'd be a very rich woman.
My son, Cameron just turned 13 and he's always been unschooled. Cameron recently decided he wanted to write a book. Not a picture book, not a childrens book, a chapter book. He came up with a unique idea several weeks ago and has been talking about it ever since. It's top secret stuff, unless you are one of the chosen few that have been privy to the basic plot, so I can't tell you what it's about other than to say it has vampires in it. I will say I was very impressed at the amount the depth in the story idea and the amount of detail he was putting into it. It was obvious that he had been mulling this story over for quite some time and was putting a lot of time into thinking it through. This week he decided to start putting his ideas into writing and he's already a few chapters into his book. He's been sitting at the computer for HOURS every day tapping away at the keyboard. He'll come ask me how to spell a word or ask me if I will proof read what he has so far, but other than that it's a very solitary pursuit.
Lots of kids probably go through a phase where they write stories, so some of you may be wondering what the big deal is. The "big deal" is that he is doing this without EVER having been *taught* how to do the things he is doing to write this book. He's never been interested in knowing how to punctuate sentences, had no interest in writing anything, let alone a full book, and didn't give a hoot about spelling. He was also a "late" reader by school standards and didn't even start reading chapter books until the last year or so. He's a very auditory learner and still prefers to listen to audio books rather than sit still and read, yet he's WRITING A BOOK.
He started by coming up with the basic story. That part took a couple of months. If some of the critics of unschooling were correct, he should have stopped right there. I mean, he hasn't been taught how to write, didn't know how to spell, had never studied grammar, etc. But he *didn't* stop. He kept going because he was doing something he had developed a passion for and he was fully engaged in the process. I could literally see the excitement, the fire, in his eyes when he talked about his book, and that light stayed there even when he got frustrated, or tired, or ran into a problem. I'm honestly not doing the process he is going through any justice. You would just have to see it for yourself to understand how *driven* he is right now. It's been fascinating to watch.
Next, he decided to study the parts of a book. I don't mean he did worksheets where he filled in the blanks with lines pointing to the physical parts of a book like I've seen school kids do. I mean he sat down with a stack of his favorite books and started really *looking* at them. He paid attention to all the parts, including those he probably skipped in the past. I'm willing to bet that he was doing the same with the audiobooks he listened to lately too, but since I can't get inside his head to know for certain, that part will remain a mystery. Then he took his stack of books, placed them by the computer so he could reference them, and started writing. First he wrote a teaser for the back cover, then he wrote the prologue. (I didn't even know he *knew* the word prologue!) That was when I got my first glimpse at his book and my initial reaction, to be totally honest, was utter shock. I had heard the basic story and knew a few details, but I had NO idea all of this was going on inside his head! It's already a really GOOD story and he hooked me with the first few lines. I could tell that he *gets it*. He's never written a book before, but he knew, from years and years of listening to stories and now reading them himself, that he needed to grab the reader's attention right from the beginning, and that's exactly what he did.
**Hitting the virtual pause button for a moment to admit to my wee bit of jealousy as well as huge amounts of admiration. My first attempt at writing a book was a complete disaster. I was so traumatized by it that I didn't attempt to write another story for pleasure again until just recently. That first attempt was 30 years ago!**
I won't say that his writing was perfect. Far from it. But he was open to learning how to make it better. He asked me to help him with the spelling and punctuation, so I told him how to spell the words he got wrong, showed him how to punctuate dialogue, and corrected a few homonyms. He took the criticism without the slightest bit of irritation, then sat down and got back to work. Over the course of the next couple of days he worked off and on, only coming to me when he couldn't figure something out on his own. I haven't been invited to see the latest chapter yet, but I'm really looking forward to it!
Will he finish his book? I don't know. Does it matter? I don't think so. Lots of professional authors have multiple books that they've never finished. Finishing really isn't the point. The point is he's doing something he's absolutely passionate about at the moment, and in the process - purely as a byproduct of following his passion - he is learning things in a matter of *days* that, had he been in school, he would have spent *years* studying over and over and over. He is proving, once again, that compulsory school is both unnecessary and monumentally inefficient.
My son, Cameron just turned 13 and he's always been unschooled. Cameron recently decided he wanted to write a book. Not a picture book, not a childrens book, a chapter book. He came up with a unique idea several weeks ago and has been talking about it ever since. It's top secret stuff, unless you are one of the chosen few that have been privy to the basic plot, so I can't tell you what it's about other than to say it has vampires in it. I will say I was very impressed at the amount the depth in the story idea and the amount of detail he was putting into it. It was obvious that he had been mulling this story over for quite some time and was putting a lot of time into thinking it through. This week he decided to start putting his ideas into writing and he's already a few chapters into his book. He's been sitting at the computer for HOURS every day tapping away at the keyboard. He'll come ask me how to spell a word or ask me if I will proof read what he has so far, but other than that it's a very solitary pursuit.
Lots of kids probably go through a phase where they write stories, so some of you may be wondering what the big deal is. The "big deal" is that he is doing this without EVER having been *taught* how to do the things he is doing to write this book. He's never been interested in knowing how to punctuate sentences, had no interest in writing anything, let alone a full book, and didn't give a hoot about spelling. He was also a "late" reader by school standards and didn't even start reading chapter books until the last year or so. He's a very auditory learner and still prefers to listen to audio books rather than sit still and read, yet he's WRITING A BOOK.
He started by coming up with the basic story. That part took a couple of months. If some of the critics of unschooling were correct, he should have stopped right there. I mean, he hasn't been taught how to write, didn't know how to spell, had never studied grammar, etc. But he *didn't* stop. He kept going because he was doing something he had developed a passion for and he was fully engaged in the process. I could literally see the excitement, the fire, in his eyes when he talked about his book, and that light stayed there even when he got frustrated, or tired, or ran into a problem. I'm honestly not doing the process he is going through any justice. You would just have to see it for yourself to understand how *driven* he is right now. It's been fascinating to watch.
Next, he decided to study the parts of a book. I don't mean he did worksheets where he filled in the blanks with lines pointing to the physical parts of a book like I've seen school kids do. I mean he sat down with a stack of his favorite books and started really *looking* at them. He paid attention to all the parts, including those he probably skipped in the past. I'm willing to bet that he was doing the same with the audiobooks he listened to lately too, but since I can't get inside his head to know for certain, that part will remain a mystery. Then he took his stack of books, placed them by the computer so he could reference them, and started writing. First he wrote a teaser for the back cover, then he wrote the prologue. (I didn't even know he *knew* the word prologue!) That was when I got my first glimpse at his book and my initial reaction, to be totally honest, was utter shock. I had heard the basic story and knew a few details, but I had NO idea all of this was going on inside his head! It's already a really GOOD story and he hooked me with the first few lines. I could tell that he *gets it*. He's never written a book before, but he knew, from years and years of listening to stories and now reading them himself, that he needed to grab the reader's attention right from the beginning, and that's exactly what he did.
**Hitting the virtual pause button for a moment to admit to my wee bit of jealousy as well as huge amounts of admiration. My first attempt at writing a book was a complete disaster. I was so traumatized by it that I didn't attempt to write another story for pleasure again until just recently. That first attempt was 30 years ago!**
I won't say that his writing was perfect. Far from it. But he was open to learning how to make it better. He asked me to help him with the spelling and punctuation, so I told him how to spell the words he got wrong, showed him how to punctuate dialogue, and corrected a few homonyms. He took the criticism without the slightest bit of irritation, then sat down and got back to work. Over the course of the next couple of days he worked off and on, only coming to me when he couldn't figure something out on his own. I haven't been invited to see the latest chapter yet, but I'm really looking forward to it!
Will he finish his book? I don't know. Does it matter? I don't think so. Lots of professional authors have multiple books that they've never finished. Finishing really isn't the point. The point is he's doing something he's absolutely passionate about at the moment, and in the process - purely as a byproduct of following his passion - he is learning things in a matter of *days* that, had he been in school, he would have spent *years* studying over and over and over. He is proving, once again, that compulsory school is both unnecessary and monumentally inefficient.
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