Exploring light and dark

Sunburst and I spent some time over the summer exploring the lovely qualities of charcoal.

We decided to tackle a series of exercises from Thomas Wildgruber's inspiring book, Painting and Drawing in Waldorf Schools, and we had so much fun.  They start very simply with spheres, and then increase in complexity with each exercise.

The guidance provided with these drawings is wonderful.  I was required to do a little bit of charcoal work in college, but with very little guidance.  Looking back at my youth, I am so aghast that I paid and attended college level art classes that involved no actual instruction.  While we inadvertently learn something through our own repeated ill-attempts, with guidance the process is much less painful and infinitely more productive.

Another thing that struck me about these exercises is that even with such a simple medium, the results vary.  While Sunburst and I were drawing the same things, stylistically, there is a huge difference.  Her drawing style with charcoal has a scratchiness to it that no matter how hard I try, I cannot manage to replicate.  The same is true for her-- she can't soften her drawings to match the feel of mine.  We had a lot of fun trying though.  And as Sunburst is getting older, she really enjoys it when there is something obviously off about my drawings.  Yes, the teenage years have truly begun!

Here you can see the style differences.  I wonder if it has anything to do with temperament.


 


At one point in the exercises you progress to drawing your own image using what you've learned-- the examples for this exercise differ between the German and English editions.   Sunburst couldn't wait for this exercise, because of course she knew exactly what she wanted to draw-- horses!

I was more reluctant because I had absolutely no idea what to draw. In the end though I managed to surprise myself.

We took a small break from there to begin our study of discovery, renaissance and reformation.  We hope to get back to it and complete the last three exercises-- trees and landscapes.  The difference these charcoal drawings have made in Sunburst's renaissance artwork is definitely noticeable.  On more than one occasion lately I have heard her exclaim, "Did I really draw this?!"

We've moved on into taking the dark/light exploration into our work with colored pencils, and the results are really fun.  Moonshine, meanwhile, has been watching this progression with awe.  "Will I be able to draw like that too someday?"

"No," Sunburst told her with all sincerity.  "Your drawings will be even better."

First day back

Today was our first day back to lessons, and the shining faces of my children said it all.  They were so ecstatic to begin another learning adventure.

We started the day with a little ceremony outside in the sun.  I led the children into the back garden with a little follow-the-leader movement song.  It was mostly for Kitty Bill's benefit, but all of them were happy to participate and take up the wonder of the moment.

Tip-toe, tip, tip-toe
Tip-toe, tip, tip-toe
Gallop, gallop, gallop, tip-toe
Gallop, gallop, gallop, tip-toe
Hop, hop, hop, tip-toe,
Hop, hop, hop, tip-toe
Skip, skip, skip, tip-toe
Skip, skip, skip, tip-toe...
Stop!

It's actually a long path to the back garden, but when we finally arrived I welcomed the children with a little song that I made up on the fly-- I can't always manage to plan these things ahead of time.  I welcomed Sunburst into Grade 8 by waving the rainbow over her head, tying a silk around her shoulders, hugging her tightly, and giving her a little something to keep in her pocket.

She helped me wave the rainbow so I could call Moonshine forward to run under the rainbow into her Grade 5 year.  She has been counting down the days until lessons started again, and she was absolutely beaming!  She also had a silk cape, a warm hug, and a little something put in her hand to wonder over.

Then it was Kitty Bill's turn.  He was so happy!  I sang him a little song about growing up and being ready for first grade (again, something I made up on the spot), and then welcomed him under the rainbow with a silk, an extra large hug, and a little something.

The idea for the little somethings  came to me late last night.  I had been racking my brain trying to come up with something special to commemorate this year-- a really special time with all three children engaged in formal learning together.  In my planning over the week I realized that each of them were facing a different adventure this year.  I decided to represent that in symbols.

I went outside and found a suitable branch in our wood pile, sawed off three rounds, and gave them a minimal sanding.  Then I sketched out the symbols and took a woodburner to them.  Kitty Bill received a heart; it's a perfect representation of Grade 1 qualities.  Moonshine received a leaf which represents the new beginning in Grade 5.  We'll dip our toes into the creation stories and myths of several ancient civilizations this year, and we'll learn about the growth of plants in botany.  Sunburst received a compass as we begin our voyage into the discovery of new lands and new ideas, battles and rebellions, but it's also so she doesn't lose her way into the teenage years.  I purposely left the directions off the compass so that she could find her own north, her own way.

She seemed to get it.

The special somethings were a big hit.  Throughout the day I spied each one of them taking up their wooden symbols and caressing them, studying them, even smelling them.  Sunburst and Moonshine are already planning to independently knit special bags to keep them in.

And all that worry about how I was going to adjust our rhythm to teach three children was for naught. Somehow I managed to present three main lessons today.  I led Kitty Bill into the opening of his wondrous alphabet story, walked Moonshine into the realm of the mysterious, sinking Atlantis, and dove headlong into sea voyages of discovery with Sunburst.  It was a day of stories, singing, forms, bean bags, counting, balancing games, clay modeling, knitting, German, and mathematics.

Around four o'clock, after completing two pages of review on geometry and ratios, Sunburst asked me, "Is that it?  I feel like we haven't done enough today."  Silly girl.  As Moonshine was busy modeling her idea of Atlantis in clay, even Kitty Bill asked for more work.  In the end, he agreed to take up his new block crayons and draw a picture of his entrance into first grade.

I remember when the girls first tried out drawing pictures with their block crayons.  I vividly recall teaching each one to gently shape the forms instead of drawing with lines.  Neither of them thought it was easy.  They both struggled with holding the blocks in just the right way.  Sunburst used too much force; Moonshine didn't use enough.  Drawing with these crayons really is an art lesson in and of itself.

Since I wasn't having Kitty Bill draw in a lesson book, it didn't occur to me to guide him.  I wasn't even watching.  I didn't model anything for him to replicate.  I just said, "Why don't you draw something from today with the rainbow," and this is what he came up with.

The girls saw it first, and they were amazed.  How did he know to do it without lines?  How did he know to shape it?  How did he know to make the cape behind?  How did he get everything so perfect?

He shrugged his shoulders and told them that he had been watching them draw for a long time now.  As if it were that easy.

Each of them shared their hopes and dreams with me for learning and growing this year, and when I kissed each one of them goodnight, they all remarked at how excited they were for tomorrow.  It can't come soon enough.

I have a feeling this is going to be a really great year.

Passing notes

Friday afternoon I found myself sitting at the table fidgeting with a piece of paper. I was sitting there trying to come up with new and exciting ways to explain how a person can remember 7x8=56, and like Sunburst, I was drawing a blank. We had already talked about how nicely it goes 5-6-7-8 (56=7x8). And we had also noticed how it was 7x4 doubled. But beyond those things, I had nothing. The seven times table can be like that. So I sat there, letting my mind wander, and I began playing with the sheet of paper. With my help, it folded itself into a note.

Do you remember folding notes?

It seems like several lifetimes have passed since middle school, but I still fondly remember jotting down my most important little thoughts on notebook paper, folding them up into little packages complete with tiny pull-tabs and passing them to my best friend. I'd wait anxiously for her reply, and then I'd fire off another note. To protect our identities we had clever nicknames for each other, which we changed mercilessly and often--- Sparky/Shaggy, Nikki/ Vince, Gordie/Chambers, Mrs. Taylor/Mrs. LeBon, Mickey/Davy, Inchworm/Dead Inchworm, Fish-Head/Dead Fish-Head... nothing was off-limits, apparently.

I don't remember ever getting caught, even by the dreaded Ms. Yanagihashi, who as the detention marm, inspired dread in the souls of all sixth-graders. We were careful and calculated, Sparky and I, and our passing of notes continued for many years... crammed through locker vents, hastily pressed into each other hands in the hallways and courtyards of school, and when our paths diverged into separate high schools, the fancily-folded notes of yore gave way to entire notebooks of random thoughts, odd doodles, and teenage rants exchanged at length over phone calls or weekend sleepovers.

It's been a long time since the days of passing notes with Mrs. Taylor. A few years ago she sent me one of the notebooks of notes I had given her during our Freshman year, after extracting an explicit promise from me to mail it back to her or suffer the dire consequences of her wrath. It was awful and embarrassing as an adult to comb through those pages I had written at 14-- so much angst, so much uncertainty. But like it or not, those were my important thoughts back then, both the good and the ugly, the silly and the morose. For whatever reason they must have meant something to her, and she kept them all these long years.

I sat there basking in nostalgia and idly playing with the little pull-tab I had crafted on the note in front of me. Suddenly I knew what I had to do.

I picked up the nearest pencil, and in teeny tiny letters, I wrote on that tab: 7x8.

I opened up the note, and inside, I wrote the words: "the answer is 56." I folded it back up again and slyly passed it to Sunburst. She took one look at it and grinned. She unfolded and folded that note many times. And then she wrote me a note of her own, folded up in just the same way.

About fifteen minutes later she passed me a note of her own making. I was giddy as I imagined what exciting bit of news or sweet words of endearment she was passing me. The little pull tab said, "Sara" on it, and inside I found the words: "Is it time for lunch yet?" Endearment? I suppose with a nine-year-old that's close enough.

During lunch she told me 7x8=56. So I took that as a cue and secretly made her two more notes folded in equally enthralling ways. 8x8 made it into a heart-folded note, along with the answer and my own words of endearment for her. She found it on the stairs on her way to bed. She snatched it up quick as lightning and hid it under her pillow. When I came upstairs to tuck her in, she was smiling brightly, but didn't say a word about the note. After I said the bedtime prayer and kissed her goodnight, she told me, "64. 8x8 is 64." She pulled the opened note from under her pillow and asked me to show her how to fold it back up again.

We folded and refolded the heart-shaped note several times, and she admitted to me that she thought this was the neatest way ever to learn the times table. She couldn't believe she was actually learning this stuff, that she only had two more problems to go, and she was so proud of herself. She said, "I doubt teachers can pass notes like this in public school, and I bet no one has ever learned the times table like this before. It's so interesting mom. Interesting and creative. I'm sure glad I'm homeschooled." And if that wasn't enough sugar-coated syrup to melt my heart, she looked at me with shining eyes and said, "Everyone should feel lucky to have a mom."

Yep, she had me in tears. Does homeschooling get any better than this?

The next morning at breakfast Sunburst discovered an arrow-folded note that read 8x12. She looked at me knowingly before slowly and carefully opening it. She read the answer inside, and closed it back up again. A little while later she told me the answer.

"Only one more problem to go," I told her. "Do you remember which one is left?"

"12x12," she said. "But I think it's 144."

Why Homeschool?

In the past two weeks I have met more and more families that are considering homeschooling. More than have crossed my path in the past two years. Way more than since I was first introduced to the idea of homeschooling over ten years ago, before I had children of my own. Today it is estimated that there are somewhere between 1 and 2 MILLION homeschooled children in the Unites States, increasing at a rate of 7-15% per year. The sheer number of us is astounding!

And it's no wonder. Homeschooling is not a new idea. It's the oldest educational system there is. Parents have always been teaching their children, from humans to wombats, it's cross-cultural and cross-species, and has been around for as long as there has been life on this planet. We're just returning back to the old ways, the natural way things used to be. There is nothing novel about it.

I shouldn't be surprised that others have come to similar conclusions that I have about the U.S. public school system. Some folks say that it sucks the life right out of their children. Others say No Child Left Behind sucks the life right out of the teachers, so it's no wonder. They're between a rock and a hard place, as the old adage goes. They have to teach to the tests to maintain funding. There is no time left to stop and smell the proverbial roses. No time for experiential learning or fun and games. Music and art and sports have been labelled extra-curricular rather than fundamental to the educational experience, and in some places done away with entirely. And many people say that the loss of those things, among others, turns our children into robots. They say that public school is a factory, a machine, and our children are squeezed through the process until they emerge on the other side, dumbed down, nondescript, submissive and spiritless. Or cynical and maybe even angry.

Me? I don't know. I'm a product of that system. It wasn't a fate worse than death, but it wasn't terrific. I got out before the major budget cuts, before the stringent testing, before anyone talked about viable educational alternatives. There are many reasons not to send your kids to school. We could bash the public educational system until the cows come home, but to what point? Who does it serve?

I think a more interesting question is: Why are people homeschooling? What's the payoff? What does it do for your children? For your family?

What could I say to all these people that are on the fence, or interested but overwhelmed, that would really give them a fuller sense of what homeschooling is all about? I've been thinking about it, and have come to realize that what's really key is not my curriculum choice. It's more about how I teach than what I teach. In that sense I don't think I'm really that different from the larger homeschooling flock. My reasons are simple, my findings are ordinary. Ordinary among homeschooling parents, and yet... they are phenomenal. Ordinary phenomena.

Subject matter aside, my children are learning:

• to think for themselves
• to question
• to find their own answers or truths
• that the right answers are often a matter of perspective
• to trust themselves
• to be interested
• to create and explore
• to develop relationships with each other, their parents, and the world
• that they have a voice
• that they're unique and special
• to dream
• to follow those dreams
• and that they, and their dreams, matter

Even if they learn nothing else, I will have done my job.

But in my experience with other homeschooling families and teaching my own children, it's obvious that homeschooled children also learn the key curricular ideas of our time-- the three Rs. They also manage to learn physics, astronomy, biology, chemistry, engineering, history, sociology, etc, etc. And they do it remarkably well because they love learning. Being able to learn something at your own pace and because you're interested in it is incredibly motivating. Initially I was worried that my children might not be interested in the right stuff, but the fascinating thing is that if you let them guide their own learning the content seems to just bubble up out their interests and questions. They manage to turn a pirate card game into a lesson of physics, world geography, geometry, history, and moral fortitude.

The bonus factor is that I'm learning all these things, too. It's no secret that most homeschooling parents find themselves repairing their own educational shortcomings, everything from physics to self-esteem, in the process of educating their own children. We're all learning how to stand up and follow our dreams.

It's not an education of facts. It's an education of spirit that no institution could ever hope to compete with.