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Presented May 9, 2004 UUCC of Hendricks County Danville, In. by Mary Schnake About a year ago, Bill Harrington stood up at joys and concerns and shared about how sometimes just the right song comes on at just the right moment. He got in his car one Saturday to go to the grand opening of McCloud Nature park, which he had invested considerable time and energy into helping create. He turned on the radio and heard "Saturday in the Park." I wish I could say that I remember all joys and concerns so clearly, but I can't. I remember this one though because I've had that same experience several times. One such time was the first time I heard the prelude we sang today, "I Hope You Dance". I was driving down Washington Street here in Danville, wondering what to do about "the school situation", which is how we had come to refer to our concerns about Abe and school. A song came on the radio I had never heard before. It began "I hope you never lose your sense of wonder". The tears came automatically and wouldn't stop. It was one of those rare, identifiable moments of epiphany in my life. By the end of the song I knew that we needed to try homeschooling. Of course, there were other things that had been nudging me in that direction—my son's persistent unhappiness; a book I had just read, Coloring Outside the Lines by Roger Schank, that echoed my beliefs about education; George Bush was just beginning his presidency which meant, if he had his way, the No Child Left Behind Act and even more high stakes standardized testing–which was already bad enough in my opinion. But it was hearing that song that settled it. As I was listening to it, I realized I had been resisting homeschooling as an option because sending our kids to school was the path of least resistance—it's what everybody did, it was a way of being involved in the community, our game plan was that I would go back to work when Sophie was in school --in short, it was just easier. I know there are wonderful, dedicated teachers out there who connect with children and inspire them to reach outward and upward. However, I deeply believe the school system is inherently flawed and is, at the very least, partly responsible for the loss of wonder in many kids. I had resigned myself to the fact that it wasn't going to change in any meaningful way. I sent my son to school thinking that as long as I remained involved and encouraged him to pursue his interests outside of school, it would be ok. I was wrong. I found myself telling my son, who hated school from his first day in a Montessori preschool, to just try to make the best of it. What an awful thing to say about learning! But I couldn't really refute any of his complaints. I felt like I was selling out, and worse selling out my son. It hit me that if I really wanted for my children what was expressed in the song, I had to be willing to dance--I had to reclaim my idealism and act on what I believed. It wasn't long before this renewed sense of idealism made it impossible for me to remain in the Christian church. When Abe was about 3, I began feeling a need to figure out what I believed because I was conflicted about celebrating Christmas and Easter when I didn't consider myself a Christian. Believing one's religion is usually a function of one's culture, and being that we live in a Christian culture, we began looking for a liberal Christian church. We went to several churches trying to find one that was a good fit. Although I tried, I was never really comfortable thinking of myself as a Christian. It had gotten to the point where I just couldn't do it anymore. So, I went to the UU website to check it out. I read about UU when we first began looking for a denomination; I thought the principles sounded nice, but I really wanted to give Christianity a shot, and, I must admit, I thought "These people don't believe in anything." But this time when I went to the website, it just felt right. It immediately occurred to me that the principles echoed the reasons I chose homeschooling. I was happy to discover that there was an online group of UU homeschoolers that felt the same way. When I joined the list in the fall of 2001 there were about 90 members. Today, there are more than 370. The number has more than quadrupled in the last two and a half years. More and more people are seeing this connection. In fact, Don Skinner of UU World has been working on a feature story about UU homeschoolers that is scheduled to appear in the July issue. When I was an adolescent, I became fascinated with the authenticity and enthusiasm of children and wondered why people seemed to lose those qualities as they grew up. I went to IU and majored in psychology not knowing exactly what I wanted to do, but thinking that I wanted to work with children. After graduating in 1987, I moved to a small town in Washington state where I worked in a day care center for two years. Most of the first year was spent with babies. I soon had no doubt that we are born with very distinct personalities and ways of approaching the world. Some babies were very active and independent, some very social, and some were very pensive, thoughtful observers. It never occurred to me that any of these ways of being were better—they all had value in their own way. Homeschooling honors this inherent worth and dignity. Parents have a vested interest in and an intimate knowledge of their child. This, and the fact that they are dealing with only a few children at most, makes it possible for every gift and learning style to be more easily recognized and more fully validated. Children can progress at their own rate, in their own way, without feeling like they are behind. John Holt, who is considered by many to be the father of homeschooling, said "Perhaps they are thrown too early, and too much, into a crowded society of other children, where they have to think, not about the world, but about their position in it." I know this process of figuring out where you fit in is part of growing up. But it seems so pervasive and starts so young in school. Not to mention that adults weigh in with their opinions in the form of grades and awards. Most homeschoolers participate in group activities like classes, field trips, and social get-togethers. Most things are offered for a range of ages because there is the recognition that interest and ability is a better indicator than age of whether something is appropriate for a given child. This multi-aged grouping of children was one of the things that made sense to me about Maria Montessori's philosophy of education when I first heard of her. I was happy to get a job at a Montessori school soon after I returned to Indiana in 1989. The more I learned about her philosophy of education the more I liked it. She believed, as did the humanist psychologists like Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow that I was attracted to in college, that, in her words "The child has one intuitive aim--self-development. He desperately wants to develop his resources, his ability to cope with a strange complex world. He wants to do and see and learn for himself, through his senses and not through the eye of an adult. The child who accomplishes this, moves into harmony with this world. He becomes a full person. He is educated." She felt the way to help children do this was to create an environment where children are respected and free to explore what they want, when they want, for as long as they want. She believed the job of the teacher was to observe the child, see what they were interested in and create the environment and provide the materials for exploring those interests—the "curriculum" is set by the child. There were no grade levels and the relationships in the classroom were much more equitable—the teacher was not an authority figure but a facilitator. I have observed this same equity in homeschool communities. Because they tend to see adults as allies, most homeschoolers I have seen interact more readily and openly with adults. Homeschooled children can also interact with and build diverse groups; witnessing first hand the interdependence of community. With their parents, they seek out and use resources in the community to enhance their growth—the library, museums, homeschool groups, community colleges, civic organizations, or maybe a friend or neighbor who shares an interest or knows someone who shares an interest of yours. And, of course through the internet you can interact with people all over the world. Homeschoolers also have more time to become involved in their community or with a cause that they are passionate about because they are not spending most of their day in school. School does not look like the real world. After graduation, you are never again in a situation where you spend the majority of your day with others who are within a year of your age and who live within a few miles of you. Homeschool activities and gatherings often involve whole families, so the children are used to interacting with a wide range of ages. I think this is, in part, responsible for one benefit of homeschooling that I hadn't considered until after we started. That is that ageism isn't as common in the homeschooled kids I have been around as it is on many playgrounds—you know, the attitude that a third grader is too old to hang around a first grader. I don't normally think of compassion as one of the reasons we chose homeschooling, but compassion for my son is really what started the search for an alternative that led to homeschooling. I knew my son disliked school from the beginning, but I didn't fully realize the toll it was taking until I went to an open house in the fall of his second grade year and read his journal. About once a week there was an entry like "I hate being here." "Today is Monday and I feel sick." I knew we had to do something. I realized I could not expect a teacher who had 26 students to really know the state of my son's mind or concern herself with his happiness, especially when he appeared to be doing fine. Good teachers recognize the importance of the holistic development of the child, but it is very difficult for them to attend to this as their primary responsibility is to see to the academic progress of a large group of children. In healthy families, you have a sense of being loved unconditionally and are accepted and encouraged to growth in all areas of your life. In fact, many homeschoolers—UUs among them—say that strengthening the family unit and maintaining closeness within it is the primary reason they homeschool. Some kids have a really hard time feeling accepted among their peers and, in certain cases, by their teachers. A few suffer teasing and rejection that can be quite painful. Even for those who do fit in, watching this treatment of others can be damaging. I have a friend who is against homeschooling because of the socialization the children miss out on. When I asked her about those negative aspects of socialization that occur in schools, she thought that living through it could make you strong, and leaving school because of it is like running away. I disagree. I think of it as empowering. If a friend of mine had a job or was in a relationship where they were ridiculed on a daily basis I would not tell them to stick it out because it would make them strong. I would say you have inherent worth and deserve to be treated with dignity—let me help you find a way to get out of there. I don't understand why we would have any less compassion for our children. From the time I was in fifth grade, the first day of school in just about every class I took had one thing in common. The teacher would write their grading scale on the board. They didn't ask what I hoped to get out of the class, or even why they thought the class was important for my development. The emphasis was not on personal growth but on what you had to do to make the grade. You do this by giving the teacher what they want. I did very well in school because I was good at figuring out what my teachers wanted and compliant enough to give it to them. My goal was to get an A with the least amount of effort possible. I don't believe I was unique in that regard. Roger Schank points out in the book I mentioned earlier, that this mindset prevents children from thinking creatively. When a question is asked, or a project assigned many students' first thought is not "What do I think?" or "How would I like to approach this?" but "What is the answer the teacher is looking for?" or "What can I do to get an A?" John Holt made a similar observation over thirty years ago in How Children Fail. He believed many children fail because they are afraid to try—it's better to appear not to know something than to be wrong. Failure is not seen in the same light as Thomas Edison viewed it when he said. "Results! Why, man, I have gotten a lot of results. I know several thousand things that won't work." The notion that failure can lead to growth is not one of those implicit messages being taught in our culture. I would say that the free and responsible search for truth and meaning, the right of conscience, and the use of the democratic process lies at the heart of the reason we chose to homeschool. My belief that humans are inherently motivated to find truth and meaning in the world was reinforced by my experience in that Washington day care center. In addition to working with babies, I worked with two and three year olds. I watched how children approached things and how they naturally delighted in figuring out and gaining competence in their world. It occurred to me that children are scientists. When encountering something new, they don't just look it at, they engage all their senses: What does it taste like? How does it feel? What does it smell like? How does it sound? They observe: What do mom and dad do with this? What does my sister do with it? They perform experiments: What happens if I throw it? Will it fit in my nose? I left Washington state wondering what caused many children to turn from enthusiastic, curious learners into bored and jaded second and third graders. I felt I knew the answer. In my cognitive psychology classes I learned that real learning happens when what is being learned is inherently interesting to the learner or when they have a real need for the information. When children are young, they are figuring out things they want and need to know-- not following someone else's agenda. I wonder why we stop trusting that children will seek growth and competence and feel like they need a formal course of education set out for them. Albert Einstein said, "It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry; for this delicate little plant, aside from stimulation, stands mainly in need of freedom; without this it goes to wrack and ruin without fail. It is a grave mistake to think that the enjoyment of seeing and searching can be promoted by means of coercion and a sense of duty." Maria Montessori shared this belief. She felt that gaining knowledge and competence is intrinsically satisfying and that rewarding children for learning—whether in the form of stickers, grades, or even verbal praise—was not only unnecessary, but actually interfered with learning. Children know when they have mastered something—they don't need someone to give them a grade, or praise their work. In these situations the child is no longer freely learning, but is in danger of shifting his focus to meeting the expectations of, and pleasing adults. When I worked in public schools as I was pursuing my elementary education degree, the self-motivation I saw in the children there was noticeably less than what I saw in the children at the Montessori school. Homeschoolers have a much bigger voice in matters that concern them— namely the path they will follow on their search for truth and meaning. They have a sense of controlling their own destiny. I mentioned earlier that I had resorted to telling Abe to make the best of school. What I actually said in full was "Sometimes there are things we have to do that we don't like, so you might as well try to make the best of it." It always left a bad taste in my mouth because I really don't believe that there is anything we have to do—we always have a choice. Sometimes a choice might have such undesirable consequences that we don't consider it a choice, but the reality is we do have a choice. I want my children to grow up believing they can affect their circumstances—they are not without options or without voice. When I was first approached about presenting this talk, I went to the UU homeschoolers message board for input. I hadn't visited it in a while and when I got there they had been having a discussion about whether UUs can claim they are homeschooling for religious reasons. Since I have become a UU, I have come to see that everything we experience and learn in life, every aspect of our education and growth, is a part of our spiritual development. As UUs, we believe that each person must decide for themselves what is true and meaningful and worth exploring on this spiritual journey. Homeschooling gives my children the freedom to do just that. So I can honestly say that "Yes I homeschool for religious reasons." Unitarian minister Ralph Waldo Emerson put it like this: "I believe that our own experience instructs us that the secret of Education lies in respecting the pupil. It is not for you to choose what he shall know, what he shall do. It is chosen and foreordained and he only holds the key to his own secret." When Abe was three or four years old I asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up. He said "Myself." I have no greater desire for my children than that. |
