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JSchaaf
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| Posted: Dec 20 2005 at 10:03am | IP Logged
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Cay and I were getting a little OT in the Unschooling and Laziness thread so I thought I'd bring our discussion over here.
Cay said:
I can start the thread. I just don't know if I can be active in what I start.  And, perhaps, it's just you and I that are needing to account to ourselves.  Could it be because we're both hurricane evacuees?
Really it was the evacuation that gave me the most sense of peace regarding our schooling decisions. I saw people, after only 3 days on the road, trying to find a school to place their children. I sat in FEMA lines and offices listening to people lament their children's education. They were desperate. They had no confidence in themselves or in their dc that they could---and would---learn despite the conditions. Has public education deliberately stripped away people's power to learn and think for themselves???!!!
Instead of observing everything around them and using it as a learning tool, they were in a deadlock theory that learning could only take place in an institution. I know you had your own experience with outside influences, Jennifer.
Once again, I understand their point. They believed their children would do better with some type of normalicy, that their days would be better spent in a classroom with activities and learning opportunities vs. living in a camper filled with 11 people or in a hotel room or in a civic center filled with other evacuees.
The thing that struck me as ironic is that I knew (with no doubt) that these children would not remember a month of spelling or algebra or geography, etc. What they'd remember is the hurricane and the aftermath. What was the purpose in trying to fill their heads with trivial stuff (twaddle) when they already had so much "real life" to process?
My oldest ds was given a chainsaw and an ax and, like his forefathers before him, learned to strip the land and use his back to survive. Using one's back is also very good for working the mind, though modern day educators probably wouldn't agree. You know how much meditating and thinking he did that month? How many survival skills he had to use living without electricity and modern day conveniences? I know that you know, Jennifer. 
It was (is) a decision each one of us has to make (as you have done, Jennifer). We have to observe our situation every year (and sometimes every month) and discern where our dc will learn best. But, no matter what, only our dc will tell us when and how they will learn.
Have I gotten way-OT or what!?
I have a little girl's b-day to celebrate today. So I best get off my soapbox and get busy.
Jennifer again:
I keep trying to analyze our evac time in NY-was putting my girls in school up there a weakness or character flaw on my part (MY life would be easier with the girls in school), or was I reacting to the outside influences? Probably both. I try to look back on the situation but I just can't. Too many emotions.
And putting Anne-Catherine in kindergarten here? Again, probably a hasty decision...but it's been a long 4 months with no dh,no support, no childcare, no church ties, no friends and I was finding I couldn't be ALL things to All my children ALL the time. I am pleased with her school, we were able to get a scholarship to a small Catholic school. That certainly swayed my decision-I think I would have been more adament about keeping her home if our only choice had been the huge public school down the street. I have been leaning too much on Anne-Catherine (she's only 6), she's been the one to see me cry and worry. She's also the one most sensitive to my irritable/crabby/angry times. I think that until I can get myself put back together she's actually happier at school. Breaks my heart to say it, but it's true.
I don't know if she'll return in the fall for first grade. I actually don't have the mental and emotional stamina to think that far in advance. I guess I need to start thinking about it, because registration starts in Feb. Maybe we won't get the scholarship again and our decision will be made for us!!
So, I'm not quite sure of the purpose of my ramblings. But I'm having a good cathartic cry, so I'll go ahead and hit "post"
Jennifer
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Cay Gibson
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| Posted: Dec 20 2005 at 12:26pm | IP Logged
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JSchaaf wrote:
| Cay and I were getting a little OT in the Unschooling and Laziness thread so I thought I'd bring our discussion over here. |
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Great idea, Jennifer.
I've linked it to my blog so hopefully some other hurricane/evacuee victims will find their way here.
JSchaaf wrote:
| I try to look back on the situation but I just can't. Too many emotions. |
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I don't think you should, Jennifer. Not yet. Wounds are too fresh. You've lost your home and all those ties you mentioned here...
JSchaaf wrote:
| ...it's been a long 4 months with no dh,no support, no childcare, no church ties, no friends and I was finding I couldn't be ALL things to All my children ALL the time. I actually don't have the mental and emotional stamina to think that far in advance. But I'm having a good cathartic cry, so I'll go ahead and hit "post" |
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Oh, Jennifer, I hope I wasn't the cause of your "cathartic cry".  I wasn't self-directing any of my comments at you personally. It was a time when many, many, many, many, many personal decisions were made... had to be made . We made them and now we move on. Looking back only brings regrets. Life is not meant for regrets; it's for living.
I think the school officials and authorities learned a lot in that month between Katrina and Rita. Actually they learned A LOT in general but I'm just mentioning this one area. They did not tell our parishes to send dc into schools away from home. On the contrary, they were telling "Don't do it!"
With Katrina, it seemed everyone was ignoring the vital necessity of children staying with their families. They were trying to get them back into the government structure. Katrina was one big governmental upheaval. They didn't look at the overall effect on the children.
I think they realized their mistake with Rita. They realized that going through a hurricane and being evacuated for weeks at a time was dramatizing enough. Putting them into a strange school (where they were stimatized) was not for their well being.
You have made the best decision for your dd. You really have! If she thrives in school, why mess with a good thing? There is still so much you can do with her at home to continue that home schooling mentality that so many of us love and desire. In looking at my dc and what they have learned, I am constantly drawn back to the realization that what they know was not learned from me, a school, etc. It was learned from life and whatever caught their attention at that moment in time.
The school has her...what?...7 hours a day. You have her the other 17 hours! You do the math and figure who's going to be the overall influence in her life. You will. Your home life will. And once your dh gets back home, life will slowly get back to normal and more stable. I think it's more important that you make your home beautiful and wonderful for your girls than worrying about "schooling" them. Make it a haven that invites your girls and your dh to want to come home to. Make it warm and loving. Have Christmas carols playing on the CD when she walks in the door from school. Buy the sugar cookie pre-made rolls ahead of time (no stress, no mess, no work  ). Cut them and let her place them on the cookie sheet while you discuss her school day (or roll the dough out and let the girls use cookie cutters). After they're baked, let the girls ice and sprinkle Christmas sprinkles on them.
Do all that "stuff" we were discussing at the unschooling/lazy thread...you know, all the stuff with "no substance". Ignore the naysayers. There is real substance in what we do within our homes with our dc, whether they are there 24 hours, 17 hours, or only every other weekend of the month (as in the case of divorced parents of which my brother is one). He gets his girls every other weekend and truly does try to give them a "home" that they look forward in coming home to.
There are so many different situations out there. We are all in different situations. And we are all still learning. That's the beauty of Real Learning. It isn't institutionalized or boxed in holes. It isn't a clock on the wall. It isn't something that happens in 7 hours a day or 17 hours a day. It's the atmosphere, the environment, the self-discipline that happens every day of our lives. It's the life we make for ourselves and for those we love.
__________________
Cay Gibson
"There are 49 states, then there is Louisiana." ~ Chef Emeril
wife to Mark '86
mom to 5
Cajun Cottage Under the Oaks
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JSchaaf
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| Posted: Dec 20 2005 at 3:56pm | IP Logged
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Oh, I just wrote a long post and it's gone! 
I'll try it again later...
Jennifer
PS Don't worry about the crying, Cay, it happens every couple of days and it was time!
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JSchaaf
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| Posted: Dec 20 2005 at 4:27pm | IP Logged
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Ok, I'll try again. It seems to me that after Katrina the focus was (rightly so) on the physical-shelter, food, clothes, getting kids into schools. I feel not much attention has been paid (by the media, my family, and myself) to the other needs: mental, emotional, spiritual. I have to say that this is the worst thing to have ever happened in my life. And we did ok after the storm-physically. A month at my mother's, a month in a furnished apt in Alabama, and then to Texas and into a house. I don't know how I would have handled being in a shelter for weeks on end or still living in a FEMA trailer in my driveway. I guess I think (and my family thinks) that everything should be "OK" now...but it's not. I'm not sure if I'm depressed or just burnt out from this ordeal. I've realized that putting Anne-Catherine in school was the RIGHT decision, just maybe not the IDEAL decision!!
I'm so inspired by all the things you said above-but I don't dare try and quote you or I'll lose it all again. Bethany (my 5 year old) actually brought Elizabeth's "Real Learning" into the car with her today-she likes to look at the artwork in the book. Maybe I need to get it back from her and have a re-read. I'm thinking that instead of worrying about school and curricula and what we had been doing and thinking about all the plans that were set aside I need to start fresh-get myself and my home in order and really make a learning atmosphere here at home. Right now it's just a place to hang out it until we need to go out again. We have eaten way too many fast food meals and spend entirely too much time at WalMart and Target-it's almost too much effort to cook a meal and spend some real, quality time with my girls.
Nick will be here tomorrow-part of me thinks that his arrival will bring closure but I know it'll still take a long time to get back to "normal" (Probably as long as it takes to pay off all our hurricane debt!)
I have got to go. I have been spending way too much time on the computer in the last four months. Reading about other people's lives in much easier than dealing with my own,KWIM??
Jennifer
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Kelly
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| Posted: Dec 20 2005 at 7:28pm | IP Logged
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Oh Jennifer, hang in there. Take a deep breath, maybe put your feet up for a while. You've had a tough few months. You're doing a GREAT job in the aftermath of all this huge upheaval in your life. But in the words of Julian of Norwich (is she Blessed or Saint???), "All shall be well and all shall be well, all shall be excedingly well". You're in our continued prayers!
Kelly in FL
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: Hurricane Homeschool
