It's not even midday yet...

[ButterPie]

Hiya,
So, today I have been trying out HE style stuff (ie being slightly more focused than normal) with my 3 yo, and it scared me a bit how fast we progressed! We went for a walk, looked at different plants and talked about some leaves being bigger than others, noticed that some plants were spiky and decided it was probably to stop animals eating them, and brought a worm and two daisies home.

We put the worm in a jar with airholes and some leaves with a drop of water, then had some juice and a snack, watched a bit of a hoof and safety dvd that came free from the bbc and played the game that came with it, then talked about it, watched an episode of alphablocks and ran about being in a band.

Then we put the worm in a magnifying thingy and I wrote down what DD told me about it, and we looked up facts about it on wikipedia (can anyone recommend a better site? Or a good book?) We also measured it with a tape measure.

Then we mixed brown paint and did finger painted "w" pictures and dipped wool in the paint to make worms.

How is it only half eleven? None of that felt like "school"...it was just messing about! How can I slow down the pace a bit? I hope she will need less input from me as she gets older (well, she will have to, she has a younger sister and I work from home!) but that was actually fun...

I don't want to be a pushy mother, or babyfy them, how can I make sure I don't?

Any tips?

:D

Oh my. This is so much the classic autonomous HEing experience!

I have times of day when I really concentrate on a particular child and yes, if I wrote it down, it could well come out with the intensity of your morning. Day in, day out, that sort of intense connection really pays off - but it can be just half an hour or an hour in between doing the shopping and taking the younger one to toddler group, and having someone round to play and all the other things that happen in a family, and they will still be progressing by leaps and bounds. I'd say the important thing is not to expect yourself to be managing that sort of sustained concentrated attention every single day, or you'll end up thinking you are failing!

A 3 year old probably needs a lot of input, where a 6 year old (say) will often be fine to get set up with an activity and then you can chat about it as they do it but you are also unloading the dishwasher, yk? And when you DO have time for an intensive morning with them, watch them soar!

I'd try to relax and also notice how easy it all is - it's just conversations with your child, following their interests, being with them. Educationalists have a vested interest in telling us that it's all terrible difficult and you have to be professionally trained in order to support a child in learning effectively and it is absolutely necessary that it should happen with a child's peer group and it takes hours of every day and it's all bulls**t. Emperor's new clothes, IMO.

prepares self for a pasting from any non-HEers or school teachers reading this thread

Having only been HEing for a couple of months (11,7 and 2 yr olds) it keeps crossing my mind exactly as Ommm said; it's so easy..
I am just beginning to stop questioning this and just BE with my children, whilst trying to facilitate their latest interests or paths. It is a wonderful rollercoaster of a life really. As you can imagine, after 7 years of education at school, it's hard to get out of the mindset of hours, structure, or things 'not feeling like school'! All I can say is, get on the ride that is life and just be there to help steer..
My journey with this is still all spangly and new and most certainly I wobble at least once a week; usually because I question what other people would make of what we do. Then I remember who gave birth to them, who helped them learn to talk (that wasn't at school!!) and who knows these little people best. Do what feels good and most of all enjoy!

Big conversation tonight with DP about education, I know what I am going to want (HE, with classical elements but not as strict as in the well trained mind) and I get the distinct impression that his doubts are going too :D

The first thing that DD said to me this morning was "I don't want to go to nursery today, I don't like it"

Apparently the other children push and are loud and she is naughty when she is there.

I want her home.

Don't send her, then

(well, I guess nursery isn't open on a Sunday, but you get my drift)

Just chatted to DP about it (I wanted to have his support) and she is coming OUT of nursery. We are going to get me (and, by extension the kids) an all zones mothly bus pass so all of Tyne and Wear will be at our feet. I think today convinced him.

We need to decide a rough plan for the next few years (will she start school or will we just ramp up the HE slightly?), but for now, no more nursery for DD1! :D

Wow! That sounds like so much fun!

Don't worry about slowing the pace down unless she or you want to. Work together as a family team. You'll find some days are just chock full of stuff that looks like learning and others are chock full of stuff that looks like lying around doing sweet FA. But I believe that what we see of what we think is children's learning is only the very tip of the iceberg of what is actually going on. I think we see them learning how to write the letter W, but actually something completely different could be going on as well - maybe they're learning about friction of pen on paper, or how your breath feels on their neck, or thinking about how pleasing the lovely points look at the bottom of the letter. We see them lying around watching tv, but they could also be thinking about that letter W, or thinking about how the fabric of the sofa feels on their skin, or having some really deep consolidation of learning going on at a very subconscious level.

The point is, the more we let children direct their learning, the better it will be IMO. That does not mean doing nothing, it means just doing things because they're fun and not caring whether or not their educational - just don't separate learning from living in any way at all.

I have huge wobbles about autonomous learning with my children and I am constantly itching to do things that look like learning with them, but they rarely let me and still they know so, so much. They are so capable and self-aware and full of knowledge and desire to be engaged with the world.

DD1 (nearly 7) looks a lot of the time that she's doing what some parents would frown upon - mooching around being 'bored', playing on the computer, watching dvds - but she really does know so much, and we have fascinating conversations, and she reads and reads and reads, and listens when I have radio 4 on in the car, and asks questions about it. I wish I could trust her more, and stop worrying about her spending so much time looking like she's not learning, when I have so much evidence of how well it's working for her!

I'm so excited! I really do think we can do this, all that rubbish of school is just another thing they might choose later on, but they don't NEED to do it.

DP was a bit worried that it might be too much for me but I find the days she isn't at nursery so much more fun. When she is at nursery, we have a nice bit of morning, then it is arguments about naps, then rushing lunch, then arguing about nursery, then I have afternoon being bored and get a tired and grumpy girl back at teatime with an upset tummy because they let her eat unlimited fruit.

:D

x-post! Woohoo about your decision!

Once you've got your head around it, it's actually quite easy (and fun) to HE as default, and just know that you can send them to school if it ever stops working, for whatever reason.

School is such a waste of time for children with a mum like you

I am a happy butterpie.

Hurrah for you!
Mrswobble; My DDs seem to do the same; something I really do wobble about. But like you, I see how much they have taken in and the difference, especially for my eldest, is amazing since leaving school; more relaxed, confident, less pissy and tired and willing to try new things.
I have an LA visit this week, and have nowt much written stuff to show them. But it's threads like these that re awaken me to exactly how beneficial education 'other than at school' is.

Great that you have made your decision!! Sounds like your DD is going to have wonderful time and learn loads along the way.
We were up your way last weekend - family up tthere - and we visited Souter Lighthouse. Might be somewhere you know well anyway, but if not - it has a really good children's/education room - pirate boat to play on, dressing up clothes, interactive displays about nautical flags, morse code, smuggling, art/craft area, not to mention the climb to the top of the lighthouse, and old lighthouse keepers cottage and a great outdoor play area (oh and the biting wind soming off the North Sea, brrrr, I'm a soft Southerner now!) Well worth a visit.
(Gave me ideas for some pirate inspired activities this week too.)
Good luck with it all.

That's decided then- we are now a HE family!

Er...what now?
In fact, I know what now, I am going to write down which toddler groups and daytrips we will go to for the next couple of weeks, as I find it a lot easier to plan ahead like that. Plus it will stop people telling me I am somehow depriving the girls

What now?

Um...you just carry on as normal!

Read and read and read. Get meeting up with other HEors to start building up a social network for you and the girls. That's not essential, but I, personally, find it really helpful to be with other HEors, especially when I'm having a wobble. Makes it more of a lifestyle than a very bizarre choice!

butterpie Best of luck! I deregged my ds1 (6) in January and havent looked back! I love having my boys at home with me even when it is a bit stressful (my youngest in 19 months and currently in the phase of "I want it and I want it now"!!!)

ds1 isnt doing any structured work today as I have lots and lots of appointments and a new washer being delivered and all manner of other rubbish to do and so he is up at my PIL BUT before he went up there this morning (at about 8am actaully!) we read a book together (he reads 1 paragraph per page and I read the rest as he is still trying to get over his negative experiences of literacy at school so I am not pushing him) about the history of ships which lead to a discussion about how ships find their way, John Harrison, chronometers, GPS and latitude and longitude!!!! I love it when he learns like this because I really think he is taking it in. I use workbooks too and a one to one reading scheme and he uses mathswhizz for numeracy but I am more and more coming round to the idea that autonomous learning might be the way to go once he can read more fluently.

but but but

when did everyone start thinking nursery was 'school'??

You're a mother of a 3 y-old! What are you on about? It's all about dressing-up and playing and making leaf collages and measuring rain fall and painting stuff and cooking and talking isn't it? Isn't that what involved and interested sahm's do with their 3 y-olds?

You're enjoying being with your pre-schooler and having fun

You're a great, involved mother of a 3 y-old. You'd be doing all this if your child was going to school in 2 years time or not - wouldn't you?

Why would it feel like 'school'? She's not anywhere NEAR old enough for school. . .

Anyway, it sounds fun. I loved mine at 3y, they're dead funny and curious. Am not having a dig - am genuinely interested to know when it happened that people would say 'we're a HE family' because they're hanging out at home with a 3y-old

That means I've HE'd. Who knew?

ahundredtimes wrote:

when did everyone start thinking nursery was 'school'??

When schools started taking 3yo? And telling parents there'd be no place at 5 if they didn't go to nursery? And govt started telling parents that [badly paid and ill-trained] professionals need to do this stuff?

You're enjoying being with your pre-schooler and having fun

You're a great, involved mother of a 3 y-old. You'd be doing all this if your child was
going to school in 2 years time or not - wouldn't you?

I totally agree. The problem of having a society that is so obsessed by targets and schools is that anything that is identifiable as "learning" is assumed to be a school's business. In fact, it is OUR business as parents and sometimes you might want to get a school involved. However, I can't think of anything that a school or nursery can do for a 3yo that a family cannot do better. Even if the family is not great, it's better than nursery (see Tizard, B. & Hughes, M. (1984) Young Children Learning. London, Fontana).

yes, it's really odd isn't it? I don't remember being told anyone had to go to nursery. But I might remember it wrong. Mine went somewhere a couple of mornings a week - but nobody pretended it was in anyway educational

I read the HE threads sometimes, as I think it's interesting and my SIL has started HE-ing.

I'm often struck by how people say they've done things that day - and I think 'well, we do all that too! Just because someone goes to school it doesn't mean you don't talk about stuff, or do interesting things or they lose all curiosity or self-motivation to look something up or write about it or read about it' etc etc

Then I realized, that part of that is perhaps if you HE you feel the need to justify what goes on each day? In the way you just don't if your kids also go to school?

So then I thought, how odd if people now start doing that about 3 y-olds too.