Unschoolers “Playing School”

I have already shown that our family's homeschool didn't try to replicate what happens at school. I didn't set out to have a curriculum with learning divided into discrete steps—lesson-sized chunks that would be introduced, practiced, tested, and periodically reviewed. I didn't intend to carve up the world into separate subjects like Science and History and Art, and I didn't want to spend much time on evaluating (testing) or labeling (grading) my kids.

Instead, I hoped to concentrate on true learning.

I hoped to promote education by listening to my kids' expressed interests, helping them learn about those things, and exposing them to other cool stuff.

So it was pretty funny to have the kids ask for formal lessons—exactly what I didn't  want to institute.

However, there is a very, very different feel in playing at school, on the one hand, and really “doing” school (whether at public or private school or in a school-like homeschool), on the other hand. Playing at school when the kids want to do that is child-led learning, is tapping into their interests, and (by the way) is lots of fun. If I would have chosen a Letter of the Day, myself, and if I were serious about introducing and practicing and testing for mastery of that letter...it would soon have become drudgery for them and for me.

Fun for all—and all for fun?

Naturally, not all learning has to emphasize fun. My kids often chose to do things that involved a lot of work and even drudgery. Learning gymnastics and ice skating and dance, for example, involves sit-ups and sprints as well as glittery costumes and performances. But self-imposed drudgery to reach a goal that the child has freely chosen is, again, very different from days and weeks and months and years of slogging through boring or mystifyingly irrelevant lessons “just cuz.”

Typically, adults say that knowing all that school stuff will be important someday. But that is not a very convincing reason to study hard—because no matter how smart or not-so-smart kids seem to be in school, they're all smart enough to realize that parents and other non-teacher adults, by and large, don't remember all that supposedly crucial stuff. All the kids have to do to find this out is to ask for help with their homework!

What every fourth grader should know...

I know that we can have a panicked response when our children or, say, people on the street don't know something that we consider absolutely minimal for being considered “educated.” But we probably all have different lists of what that baseline-supposedly-necessary knowledge is. I would say that everyone should know the planets of the solar system and the definitions of the words proton, neutron, and electron. Someone else might say that it's crucial for an educated person to be familiar with the names of Shakespeare's major works and to have read at least one. Most of us would agree that familiarity with the structures of the government and the particulars of our nation's written constitution are important for being good citizens, but some people would stress learning about past presidents, and some would stress learning about Congressional and lobbying procedures.

However, maybe the concept of having a list of facts that EVERYONE needs to know is, at heart, erroneous. As education scientist Sugata Mitra says, when you can look stuff up on the internet in just a few seconds, why should you try to stuff that stuff into your head?

Proof positive that it's not THAT important that your kid know what every fourth grader should know:

Before I had kids, I was managing editor in a company that, among other things, produced textbooks. I headed up the project of writing the fourth grade state history book, and for a while, I not only knew tons and tons of California history, I even knew exactly what page and paragraph particular facts of that history could be found in our textbook. The book was adopted by the state of California, and for a number of years I often saw fourth graders with my book under their arms!

(If you know anything about textbook writing, you know it's a huge committee effort, but as MANAGING editor, all changes and additions and deletions—and all photos, diagrams, illustrations, and charts—went through me. So it really seemed like my baby...until I had a real baby, at least.)

One task that fell to me as managing editor was choosing the VERY MOST IMPORTANT stuff that we really wanted kids to remember, and writing review and test items about those particular concepts, terms, and facts. I thought I chose really well. I stayed away from dates, because few of us remember them. Instead, I went for the really meaty concepts and facts that I thought every Californian really ought to know.

Flash forward four years. I was over at Camille's house, and her cousin, who went to school, was trying to rush through his homework so he could join us in celebrating Las Posadas. He had history homework that involved my book, and he was having problems with one of the review questions I myself had written.

Camille's mom grinned and said, “You have the book editor right here—go ask Auntie Cathy for help!”

As I confidently reached for the book, I asked which question he was stuck on.

“Number 3.”

I read the question...and realized that I had NO IDEA of what the answer was. Of course, it didn't take me all that long to scan through the chapter and find the answer—and then to help the student find it as well—but I was shocked! Shocked, I tell you! If that test question really dealt with something that EVERY Californian should know, right off the top of their heads, as I had been confident when I wrote the question, then how could I—the book's editor—have no idea what the answer was a mere four years later?

The actual crucial thing in education isn't knowing the right answers. It is the confidence that we can find the answers.

Journal Entry 6

Tuesday, September 22, 1985

Today Lindsey is going to “Mommy and me” class with Camille's cousin Enrique (“Kiki”) and Aunt Delia. So for a while, it will just be Camille, Mindy, and me.

The girls begin the day by “playing school.” While I'm urging them to eat breakfast, get dressed, and succumb to hairbrushing, they're busy getting out books, arranging their “cubbies” (boxes of “school supplies”), and talking about lessons. Probably inspired by Sesame Street, they announce that the day's letter is C.

I play along. I write capital and lower case Cs on a miniature blackboard and urge them to do the same on theirs. They eagerly comply and identify the sound that C makes (the hard-K sound, that is). It's easy for them to think of names and words that start with C, since Camille and Cathy are perfect examples!

Then I challenge them to say the C word that I draw on my board. Again, no problem! They immediately identify pictures of a coat, caterpillar, and cap. I write the first two words on the board, and we discuss the facts that OA together say O and that the word cat can be found inside the word caterpillar. I challenge them to write cap on their boards by sounding the word out, and they are able to do that without breaking a sweat, too.

I ask if the kids want to draw a C word for me. Camille promptly agrees and draws an oval. I say, “Cabbage?” while I search my mind for more likely oval objects that start with C.

She shakes her head no and informs me, “It's an O word.”

Oh, yikes—apparently not cake or candy or cookie.

I suggest, “Oval? Olive? Orange?”

Camille kindly gives me a few hints (it's a food, it's green), and I finally hit the mark with avocado. She is pleased that I “got” it and isn't a bit fazed when I show her that that word starts with A and ends with O.

Next, it's Mindy's turn. She draws what clearly looks like money, and I ask if it's an M word.

“No, a C word, like you said,” Mindy answers.

“Cash?” I ask, and Mindy nods with satisfaction.

The girls use the Sesame Street coloring computer program. On the C page, Camille discovers C words cookie and cupcake as she electronically colors. Mindy chooses the H page and colors house, hat, horn, and Herry Monster.

Then the girls run out to excavate dinosaur bones, as they did last week.

As they play, I do some housework and lay out some nice watercolor supplies. Of course, the minute the girls come inside, they want to use the paints—they're especially cool because they come in tubes!

We all mix colors. Then the girls use a stencil to trace a dinosaur outline while I sketch a dinosaur freehand. Next, the best part: lavishing on the paint.

Camille stops painting first and goes back to the Sesame Street program, choosing the letters A (apple, airplane) and B (Bert, Big Bird, ball). Then she moves on to another computer program, the Sorter game of “Reader Rabbit.” She has to sort words that start with W or C into two piles, and she informs me that she “can't do it—it's too fast.” I'm interested to note that, after such a dire pronouncement, she does the task perfectly!

Mindy asks for a turn at the computer and plays a “concentration”-type game matching words and pictures. She is competent but not perfect in remembering where the matches are.

I glance at the clock and decide the girls will probably ask for food soon. I remember a snack Mindy wants to try and make peanut butter-apple spiders with celery-curl antennae and raisin eyes.

The kids are thrilled with the snack, and Camille knowingly says that they are spiders, because spiders have eight legs.

Camille is being unusually affectionate, kissing me on the neck and whispering secrets in my ear. I can't make out what the secrets are, mind you, but she seems thrilled to be imparting them!

Perhaps because of this secret-telling, Mindy has gone off away from us (which is unusual for her), into her room, even closing the door. (That's really unusual for her!) Eventually Camille wanders down the hall to see what she's doing, and she comes back with a hurt expression. “I can't go in Mindy's room,” she tells me. “There's a sign on the door.”

I go to check it out for myself. I kind of expect to see a badly-spelled sign that says something like “Do not enter.” Instead, I see a sign that has a number 5 on it. I call through the door, “What does the sign say, Mindy?”

“No five-year-olds allowed,” Mindy answers.

Huh! Mindy herself is five!

I turn to Camille and say, “You can have Lindsey's room and make a sign for the door.” 

Camille doesn't want her own exclusionary room, though, so she and I go back to the family room. I am wondering what's up with Mindy but am also pretty sure that she should be allowed to seek privacy if she needs it.

Camille asks me to read the Sesame Street magazine. There are poems, stories, and games, and we even learn some Spanish words.

Soon enough, Mindy rejoins us.

When Lindsey comes home with Kiki and Delia, she seems much closer to Kiki than ever before. All four kids play together while us moms talk and make egg-salad lunch. We all eat together. When Mindy and Camille are done eating, they get some cellophane tape and march off to Mindy's bedroom. When I hear their door close, I suspect that there is more sign action, so I go down the hall to check it out.

Sure enough, there is a new sign on Mindy's door: “No 3 year olds allowed.”

I look in on Lindsey and Kiki, both in Lindsey's room. They are playing side-by-side, Lindsey with the Fisher Price zoo set and Kiki with the airport. They seem quietly happy, so (naturally!) I don't draw their attention to the closed door or sign. But as I leave, Lindsey asks me to close her door, so I guess she noticed.

“Are you guys okay?” I ask. She nods in response, and Lindsey's no stranger to expressing herself, so I figure she's not feeling the least bit hurt by a closed door. Maybe she figures it's just the thing to do today. So I close Lindsey's door, as requested, and go back to chat with Delia.

The next time Mindy's door opens, she wants us all to hear an Important Announcement: “We have a store. And it's now OPEN!” So Delia and Kiki and Lindsey and I all go shopping and “buy” plenty of items from Mindy and Camille's store.

Some friends, Candace and her mom Cindy, stop by. The five kids seem like a mob, somehow, and I'm pretty glad that they want to play outside in the playhouse. Eventually Candace and Cindy leave, but a glance at the clock shows me that it will soon be time for Roz and Ginnie, who live down the street, to come over to join in our piano fun.

I feel a bit tired from all the coming-and-going, and I'm not sure what we should do while waiting for piano class. Luckily, Mindy is ready with a suggestion: sidewalk chalk. We all go out to the driveway, where we write names. I write, “Welcome to De Colores, Roz and Ginnie.” Mindy writes Camille's name, then Mindy, then Camille again. Camille makes a long wiggly drawing (a snake? a really large worm?) and then writes her name. What blows me away is that Lindsey has started writing her name. (At age 3, I didn't think she knew how to spell it yet.) She writes L I N, then asks me what the next letter is. (Oh. She doesn't know how to spell it yet. That's okay, she's only 3.) I tell her D, and use my finger to trace a D shape on the driveway, and Lindsey writes the letter. We follow this procedure for the rest of her name: S E Y. And there on the driveway is Lindsey's almost perfectly written name.

Yeah! I'm very impressed.

Lindsey decides to write her name again. She copies without any help from me, and the result is only slightly incorrect:

Soon we see Roz and Ginnie and their mom Cindy ambling down the street. There are whoops of glee as the girls run to greet their friends, and we are soon arrayed around the piano for keyboard-and-movement fun and games.

So concludes another day.