Wow, what a full day!  As I was getting all my kids up and dressed much earlier than usual this morning, I was thinking it felt like getting ready for a bris. Of course that wasn’t the reason we were all up – I needed to get my youngest 4 (except the baby) to my inlaws and get to the place the conference was being held by 8 am with everyone else so we’d be there before anyone checking in.

We started the morning with a general session by Molly B. Koch, a parent educator with over fifty years experience who’s still going strong at 81!  I bought her parenting book and am looking forward to reading it. She has a wealth of experience. 

I wish I could have been in two places at once and heard each of the workshops being given in each time slot because I know I would have gained from every one of them.  Every speaker did a great job and I’m looking forward to listening to the recordings of those I couldn’t be at.  (Making the cds will be the next project.  :))

After the first general session, we had a workshop on different approaches to homeschooling and simultaneously another on the benefits to the family of homeschooling.   After that was a session on socialization and another on teaching Hebrew reading and writing creatively.  After these workshops, Rabbi Menachem Goldberger of Tiferes Yisroel of Baltimore spoke.  Because of his communal position, he has to walk a fine line when participating in our home education conference because of his support of parents who choose to educate their own children – while not being perceived as being anti the school system.  It’s a precarious balance but I believe he succeeded.  He spoke about the importance of recognizing the needs of every child and educating him accordingly, and shared his experience of 20 years of dealing with homeschooled families in his shul.  

After that there was a lunch break for an hour, and though I reserved a lovely ‘eating together’ room for participants to spend time together during the break, since I spoke with Rabbi Goldberger right after his talk and then to a couple of attendees, I didn’t remember to announce the room was available until most of the participants had already left the conference room.  But I think everyone managed to connect during their lunch anyway. 🙂

After lunch we reconvened for three workshop sessions.  I participated in one of the first – the Veterans Panel – along with three other moms.  I think we could have easily gone for two hours instead of one if we had been able to accept all the questions people had.  Right after that I gave a talk on Teaching the Multi-Age Family.  I have to admit that I was very, very tired before the day even started, and before I gave my talk I told my dh that I was concerned about being able to be coherent in my talk because of my exhaustion.  I hope I succeeded; I haven’t listened to the recording of me yet and am not in any rush to do so!  (Do you think it’s fun to listen to yourself?  Instructive maybe, but not fun!)

My two teenage daughters attended my talk though I told them not to waste their time since they know how we homeschool and it would be boring for them.  Interestingly, though, they really enjoyed it.  One told me she never knew there were reasons for why we do what we do, that there was a thought out purpose in various ways I structure our academics; she just accepted that’s the way things are in our house.  So it’s nice that they now appreciate how we homeschool more than they did before attending. 

Then there was a final session before we closed, one on dealing with burnout and the other by my dh on teaching your kids limudei kodesh.   I got a lot of very positive feedback from those who attended the conference and I hope that everyone attending enjoyed themselves as much as I did.  A nice plus was getting to meet three of my until now faceless blog readers (waving hi to Sharon, Yael, and Julie), and realizing that one of them was a Shabbos guest of ours ten years ago when I lived in Israel!  

Someone emailed me tonight the following: “It was a lovely day! Thank you so much for all your efforts and organization which allowed this to happen. I definitely got the feeling that this was something that people NEEDED! A place to go and have questions answered in a relaxed atmosphere.”  And from someone else: “I was able to walk away with some new insights and chizuk. Thank you again for arranging today’s event. It must have taken up a lot of your time. It was a beautiful turnout. I just wish I had more time to speak to all the new faces. They seemed like such a warm, educated, well rounded and intellectually honest group of people.”

My biggest regret, if you want to call it that, is that I couldn’t speak to all the people I wanted to speak to for the time I’d like to have spoken to them for!   I enjoyed every minute with every person; it was really the people who participated as both speakers and attendees who made the day what it was.  My older three kids also really enjoyed it; as a plus, I think it’s valuable for children get involved in helping their community and am glad they had a chance to participate in organizing this with me.

With Hashem’s help I’ll soon decide on a date for next year’s conference so I can reserve the location!

Avivah

I wanted to pop my head in and let you know I didn’t disappear!  I’ve been busy yesterday and tonight with details for the conference, so I haven’t been able to post for these couple of days.  It’s not for lack of things to post about as much as lack of time!  Tomorrow night I’ll hopefully be back to posting, once the conference is over. 

For those of you in the area, please come – it’s going to be great!  (9 am – 5 pm at the Baltimore JCC, second floor, $20 for the day.) 

Avivah

I like when people realize their financial limitations and look for ways to cut their spending and live within their means.  And now the governor of CA is being forced to look for solutions of his own to his state’s disastrous financial situation (they’re expected to run out of money in about 2 months), and he’s looking for ways to cut back government spending.  (I often have wondered if govermental spending has any limitations, so it’s nice to see that there is a point when even government officials recognize they can’t keep on spending – too bad things have to be extremely desperate before cuts are considered.)  One of the things he’s planning is to cut out conventional textbooks.  What does he plan to use instead?  Online textbooks. 

I commend the government officials for trying to find solutions out of their dilemma.  This would be a big savings, and it was also pointed out that it will be better physically for the students since they don’t have to shlep around all those heavy books. 

As far as the value of the texts themselves, in my opinion, getting rid of most textbooks isn’t much of a loss.  I’d be hard pressed to think of less effective ways to learn than from standardized textbooks, unless it’s to listen to a teacher droning on and telling the students the exact information they could read for themselves in their textbooks.  But replacing them with online versions of the same dreary works isn’t going to improve student learning or retention.  Though I love to read, I see online reading as a necessary evil (I’m sure my kids would be surprised by this, since I do so much of it); it takes more time and I don’t think it’s healthy to spend a lot of time in front of the computer.  And while the kids wouldn’t have the physical strain on their shoulders from lugging around a heavy knapsack, they’d have eye strain to consider.

In our homeschooling, I try to avoid textbooks as much as possible.  Textbooks are designed to be politically correct above all else (and as such are a venue to promote values that I don’t share), and just as bad, their accuracy of the facts is often questionable (this isn’t a matter of opinion – do some research if you want to learn more).  

Some companies have tried to eliminate the political aspect by choosing selections that are more neutral.  When my ds was in ninth grade last year, I had the opportunity to review his English textbook – it was a kosher version of regular literature texts (Mesorah publishes them under another company name).  They use selections of classic works and stories that don’t have the less desirable elements of typical literature selections.  I thought it was a nice idea, and then I read through a good part of the textbook.  Gosh, it was dull – and I have a high comprehension level and love to read!  It didn’t suprise me when my son fell asleep repeatedly when reading the stories that were assigned.  In their efforts to take out anything objectionable, they weren’t left with much of interest.  I commented on this to the English teacher at parent conferences, and it was clear that though she didn’t want to say so outright, she agreed with me. 

In place of textbooks, I prefer what Charlotte Mason termed living books – books that are engaging, written by people who care about their subject matter – not committees.  And of course, hands on learning opportunities can’t be beat for integration and assimilation of material. 

As far as CA and the choice they’ve made, while they won’t improve students’ learning, at least they’ll be saving money! 

Avivah

I just set up a new site that has the basic information regarding the Torah Homeschooling Conference.  If you’re interested in viewing the scheduled presentations, look on the top right side of the screen where it says ‘Conference Schedule’.  There is a contact email there for further questions or regarding payment.  http://jewishhomeschooling.wordpress.com/

I’ll add specific details as they arise.

Avivah 

Even though I’m still finalizing some last details, I want to give anyone who lives out of the area some advance notice about the first Torah Homeschooling Conference, so that you’ll have time to make arrangements if you want to come in for it.

The conference is geared towards providing support and encouragement to those who are already homeschooling, as well as answering questions of parents who are considering homeschooling.  It will be held in Baltimore on June 28, 2009, on the second floor of the Park Heights JCC, 5700 Park Heights Ave. 21215.  Check-in/registration will begin at 8:15 am; the talks/workshops will begin at 9 am and end at 5 pm.  Topics that will be covered will include (but aren’t limited to): creative approaches for teaching Hebrew reading and writing, teaching limudei kodesh, different approaches to homeschooling, the benefits of homeschooling and dealing with challenges, socialization, marriage and homeschooling, burnout, and a veterans’ panel in which questions will be accepted from the audience.  A couple of topics are still being finalized. We have a rav who will be speaking on the importance of chanoch l’naar al pi darko, and a parent educator/author who will speak about building the connnection with your children. 

Except for the two general sessions, which will be for all attendees, there will be two workshops during each time slot (for a total of five workshop choices), and parents will need to preregister for the workshops that most interest them, as there is limited space.  All workshops will be given by experienced homeschool parents.  I plan to have all workshops and talks recorded for later purchase, so that if someone misses one, they’ll be able to hear it later on.

The cost will be $15 per person or $25 per couple for advance registration.  Payment for advance registration needs to be received by June 15 and your workshop choices should be included at that time.  If you choose to register at the door, the cost will be $20 per person or $35 per couple.  Your workshop choices will be limited to the available openings at that time, so while you’ll definitely be able to attend something in each time slot, you won’t necessarily be able to attend the one that most interests you.  If I can get a website set up within a week, the workshop schedule will be available online; otherwise it will be available from me or another volunteer by email (I’ll share those details when we’re ready to send the schedule out). 

I’ve spoken to the JCC and they are willing to provide babysitting for infants through age 3, in the same building where the conference will take place.  They are licensed and insured, and well set up for children of this age.  The payment for this will be separate from conference costs and will be made to the JCC at the time you are there.  Since they will be bringing in staff just for this, and are going well outside of their usual services of providing babysitting for just an hour at a time, I’ll need to know by June 15 if you’ll need babysitting services so that I can let them know how much staffing they’ll need.

Lunch can be purchased at the Eden Cafe, a kosher dairy restaurant in the same building, or attendees can go to other area restaurants during the hour long lunch break.  There will be some Jewish academic resources available for purchase from the Center for Jewish Education’s store, as well as a huge variety of curriculums available for browsing in their library (on the same floor as the conference rooms).

Since as you know I’m due any minute, if you want to get involved and help out, I’d love to have your help!  As of right now, what I most would appreciate help with is:

– keeping track of registration, payment, and workshop choices

– if you know how to set up a basic wordpress blog with a shopping cart and online registration capacity, and can do it inexpensively, please let me know. 

– **if in Baltimore – setting up the recording devices for each talk

– **if in Baltimore – making Shabbos arrangements for visiting families.  I’ve negotiated a  discount at an area hotel (Radisson at Cross Keys) for workshop attendees, but this will be the only option for out of town visitors if someone isn’t able to help with Shabbos arrangements. 

– compiling useful homeschooling articles to include as handouts; someone has already volunteered to compile lists of homeschooling resources

– helping to get the word out about the conference

I think our community is very overdue for an event like this, and am looking forward to the conference.  I hope that I’ll get to meet a number of online homeschooling friends in person!  And meeting new friends will be wonderful, too!

Avivah

>>Can you explain a little bit about the “copy work” you mention?<<

Copywork is a method espoused by Charlotte Mason.  Being an eclectic homeschooler, I don’t limit myself to approaches or techniques from just one method – I adopt ideas that resonate with me.  When I read about Charlotte Mason’s work, I connected with several things she wrote about.  One was the focus on quality literature; another was the idea of copywork. 

Copywork is exactly what it sounds like – you have your child copy written passages.  My kids begin copywork as soon as they finish a basic workbook on handwriting, so that they are familiar with how to form the letters properly, at about the age of 6 or 7, depending on the child.  My six year old now isn’t doing it; I don’t feel it would be constructive for him yet.  It’s important that whatever they copy be quality writing samples; though the copywork serves as handwriting practice, it also serves as so much more.  They continue doing copywork on a daily basis until they are ten, at which point I transition them to developing their independent writing skills.

By providing your child with a good model of writing, over time he will develop a sense of good sentence structure, grammar, and spelling.  I don’t make grammar or spelling an independent subject – I know that they’re internalizing these things when they do their reading and copywork.  How much they do is much less important that the quality of the work they do.  When they do their copywork, it has to be exact – every punctuation mark copied properly, every word spelled correctly, written neatly.  If it’s sloppy then they have to do it over (that has rarely happened).  Part of the goal in doing the copywork is to help a child focus on the details; too often kids gloss over small details in their rush to get their work done.  Before they show it to me, I tell them to look at it and compare it to the original, to be sure there are no mistakes.  They often see things on their own that need to be corrected, and finding your own errors is more valuable than having someone else point them out to you.  Their copywork should be something that they can take pride in showing someone. 

I’ve used different things for them to copy from over the years.  It can be any book that you feel is well written and appropriate for the child’s age.  Initially, I used A Child’s Garden of Verses, by RL Stevenson.  That was good but then I felt that copying poems wasn’t as helpful in developing a sense of regular sentence structure as a book would be.  I started my dd8 (then 7) on the first book in the Billy and Blaze series, and now she’s using a McGuffey reader, as is my ds10 (they use different levels – McGuffey readers begin with a primer and go up to level 6 – I start the copywork with the first reader, which comes after the primer).  I plan to use the McGuffey readers for copywork for all of my kids from now on, with the exception of when they are new to copywork – to start them off, I’d give them something more engaging if I felt it would be helpful to them.

Avivah

>>My daughter is so resistant sometimes. She has a very short
attention span and gets easily frustrated.<<

>>My oldest is 7 almost 8. The days which are good are good. We can get our kodesh and chol done in 3-4 hours (spaced around breaks and lunch). On the bad days we cannot get school going because he shleps out (or had chutzpah about) his morning routine (dressing, making bed, davening, eating breakfast and usually a chore) so he is late in getting started, then it goes downhill from there. I have seemed to solve one of the problems (more or less) by having him go to his own office with his work and a timer which he tries to beat and I also give him firm limits on how long he can take to finish an assignment (otherwise he shleps that out forever). He gets distracted by his siblings’ (boy 5, girl 2) antics and schooling. That seems to work (and takes a lot of stress of me watching him mess around all monring/afternoon). <<

I’m answering both of these questions in this post, since they both seem to be to be about how to handle a child who is resistant to learning.  I had this, too, when I started homeschooling my son for half a day.  He really didn’t like my ideas of what to do and how to do it, and we had a lot of conflict about it.  He was about 7.5 at that time. 

When I started off, I didn’t have any homeschooling philosophy formulated – my goal was to teach my child at home whatever he would be learning in school.  I read The Well Trained Mind (classical approach based on the trivium), and it sounded good.  It was the only thing I read, so I didn’t have much to compare it to.  Anyway, it was terrible for us because it was totally not a fit for my child’s needs and personality.  He was resistant because he didn’t like it – pretty simple, right?  So I had to learn more about different ways of learning, and look at what my deeper goal was.  My true goal was for him to find learning relevant and meaningful (to some degree, anyway!), and for it to be a positive experience for him, since I wanted learning to have positive associations throughout his life. 

This meant reassessing what learning looked like and how it took place.  Of course the only model I had was the school model and the classical model of education followed that in many ways, which is why it initially appealed to me.  It felt secure and safe and seemed to promise a quality education.  But it wasn’t working.  He was unhappy, and I was unhappy that there was so much tension and negativity involved in getting him to do his work.  Finally, I realized that I had to let go of my expectations and look for what would work with him.  I took a big step backwards, and started focusing on making our home learning environment enjoyable and relaxed.  I read to him, and stopped expecting him to read out loud to me a certain amount of time.  I stopped giving him grammatical rules to copy into his grammar notebook.  I stopped just about everything, I think!  I replaced that with more hands on activities, and just relaxed time together.  Though I worried that he wasn’t learning anything, our house very quickly became a much more pleasant place to live.  In seven weeks, he went from adamanatly refusing to read aloud to me, or even open a book on his own (“I hate reading!”), to independently reading to himself in his free time.

Children this age (up to and including age eight) need very little official learning time.  For our family, I’ve broken down their academic needs to the very basics – reading, writing, arithmetic.  That’s all that I expect and I know that with solid basics in place, they’ll be well eqipped to handle anything else they need as they get older.  And I don’t think it should take very long at this age at all, not more than an hour total for kodesh and chol.  My dd8 started this year (when she was still seven) reading for 15 minutes daily (alternating days for Hebrew and English), 10 minutes (or two – three sentences) of copywork, and 15 minutes of math.  Now she reads all the time so it’s not part of her official schedule; only math (one lesson) and copywork are.  3 – 4 hours is a LOT, and more time doesn’t necessarily equate with more learning.  (That’s why I’ve thought for a long time that the schools would benefit everyone if they cut the hours down – the longer a child spends on his work, the less effective he becomes.) 

I know, it sounds inadequate, doesn’t it?  But don’t forget, children are learning all the time, from everything they do.  There are lots of fun ways to ‘sneak’ in the learning and if you integrate it naturally into your day, they won’t perceive it as school work.  I didn’t even try to sneak it in; I started looking at education and information from a different paradigm, which would best be reflected by the statement ‘Education isn’t about filling a bucket, but about lighting a fire.”  (My apologies if I didn’t get the quote exactly, but that’s the gist of it.)  Then my focus became more about helping motivate them to want to learn instead of stuffing them full of what I thought they needed to know.

In my opinion, resistance from a child is a sign that you need to reassess what you’re doing and why.  This isn’t an either you get your way or he gets his way situation – if it’s not working for both of you, then it’s not working at all.  Both of you need to be basically enjoying your time together and feeling your needs are met.  That’s the beauty of homeschooling, that we can have an enjoyable educational environment that fits everyone’s needs.  Educating our kids is about really working with each of them according to their needs.  I’d suggest you think about what is a priority to you, regarding what you want him to learn, and drop everything else.  He has many, many years ahead of him to learn other things, and the best time for a child to learn something is when he wants to learn it.  You can make a child do their ‘work’, but you can’t make him internalize the message and really learn anything (I once argued this with a first year teacher, who adamantly disagreed with me – he said that a good teacher can make a child learn.  I said, ‘No, a good teacher makes a child want to learn’  He didn’t see the distinction, but it’s a very important one.) 

I really like having games around because they are a wonderful way to give a child something to do that he’ll enjoy and you’ll know he’s learning.  There are games like Scrabble and Boggle for spelling, Battleship and Monopoly for math, and so many others for every possible subject (this is a good way to get in history, geography, or even Latin roots – I bought a card game for that).  

I also have a lot of hands on manipulatives that I let them play with; I don’t really use them to explain mathematical concepts though that’s what I initially got them for.  These manipulatives include: pattern blocks (which are just wonderful), base ten blocks, cuisenaire rods, linking cubes, tangrams, teddy bear counters, a hundred number chart, spherical shapes, fraction pieces, a scale, magnets, and other things I’d have to go downstairs to look at to remind myself about.  I have flashcards for numbers, time, abcs, Hebrew letters.  I have Brain Teaser kind of things, puzzles, etc.  These aren’t getting used all the time, but when someone wants to use them, they’re there for them. 

I’m giving these as examples that taking a more relaxed approach doesn’t mean being neglectful of their education or letting them do whatever they want all day long.  One thing I feel strongly about is that the time that is freed up for the child can’t be used on tv, videos (unless they are educational ones that you feel are valuable), or computers.  If children are giving wholesome alternatives as to how to spend their time, they’ll find productive ways to spend their time.  The chances are high that the activities they choose will be those which you can honestly identify as academic time when you look at all that they’re learning.

Oh, one more thing.  I can see how a 7 yo would find it very distracting (and unfair!) to do his work when he sees his younger siblings playing around.  That’s normal, and it’s reasonable for him to feel this way.  I used to do a lot of reading to all of my kids when they were younger while the littlest ones played, and then when the little ones were ready for a nap, that’s when I had the oldest one do the more formal work – I didn’t try to do much with him until the house was quiet enough to focus on him (when my oldest was 8, we had a 1, 2.5, 5, and 6.5. so there were a lot of distractions for him!).  This dynamic does change over time – since most of my kids are now old enough to be formally doing academic work each day, the younger ones want to do what the older ones are doing!  (That’s why my three year old will insist he has to do his math before he can do anything else – a few days ago he was trying to convince me that he was 6 so he could do what his older siblings were doing. :))

Avivah