Category Archives: homeschooling

A reading program for struggling readers, and a speech training program for struggling talkers

homeschooling, parenting, Trisomy 21

At the beginning of this school year, I attended a meeting for mothers of my first grader’s class.

When the teacher discussed the different things they would be doing, she mentioned that they would be beginning reading this year. I asked if they would be using the McGuiness reading method, and must have winced when she said they would, since she asked me if I had a problem with that.

I explained that it was extremely slow, and my eleven year old is still not reading Hebrew independently after three and a half years of McGuiness. He is very bright and I expected he would learn to read within a year; he unquestionably had the capacity. I was very optimistic and relieved that Hebrew reading was something I wasn’t going to have to teach when he began at this school but have since learned that the approach is agonizingly slow. I said that it was frustrating and disappointing for me because he wants to be able to read his parsha in shul for his bar mitzva, and I don’t see how that’s going to happen with this slow reading program.

My last comment caused a rash of whispering and shaking of heads amongst the other mothers. Clearly they thought I was completely unrealistic in my hopes for him and were tsk tsking to one another.

It’s interesting that not one of the other mothers came over to speak to me afterwards, even though I’m the only one in the class who has an older child in this school and has experience raising an older child with a disability. Maybe they were all put off by my comment.

One person wasn’t put off, and that was a new assistant. She came over to speak to me privately, and told me that a family member of hers trained in a different approach to reading and has seen a lot of success. She further explained that the course is available for parents so they can teach their own child to read.

I thanked her and looked it up right away when I got home. It’s a video training program for parents, accompanied by a workbook to use when learning with the child. It sounded interesting, but it was expensive and I was afraid to buy something like that and not see it through.

I know my strengths and I know my weaknesses. Systematic application of detailed programs are something I have to put a lot of conscious effort into, and I wasn’t sure that realistically I would be able to follow through. I have a tremendous amount on my plate at any given time, and it was the beginning of the school year and before the fall holidays, which are especially busy times. I was afraid I would buy the program and it would languish mostly unused, leaving me with guilt that I not only wasted the money but didn’t take steps to help my son with reading. I have enough things on my mental list that I wanted to do but didn’t follow through with, and really didn’t want to add something else to that list.

———————————

While I was thinking about the reading program, someone else told me about a speech training method that would help my children’s articulation. Both my eleven year old and seven year old have Down syndrome/Trisomy 21, and thank G-d are smart kids. But their speech can be hard to understand at times. We’ve come very far with the help of Gemiini – ds11 was diagnosed with apraxia at age two, and by age five when he met a new speech therapist, she said it must have been a mistaken diagnosis because he didn’t have signs of it.

It wasn’t a mistaken diagnosis – we did a lot of work on our own using Gemiini and together with our own strategies, that helped him move forward in speech significantly.

The speech method I was told about is called Verbal Motor Learning (VML) and training would begin in December and be held mostly over Zoom for attendees in Israel. Again, I went back and forth in my mind about the expense (about four thousand shekels) and if I had the capacity to apply what I learned on a consistent basis.

Now I also had to consider which of the two programs was more important – reading or speech? Could I do even one of them? But both were so important to me.

After several months deliberating, I finally decided to jump in and get the reading program during Chanuka vacation. I would get started right away and get some traction, and then would sign up to begin the speech training.

Naturally, plans don’t always work out the way we intend.

The materials for the speech program didn’t come for a week, and by then vacation was over. In addition to usually having ds11 home with me (that’s been the case most of the year – a topic for another post), I was then busy setting up and meeting with therapists for the twins and other school meetings for them that had been delayed because of the war.

The deadline for the speech training was coming up. I finally sent in the registration form online, but didn’t get a response back. When I called, I learned that due to lack of enrollment, the Israel training wouldn’t be held and my forms hadn’t been received. I asked if there was another online training available. There was – just one more. It would begin two weeks later, taught in English and translated into Romanian, with the live demonstration portion taught in Romania.

The hours of the course are very difficult for me – two full days a month (9 am to 5:30 pm), then another evening from 6 – 10:30 pm, three days in a row. The training in Israel that was cancelled had been morning hours, with classes twice a week – that was more doable for me. But I decided to sign up, even though I can’t go to Romania for the hands-on workshop.

I’ll share more at a later time about each of these programs when I have more experience with them both. This is where I’m up to now:

It’s been about five weeks since I’ve been doing reading sessions with ds11 and it’s going really well. He loves it and every night before bed – when I’m so tired I really don’t want to do anything – he reminds me that we need to do reading and enthusiastically brings me the workbook. He’s great with a structure and keeps me on track! It’s very, very encouraging to see his progress so far.

Last month, I began the speech training program; right now I’m in the middle of the second month’s sessions. Most of the others on the training are speech therapists who work with non-verbal children; most are in Romania but there are a few from other European and South American countries. I’m the only one from Israel and there’s no one from America.

Even though as the eternal student I generally love learning, this isn’t easy or enjoyable for me. Almost from the beginning I could see what an incredible tool it could be for my boys, if I could see it through. However, I find it draining to sit on Zoom for so many hours. And it’s not easy on my family.

Last month, the twins got completely dysregulated after just one afternoon of me not taking care of them, even though the older boys and my husband were with them, and even though they saw me in the bedroom and talked with me briefly. They both just lost it emotionally.

The hours of the training allow me to get the kids ready and take them to school as usual, and at 9 am start the classes. Often during the week a child will stay home with me for a day, and the kids regularly ask me whose day it is to stay home. Yesterday when asked who was staying home, I told them everyone was going to school that day and I would be doing my classes from the computer, at home.

A few hours later, I got a call from dd6’s teacher to ask me if something was wrong with her, that she was very emotional, complaining that different parts of her body hurt and crying about everything. We had a relaxed and pleasant morning before that, nothing was out of the norm; I never send a child to school who indicates they aren’t feeling well. She was fine.

She came home and screamed and cried literally off afternoon, even though I was home and available for them. I haven’t seen her act like this in months. I believe that something about hearing I would be doing classes while she was in kindergarten caused her to feel like I wasn’t available even though she wasn’t home at the time.

They’ll be waking up soon and I’ll be sure to be extra reassuring and not mention the classes – yesterday morning I literally made only one comment in passing that I would be doing classes. I’m a very strong emotional regulator for her and it was pretty powerful to see how when she thought – not experienced – me not being available to her, it threw her into an emotional tailspin.

Last month the older boys had a couple of days off and together with my husband, took care of the kids while I was doing the training. This month I have chosen to make up the afternoon sessions and review the recording afterward (I usually attend live) so that I am there for them. This is more challenging for me but I hope it will help the twins stay on a more even keel.

Avivah

The disappointments in raising animals

homeschooling, parenting

When you raise animals, you learn a lot about disappointment.

There’s so much time, money and energy that go into raising animals, but the end result isn’t completely in your hands.

My fifteen year old son learned a lot from his experiencing raising chicks last year, and applied all those lessons to this season’s hatching. He renovated the incubator he built, set up good systems to protect the newborn chicks from injury, worked out the heating lamp system to keep the baby chicks warm as they grew, and the first two batches of chicks did really well.

Until he switched their food for Pesach. Six of his bigger chicks died in two days. We don’t know how many more would have died on Pesach, because…

Right after the first day of Pesach was over, all of his chicks were stolen from our gated backyard in the middle of the night. Every single one, from the new batch and the older batch. The afternoon before forty chicks were running all over the backyard, and the next morning none were left. When my son told me, I couldn’t believe it. I kept trying to think of a different reason to account for their disappearance.

It’s quite disconcerting to experience a theft like this.

I have a very, very good guess about who stole them. It’s very likely it was the same lovely children who stole his male goose on Shabbos morning last year. The children who two years ago stole all the tools a professional worksman left next to my gate, then claimed they didn’t have anything when I went to their home to reclaim them – and continued to claim they didn’t have anything as one by one, the tools were revealed in their yard. (Their mother standing right there said nothing but a very weak, “We don’t take other peoples’ things,” clearly not caring at all and not making any apology for the blatant theft of expensive professional tools.)

When something like this happens, you see how much we rely on parents to keep our world safe – when parents turn a blind eye or tacitly encourage these activities, it’s very hard to find recourse.

My boys are pretty certain about who it was, too, but won’t say a word about the evidence they have to support that conviction – they’ve accepted on themselves not to talk about those people. Interestingly, the morning after the chicks were stolen, the boy I suspect came to ask if we had spare pieces for a bike. He’s not a friend, and has never come to our home before. There’s no reason for him to ask us for this – and it made me very much wonder if he had entered our backyard (that can’t be seen into by passerby) and seen the bikes waiting to be repaired there. Who knows? I’m impressed with my son’s equanimity and his choice not to dwell on it, despite the significant financial loss and energy investment.

My son began incubating another very large batch of eggs. Two weeks into the three week incubation period, the power went out for fifteen hours. He was concerned the chicks were going to die, and most did – but thirty out of two hundred hatched. Not a great success rate but better than nothing.

In the meantime, one of his hens began sitting on her own eggs. When the first chick hatched, she took a walk with him. While she was off her nest, another hen sat down and co-opted the nest, then hatched the second chick, then walked around proudly with him.

My son wasn’t happy with that – he felt it was unfair for the first mother chick who did all the work for three weeks to have someone steal her nest. Somehow they worked it out between the hens, because a day or two later, the first mother had reclaimed her nest and the second chick. Barnyard drama. 🙂

As soon as the latest chicks were hatched, my son put them underneath the mother sitting on her nest. Chicks do best when raised by mothers and it’s much less intensive than using a heat lamp. By the time he had given her twenty chicks, she was very busy gathering them all under her to keep them warm.

So my son put another hen in with her to help her out, then put the rest of the newly hatched chicks in. So far they’ve lost three who weren’t kept warm enough, but all the rest are doing great.

It’s not just our experience, having especially bad luck raising chicks or animals that things like this happen. It’s the nature of it. There’s often something unexpected that goes wrong. Neighboring children bought ten chicks from my son’s first hatching, and did a fantastic job keeping them alive. Then a couple of days ago they woke up to three dead chicks in their coop, and the other seven were missing. (Their rooster they got from us was stolen the same night that my son’s chicks were stolen.)

They didn’t know what could have happened until they watched the replay on their security cameras. A fox repeatedly throughout the night came in and out of their yard, each time taking a chick with him. I know they planned a trap for the fox the next night, anticipating he would return for the three chicks he killed, but I didn’t yet hear an update.

I felt so badly for the children; I know what’s involved in raising week old chicks. It’s very disheartening to spend so much effort for months, and then have nothing to show for it.

Thinking about foxes and chickens, my son reflected to me a couple of days ago, “You know, Roald Dahl books make the good guys look bad, and make the bad guys looks good. In Fantastic Mr. Fox, the farmer trying to protect his chickens is the bad guy, and the fox is the good one. And in Danny, Champion of the World, the poacher and his son were stealing but they looked like the heroes.” He’s completely right.

I now have a padlock on the goat pen. And my son is sleeping outside to guard his chickens from the fox, in case he decides to make a visit. He likes sleeping outside once the weather gets warm, so he’s just moving out a bit sooner than he otherwise would. 🙂

Avivah

Helping birthing doe deliver kids

homeschooling

It’s been a busy few weeks with Pesach preparations, tons of guests, and finally things are getting back to normal.

This week has been kidding season. It kicked off on Saturday night with our first time mother delivering twins – we got there in time to see the first had just been delivered, and were able to watch the second being born.

Bambi and Moonbeam, right after birth

The babies were dried off (both males), we got them nursing, and we all went to bed grateful things went so smoothly.

The next day the babies weren’t nursing and the placenta was still not fully detached. As the hours went by, it got more and more stressful worrying about this. I reached out to vets for help, but those we reached didn’t deal with goats. We couldn’t reach anyone knowledgeable about the specific issue we had until the late afternoon, nor could I find anyone who could give me contact information for a vet who deals with goats.

A friend with goats suggested we bottlefeed the colostrum to be sure to get it into the babies, so my son ran out to buy bottles and then milked the doe to feed to her kids. They didn’t get the hang of sucking on the bottle so we had to hold their mouths open and drip the colostrum in. That may sound cute but it really wasn’t fun. Baby goats will die if they don’t get enough colostrum soon enough, and we were both worried that the babies weren’t getting what they needed.

Someone came to show me how to help get the placenta out by pulling up on the goat’s midsection, and a bit more of the placenta came out when she was here. But it was still not coming out. While she was here, two more people came by, one of who knew someone very experienced with goats. She called him and asked him to come by and help us.

I was so grateful when a couple of hours later he arrived. Finally someone with the knowledge and experience to deal with the placenta issue – a fully or partially retained placenta is also something that a goat will die from if not resolved soon enough. By this point it had been nineteen hours since she gave birth and the placenta hanging out was beginning to smell. He was able to remove it, and showed my husband how to give her an antibiotic shot.

He checked the babies and said they looked very healthy and strong, and their tummies were full and that’s why they weren’t nursing more. That was such a relief.

Happily, the kids started nursing regularly soon after that. With the mother doe recovering beautifully from the birth, we had a couple of days to relax and enjoy the kids before the next goat kidded. She delivered when no one was home without any complications, and my son came home to find a healthy singleton all dried off. A big and healthy purebred male.

Two and a half more days went by, and yesterday afternoon my son came inside to let us know the amniotic sac had partially emerged from doe number 3. We all ran out, anticipating seeing the birth within a few minutes. We waited, and waited, and waited. The face and front hooves were visible but then retreated back into the mother.

Even though everyone was very quiet, I thought perhaps our presence was hindering the birth so we all went inside to leave her alone, also taking the other goats and their kids outside the pen to give her space. More time went by, and I wanted to look up how long it should take a goat to give birth once the amniotic sac emerged, since I was concerned it was taking too long (over two hours had passed since we first saw the amniotic sac beginning to show). I also was worried because when she was laying on the ground, another goat tread on the amniotic sac and popped it – would the kid be born dead by the time he was out?

What I read led me to think we had a difficult presentation on our hands, and that was the reason for the extended laboring time. Usually they say goats give birth on their own and you’re not needed, but this wasn’t one of those times. My son called a friend with goats for advice; he was told we would probably have to help pull the kid out. Ds13 and ds15 went out to the pen, and at the first contraction, ds15 began pulling the kid out by his front hooves. Once the head and both front hooves were out, the body should have slid right out, but it didn’t.

Ds13 took the hooves on the right side of the kid, and ds15 held the hooves on the left side of the kid, and with each contraction, they pulled together.

We soon saw the reason for the delayed birth – the head of the second kid was right under the stomach of his twin, instead of being behind him. (Probably the back hooves of the first kid were keeping the head of the second one held in place.)

I told ds15 to push the head back in to allow the first kid to be born, but the force of the contractions was too strong and he couldn’t. Instead, the two boys pulled together as much as they could to get the first kid out from. They later told me they were pulling very hard because it was so difficult. It was a relief to see him breathing and his mother began licking him off right away. The head of the second one came out together with the birth of the second half of the first kid, and within a few minutes the second kid was born (also with assistance). (Male/female twins – there’s only one female out of five kids born.)

Whew. Ds13 got them started nursing, and we’ll keep an eye on them today to make sure they’re nursing on their own.

First time mother Bambi with four day old Moonbeam, curious about a hen

Goats can’t stand up immediately after being born, and it’s fun to watch them develop the ability to walk. They are wobbly and tumble quite a bit. Of the first two kids born, one is more playful and the other is shy – watching the inquisitive kid is so entertaining! Yesterday we were all very entertained and laughing watching him bound up the tarp covered hay, then sliding down – and then doing it again and again when he realized how fun it was.

So far, Starlight wins the award for the cutest and most engaging kid – we’ll see how the newest kids shape up in the next couple of days

Are you wondering what we’re going to do with eight goats? We’re not going to keep them all! The males will all be sold as soon as they can be weaned. We have yet to determine if we’ll keep all the does and the doeling, or just two of them. In a month we’ll assess the milk production and make a decision. The only doe who isn’t in question is Buttercup, the goat who gave birth yesterday.

We’re relieved to have successfully navigated our first kidding season. Now it’s time to enjoy the antics and playfulness of our baby kids!

Avivah

About homeschooling and being ‘different’

homeschooling

Many years ago when I was considering homeschooling all of my children, and my oldest was just eight years old, I was worried about what would happen when it was time for shidduchim. I clearly remember asking an experienced homeschooling mother about this during our initial phone call, and now we field calls from others asking the same thing.

Conformity is a big value in my community, and to do something that was so visibly different felt very risky. I was worried that by doing something so untraditional, my children would be written off as suitable candidates for marriage.

The shidduch for my daughter who is currently engaged was suggested almost a year ago, and then was suggested a second time a couple of months ago. The first time I met her mother-in-law, I asked what caused the suggestion to be put on hold initially.

She told me that since her son was raised in the Israeli charedi system, she was concerned that our family was too different. I asked what ‘different’ meant to them. It was very straightforward: my daughter is more comfortable in English than Hebrew, was homeschooled and we live in Yavneel.

I understand the hesitation and I would likely have had the same concerns if the situation were reversed. Cultural differences are real (see my story below), and getting a clear sense of the internal values of a family before meeting them can be hard. Obviously our mechutanim moved beyond the initial concern; our children are a beautiful match and our families are a good match, too!

(Funny story: someone I don’t know called me to suggest an Israeli young woman as a shidduch for my son. I told the caller that as English speakers, culturally someone from an English speaking home would be more suitable. No problem, she says, the young woman knows English well from school. Personality-wise, not a match. Other details, not a match. She had an answer for everything. Until she suddenly asked, “Where do you live?”, and I said “Yavneel”. There was a long pause and she slowly responded, “Ah, it’s really not a match.” I thought it was funny that after all my much more relevant points that it was this superficial detail that meant so little was seen as significant, but relieved to finally be able to end the conversation politely.)

Sometimes people seem surprised to see our kids look so ‘normal’. I find it amusing that they’re so surprised. Do they think my sons walk around chewing on a stalk of hay, dressed in bear skins?

Someone recently visited Yavneel whom I hadn’t seen for thirty years. Her husband had met my teen boys in shul and was impressed by them, and when she came over to visit, she inquired with keen interest as to who my kids married. It wasn’t typical of who she is to care about details like this and I realized she was trying to size up the results of our homeschooling. She was clearly surprised that our kids were all living such ‘normal’ lives, and had made such ‘normal’ shidduchim.

Did I go against social norms by homeschooling my children? Yes. Am I social misfit, or are my kids weird and strange as a result? No, very much not.

Sometimes I reflect on the irony that my children look more mainstream than the children of many families who have gone through the system their entire lives.

When people say someone is ‘different’, sometimes it’s simply descriptive, and other times it’s a pejorative. Regardless of intention, I’ll be the first to agree that I think independently. Doing something because everyone does it isn’t a compelling argument for me. Much more important considerations are if it makes sense to me and is right for my family, which generally is determined by a lot of thought and research.

So many people have told me they’d like to be doing something different than what they’re doing, but they feel bound to live inside the societally defined box they find themselves in. They tell me they’d love to live the way that I do or make the decisions I’ve made, but they can’t.

I understand the discomfort and fear of judgment that comes with stepping outside of societal expectations. Our family has at times come under more scrutiny than others as a result of homeschooling and now because of living in an off-the-beaten-road community. I don’t question if that’s fair or not. It simply is the reality.

Judgments and assessments of who you are are present for everyone to some degree, and there’s a bit more for those of us who have made different choices. It’s annoying at times, but the tradeoff is living a life that I resonate with.

Avivah

Processing our own homegrown chickens

homemaking, homeschooling

This past spring/summer, my son hatched a bunch of chicks in his homemade incubator. He sold most of them, while holding back a given number for his own flock. His intention was to have more laying hens, but as they got older, it became clear that a number of the chicks were males.

He’s already gotten requests from a past buyer and from new potential buyers about his chicks for the coming season, and has close to one hundred eggs ready to incubate. For a few weeks I’ve been asking him to dispatch the excess roosters, but that hasn’t yet happened. When he mentioned being ready to start incubating his first batch of eggs, I absolutely put my foot down – no new chicks until the roosters are processed.

That was the motivation he needed, and he made arrangements for the shochet who taught him to come over.

As soon as Shabbos was over, I drove my sixteen year old son to the bus station so he could get travel back to yeshiva and was surprised when I got home to find a yard teeming with activity.

My fifteen year old son did all the shechita; the shochet was there only to oversee him. He shechted six roosters, five of which were kosher. The sixth was a mixed breed rooster, which is very hard to get a kosher shechita done on. This was additional validation of the decision my son made to move from raising mixed chickens to a heritage breed.

While he was doing the shechita, there was a chicken plucking party with five or six boys of different ages going on! They had a great time, and I was grateful to all of them for doing it so I didn’t have to.

The next morning my husband salted all the chickens as the next step in the kashering process, then rinsed them all and now they’re all in the fridge, ready to be cooked. When I watched him salting them, he commented that it’s a lot of work to process your own chickens.

Yes, it really is.

Is it empowering to raise your own animals, to know what they’re fed, how they’re treated, and to know they are healthy and disease free? Yes, absolutely. Our animals all enjoy a standard of living that is far above factory chickens. But it’s also a lot of work.

Is it a frugal thing to do? A lot of time, energy and feed went into raising these chickens. Honestly, it’s very hard to compete with industrially raised food on a cost-point basis. At this point it’s not a money saving endeavor, since my son has to make back all that he’s invested into the coop, supplies and purchase of his original chickens, which cost around three thousand shekels.

So why do it?

This is something that interested my son and as a homeschooling mother, I try to support their interests. Additionally, I value traditional knowledge combined with hands-on skills, skills that were widely known for centuries but have been lost to most of us in our modern lives. I want my children to have these skills, and I myself want to have these skills. Raising chickens is a skill-set, and my son has gained real life skills in the raising and processing of chickens.

As a society, we have become dependent for all of our needs on a supply chain that is becoming increasingly fragile. It’s nice to know that there are things that we can do for ourselves, and be less dependent on others to do them for us. I like knowing we can raise some of our own food – currently we supplement our store bought food with home-raised eggs, milk and now chicken.

While we’re very far from being independent in raising our own food, every bit of progress is something to feel good about. This was our first batch of chickens, and it’s taken time to get to this point. My son bought the mother hens as week old chicks that he raised, eventually incubated the eggs they laid when they reached maturity five months later, and now has raised those chicks to adulthood. It’s quite an accomplishment.

When my son first talked about doing this, it was just an idea. Now that it’s come to fruition, I’m more enthusiastic about him increasing the number of chickens he raises in the coming months.

Avivah

How and why I decided to homeschool – reposted from 2009

homeschooling

Can I ask one more question? Why do you homeschool? What is the financial, hashkafic, halachic reasoning behind such an unorthodox choice for a family that seems (from your bio) to be pretty normal? I am dying to know.

This isn’t a short answer, but I’ll try to be as succinct as I can without leaving out the major factors.

I didn’t set out to homeschool – Hashem kind of led me to it and I feel unbelievably blessed that He did.  When I moved from Israel in August 2000 (my husband had been offered a position as a shul rabbi so we moved to Seattle for that), my oldest was a seven year old in second grade and struggled because the secular subjects required reading and writing skills that he didn’t yet have, and his Judaic skills were much more advanced than his classmates.

We brought him home for half a day with the intent to bring him up to par in secular subjects – I did it out of desperation, because he was so stressed out that it was affecting the entire family, and nothing else I was doing was helping.  (This was one of the worst periods of my life, which has shown me how often the best things come from the most difficult situations.)  I didn’t know anything about homeschooling, and didn’t consider myself to be homeschooling him.  I was just tutoring him at home.  The principals and teachers were very supportive of me doing this, because they knew they didn’t have the ability to help him catch up.

Despite the many obstacles (like not knowing what I was doing and constantly doubting and second guessing myself), he thrived and we achieved our goals for him. Along the way he became much happier and more relaxed, which positively affected everyone.

We put him back into school for the full day about three or four months later with no intent to bring him back home.  But then we started to see behaviors we hadn’t seen for a long time that were attributable to nothing but being in school, behaviors that were subtle and everyone would say were normal. 

In the past we thought it was because he didn’t yet have friends, was pressured academically, felt the strain of a major move, etc.  But now he was doing great academically in all his classes, socially comfortable, the family had settled down, and life was all around positive and relaxed – there was absolutely nothing wrong.  And I saw that school actually created a kind of tension in children, even a child who was succeeding, something I never would have recognized if it hadn’t been totally absent from him for so long.

For the next few months, I thought about the significance of this.  I thought about what it would be like to have all the kids at home (if it was such a big improvement with one child home just half a day, imagine if everyone were home all day!), without the school induced pressures of carpool, tuition, mandatory parent service hours, and constantly worrying about keeping up with exactly what the school was up to, all issues I had to deal with when he was home for half a day.

What if we didn’t have to rush everyone to bed so that they could get up on time the next day, what if I could relax through our morning routine instead of rushing to get them to school on time; what if my primary goal wasn’t school centered but values centered?

I had by now started reading a lot about homeschooling philosophies, educational models, and thinking very seriously about what it all meant to me and where I stood.  I was working through some very major ideas about where parenting and education met, and my role in that.  I thought a lot about the kind of children I wanted to raise, the qualities I wanted to help them develop, and in what environment those would best be nurtured.  I strongly felt homeschooling would help us best meet those goals, though I had no idea how right I was.

But I was scared.  I was a conservative kind of person, someone who was very much part of the mainstream, who was comfortable being part of the mainstream and in fact found security in being clearly identifiable as being mainstream.  I didn’t want to be different from everyone else.  I didn’t want to listen to my conscience.

Not only that, my three kids were all doing great in school (preK, kindergarten, second grade) – there were no behavior issues, academic issues, social issues – nothing.  And the following year all three of them were going to have the most experienced teachers in the school, teachers who were so good that people would actually switch their kids for the year to this school to have these teachers. Who in their right mind would take out their kids at a time like this?

But the problem was, I was trying to live my life with integrity and I couldn’t silence the voice inside me that kept telling me that this was a change I should make, that even as seemingly successful as the kids were, that there was more they could be than model students.  I couldn’t ignore what I really believed was best.

I had two discussions at this time about this that gave me the support I needed to make the leap to homeschooling, one with my husband, and one with the wife of the rosh kollel of that area, and with both I expressed my fears and feelings of inadequacy.  My husband told me that no matter how wonderful the teachers were, he was confident that I could do just as well.  The rosh kollel’s wife, when I told her my fears of appearing non mainstream and not being like everyone else, said, “Who cares what people think?” (I fell out of touch with her when we left Seattle; when she visited Israel in 2020 we reconnected and I had the opportunity to thank her and tell her how pivotal her encouragement was). These two conversations gave me the final boost I needed to do to begin to live out my vision.

It was making the decision to homeschool that was the hardest thing. But since then, I’ve never looked back.  It was clear from the very beginning that it was the right thing for our family – there were so many advantages that I can’t begin to express them here.  I had the advantage of knowing what life with my kids in school was like, and it was very easy to compare and contrast that to homeschooling.

Life with kids in school is a pale (and stressful!) comparison to a homeschooled life.   Though people have told us that because we’re such good parents our kids would have been great anyway, I know it’s not true and they’re making false assumptions.  I’m not an amazing or unusually good parent.  But homeschooling my kids and the time it’s given us together has been the factor that has made all of the difference.

To go back to the original question, there were no negative factors – tuition was affordable for us (I’ve never felt that finances alone were a reason to homeschool), the kids were successful in school (and I was happy with the school), and I had a great rapport with the administration.  I don’t have a bone to pick with schools, not then and not now.  Choosing to homeschool wasn’t coming from negative motivations, but rather from a strong philosophical belief that it was the best thing for my children, to educate each of them according to their individual needs and personalities (‘chanoch l’naar al pi darko’).

I didn’t and don’t believe that a one size fits all institution with hired workers can know and understand a child and their needs (crucial to effectively educating them) as well as a loving and motivated parent.  I felt that building a strong family would happen most effectively when the family had ample time to spend together in a relaxed way, not pulled in lots of directions all day long, every day, with everyone coming together at the end when they were tired and uptight.  And there were lots of other more specific concerns about education and child raising that I had.

As the years have gone by, my conviction about all of these things has only gotten stronger. I’m at the beautiful place in life where I don’t have to wonder if this homeschooling business was all a major mistake on my part and what will all come out from it in the end. I’ve been so fortunate to have seen the things I trusted to happen, happen, beyond what I ever hoped for.  Is life perfect?  No.  Are my kids perfect?  Obviously not.  And me?  You all know I’m not perfect by now! 

But I can’t tell you how incredibly grateful I feel every single day for the life I’m privileged to have with my family.  I don’t take it for granted because I hear and see from all that goes on around me how special what we have is.

Avivah

Is homeschooling expensive?

frugal strategies, homeschooling

Following the last two posts that I wrote and shared years ago on a homeschooling forum, below is my follow-up to questions asked, about an article on budget-wise homeschooling that I mentioned just having written, babysitting and curriculum costs, and burnout. The costs are all specific to the activities mentioned in the last post. Again, this was from 2004, with six children ages 2 – 11.

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The article I wrote was for Live Free Learn Free (a mostly unschooling mag), and should be out soon (printing was delayed because of the holidays), and was titled, “Homeschooling, expensive?  Naah!”  In that I detailed how we spent less than $150 for the year for six kids, including all outside expenses, including Girl Scout and 4H dues. 

I have never hired babysitters to watch the younger kids, and have always had babies and toddlers since I started homeschooling.  (My youngest is now 2.5.)  So we didn’t have that expense. The first year I started homeschooling, I purchased curriculum used on vegsource.com (namely Saxon math).  It cost less than half of what I would have paid for it brand new, and I resold it three years later when I switched to Singapore for the price I paid for it.   (And then that money was used to make my new purchases. :))  For the three years I used it, I didn’t need to make any further outlays.

There are always free and low cost alternatives, regardless of where you lived.  In Seattle, we had great community centers and my kids were able to take swimming, dance, karate – all very cheaply.  Otherwise, we did things on our own as a family. 

In Baltimore, classes like that are four times the price, so we do different things.  Here I am hooked up with the larger homeschooling community and can go to activities as part of a group and get the sharply discounted rates.  Recently, in the space of three weeks, I took my kids to a concert at the symphony hall (got free tickets from a friend), a dance concert at the university (free), the Nutcracker (student performance – $4 per ticket), a Chanuka concert for the family ($5 for family), and a musical of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (I blew my usual budget and paid $6.50 per ticket for this, also a student ticket price).  That is a lot of entertainment for the money, though people will tell you that providing quality exposure to the arts is pricey.

My girls now take sewing lessons once a week – it costs $10 for each of them per lesson.  That is my largest ongoing expense, and $80 a month doesn’t compare to what I would pay for school even with the biggest tuition break I might qualify for.  The knitting club is free, 4H has minimal dues, Girl Scout dues are about $30 – 35 a year each. 

I have a membership to a science museum which allows me reciprocal privileges that I use at other places (science centers, cultural museums, aquariums) when I travel – that’s $50 a year.  We use the library a lot, frequent the library book sales and thrift shops for cheap reads. 

A couple of my older kids will be joining a math club next week, and it will be $30 per child for the semester (which goes until the beginning of the summer.)  When my kids took a sailing class, it was also as part of a homeschool group, and we got much better prices than the general public because they were already there and had very little business in the middle of the week.  When we go ice skating, I go to a homeschool session – $4 for the first person, $3 each additional person, and it includes the skates. 

Parks and nature centers are free.  Lots of historical events are free or minimal charge.  Even for events that charge, there are times that it is more affordable – for example, I took the kids to the Renaissance Faire in September, which is $17 for adults, $8 for kids.  I went on the one weekend that kids under 12 were allowed in free, and at the gate they gave me a $3 discount on my ticket because I shop regularly at a certain supermarket (I didn’t know that until I got there and they asked me).  So it cost me $14 for the entire day with all six of my kids and a friend of my son, going to plays, jousting, puppet shows, historical reenactments, etc.  Would the next weekend at full price when they did the same events have been more satisfying? 

I buy Singapore math books – the textbooks are non-consumable and can be passed from once child to the next, so it is a one time purchase (about 7.50 each). The workbooks are about also about 7.50 each, and each child uses two a year. That’s $60 total for my purchased curriculum.

Games are cheaply bought at any yard sale, and can provide loads of educational value. Paper, pencils, and art supplies also aren’t expensive.  Fun with friends is free. I don’t send my kids to a private rebbi or tutor for Judaics – not because I can’t afford it, but because I enjoy learning with my kids and learning groups tend to become very school-like in their approach.  This is where I see most frum homeschoolers paying big bucks. 

Homeschooling is about choices, but homeschooling with minimal costs doesn’t mean doing without or burning out.  It means choosing what is worth spending money on – I wouldn’t pay $10 per person for any museum or class.  (Remember I have six kids so with at least four kids in a class this would add up fast.)  As far as burning out, a parent always has to be aware of their limitations and act accordingly, or they will become overwhelmed. 

I do a lot with my kids, but I monitor my energy so that I don’t get caught up in running around to every possible opportunity that presents itself.  ‘Know thyself’ is applicable in many circumstances, particularly to moms who want to do it all and do it well.  Burnout would be less of an issue if people didn’t keep pushing themselves when all their internal warning signals were bleeping dangerously.

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Are you enjoying the recent ‘look back to the past’ posts?

Avivah

A homeschooling day with six kids, ages 2 – 11

homeschooling, parenting

Continuing from my last post, circa November 2004, responding to a question as to what a typical homeschooling day looks like for us… it seems particularly timely to have found this when I was writing about how our family life has changed over time. It’s poignant for me to reread the details of those days, to look back on a snapshot of our lives.

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Well, I gave my philosophical perspective, but here is a sample of what our days are like. After breakfast, we have our academic time.  (Davening may be before or after breakfast, my kids now daven on their own so it depends on how early they wake up.) 

I learn chumash with each of the older kids separately, and listen to my 5 year old do kriah (Hebrew reading).  While I am busy with one, the others will be busy with math.  We all are in the living room during that time, but if someone has a question, they have to wait until I am finished with the person I am with. 

After everyone finishes, we may sit around and do a read aloud – this week, I started a book about kids who go back in time to the Mayflower.  This part of the day takes about two hours.  Then we have lunch (usually sandwiches), and the rest of the afternoon is spent on other activities.

This describes our most ‘school-like’ days.  It is pretty dry and doesn’t even begin to capture the richness of our days.  It doesn’t run like this on the days that we are out with various activities in the morning (eg September was busy with sailing classes, Oct. had gym classes), and never typical for Fridays or Sundays. 

Twice a week, a couple of my kids help out at a sheep farm for the morning.  We attend a book discussion for kids once a month, the girls have Girl Scout meetings twice a month, they all have 4H at least once a month.  A couple of my kids participate in specific 4H projects, sheep and beekeeping, which have them out of the house more often. 

My girls have sewing lessons every week, knitting club every other week.  We go to the libraries regularly, nature centers, friends, and then there are the one time trips. Last week a couple of kids were busy digging a fire pit in the backyard of someone’s home for the colonial feast that is being planned this Sunday, they all attended a program on Woodland Indians (in which they not only listened to a presentation, but ground corn with a mortar and pestle, dressed in authentic Indian clothing, went in a wichot (wigwam), shot arrows, and much more), and my son read a biography of Daniel Boone (history/social studies). 

Yesterday one daughter was out with a couple of friends painting a backdrop for the puppet show they are planning for Chanukah, and have been working on weekly (writing/halacha/holidays/arts and crafts).  Two other kids were out at a different friend’s home (socialization – just joking, everybody!!).  My oldest son has been very busy for the last couple of weeks building a tree house (math/measurements), sewing cushions for the bench inside (real life skills), planning a treehouse club for his siblings, which includes various prizes and incentives.

They have all been busy getting ready for Chanukah by making presents for family members and friends and listening to Chanukah songs on cassette (Jewish holidays).  We have a trip to North Carolina in a few days, where we will attend the local science museum (science), and on the way home will probably stop by the Science Museum of Virginia.  (Last year when we went to Colonial Williamsburg, I stopped on the way in Richmond at the SMV to break up the trip. It was a good plan so we will try it again.) 

We attended a concert at the Meyerhoff Symphony hall a few nights ago (music), have a play scheduled for the beginning of Dec (literature and the arts), and a ballet for the middle of Dec (music, the arts and social studies). 

I read regularly out loud in the evenings to everyone (though my selection doesn’t always manage to hold everyone’s attention equally :)), and usually choose Newberry honor or medal books, classic type material (literature, grammar).  My kids read a lot independently (spelling, reading comprehension), and also enjoy listening to audio books (auditory processing skills).  The younger ones listen to their own selections of books with cassettes – my 4 yo recognizes her favorites at the library and ‘follows’ along with her finger in the text as she listens.  Even my 2 yo sits and listens with them. 

They enjoy board games and card games (my 4yo is fantastic at Uno – I don’t know how she got so good at strategy, but I have to work to beat her – the last game I put down my last card right before she put down her last card, and I only was able to win that time because I happened to see her cards since she isn’t careful about how she holds them!). 

We have brain teaser kind of stuff around, which they pick up and play with as they like.  They listen to the radio when I have it on and have picked up a lot of information, as well as critical thinking skills.  We have great conversations on many different topics.

Now the question is, what was the schooling part of the day?  There is lots of learning going on all the time, but it doesn’t resemble many classrooms because we don’t do much worksheet kind of stuff.  Being relaxed doesn’t mean doing nothing – for us, it means being busy with things we enjoy and learning lots along the way.

This probably didn’t help you much, though, right?  Because you may be thinking you don’t enjoy this kind of activity or your kids are too young or you are too tired or there isn’t enough scheduled…….. That’s why it all comes down to developing your own philosophy and finding what works for your family. 🙂

Avivah

Parenting – get clear on your goals, know who you are and where you want to go

homeschooling, parenting, personal development

In the middle of writing my last post, I did a search in my inbox using a keyword that didn’t pull up what I was looking for, but did result in me finding some things I had written about homeschooling in the past that I had long forgotten having written. The following was shared on a Orthodox Jewish homeschooling email list at the end of November 2004. I was active on this listserve for years and loved the far ranging and fascinating conversations we had (no comparison to the brief answers given on a FB group), but it’s been closed for many years now.

However, the questions and responses are just as relevant today as they were then and though specifically addressing homeschooling, are just as applicable to any parent thinking about his approach to parenting.

>>Hi, I just joined the list. I have a 21-month-old boy, who is nowhere near ready for school yet, but I’m thinking about home schooling, yet need to learn more about it. One thing that I want to be able to visualize is the structure (or non-structure) of home schooling–i.e., how is the learning set up. Please enlighten.<<

I think you are incredibly fortunate to have the opportunity to learn about homeschooling before your children are school age.  Homeschooling is a remarkable opportunity, precisely because it is so individual.  One person’s schedule may look totally different from someone else’s, but what counts is how it works for that family.  

I prefer a relaxed approach, and find it very effective for my family and my goals.  What I find stimulating and productive might seem too undefined to some, too busy to others.  A couple of weeks ago I was talking to a homeschooling mom who was proudly telling me her schedule, and I had the strongest feeling of sympathy for her kids, but it seemed to work for their family.  (This might also have been related to her answer to my question about her homeschooling style – “We push through until we get it right.”  My question followed her description of how she forced her kids to play sports even though they came home crying after every session. But I digress.) 

She has four kids, ages 4 – 10, and starts at 9 am every day, and goes until 3:30 or 4 pm every day, with an hour for lunch.  She isn’t Jewish, so she isn’t doing a dual curriculum, so in my opinion, this was overkill.  Gosh, I felt like I had hives listening to her.  But then again, she might have had the same feeling listening to me.

As someone else suggested, read up on homeschooling. Don’t limit yourself to any one approach – read about them all, and you will find yourself developing your own ideas and opinions as to how you want to do things for your family.  Think about what education means to you – is it the same as schooling?  Why or why not?  What do you think is positive about the school experience?  What is negative?  Why?  How do your children learn best?  How do you perform best?  What are your goals – not just regarding academics, which may be one of the less important things in raising children, but in terms of character development, etc.?

Homeschooling and parenting styles overlap so much that it becomes hard to distinguish where one ends and the other begins.  Talk to people, get ideas, but most importantly, give yourself lots of time to think through the issues yourself.  And for now, just continue enjoying your child – it will be years before you will need to do anything in a more structured way than what you are already doing.  

Avivah – mom to (then) six great kids in Baltimore

Why a family dynamic is constantly evolving

aliyah, homeschooling, parenting

My husband looked at a family picture of when we had just six children that was temporarily moved to his desk, and commented, “The older half of our family!”

This past Friday night at the Shabbos table, I looked around at everyone there and thought about how our family has completely changed through the years – not one person sitting there was alive at the time that the above mentioned photo was taken.

A friend who grew up as almost the youngest of a large family told me that her experience growing up in her family was very different from her older siblings. Now I’m seeing for myself how true that is.

Younger and older children in a family will always have a different experience growing up in the same home, with the same parents, because things change over time.

Getting older and more mellow – My husband and I have been parenting for almost thirty years together. We have gotten a lot of experience and consequently are fairly secure as parents, and feel relaxed in our parenting at this stage. We aren’t constantly questioning ourselves and wondering how to deal with different things that come up. We genuinely trust that our kids are awesome people who are going to grow into amazing adults. We know it. We don’t have to work hard to remind ourselves of that, to affirm it, or to agonize over the challenges they experience. We know who we are, what our approach to parenting is, and our relationship with one another is steady and consistent. This is a product of time.

Living in a different country – Not every family will experience the major moves that we did, but moving to a different country has made a huge difference in what our children experience. Growing up in the US provided different opportunities and challenges than living here in Israel. The children who are now teens in our home moved here as young children eleven years ago. They speak an additional language, they interact with different people, and they have different interests.

I could give lots of examples of this! Here’s just one: my two oldest boys were excellent baseball players, the top in their leagues. During baseball season, our family spent hours every week attending their games. This activity has been completely absent from our lives from the time we moved to Israel. While their younger brothers have the potential to be just as athletic, there isn’t a framework for that here.

It’s been interesting for me to notice my homeschooling style evolve, and that has been specifically related to living in Yavneel. Until moving here less than three years ago, I’d self-identified as a ‘relaxed homeschooler’. That meant that we had regular daily academic activities of reading, writing and math, integrated read-alouds of historical fictions, lots of trips and outside activities. This was consistent of our family homeschooling style for almost twenty years, wherever we lived (except the trips – after we moved to Israel we did very few trips).

Now our boys have opportunities to follow and develop their interests in a way they never could before, and my style has evolved to almost completely unschooling. While they periodically pull out a math workbook at my bequest, that’s no longer an important factor for me. I trust not only their own inner desire to learn, but I trust the external framework provides the possibility of them being able to independently pursue their interests. For example, I mentioned my boys helping someone out with his horse a couple of weeks ago. Well, one son has continued working with the horses daily. Where will it go? I don’t know. But there’s the opportunity to do learn and experience much more.

My thirteen year old began traveling locally by bus last year when he took a year long sailing course at the Kineret. He’s now expanding his comfort zone and learning to use public transportation to get to RBS, so he can stay in relationship with friends made when we lived there. When someone can get to where he wants to go independent of being driven by a parent, it opens up possibilities. This is something I’m comfortable with in Israel that I would not have allowed in Baltimore due to safety concerns.

How your family is ‘built’ – Of our oldest five children, three were girls. For years people thought of us as a girl-family, because the presence of our daughters was so significant. When our next six boys joined the family, their presence obviously made a big impact as we had a very busy home with lots of young children. But our older girls remained highly involved and visible in our family life. When our oldest two daughters got married within twelve days of one another five years ago and they weren’t a daily presence anymore, things changed a lot.

It’s been years since anyone has thought of us as a girl-family! Right now the younger boys are 20, 16, 15, 13, 10 and almost 6. We have a lot of male teen energy. I was watching my fifteen and sixteen year old sons wrestling tonight, and remembering how for years I never allowed wrestling in our home. Now I see it as appropriate and healthy.

Parents don’t independently create a family atmosphere and impose that on their children. Children are partners in creating the family with their own personalities and interests, too. For years, we enjoyed singing at the Shabbos table. Then we had a few years when our two middle children were the oldest at home on Shabbos, but they didn’t enjoy singing at that stage (now they do) and we naturally sang together less as a family. Our Shabbos meals became much shorter and more discussion-heavy.

Life continued to evolve and our three teens who are usually home now enjoy singing chazzanus (cantorial music) together when they are getting ready for Shabbos. It’s not my personal style but they enjoy it and it’s a nice thing to hear them enjoying together. Our sixteen year old went to the Friday night tisch of a chassidish rabbi, and heard a beautiful complex tune which he took time to learn well. He taught that song, and another equally complicated song, to the rest of us. Those songs are new to us, but are now becoming staples at our Shabbos table, and we once again have lots of singing at the Shabbos table.

Not only that, our family itself has expanded, with the addition of four spouses and seven grandchildren (so far). Each of these people have added to our family dynamic, too!

So life is continually evolving, even at my stage when it would seem that we’ve been doing this so long and you might expect that it’s the same old, same old!

Avivah