How to uncover drive and determination

This is a guest post from Danielle Ali Shah. She is an Australian living in Rawalpindi, Pakistan with her husband, and three children whom she homeschools. You can read her blog here. This post is about Danielle’s daughter, Diyana, pictured above.

I often think of my kids as pretty non-self motivated learners, since they tend to glue themselves to their computers to play games for hours on end whenever they are allowed. It is one of my biggest fears with the idea of unschooling… that they will NEVER leave their computers if they were given the choice.

But lately I have realised that learning doesn’t always come in the form you expect it. Read more

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Learning in the 21st century is unlearning

I can see that books are becoming retro. People don’t have stacks of them in their home anymore. And lately I’m seeing books as artifacts, like a globe that shows Africa smaller than the US. But I am convinced that it’s important for me to leave books laying around because I see, in hindsight, that my parents had a lot of influence on me based on the books they had around the house.

For example, I spent a lot of time reading the encyclopedia. But our edition was one of the last made by Britannica, and it was so complex, with an index of abstracts and then a reference to a page of an article in another volume that seemed, often, unrelated, so that actually, I was reading a print version of the Internet, and, no surprise, it got cumbersome very fast. So I turned to the shelf of Agatha Christie mysteries and wished I had found those before I blew through the shelf of Nancy Drews at the library. Read more

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Kids suffer long-term from schoolwork that doesn’t interest them

When people ask me why my kids aren’t learning math, I ask them why their kids aren’t learning an instrument. Or why they aren’t learning a language. Because math, music, and language all develop the brain in similar ways. They are all good for a similar type of learning. But the question that assumes that math is the one right way to develop that part of the brain betrays the assumption that traditional school knows best.

Traditional school has kids do a little of everything. So parents have in their heads that this is the right way. This would be okay, of course, if we didn’t live in a world that rewards specialists. For ten years I have been writing about how important specializing is for your career. Specialization is essential, really, to staying employable throughout your adult life. But I have recently been blown away by how clear the research is that kids should specialize as well. Read more

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My brush with Internet censorship

We are by our patch of daylilies, next to the barn. And the boys are playing with sticks, while my husband and I watch. It is a perfect moment. One of those moments when I feel like maybe, just maybe, I can stop worrying if I’m a good enough parent.

My son says, “Look! The stick is a laser and I’m killing villains!”

“Look! The stick is a ship in outer space and I’m flying!”

“Look! The stick is a pole and I’m dancing!”

WHAT?????

I say that. I say, “What?” And he says it again. And he moves his hips in a perfectly pole-dancing way.

“Where did you learn that?”

“On YouTube.”

Read more

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How to teach kids to reach big goals

It’s recital time. My youngest son just had his cello recital. While I was sitting in my seat, watching eighty kids run around eighty cellos and hopefully not crushing them, I thought about the last meeting I had with my son’s psychiatrist.

We go to a child psychiatrist so I can have someone keeping tabs on me. I want to know that I’m doing okay and not messing up my kids as I take them way way off the beaten path.

The psychiatrist said that I need to make sure the kids have goals they have to work hard to achieve. Read more

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Why you should homeschool gifted kids

Now that I have a kid who is really talented, I can see what not really talented looks like.

For example, his skateboard teacher tells me he’s great. But I think to myself, well, is he one of the best in the country for his age right now? Probably no. I see the 12-year-old who just landed a 1080. My son is not on track for that, I don’t think. And also, I took him to skate in Los Angeles, and I have to say that no one stopped us to tell us how blown away they were with his skating. (Wondering if you have a kid who is talented in sports? You can study the process of identifying sports talent here.)
Read more

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Dispatch from the Wisconsin election: True school activists vote for Walker

It’s election day here in Wisconsin. We are voting to recall the governor. Or not.

I have never voted for a Republican in my whole life. Governor Walker is tied closely to the NRA, he is anti-abortion, he is generally against everything I stand for. But you know what? I hope he wins.

Because I think today’s election is a referendum on school unions, and I think the unions stink. I think they hold back school reform, they give antiquated protections to school employees that do not deserve any special treatment when most workers are not protected. And there cannot be drastic school reform until there can be drastic hiring and firing. That’s how corporate America makes significant changes—by hiring and firing. So we need to do that in schools as well.

Read more

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The argument against raising well-rounded kids

There’s a reason that you see so many photos of the same activities on this blog. Because I’m not a big fan of dabbling. I want the kids to find what they are great at and focus on that. There is a wide body of research to show that being great at something feels a lot better than dabbling.

We should use this research to guide education, because nowhere in the world is well-roundedness still valuable. The last time you actually needed to be well-rounded was when the landed gentry was trying to marry off one of their daughters in the 1500’s. Then, it was good to find a woman who could dance, speak a bit of French, cook enough to supervise the household help, and play a bit of piano and keep up with male conversation about politics if need be. That’s well rounded. Read more

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Homeschoolers don’t need a science curriculum

It turns out that test scores for US students are going down for science. And Steven Strauss, a leadership fellow at Harvard, says the US is approaching Third-World status because student math scores are so low. But you know what? Math scores are not the harbinger of developing society. Women entering the workforce and earning their own money is what leads a developing country out of Third-World status.

And you know what? Science scores are not what make women employable. Grit, determination, and self-confidence make women employable. Not because you can wish your way to the workforce, but because those traits make you able to get the help and mentoring you need to make your own money. Read more

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How to teach kids to buy happiness

If you are going to focus on teaching kids soft skills for successful living, then of course you are going to teach them about money. The idea of an allowance is becoming controversial. Maybe it’s not such a great idea.  But if you are going to teach money, then why not teach how to buy happiness? After all, what better lesson is there? So here are four lessons about buying happiness that kids can learn as kids.

1. Anticipation makes a purchase more exciting.
It was clear to me that we’d be buying a bike this summer. The kids learned to ride bikes on our trip to California, and my youngest son is hooked. Read more

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