The Best Nest: Staying Out Of Their Way

Photo copyright Amy Jones 2013

This little egg and this little nest are why I unschool.

This week, I decided to take my little girls, ages 5 and 3, to our town's small art museum. (On a side note, I had the bright idea of giving blood right before this adventure, and it's amazing that I didn't keel over onto a fragile exhibit.)

Our museum does a yearly festival that is totally dedicated to the gourd. Gourds galore. Gourds painted to look like trout on a line, gourds decorated to look like geese, and of course, the inevitable Santa Gourd.

I was afraid that my girls would run loose in there, and maybe damage some poor, unsuspecting artwork, but no. While Lily (3) was a little shy and wanted to be carried (fine with me), my eldest, Georgie, walked around the exhibits, letting the wheels in her head fly at full speed. 

I kept hearing her mutter to herself, "I have an idea." Over and over. And I'll wager that, each time she said that, there was a different idea whizzing through her head.

At the end of our tour of the exhibits (we were the only ones in there), Georgie told the curator that she was going to have her own gourd show right there at the museum.  

The curator graciously said, "Well, let me get you started," and he produced a box full of small gourds and invited her to pick one. She selected an egg-shaped gourd, and the man explained to her that farmers sometimes paint these gourds white and put them in nests as a visual aid for the chickens.

And, with that, our afternoon was planned for us. Georgie talked of nothing but painting her egg while we were in the car, while we were in the grocery store, and while I frantically tried to find paint for her.

True to her word, as soon as I gave her the materials she commenced to paint the egg white. When it had dried, she drew cracks all over the egg, a little pink baby bird, and her own name (which she said she wrote "to look like cracks in the egg too").

But that's not all. After she was finished with the egg, she had to make a nest. She asked me for cardboard, then made the nest by cutting an oval shape for the bottom and a strip to glue around it for the walls of the nest. Then she colored the whole thing yellow.

Wow, you might say. What a creative mom with great ideas, who makes her kids follow through with their plans.

Not so. I plan very few activities for my kids. I don't need to. I don't have time to. They're too busy planning their own, like this egg and nest--Georgie's idea, motivation, and work, from beginning to end.

And that's why I unschool.

Not that long ago (a matter of months), I might have interrupted this beautiful project with what I thought she should be doing, like a reading lesson. Why? Because I can't stand any loose ends. I make my plans, and I must carry them out, irrespective of what life is going on around me.

But, slowly, I woke up to see that, well, life was going on around me, irrespective of my plans. 

I realized that I didn't want to miss their lives while the proverbial i's were dotted. I didn't want them to miss their own lives while the t's were crossed. I have two very vibrant-minded girls, and those vibrant minds are great little teachers.

Just look at what all my daughter learned with this project:

• Art from painting the egg and building/coloring the nest
• Math from making the oval and cutting a strip to match its circumference
• Writing from putting her name on it
• History from learning about how farmers have traditionally used the egg gourds
• Science from learning about how gourds grow and that they come in all kinds of shapes
• Planning
• Tenacity
• Accomplishment

True, our trip to the art museum might be called "strewing," but I already knew that she loved creating her own art, so we'll call it "encouragement" instead. 

But that's where my involvement in this project ends, other than fetching what materials she asked for. She planned this and carried it out on her own, with no procrastination--or nagging from me--involved.  

I just stayed out of her way, and she learned. She created. She succeeded.

And, I got a really cute knickknack in the bargain.

Monkeying Around with Shakespeare

A couple of years ago, David and I had the bright idea of a calendar called Sock Monkey Shakespeare. The idea came to me when I had a dream--during a very high fever--of a sock monkey portraying Hamlet. I lay in bed, brain roasting, 4:30 in the morning, and let the idea stew in my bubbling juices. A sock monkey wouldn't hold a skull--no, he'd hold fluff!

When David woke up, I told him my idea, and he loved it. We bought some Rockford Red Heel socks, made the monkeys and their costumes and sets by hand, I read 16 Shakespeare plays, and we watched every Shakespeare-related movie we could obtain.

Two months later, we had a calendar, and a super-cute one at that. We, at the time, knew nothing about marketing, however, so the calendar just kind of sat there.

Today, however, it's serving as a great unschooling tool! Georgie and Lily are playing with the celebrities themselves, and have been having a great time going through the calendar. Georgie knows the beginning of the "Friends, Romans, Countrymen" speech, and she's been teaching it to Lily.

As they've been leafing through the calendar, Georgie has been telling Lily the synopses each photo (she's had the tour of the calendar before), and I've been amazed at how well she remembered each one. She's also familiar with William Shakespeare from a great Magic Tree House book!

Romeo and Juliet from Sock Monkey Shakespeare (c) David and Amy Jones 2011

I'm so glad that they have an early appreciation and understanding that Shakespeare meant his plays to be fun and entertaining, not boring or the bases for long, tedious projects. Learning was never meant to be work!

Not-Back-To-School: Top Ten Things She'll Miss

Well, next Monday would be Georgie's first day of Kindergarten, had we chosen to send her this year. So, I wanted to commemorate this time with a top ten list on what she is missing by staying home with me:

1. She won't learn that she has to only make friends within a group of people just her age.
2. She won't learn that she has to stay still and quiet all day long, never making waves or rocking the proverbial boat.
3. She won't come home with thirty sets of parents' worth of values (or lack thereof).
4. She won't be told what she is supposed to think or believe. She can figure those things out on her own.
5. She won't have to wait until receiving permission to go to the bathroom.
6. She won't have to miss playing in the park or outside in our yard in the middle of the day.
7. She won't have to forgo lying on my bed, watching a Veggie Tales or What's in the Bible (or Disney movie) when she needs some downtime. And we all need downtime. 
8. She won't have to stop jumping up and down, yelling (within reason), making paper dresses, staging plays, or climbing to get sap from the tree for her sap collection.
9. She won't have to spend the day without her little sister.
10. She won't have to spend the day without me. 

This list is not exclusive, but it's all I can think of for the moment (same thing?). I'm so blessed to have my sweet girls home with me!

"Did You Ever Stop to Ponder"--A Great First Experience at the Movies

Today was such a special day, or at least this morning was super-special.

Today, I took my two girls, ages 5 and 3, to their very first movie at a movie theater. I know, that's unthinkable, that they're that old and hadn't been to the movies yet, but times are tight, content is bad, and behavior is volatile, so there you are.

It was so awesome, and I'm so thankful that I got that special moment all to myself .  I'm also glad that we waited until they were older to take them to the movies for the first time. They'll remember that all their lives.

The movie was Charlotte's Web, the old Hanna-Barbera cartoon version that I grew up with and hadn't seen in 25 years, at least. Georgie was already familiar with the story--we read the book last year when she was 4.

The girls behaved wonderfully during it. Lily just sat on my lap and lay back against me the whole time, and Georgie beamed almost throughout and leaned her head on my shoulder several times. She knew what was about to happen before it happened, of course, but the whole experience seemed to thrill her immensely.

Tonight, she's been writing a song called "Did You Ever Stop to Ponder," about losing a friend, no doubt inspired by the story.

Thumbs Up, Thumbs Down

After reading Georgie a whole bunch of Shel Silverstein poems, she decided to compose her own. Here it is:

Thumbs up,
Thumbs down.
Put them together and what do you make
But a thumbs up,
Thumbs down
Really bad mistake!

All Things Bright and Beautiful

One of our chapter books right now is that great classic, Black Beauty. If you haven't read it, it's the story of a horse (of course), told from the horse's point of view.

As we read it, there are parts that I am tempted to skip, just to spare my little one from hearing anything horrific; throughout the book there are descriptions of the maltreatment of animals. And, yes, I can tell that hearing these descriptions makes her sad.

But I'm also intrigued to see her 5-year-old heart growing as we read this together, her compassion being molded and shaped.  And I mean compassion that you can see blazing out of her black eyes (if I may be so dramatic). She has told me, "When I grow up, I'm going to have a horse. It will have no bit, and I'm only going to use a cloth saddle and reins."

I think the author's endeavor to strike a chord of compassion in the reader is certainly resonating in Georgie.  She's determined never "to treat animals that way" and "always to treat her horses very well."

I believe that every time I read Georgie a book, she retains not only the information, but the deeper concepts. I fervently believe this, since she references books at all times, remembering concepts we read about as long as a year ago when she was barely 4. And, if the books are molding and shaping her little heart into what it should be, then I'm doing my job. On top of that, she's getting a biology lesson, history lesson, and literature class all in one, plus readying herself to follow long stories when she's able to read them herself.

As it is, every time I get to the end of a chapter, all I hear is the demand "More!"  And I usually give in.

Great Books for Little Girls

Georgie is madly addicted to chapter books. Yes, we read regular kids books every day, but she's so into the classics, and she loves moving from one chapter to the next of a long, ongoing story.

Right now, we're reading The Secret Garden, a great choice for February when spring is just beginning to poke through the brown of winter.  But that's the fourth classic we've started this week. Yes, fourth.

I'd like to share a short list of some of our latest favorites:

• A Little Princess by Frances Hogsden Burnett: The entire family got into this story. David asked me to only read it at night when he could be home. It deals with grief in a very real way,  and the heroine learns to be an awesomely strong person through her grief and ill treatment.  Like the Apostle Paul, she learns to abase and to abound: that is, when she is rich, she is kind and generous; when she is poor and all is taken from her, she is still kind and generous, but ends up growing an even stronger spirit. A great lesson in how to deal with sudden change, and how to stand strong in the face of enemies and adversity.
• Understood Betsy by Dorothy Canfield Fisher: I had never heard of this book before, but it's one of my absolute favorites. It's another story of a little girl taken out of her element into a situation she can't control, but in this case a sickly city child learns to think for herself and becomes healthy in the Vermont countryside.  It's not a dumbed-down story at all. No, the situations are very realistic, but also very entertaining. I particularly liked the scene in the one-room schoolhouse.  Betsy has only had experience in a public school setting, so she is floored when the teacher puts her in seventh-grade reading, second-grade arithmetic, and third-grade spelling. I was shouting "Amen!"  That's exactly the kind of school I want to provide for my girls!
• All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor: Another book I'd never heard of, but Georgie had her little giggle box turned over several times during this account of a Jewish family of 5 young girls in 1912 New York City. We learned about the Sabbath, Passover, Purim, and Succos, as well as the ups and downs of sibling love and rivalry. 

So, there's the Oak Knoll Review of Books for this week. I think that, for obvious reasons, Georgie especially likes stories about little girls, and these are three very good ones. The Secret Garden has also been great so far, but is much denser than the aforementioned books, plus I've been forced to try my hand a Yorkshire accent!

The Way They Should Go

I love the different personalities between my children.

Georgie just came in to show me a bow an arrow she'd fashioned. The bow was a toy violin bow. The arrow was a toy broom handle attached to a toy mouthpiece (to a toy wind instrument).

Lily, on the other hand, is at the table "reading" Magic Tree House to a family of Legos.

You see, if you give my girls any select items, Lily will make a family out of them, and Georgie will begin assembling them into some kind of invention.  I adore watching the differences in how their little minds work.

And that's what my job is--to figure out their personalities, learning styles, interests, and passions, and train them in the way they should go.  Listen to their plays. Watch their puppet shows. Help them with the masks, costumes, and sets that go with the plays and, yes, pretend battles (to which I've just now been invited). 

Yes, my job is to fill them with information through books, etc, but also to stand back and let them grow into what they're supposed to be. I didn't teach Lily to make a baby doll out of everything from a banana peel to a rolling pin; she does it because that's what Lily does. I certainly didn't teach Georgie to make that bow and arrow or any of her dozens (or hundreds) of other inventions that she's crafted since she could crawl.

But, what touches me the most is that, even though it helps to have construction paper, blocks, and various other toys at hand, I know that these little ladies would follow in these bends if we lived in a one-room shack with no electricity.

The point is--they're free. Free to be who they are without conforming to any standards other than those set by God, us, and themselves.  And when they are old, let's just see what kind of lives they'll have to look back on.

Quothe the Georgie

Yesterday, right after my girls got up, I offered to read "The Raven" by Edgar Allen Poe. Yes, this is a bit wordy for my 2-year-old, but Georgie (5) has loved it for years and understands what it's about.

So, as I began to read, Georgie "perched upon the bust of Pallas," which was the iron bedstead, and proceeded to play the part of the Raven. It was her job to provide the same line, as needed--"Nevermore."

And so she did, through the entire poem. I remember not understanding this poem in high school, and she gets it at 5. Maybe it's because of our discussions of it, but also because we act it out. I can "Quaff!" with the best of them, and am anticipating notice of a Tony Award nomination soon.

A Quilting Adventure

This month we started a new adventure--quilting!

Thanks to a great lady, whom we'll call Ms. Kathryn, Georgie is learning so much about the art of quilting, and so am I.  Our plan is to meet with Ms. Kathryn at least once a month and make a quilt square, each based on Georgie's favorite book that month.

Ms. Kathryn supplied Georgie with fabric pens, and Georgie drew the cover to this month's favorite, Zero the Hero. 

At the end of the year, she will have made a quilt representing each month of her 6th year, and by the time she's 6, it should be finished. At least, that's the goal.

Ms. Kathryn had the idea of making the borders out of different strips of fabric, maybe even made out of some of her clothes, and sewing or writing the titles of books on the strips so that they look like book spines. Great idea!

A book quilt is thoroughly Georgie. I can't wait to have it, but will enjoy the journey immensely.

Literary Theater

At our house, it's often not enough just to read a book--we have to have a theatrical presentation, complete with sets, costumes, and masks.

Yesterday we had two such performances.

First, we read Sir Cumference and the Great Knight of Angleland.  She was Radius, and first made her own medallion (protractor) out of construction paper (her idea).  Then, as I read the book, she acted out every part of it. I had to wear the princess hat, since I was Lady Di of Ameter (and all the other characters that weren't Radius).

Now she has a great grasp on angles (straight, acute, and obtuse), and how to measure parts of a circle, and she didn't even know she was being taught! She did it her own way, and learned.

Later in the day, she made me a mask so that I could play the Maestro in Belinda and the Glass Slipper (and all the other characters).  She had to be Lola, the main character.  I read the book as we acted it out, complete with the dancing.

It amazes me how she loves to make sets and costumes, and act stories out. She does this with her history and, as with Sir Cumference, even her math! Theater can be a great teacher.

Will her name be in lights one day? I don't know, maybe, but she's found a fun way to learn that really helps her remember. Much better than studying for a test, any day!

Little Pituitary Gland

Yesterday I read Georgie a few facts about nerves, and she really picked up on the pituitary gland. For some reason, that's what she mainly got out of the lesson, although we had a great time playing "Secret in a Sack"--a game where I put different objects in a paper bag and she feels them to guess what they are and describe their texture.

Later that day, she starts chatting about the pituitary gland (remembering the correct pronunciation perfectly), and showing me where the gland is on a baby doll.

Later than that, she was in the living room playing and starts singing a little song about the pituitary gland. It went like this:

Little Pituitary Gland
Little Pituitary Gland
At the back of your little head
Telling you to grow from a baby
And then a toddler.
Grow and grow and grow
To a big kid and then a grownup--
Little Pituitary Gland
Helps you do it.

Not bad for 5!

One Small Step for a Man, a Milestone for Georgie

Well, last night was a monumental night in the Jones family. In honor of turning 5, Georgie got her very first library card, and checked out her first book. The book was Knuffle Bunny Free, a very appropriate choice, since it's about a little girl starting to come of age and find some independence.

She was so excited all day before we went to the library that she didn't feel like playing the "Rabbit Shoots the Sun" theatrical that she'd planned the night before, complete with costumes (I believe we will be doing it today though, by her implications last night).

After she checked out the book, library manners were put aside as she scampered about shouting, "I checked out my very first book!!!"

We went to Pizza Inn to celebrate.

You have to understand, books are a major factor in little Georgie's life. She has no interest in television--she doesn't have any idea what comes on. She will watch a DVD every now and then, but lose interest after a while and ask to be read to again. I read to her at least 3-4 hours a day. At the very least.

Soon, she will be able to read these books on her own, and I'll have to watch in silence while she's in "the Bookworld," as Jasper Fforde calls it.  I'll enjoy reading to her all I can, while I can, and I'm getting a better education this way than I ever did in college!

But, now, she can check them out herself.

Georgie's Book List

This is the list of books Georgie and I read together this year while she was 4. Georgie has a mind that's just on another plane of existence, on so many levels, and she listens to chapter books voraciously. In fact, we've had many a tearful tantrum in our house because "No one would read to her!" This list doesn't count the dozen or so chapter books her Grandma read to her this year.

The Magician's Nephew
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
The Horse and His Boy
Prince Caspian
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
The Silver Chair
The Last Battle
Little House in the Big Woods
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator
The BFG
Matilda
Esio Trot
The Magic Finger
Danny: The Champion of the World
James and the Giant Peach
The Giraffe, The Pelly, and Me
The Fantastic Mr. Fox
Charlotte's Web
Stuart Little
The Trumpet of the Swan
The Hobbit
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Through the Looking Glass
A Christmas Carol
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Land of Oz
Ozma of Oz

Also, understand that this list includes only chapter books, not the hundreds of children's books we've read throughout the year.