Support thread for new AE'ers + questions!

[Colleger]

This is such a big deal for me that I need support!

I also need something to read back on over the next few months to see where we were two days, two weeks, two months ago as it's often difficult to see in the moment the progress we've made. Feel free to add whether AE'ing or not.

Am I AE'ing at the moment? Well some would say no because I have not decided what I'm doing with the computer yet. I know for a fact that if I AE with the computer right now my son will spend every waking moment on it for at least a month. I'm willing for this to happen but the timing for this is rotten. DS has said he wants to audition for an important orchestra in October and if he doesn't practice he won't get in - the course is next summer. I've told him that I will not make him practice but he has asked me to remind him to at least think about practice each day - is that HE when I remind him each day that it's X day to the audition or a music lesson if he's been asked to be reminded about practice?

So the PC is currently off limits (although I've not actually told him this, he was on a ban anyway for poor behaviour) but in some ways that is a good thing because I can already see AE working. Apart from docs and car programmes being on as background music he has sat and read a science dictionary. DS hates science but every three to four minutes he's asked me what X means and I've had to go and look it up in the dictionary. He has said he will go and practice - I've not brought it up today - but I doubt he'll practice.

Regarding TV, I've now turned it off. But not because I don't want him watching it but the noise was doing my head in and it's been on since 7am. Is that ok? Is that mutual respect?

Oh, and he's clearly bored - he keeps asking for cuddles! :D

I think that valuing concepts like "mutual respect" and "autonomy" doesn't stop the fact that you are an adult with a lot of experience of the world, and he is currently an 11 year old whose focus and concentration have not had as much chance to develop yet.

He has said he wants to get into the orchestra, but his 11yo brain isn't great at translating that to "so get off your butt and do that practice then", or at least not every day. If he and you have agreed in general that he needs to do the practice, and he wants you to remind him, then I think he's showing a fair bit of maturity about finding ways to achieve his goal - using you as a "reminder service" is a pretty good mechanism!

You are letting him be autonomous by identifying his goal, and helping him to achieve it with the reminder. Autonomy doesn't mean leaving him to sink or swim without getting involved.

Same with other things too - if you can talk through what he wants to achieve over a length of time, and what will help/hinder him with that, then you might be able to agree things like a limit to PC time, if he can see that it will get in the way of other things that he considers important. So you could agree to 2 evenings a week, say, and then you keeping him to that agreement is part of a choice that he has made, not something that you are insisting on arbitrarily.

Autonomous HE was for me a long ish journey and longer one for my dh!
It sounds like you are at the beginning of your journey.

Joyce Fetteroll has a quote I like:
"The days spent in school are like living with a broken leg. The days when unschooling runs smoothly are like living with two strong legs. But the deschooling phase between them is like living with a cast while the leg heals. It won't be as bad as school but won't be as smooth as unschooling"

"is that AE when I remind him each day that it's X day to the audition or a music lesson if he's been asked to be reminded about practice?"

to my mind yes...as autonomous as when I ask my dh to remind me of something...my choice.
Him asking you to remind him, is child centred, with him making his own choices (as long as he has not been coerced into it)

Indecently my dd2 practised so much more when the piano was in one of the family rooms, we walked through to get to the rest of the house, and the same one the PC is in, and she would be on it playing without realising it, often whenever she went into the the room.
I would frequently wake to the sound of the piano in the room below, when she'd got herself up early for college. The computer came off much worse in those days.
Now though we've had a change round and the piano is in another room, and she has to have definite purpose to go and practice....and she often asks me to remind her.

There is a FB page for Mumsnet home educators, where people talk much more openly, and there are pages dedicated to Unschooling/Autonomous HE in the UK there too. Whilst no internet page is completly safe, the admins there are much tighter and you will get responses from people who are more likely to actually home educate and autonomously HE, rather than being open to detractors.
(No offence meant to MIS, whom I have great respect for, for her support of all home educators)

I'm pretty sure colleger is on the Mumsnet HE page already? I think the bit I am having to work most on in being autonomous is trying to stop valuing some activities over others - I grew up in a house where the computer and TV was looked down upon as a waste of time, and where music practice was prized above all else. We all grew up accomplished musicians on at least 2 instruments, and none of us ever plays now. Never. I feel I spent a lot of my childhood being coerced into music practice, and I didn't realise until I left home how much I resented it, and I stopped immediately. We all did things we would not have done had we not done music - orchestras, trips, scholarships etc, but ultimately we did not choose to do it and we all resented that. So I would think carefully about what you want to achieve at the end of the day - an accomplished young musician is very different to a self-motivated adult musician.

I have thought carefully, hence the autonomous approach now, but I can't help how I feel on the music front even if I will never say it to him; these feelings will fade. Unfortunately there are consequences of autonomous education. If DS decides not to practice for three months and really annoys a top tutor and then decides he does want to go for important competitions he is snookered. In his instrument, it's a very small world. I know he will have to learn from his mistakes but at what point do I let him go back and forth if that happens? How many times can he start and stop lessons before I say enough is enough? Not only does it mess teachers about but I am not prepared to pay for an activity that he tosses away one minute and then decides he wants to go back to.

I agree entirely about being self-motivated and that is what I want for him now.

I totally understand Colleger. This is a really big turning point for all of you, but I do think that deschooling ought to be de-musicing too if that's what your son wants. He's probably not quite sure what he wants right now but the cuddles are a very good sign! I'm presuming the orchestra is NCO or NYO? In which case they'll still be there next year... As for teachers/tutors, why not involve them in this? Let them know what you're doing and why, if you haven't already had that conversation. You might find that there's a good compromise to be reached. He's so very young and at such a high standard already- taking some time to work out if it's really what he wants to spend all of his time doing or not would be a valuable exercise. No tutor wants a student who is likely to hit the burn-out stage, or one who doesn't really want to be there, and it's usually pretty obvious who those pupils are. The flip-side is that he might just realise how much it means to him if he has a bit of time off and then has a fright! My failure to get into one particular music college as an undergrad was the biggest rocket up my backside possible....

Thanks for the advice flussymummy! I'm going to see if he puts any effort in over the next few weeks and if not I'm going to tell him to speak to his teachers and I'll follow that up with a more detailed email explaining our philosophy in the hopes that we won't burn any bridges. My issues with the orchestras is that we have to pay £1400 to secure two of them so if he then doesn't practice at all the money has been wasted. If we don't pay and he suddenly gets passionate then he has no orchestra to join.

I need advice on something that happened lay afternoon. After spending the whole day on electronic devises my son came down and did some maths and then came through and said he wanted to do a science experiment and worksheet. I thought he was tired, it was too late and he was finding it boring but I'd gone to the effort to set it up. Halfway through he got up and said he was done and walked out.

Because of this I told him that I am happy to be the facilitator but only between the hours of getting up and until 6pm, and if he asks me to set something up that takes a lot of time, effort and research on my part then, within reason, we see it through. I don't think HE or AE should be about being at our kids beck and call. In reality I won't stop talking to him, or being involved, if that's what he wants, after the 6pm deadline but it can't always be on his terms. I won't make him do anything but he can't expect me to be around when he wants me for something, especially if he could have asked me at any point that day but preferred to be on his Xbox.

I actually think he was doing the maths and science out of guilt as he feels he should do something. I did explain to him that he should only do it if he is passionate or interested or if he needs it as part of a goal he has.

But my question is: am I right to say to him that I can't just come running every time he yells and it's disrespectful to ask someone to do something and then decide that he can't be bothered? This goes for other aspects of his life such as committing to orchestras and then not turning up.

Hi Colleger, I know its probably a bit different for us as music is so prominent in the household but I think I'd be inclined to find dvds or interviews of musicians around the place. Maybe a few copies of the mags from abrsm, anything you can find. Is there a young musician that your ds admires? Or you could find info on the good bassoon players. If you seem like you are getting the info for yourself it may just encourage him a bit without you telling him to practice. With dd she has always been aware of the importance of practice as she has grown up with it before she played she knew dh went into music room to practice. They say that a child is about 11 before they no longer need supporting with practice. At the end of the day though unless he really doesn't want to do it he won't let all his hard work go to waste. I agree that asking you to remind him is a mature strategy. Dh once had a pupil at a school whose best friend had to call her in the morning to remind her to take instrument and to leave class for her lesson.

Is there anyway you could make the reminding automatic and not you? Pop up on computer, alarm clock, sign on wall? just because a reminder can feel like pressure and I know that even if I ask to be reminded it can be annoying when I actually am by someone who I know wants me to do something...

I didn't remind him today, I forgot! Lol!

Of course you shouldn't be at his beck and call to be walked all over, whenever it suits him. You're trying to raise an independent person who feels capable of making his own choices, but part of that is about learning to respect other people's choices as well. You're not aiming to produce a little prince who thinks the world should revolve around him, so some basic ground-rules are necessary. Your time and effort have a value, he needs to respect that. He also needs to respect the fact that things have a financial cost, and you can't simply throw money away on things he isn't going to show an interest in.

I'm sure you didn't let him treat you like a servant when he was 4 years old, there's no need to start now he's older. Respect has to be mutual - you are respecting his autonomy, he can respect the fact that you have your own interests and life and are not there solely to provide things for him.

Thanks for that, I'm reassured!!!