One homeschooling mom shares her story + Parenting and family ideas for intellectuals.
Friday, May 21, 2021
Anders Today
Anders, age 9, recently took a class in public speaking. He wrote this speech for that class. He had recently read Elon Musk's biography, Space Barons, and War of the Worlds so.. these things were on his mind!
Roslyn, since the last comment is extremely irrelevant to this wonderful post of Anderson's speech, I thought it would be okay if I asked something off topic. My son is turning one, and I'm facing either homeschooling or unschooling as possible educations. What have you come across in the unschooling arena? I love the idea of respectful parenting and allowing your child to lead with their interests, but I'm also thinking that developing skills is on the sideburner to actual learning. Ie my child will learn how to write when he finds the intrinsic value, but he may never desire to write legibly unless I teach him.. I see this as a sort of debate, so I would love to know your thoughts on this! Thank you. <3
I am not against unschooling but also not a big fan because the child's interests are too easily manipulated by giant corporations and the media, and yes, like you say, there are some skills that children will appreciate later.
I believe good habits are worth teaching to children.
Also, in my experience children appreciate being given some direction (or at least mine have).
Handwriting is the one subject Anders ever struggled with, and for that reason I am doing a lot more handwriting-prep with Henrik. We do a lot of cutting, pasting, folding, stickers, coloring, painting, etc to develop future handwriting skills.
He is better than 2/3 of my college speech class, no kidding. This kid is a walking advertisement for high quality home education!
ReplyDeleteAh, thanks Ketzia :)
DeleteRoslyn, since the last comment is extremely irrelevant to this wonderful post of Anderson's speech, I thought it would be okay if I asked something off topic. My son is turning one, and I'm facing either homeschooling or unschooling as possible educations. What have you come across in the unschooling arena? I love the idea of respectful parenting and allowing your child to lead with their interests, but I'm also thinking that developing skills is on the sideburner to actual learning. Ie my child will learn how to write when he finds the intrinsic value, but he may never desire to write legibly unless I teach him.. I see this as a sort of debate, so I would love to know your thoughts on this! Thank you. <3
ReplyDeleteI am not against unschooling but also not a big fan because the child's interests are too easily manipulated by giant corporations and the media, and yes, like you say, there are some skills that children will appreciate later.
DeleteI believe good habits are worth teaching to children.
Also, in my experience children appreciate being given some direction (or at least mine have).
Handwriting is the one subject Anders ever struggled with, and for that reason I am doing a lot more handwriting-prep with Henrik. We do a lot of cutting, pasting, folding, stickers, coloring, painting, etc to develop future handwriting skills.
All the best,
Roslyn