I Want My Four Dollars

We ended up having another field trip yesterday. After a couple weeks of being carless (and having frequent car trouble for several weeks before that), our cupboards were decidedly bare. And I'd already used up the black ink cartridge in my new printer; not by printing scads of super fun school materials, but by printing out menu covers for my husband's restaurant. A trip to St. Thomas to do some big-box store shopping was unavoidable. So I skipped my morning walk yesterday, loaded the cooler in the car and drove down to ferry dock instead (with Parker ensconced in his car seat, of course). My shopping list was four stores long (Home Depot, OfficeMax, Kmart and Cost-U-Less, St. Thomas's Costco), and I always get a little harried when I'm hurrying to catch the ferry (for no good reason, since there's always another one arriving within a half hour), but I did remember to grab the four dollars Parker received in a birthday card from his grandparents. (My in-laws didn't just give him cash for his birthday. They sent him actual gifts, too.) Aboard the car barge, on our way to St. Thomas, I gave Parker his four dollars--he'd already declared his intent to use it to buy (toy) cars--and told him he could spend it while we were shopping, if he saw something he liked. I figured we could do some "unschooling" on St. Thomas with those four dollars. Parker and I would have to talk about money, math (what does four dollars buy?), limited resources (it doesn't buy much!) and how to conduct a financial transaction. I intended to give as little input as possible; I wanted the whole episode to instill in him a sense of independence.

Parker asked if we could go to Kmart (or, as he used to call it, the "car store") first. I guess those four dollars were burning a hole in his pocket already. The toy car aisle is all the way in the back of the store, and he fairly ran there, he was so excited. The conversation about limited resources started almost immediately; Parker kept selecting big ticket items, like Hot Wheels tracks and Cars (the Pixar movie) characters. He'd see something he liked, then ask me its price. We talked about "more" and "less"--for instance, if something cost eight dollars, I'd ask Parker whether he had enough money to buy it. "No, Mommy, I need more money for Snot Rod." He did find finally find a few toys he liked, each of which cost about four dollars (thankfully, there's no sale tax here so I didn't have to try to calculate that in), and was having trouble deciding which to buy. That's when I said, "Hey, Bubs, did you know that these Hot Wheels cars each cost only about one dollar? You have enough money to buy three of these cars." Good thing we got an early start yesterday, because that occasioned much more debating and dithering. I could definitely see the wheels turning in his little head as he tried to wrap his brain around the fact that he could use his four dollars to purchase either one single toy or three other toys. Value is such a crazy, intangible concept, is it not?

Well, in the end he decided to buy three Hot Wheels vehicles (one race car, one truck, one plane). He loves those little mass-produced toys so much that I'm sure he would have gladly spent all four of his dollars to buy just one. The fact that he could purchase three obviously elated him. We made our way to the registers and proceeded to practice waiting patiently. It always (always!) takes at least 15 minutes to get through the lines at the St. Thomas Kmart; poor Parker was ready to burst by the time it was finally his turn to pay. He conducted the transaction by himself, and was ecstatic when the saleslady gave him thirteen cents back, in addition to his new toys. It was pretty fun to watch. I wish the rest of the shopping we did yesterday had been as amusing.

In the car, on ferry, clutching his four dollars.

OK, I'm ready to go pay!

Making propellor plane sound effects.

Postscript: The North American Montessori Center's Montessori Homeschool Program is giving away one free program. I'm linking to their site here in order to try to win. I've never ever won anything in my life, but I'd sure like to win this. I mean, I'm having fun getting all crafty and creating our homeschool materials, but man would it be awesome to have the real thing to help me educate my son.

Love Your Work

YESTERDAY'S ACTIVITIES:

• Using Tongs
• Dusting
• Transferring
• Fabric Basket
• Mystery Bag
• Pouring
• Rough and Smooth Boards
• Graduated Blocks

TODAY'S ACTIVITIES:

• Bead Stringing
• Transferring
• Sweeping
• Mystery Bag

I listened to this great Radiolab podcast while I was out walking yesterday. The program, in which renowned author Malcolm Gladwell discusses the subject of success with Radiolab host Robert Krulwich, was both thought-provoking and laugh-out-loud funny. (I sometimes wonder how many St. Johnians have concluded that I am certifiable upon observing me guffawing while out walking. I bet they'd be laughing, too, if I could only share my earbuds with them. Wait, Wait... Don't Tell Me!, Car Talk, Fresh Air, Radiolab and This American Life all produce some seriously funny podcasts. I'll never go back to listening to boring old music while exercising again.) Gladwell argued that while talent is good and all, what really ensures success isn't natural ability but intrinsic motivation. In other words, a person has to love what they do--pretty much to the point of fanaticism--and want to keep doing it regardless of whether it yields any kind of measurable return. Gladwell used the examples of Wayne Gretzky (who, as a two-year-old, would burst into tears whenever a hockey game he'd been watching on TV ended), The Beatles (who, before they achieved any measure of success, worked a gig in a strip club in Hamburg, Germany, playing 8-hour sets, 7 days a week, for months at a time) and Bill Gates (who, as a 15-year-old, wrote computer programs in the wee small hours of the morning instead of, you know, sleeping). If he hadn't been so passionate about computer programming (I know it's hard to fathom such an odd passion, but stay with me here) Bill Gates would have turned out to be just some smart guy from Seattle. Probably, because he is very intelligent, he'd have been a fairly wealthy and accomplished smart guy from Seattle, but there are a lot of fairly wealthy and accomplished smart guys in Seattle (not to mention around the world). He's world-famous (and fabulously wealthy, of course) because something inside him just couldn't stop programming; something intrinsic to Bill told him that computer programming was better than sleep, better than food, better than anything else imaginable. And he listened to that inner voice; more to the point, his parents and teachers allowed him to listen to that inner voice.

After I published the previous post (in which I expressed my frustration over my son refusing to do any of the new sensorial activities I'd prepared), it occurred to me that some of you may be wondering why I don't assume more of a traditional "teacher" role during our homeschooling sessions; that is to say, why I don't structure each session according to a premeditated lesson plan. In most American classrooms--from pre-K to college-level--the educator decides what the students will be taught (notice I didn't say what the students will learn), and enforces a strict schedule of lectures and/or activities pertinent to the subject matter. If the student complies with the teacher's lesson plan (sits quietly while the teacher talks, completes the corresponding activities correctly), he/she gets a gold star or an "A"--basically he/she is rewarded. If the student doesn't comply, he/she is deemed ill-behaved or unintelligent or sent to the principal's office or what have you. If the student continually refuses to comply with the teacher's expectations, punishments or parent-teacher conferences or diagnoses of ADHD (or all of the above) ensue. This method of education is entirely focused on the teacher. The student learns that it is the teacher's interests (i.e., lesson plans) that are most important; that compliance ("good behavior") is valued above curiosity, independence, initiative. Any intrinsic motivation the student may have regarding learning is slowly but surely squelched at the hands of a teacher-centric education based upon punishment and reward.

Learning is supposed to be fun, right? But how can it be when the teacher controls everything from what the student learns to how the student behaves (where to sit, when to talk, when to pee)? In Unconditional Parenting, Alfie Kohn (an author who studied and wrote about education long before he started writing about parenting) says, "Students tend not to think as deeply, or to be as interested, if they have little to say about what they're learning or about the circumstances in which they're learning it." Call me crazy, but I don't want to raise a well-behaved child who listens quietly while the teacher talks, who completes worksheets correctly and gets "A"s on all his quizzes. I want to raise a child who is curious about the world around him, who quests after knowledge, who is intrinsically motivated to learn new things. (They're not necessarily mutually exclusive; I wouldn't mind if he ends up being well-behaved and getting "A"s, too, of course.) When we do school each day, I want him to be focused on the activities available to him, and to feel free to approach them with curiosity and independence and initiative. I do NOT want him to be focused on whether or not he's doing what I want him to do, on trying to please me.

I brought up the Radiolab podcast because it seemed salient to the undeniably unconventional way I'm educating my son. Gladwell seemed to be saying that the secret to success is the ability to be intrinsically motivated--to want to do something just because you love it, regardless of any potential external reward (praise, money, et cetera). If I want my son to be successful in school--that is to say, to be successful at learning--I need to allow him to approach it without any external motivating factors. If I'd forced him to do the sensorial activities on Tuesday, he'd have been doing them to make me happy or out of some compulsion to comply with my wishes; in other words, he'd have been externally motivated to do them. The most I can do--the most I should do--as his educator is prepare the appropriate activities, make them available to him during our homeschooling sessions and give him help and/or guidance when he needs it. Like Galileo Galilei said, "You cannot teach a man anything. You can only help him discover it within himself."

Matching Squares

(Fabric Basket)

Postscript: We did end up doing sensorial activities yesterday and today. The fabric basket activity is basically a matching game: using fabrics of various textures (ideally all the same color), you cut two squares of each fabric and then mix them up and put them into a basket. The child has to use his sense of touch to find the matching squares. The mystery bag activity is another tactile one: you collect a variety of small everyday objects, put them on a tray and show them to the child. Then you cover them up with a dish towel, ask the child to close his eyes and put one of the objects into a bag. The child reaches into the bag and uses his sense of touch to try to figure out which object it is. (You can do this one different ways; put all the objects in the bag at the same time and/or neglect to show the child the objects on the tray before you start the activity.)

Small Everyday Objects on a Tray

(Mystery Bag)

The Reveal

(Mystery Bag)

The Crown Royal Bag in Action

(Rough and Smooth Boards)

My Son, the Mule

TODAY'S ACTIVITIES:

• Hardware Busy Board
• Using Tongs
• Transferring
• Pouring

This "Parker, Parker, Quite Contrary" phase is seriously going to drive me nutso (and I wasn't exactly working with a full set of marbles to begin with). My son asked to do school at least five times over the weekend. Guess what he said this morning when I cheerfully exclaimed, "Now it's time for school!" That's right, the dreaded "But I don't like school!" Then, precisely because I encouraged him to work with them, he refused to touch the new sensorial activities. I couldn't help feeling frustrated while watching my son in school today; it really seemed like he was slightly bored by the practical life activities he'd chosen to revisit. I'm almost tempted to try reverse psychology on him. "No, Parker, don't do the fabric activity! And don't do the sandpaper activity! Oh, and definitely don't brush your teeth and don't get dressed and don't go to sleep, either!" I mean, it worked for Mary Poppins, right? It seems to me that parenting requires either wiles (for example, sneaking some clothes on a kid who has adamantly refused to get dressed the second he's engrossed in play) or rigidity (the "you will get dressed right this minute, OR ELSE!" approach). If you haven't guessed by now, I'd much rather do some creative thinking than behave like some sort of strict schoolmarm. I'm not sure I'm ready to resort to reverse psychology, though; it seems like an awfully manipulative way to mother. So I'll just keep on being patient (and a wee bit wily), and sooner or later my son will stop impersonating a mule. (Sooner would be nice.)

In light of his current stubbornly contrary streak, I've been frequently fighting the urge to dangle a carrot in front of my son whenever I want/need him to do something (school included). It'd be so much easier to just barter with him; to offer a treat or a toy in exchange for his cooperation and acquiescence. But the long-term effects of Parker associating learning with extrinsic rewards would be devastating to my aim of engendering a "quest quotient" in him. He should want to learn because he enjoys it and because it fulfills him, not out of some desire to either please me or earn a reward. If there's one thing this homeschooling experience keeps teaching me, it's to let go of any personal agendas I have. I wanted to do sensorial activities this morning. Well, it's his education! It's like cooking for my son: I can put yummy, healthy meals in front of him everyday, but I can't force him to eat. In fact, he ingests significantly less anytime I start to sound even a little beseeching. ("Don't you want to eat just a little banana?") I'll keep dragging out our school shelves, and putting the materials in front of him. He'll eat something (sensorial) eventually.

In and Out of the Closet

TODAY'S ACTIVITIES

• "Threading" Toothpicks
• Pouring
• Bottles and Tops

Let me begin today with a brief description of the structure of our school. This necessitates an even briefer description of our apartment; in a word, it's small. We have one 30' x 15' room that comprises our living area, dining room, romper room, mud room, library, home theater, yoga studio and workshop, with a cute little kitchen off in one corner. My son's bedroom is adjacent to this "great room" and my husband and I sleep in a loft-like room situated directly above Parker's room. The books I read in preparation for homeschooling all recommended setting aside a particular area in the home to use for school. Ha. Maybe if we lived in that villa the Real Housewives of NYC graced when they visited St. John, maybe then I could relegate an actual room for our homeschool. As it is, I found even just demarcating a small area of our apartment implausible. I'm not complaining about the size of our home. I love our apartment; I love where it's located, I love our neighbors/landlords, I love our views, I even love the funky rattan furniture with which it came furnished. I bring up this issue of needing to figure out where we could/should/would conduct school because it seemed unfair for me to ask my

son to suddenly change from play mode to student mode the minute I said, "Time for school!" when his surroundings would change nary a bit. So what to do? In one of my how-to-homeschool books ("Teaching Montessori in the Home" by Elizabeth G. Hainstock), the author advocates keeping the school materials put away, taking them out only when it's school time. "Unless [the child] is taught that they are intended for a specific time and purpose, he will lose respect for them as teaching devices." This idea that school equipment should not be constantly at hand, right alongside toys and other miscellaneous household items, really resonates with me. Plus, it sort of solves the we-have-no-nook-for-our-school problem; the "school" stays in a closet, coming out only when it's time for "class." But how to handle (by which I mean, facilitate) Parker's mental transition from play time to school time when the only manifest change he sees will be his mom rolling a bookcase of stuff out of his bedroom closet? Here's the idea I came up with: ring a (school)bell! We have this cute little silver bell that's actually my mom's but somehow migrated from her home to ours; perfect, right? So that's what we'll do to bookend our school sessions. We started today. Parker really likes to ring the bell. Are you surprised?

Today I introduced two new activities ("threading" toothpicks, bottles and tops) and we revisited pouring. During the course of each school session, we will revisit at least one activity presented on a prior day. The materials from previous days' activities sit on the school shelves (those ones I dragged out of the closet) and Parker gets to choose what he wants to work with. His freedom to choose allows him to become accustomed to taking the initiative with regards to his learning. And, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, one of the main aims of the Montessori method is to engender a sense of--altogether now!--independence in children. Parker wanted to revisit pouring this morning, which I took as a sign that my insane interference during school yesterday didn't permanently deter him from this whole learning thing. With his mother muzzled (figuratively, at least), he did really well pouring rice and after ten minutes or so asked, "Can I pour water now?" He did OK pouring water from the pitcher into the cups; pouring water out of the cups back into the pitcher posed more of a challenge. His spills enabled him to practice using a sponge, a skill he took to with seemingly instinctive ease (which is not at all shocking since he sees his mother scrubbing away with a sponge day in and day out). I did have to explain to him that the sponge needs to be wrung out occasionally; squeezing water out of sponges is now his new favorite pastime. He got a little overzealous emptying the cups, shaking them vigorously in an attempt to get every last drop of water out. Wet porcelain (er, glazed ceramic) can get pretty slick and a cup slipped out of his hands and broke. And now my son knows the meaning of the phrase, "handle with care!"

Postscript: Just in case you're wondering, when the cup broke, I remained calm, using the opportunity to explain to Parker why we need to be careful with certain types of things (e.g., ceramic cups, glasses, iPhones)--namely, they break. We bought the 12-item set of cups and saucers at Cost-U-Less (the Caribbean Costco) on St. Thomas for $9.99. I was not exactly crushed to see one cup become a casualty of school.