How We Continue To Mesh Charlotte Mason, Waldorf, and Self-Directed Learning

            In a Charlotte Mason education, a lot of subjects are covered each day, but lessons are short.  At the beginning of this fifth grade school year, I wrote about my struggle to choose between doing it the traditional CM way and following a CM model schedule or working more from a block rotation schedule similar to what is done in Waldorf programs and schools.  I decided to go with the block rotation ala Waldorf, and I’m happy with that decision.      

We do writing, math, poetry, art appreciation, music appreciation, and ballet on a consistent basis, but rotate out history, literature, and science.  This doesn’t mean that she doesn’t learn any history or science during a literature block.  The point of doing things in a rotating block is so that we have less things to “check off.”  In a way, it’s more to help my sanity than anything else.  I’m not left with an empty nagging feeling of…”Oh Gawd….there’s so much we didn’t get done today.” 

For now, our block is literature. S is reading My Side Of The Mountain by Jean Craighead George.  Her cursive writing practice is being done through dictation and copywork. She works on typing and grammar practice through her written narrations.  We do rotate out cursive and typing practice. If she does a written narration one day, then she would do copywork and dictation on alternating days.  She is given about twenty-four math problems each day.  The artist for this term is Van Gogh. She just finished a biography on him.  The poem for this week is “Words To An Irish Air” by Aline Murray Kilmer. 

             

Aline Murray Kilmer

Just because our current block is literature, that doesn’t mean other topics aren’t discussed or covered in some manner.  S can read or do independent online “research” on a topic in science or whatever during her free time - and I’ll help her if she wants my help.  She is currently learning about the pirates Mary Read and Ann Bonny.  I didn’t assign this in any way. She found out about Read and Bonny from the internet and is running with it.  She also loves watching survival videos.  I do count her independent self-directed learning in her yearly logs.   This independent learning is not antithetical to the CM philosophy. In fact, it fits nicely with the CM idea that afternoons should be left free for individual pursuits and interests. 

Savoring History in The Primary Years

        S has wrapped up her lessons on Ben Franklin.  (She actually wrapped them up over a month ago. I just hadn't gotten around to blogging.)  So, what have I learned from this process?  Before becoming familiar with the work of Charlotte Mason, I think I would have had her quit the book after the first two pages.  The writing and expressions are somewhat archaic.  As a non Christian child, some of the references made no sense to her and had to be explained to her. She was not happy in the beginning.  But, I have come to understand that the art of learning to read this somewhat archaic style of writing (not THAT archaic  - 1950s and written for children) will set her up for success with reading classics later on. Within the Charlotte Mason method, the approach is to read only a few pages and to spread out the reading of a book over a longer period of time than you would typically see in most educational settings.  This method worked so well for us because we could discuss the words and expressions, and then I could explain them within their cultural context. (I'm not trying to suggest that you can't explain things with longer readings.)  Also, by feeling like we only needed to do one or two pages, it removed any anxiety to keep going under stress. 

After a few pages, S was on a roll. She adjusted to the style writing and didn’t need much further explanation. She was able to narrate back from the readings. It can be so funny what a child will pick up on from a book.  Of all the things about Ben Franklin, the thing that stood out the most to her was Franklin’s bathtub that he designed with a board over it with only his head sticking out so that he could have visitors to his ship cabin while he was in the bathtub.  I think the illustration also helped to cement that image in her head.   In a later retelling, I thought that she was saying that Ben Franklin was in the stockade, but then I realized she was talking about his bathtub.   

It is in the Charlotte Mason philosophy to not interfere too much with the narration process.  This is the moment for the student to share what she has gleaned from the reading.  The teacher does not tell the student what she was supposed to have learned from the lesson.  It's about respecting the student's connection to the author's work.  There can be some flexibility with this, but generally speaking asking leading questions or trying to solicit a specific answer is not encouraged in a Charlotte Mason education.  

My long term hope is that S will develop the same love of history that her grandmother, mother, and siblings have by forming a connection to the people of history. And that is also a fundamental aspect of a CM education.  In later years, students often really enjoy history classes and have an easier time with learning the material because they have formed a connection to these long departed people by having heard their stories.  There is connection that has been tended through the years. Those connections are formed by not racing through biographies, but by savoring them as best as can be done.

Math: Slow Down!

                                                    Slow Math

                What is It?  Slow math is the teaching of mathematics at a pace much slower than what is taught in schools and other curriculums.  Slow math is a direct challenge to the idea that math must be studied everyday and early on in order to be prepared for higher math.   In slow math, a fifth grader can be learning basic multiplication.

In our house, my fifth grade daughter uses a Melissa and Doug abacus to do her basic multiplication; and I prefer it this way.  I prefer it this way because she is not learning multiplication facts out of context.  She understands that 8 x 4 means eight bars of 4 beads on each bar.  Or she can draw out eight bags and fill each bag with four circles and count the circles to get 32.   She also understands that 8 x 4 means 4+4+4+4+4+4+4+4.   Mathematics is about relations and calculations are done by understanding how figures in a problem relate to each other.    Fast math is so obsessed with memorization early on that many kids (not all) completely lose any concept of how numbers relate to each other.

                What does the research say? Well, the Sudbury schools have no required courses.  Many of their students’ first math class is in 10^th grade and it’s a course to prepare them for the SATs.  Their results? Their students pass just fine.  Students who have never had a math class until 10^th grade, pass the SAT after a 20 week crash course in math. 

                There was an experiment done in a district in 1929 in which math was removed from the curriculum until 6^th grade.  By the end of 6^th grade, the students had caught up to their fellow students in neighboring districts. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201003/when-less-is-more-the-case-teaching-less-math-in-school

              In fairness, I know that we cannot fully compare the outcomes in 1929 to 2017.  For example, kids in 1929 might have been exposed to more real life math as they may have learned certain skills such as knitting and woodworking that use basic math.   Kids might have been more likely to use (or see their parents use) scales to measure ingredients. These details do make a difference, but I think that the point that delaying math instruction does no harm still stands.

                In our homeschool, math has been a part of the learning process, but it has been more of an elective.  My daughter did work through the Red Workbook in the Miquon series using Cuisenaire rods in first grade.  We did not continue with the program as I wanted to give math workbooks a bit of a rest.  A concern that was brought up was that sometimes with spiral learning (as done in Miquon), students sometimes don’t get a full grasp of some of the fundamentals of math and this can cause some problems later on.

                One thing that we did do a lot of was math games – in particular, Money Bags and Sum Swamp.  We also read a biography of Ada Byron Lovelace and she has watched the movie Hidden Figures many, many times. 

              We’re not following a math curriculum this year. I write out math problems for her to solve and then we discuss how she solved them.  Sometimes she has memorized the correct answer and sometimes she uses her abacus to find the answer.  I don’t mind if she uses the abacus because I’m happy that not knowing the answer is not a reason to quit or leave the space blank. If she doesn’t know the answer, she knows how to find out the answer.  She is also learning the trick of “If I know that 3x3 is 9, then (counting on fingers 10, 11, 12)  3x4 is 12.  Again, it’s about understanding and recognizing mathematical relationships.

My hero

   
         Truth be told, I couldn't have made it through this Hurricane Weekend without this girl. She is the one who got the air mattresses set up and inflated. (Just plug in and turn on, but still hard for me due to lingering back problems.) She got our stuff unpacked and repacked. When all phones except our one back-up line were down, she delivered my handwritten messages to the nurses' desks and to Asst. Dir of Nursing. After my shift was over, she returned to the dining room to help serve meals to the evacuees and sweep the dining room floor. 

Working Through Hurricane Irma

          This is my first entry after Hurricane Irma.  By the time Irma hit our area, it was down to a category 1 hurricane.  Seneca and I went to stay on the campus of the retirement community where I work along with many other associates.  Our hurricane experience was one of really being able to see a community pull together and everyone be able to be of service. 
           The news of the hurricane caused somewhat of a panic in Florida and people ran to the stores to stock up and fill up their gas tanks and, in many cases, gas cans which resulted in thousands of people searching for gas, food, and bottled water in the days leading up to the storm.  Preparedness is one thing, but this became panic and hoarding.  I was able to buy two cases of bottled water only because a Walgreens employee was guarding the cart of waters and selling two cases per family.  My brother found gas for me - I was almost empty.  I was so low on gas because I was waiting for payday to get gas. I had no idea that by payday my town would be almost out of gasoline.
        People may ask, why didn't I evacuate with my kids. Short answer: I knew that there was no danger.  I have lived in Florida for nineteen years and I have never experienced a hurricane.  Many hurricanes hit Florida and cause widespread devastation, but during my nineteen years here, not one has hit the county I live in. So, while everyone else was panicking, I was completely calm -as was everyone else in my family.   It wasn't the storm that started to cause me some anxiety, it was the fact that there wasn't much food to choose from to stock up on.  It was also the thought of sleeping at work on an air mattress (which I would need to get) with my bad back.
        Hurricane Irma caused the largest evacuation in American History.  And if you ask me, a good portion of that was unnecessary panic.  I'm not talking about people who live on the coastlines or in manufactured homes or in flood zones.  They needed to get out to safety.  One week before Hurricane Irma hit, we had a tropical storm that caused flooding and damage to homes, vehicles, and businesses.  Anyone who was effected by the flooding would likely have been very concerned about an approaching hurricane and choose to evacuate.  I can understand evacuating in those circumstances, but I still think that a lot of the evacuation was the result of unnecessary panic.  Don't forget that the evacuation caused a massive gasoline shortage for those who stayed behind - and those who stayed behind were nurses, caregivers, FPL workers, tree removal people, food service workers, AND we needed that gasoline to run the generators here.  Next time, I hope people think long and hard about their decision to evacuate.  If it's necessary, go, but ask yourself if it is really an issue of safety.  In my case, it would have been selfish and irresponsible of me to hog up the road and hotels when I knew my house and my work (where my daughter and I would stay at for the actual storm) were perfectly safe.  If I thought a Category 4 or 5 hurricane was coming, I would evacuate.  But I am not evacuating for a category 1 or 2 hurricane.
         Anyhow, as I have said, my ten year old daughter and I moved onto the campus of the retirement community where I work.  My dear friend, Niki, lent us her our mattresses after I put a call out on Facebook asking if anyone had any that they could lend us for the weekend.   For our first night, Seneca and I stayed in an empty apartment in one of the independent living buildings along with some of my co-workers.
       On the night of the actual storm, Seneca joined me at Health Center.  my desk at thewhich was moved to the conference room - away from the front lobby. She fell asleep early on, and housekeeping staff brought us blankets and pillows.   Our phones and computers went down. We lost power, but then our generator kicked on.  For the storm, windows were boarded up, so I was almost oblivious to the actual storm raging.  All of our residents, had to be moved out of their rooms and into the hallways (despite having boarded up windows) in their wheelchairs. Staff did everything they could to make everyone as comfortable as possible.  Snacks and juice were served.  But still, it was hard on these people who simply wanted to be able to go to sleep.    Our residents in our independent living buildings also had to come out of their apartments and into the hallways during the storm.  I learned later that members of the community's housekeeping staff sat with residents who were nervous and scared during the storm.  Sometimes just having someone there to help you feel safe really does make all the difference.      
                   Before and after the storm, our executive and leadership staff had on their sneakers and were all pitching in and doing physical work to keep the community running, and to help members from a sister-community who were evacuated to our location.   And our maintenance crew never stopped. They were out there during the storm.  And when we lost generator power after the storm, they ran from one pump to the next to get fuel to the generators and to get the window boards down as fast as possible.
      Not only did staff come together and serve the residents, but residents volunteered to help deliver meals and even to take in staff members into their spare bedrooms and pull-out couches.  The community pulled together and even hosted another assisted living community that was evacuated to our location.