Mudspark Life Learning

People who don't homeschool often don't realize there is often very little "home" in homeschooling. We spend a lot of time going and doing. This week we've explored a wetland, gone to see a play, spent hours at gymnastics, gone to a history museum, gone to the library twice, and run to a kid's consignment store to clear out toys. Then when we are home, much of the time is spent on the computer, viewing and interacting with the world. With all that going and doing, plus the high energy of sun and heat, and the lack of our during-the-school-year weekly enrichment program, my kids are actually suffering. They are having trouble sleeping and getting sick. I gave them supplements, rubbed my anxious gymnast's shoulders nightly, instituted nightly epsom salt baths (it does help), and talked about feelings. But it hit me today: the problem is all the going. We've forgotten to ground in home. Grounding in home makes us feel safe, and it's one of the gifts...

We call it "homeschool" but this word hardly does it justice. The thing is, someone who still lives within the school paradigm can't even conceive of what life is like for a homeschooling family. Because no longer is the point education. The point is living. The point is exploring what it means to be human. What do we love? What makes us tick? How can we get along with others while pursuing what we love? How can we honor what other people love? These questions become the central axis of life as homeschoolers. And suddenly it has nothing to do with "school" and sometimes very little to do with home. When I look at school websites, thinking there might be some educational community that we would enjoy being a part of, what I see is the limitations that define these institutions. Dress codes to avoid bad things (gangs, shootings). Locks and security guards to do the same. Curriculum wrapped around external measurements called testing and mandates and standards....

"When you want to teach children to think, you begin by treating them seriously when they are little, giving them responsibilities, talking to them candidly, providing privacy and solitude for them, and making them readers and thinkers of significant thoughts from the beginning. That's if you want to teach them to think. There is no evidence that this has been a state purpose since the start of compulsion schooling." - John Taylor Gatto, "The Public Schooling Nightmare" in Deschooling Our Lives ed. Matt Hern Just have to say I highly recommend this book, a collection of essays blasting schooling and educating others, and celebrating how we learn and grow as a function of being human.

You know how you thought that you would raise your kids, but in many ways they are raising you? Yes, you are the parent - but they are the teachers, pushing you to be more than you thought you could ever be. Becoming a mother was like a shamanic death, releasing the old self and struggling to figure out what being a mother actually means. Homeschooling is like that, too. Here I thought I'd get to use my stellar teaching skills to be at the helm of my children's education. That we would fall into this comfy rhythm of my teaching and their loving to learn. Crafts, science experiments, writing projects, math problems - all would flow joyfully along here at the old kitchen table. These days, my kitchen table isn't even the same as it was. Literally - we bought a new one to fit better into our house. I keep rearranging rooms, trying to make a family of four who spends a lot of time at home, and all our stuff, fit into our smallish house. The dining nook we bought almost fi...

I've figured out the goal of life. And therefore, the goal of education. Bold words, and I offer them as something to mull over and agree with as you will, or shrug off as you choose. The goal of life is to live a life that instills a sense of satisfaction in oneself. This means one has to know what it feels like to be satisfied and fulfilled. And that one has to have a set of tools that can get him or her to that fulfillment, whatever it may be. That's why play is so important, especially for young people. It's why establishing an early sense of morality without guilt is important, for it forms the foundation for being satisfied and fulfilled. The Thomas Jefferson Education folks call this early phase the Core Phase. Only then can a child have a sense of justice and right selfhood. Only by wasting time, for instance, can she learn what about that feels nourishing, and what feels empty. Only by trying on other selves and playing in all sorts of environments and learn...

  My husband just finished a power-filled retreat with Bill Plotkin , and one of the insights he brought home with him is this chart of soulcentric development . It perfectly captures why and how I homeschool (or at least towards what ends I aspire). I see my toddler as an Innocent in the Nest, and my school age child as an Explorer in the Garden. Homeschool as a way for them to explore the garden in the context of family, community, and nature. It sets up ideal conditions for them to do necessary work as teens, when they need to create a secure and authentic social self, something that is very hard to do in most of today's high schools. With this ground work they will grow up to be authentic, strong adults able to do their work in the world in a meaningful way. And by work I don't mean being successful economic units, although that can be a part of it, too. I mean soul work. Inner work that translates into a calling that makes the world a better place. Plotkin...