Less Homework Means More Learning

In today’s world of homework, classes, and sports, when do our kids get a chance to just be? Perhaps even more importantly, when do they have a chance to pursue their own interests without adult intervention or control?

Vernon Barford junior high school, in Edmonton, Canada, changed its policies in 2006, and decided to give its students less homework. As a result, tests scores improved. So did morale.

The concept of our schools assigning too much homework is not new. In 1999, Time Magazine’s cover declared, “Too Much Homework!”, subtitled with, “How it’s hurting our kids, and what parents should do about it.” A surprisingly outspoken piece, The Homework Ate My Family, calls parents to arms in the homework war, encouraging them to allow their children to have a stress-free childhood.

A sprinkling of schools and parents might have learned from those who have been warning us against the alluring draw of homework, but there is still a pervasive cultural bias towards filling our children’s time with it. According to the Vancouver Sun article, a parent complained about the new Barford Vernon homework policy, that his son “still had an hour in the evening with nothing to do.” When did having an hour of “nothing to do” become a bad thing?

The Vancouver Sun also profiles Carl Honore’s new book Under Pressure—Rescuing Childhood From the Culture of Hyper-Parenting, where he discusses the role of homework and other time filling activities as commentary on our achievement-oriented and hyper-scrutinizing parenting culture of today.

If you are interested in a deeper discussion of homework specifically, another book by Alfie Kohn, called The Homework Myth, discusses the disadvantage to homework and why it is has become so important to us in today’s educational atmosphere.

In a world where more=more, it’s refreshing to see attempts at moderation. It’ll be interesting to see if this becomes a trend.

Chelsea Link, 18, Homeschooled, Accepted to Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, Stanford, U of Chicago, and Northwestern

Chelsea Link says this about her extraordinary, yet relaxed, life: “I think I’ve had a pretty normal high school experience . . . just without the high school.”

Another interesting quote by Christopher Watson, admissions dean at Northwestern, “We haven’t changed the way we review applications, but the way home-schoolers are submitting applications has changed,” he said. “They’ve become very good at taking out the question marks.”

Perhaps it’s a combination of the two? Northwestern may not have changed it’s admissions process, but other universities have.

Congratulations Chelsea! Reading science magazines and playing music is a fine way to go through childhood.

A (Home) School Like Mine

Have you seen the book, A Life Like Mine? It has profiles of children all over the world, and what their everyday lives are like. Beautiful, vibrant pictures line the pages. It truly gives a snapshot into the various ways of life in our global community.

Imagine my surprise when I saw A School Like Mine at the library, which has profiles of what children of the world think of their schools, and it includes an American homeschooler as one of the profiles! I must say, I am quite impressed.

There is a third book called A Faith Like Mine. I was impressed with how well it covered the essence of each religion - specifically Buddhism, Christianity, and Judaism, which are the three I know the most about. The other religions also seemed quite thorough and accurate.

These books rise up to the challenge of showing the diversity of the world to our children in a much deeper way than one would expect with so little space in which to express it.

Before I finish this review, I’d like to mention how extraordinary it is that this new book, A School Like Mine, incorporates a homeschooler as one of the profiles. This has a serious implication of how homeschooling has become so tied into the national view of American culture.

I don’t think that this has come around simply because we’ve been growing in numbers (although that is part of it), or because we’re on the brink of an educational revolution which will either change or break our public school system. I think that this global recognition has come around because homeschoolers have risen up to be a force to be reckoned with both politically and socially, primarily by tapping into the powerful network of the internet. We have a pretty large footprint here. We’re a major part of the emerging online culture.

I still am convinced that the internet is what will be the tipping point of when and how American education adapts to modern needs. With that, homeschoolers are riding the wave, and we’ll sail in right along with it, because we’ve been surfing on it for a long, long time.

Carnival of Education Includes Homeschooling Posts

The Carnival of Education is pretty picky about which homeschooling posts they accept. So, I was happy to see that they included mine. Scroll down. It’s under “Homeschooling.” Link is “being invited.”

Homeschooling Lesson of the Day: How to Hate on Us

Summer offers a lesson on how to properly put together an anti-homeschooling rant. She gets an A+ for her homeschooling lesson of the day.

Friday Five - Places to Visit

What are your top five places to go as a homeschooling family?

This is our list!

1. Disneyland. Ok, this is corny, but we love Disneyland (and California Adventure). It’s free for us, since hubby works for the D. There is a lot to learn there too, and it’s got a ton of socialization opportunities (as well as opportunities to learn to stand in line).

2. Jumpin’ Jammin’. It’s an indoor playground, and oh so much more. We don’t go very often since it’s a bit expensive. But it’s one of our favorite local joints.

3. Around our block. We love taking walks. We like to go around the block, because it’s just long enough to get a good walk (and a good talk), but not so long that the kids are whining about it being too far. We also like to walk up to the bike path sometimes. It’s about a mile away.

4. Colorado. My dad lives in Colorado with his wife and three small children (those would be my 1/2 brothers and sister). We love to spend time with them. The kids also love playing in the snow. One of my favorite parts is the drive. It takes two days to get there. I love the view, and driving.

5. Barnes and Noble/Borders/Library. Anywhere with books, we love to hang out. Watch out if we have a gift card in our pocket!

Your turn! What are five of your favorite places?

Learning About Termites the Hard Way

We had a termite infestation swarm today. Looks like termites have snuck into the walls of our house and created a little home for themselves. Now we have to fumigate.

The girls were the ones to discover the swarm. They were playing on the floor when they started screaming, “Mom! There’s a bug on the wall. No, there’s LOTS of bugs on the wall. And they have big wings!”

I have never in my life seen a termite. I knew that they eat houses and that when I see a house covered in a tent, it’s for the purpose of getting rid of them. But when I saw them, I thought they were flying ants.

So I called Terminix. They came out and verified that we indeed have termites. And they informed us that the de-termitification will cost a LOT of money.

Maybe there are benefits to learning things from books instead of from real life experience.

The up side? The Terminix guy gave us a bug-wheel, which the kids are now using to identify the various kinds of bugs we have seen in our house and backyard. It is an incredibly expensive bug classification project.
We can’t get the bug service until Saturday, so it looks like we’re on termite clean-up and maintenance duty until they get here. Any advice on how to manage the termites until the Terminix guys come to kill them all?

In Favor of Public School, Against Compulsory Education and Attendance

Does our country still need compulsory school attendance? Or is it as outdated as carbon copies and scantrons?

The pros and cons of removing compulsory school attendance are numerous. One of the biggest cons is that we can’t be sure what the larger effect on our culture and society will be. The benefits, on the other hand, might be worth it.

What we know for sure is that, despite what many people believe to be true, education is not compulsory in our country. It is physically impossible to impose an education on people (it is tried though, isn’t it?) Dennis Fermoyle, author of In the Trenches: A Teacher’s Defense of Public Education, offers some thoughts on the value of forcing children to go to school, and what the changes might be if we didn’t.

I like his piece because it isn’t a public school fan-boy diatribe, nor is it a “throw the baby out with the bath water” anti-school rant. It is a reasoned look at an educational reform that just might make a real difference.

Of course, there’s no way to know what the end result of removing compulsory education would be. On the one hand, it might have the effect of increasing the polarization of our country and encouraging a societal phase of “Oh my god, we’re free, let’s party!” On the other hand, it might be exactly what we need, requiring only a short period of adjustment before we move into a stage where we prove that we’re a responsible society, with a high number of individuals who can take care of themselves if given the opportunity.

Songs by Geniuses Who Didn’t Belong in School

As we all know, school isn’t the best match for those who are highly creative. It’s no wonder, then, that many songs by talented artists express criticism of school. People of genius, and that includes musicians, don’t belong in school.

I was listening to some Paul Simon today, who is undoubtedly a musical genius, and heard this song, called Kodachrome.

Kodachrome - Words & music by Paul Simon

When I think back
On all the crap I learned in high school
It’s a wonder
I can think at all
And though my lack of edu—cation
Hasn’t hurt me none
I can read the writing on the wall

Kodachrome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the worlds a sunny day, oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama don’t take my kodachrome away

If you took all the girls I knew
When I was single
And brought them all together for one night
I know theyd never match
My sweet imagination
And everything looks worse in black and white

Kodachrome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the worlds a sunny day, oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama don’t take my kodachrome away

I wonder though, if kids of genius aren’t forced to go to school, where will they place their creative angst? And what would they write about? Perhaps geniuses need something to rebel against, to ignite that passionate spirit and to create amazing works of art? What do you think? Can a comfortable and happy genius still create inspired works of art?

Stumble It!

What’s On Your Browser Tab?

As a habit, I pile up pages on my Firefox tabs to be read when I have the time. Often, I’d like to share those links with you. But then, time passes, and I get busy, and close them, unable to do them justice.

I’m going to share some of them with you so I can close them and move on.

Space for Commerce blog discusses online schooling. I am a fan of online/virtual schools. Between online schools and charter schools, we’re actually seeing some significant change in public schools. Whether these two options are the “right” way to go, is uncertain. What I do know, is that they are creating their own internal competition, which will force the “regular” public schools to do something to keep up. As it relates to homeschooling, bah, I won’t get into that. Anyway, this is a good commentary. I love when non-homeschoolers understand that homeschooling and other alternative forms of education are good for our country.

Momlovesbeingathome sings the praises of Paperback Book Swap. She sold me on it. I joined too. Now I’m even more inspired to read the books in my piles, so that I can list them on my book swap page. I’m going to need a bookcase just for may PBS books, instead of sending them to the library.

Schoolless has a post about Learning to Bend. She has some great examples of how she has moved from “carefully laid plans” to inspired learning with her kiddos.

Unschooling Voices #12. I haven’t read through all the entries yet. I hope I can before the next one comes out! How long does it take you to read through a carnival?

The Cates at Why Homeschool offer their own plan for our country’s educational system. Great ideas there, although it’s a little frustrating to me because it’s just a mental game we’re playing by even talking about it. I suppose, though, that change has to start somewhere, and who knows when it’ll be a blog that changes things?

That’s it for now (well, I have other tabs, but they aren’t education related). Do you have a bunch of tabs up on your browser?