Beach Novel While Not on the Beach

It's spring break and I'm reading a literary beach novel while not on the beach, The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins, a Year 10 Amblesideonline free read. Seven chapters into the book, my favorite, laugh-out-loud quote is,

Clear your mind of the children, or the dinner, or the new bonnet, or what not … and don't I know how ready your attention is to wander when it's a book that asks for it, instead of a person? ~ Gabriel Betteredge, former bailiff and current house steward who consults Robinson Crusoe as his lifetime companion.

He raises a good question — How does one train attention to a book, not a person, when years of schooling has trained students to focus on a teacher lecturing or prompting? When years of worksheets has taught them to skim for answers, instead of reading to know? How can this transformation happen in a classroom with students whose abilities range from barely able to make it through a large group setting without a meltdown to gifted learners who already long to know? How do we help them go from letting facts pass through them like a sieve to seeking knowledge and making connections?

What are signs of a classroom full of seekers? Here is a list made by Charlotte Mason to assess for yourself, whether you are a homeschooling parent, a teacher at a homeschooling co-operative, or a teacher in a classroom. (These statements are quoted from Leslie Laurio's modern paraphrase of Towards a Philosophy of Education.)

"It's appropriate for all ages — even Shakespeare's seven ages of man!" — When I'm pre-reading, I sometimes gasp at an exciting connection. The other day my mind turned to a literature book when reading about Tim Severin's brilliant solution that blocked ginormous waves from entering his medieval leather boat during a gale. He and his crew sewed together pieces of oxhide with thongs to make a shell based on an image of a Roman army testudo formation that flashed into his mind. The hard part letting students make discoveries. To my delight, one girl gasped; another said, "Wait a minute;" a boy blurted out the name of the book.

"It effectively educates brilliant children, and develops the intelligence of even the slower children." — The other day we did the classic test of acids and bases using red cabbage juice as suggested in The Mystery of the Periodic Table. First, we tested vinegar and it turned red; then, we tested a baking soda solution, and it turned blue. Excited chatter erupted. We put them together and purple foam brewed. Eman, who is learning to function in a large classroom, exclaimed, "I can't wait to tell my dad I did three experiments." Another student decided to do this at home with his little brothers. The seekers of the class pondered and shared their thoughts, "Wait a minute! So, when you mix the acid and base, it reacts and becomes neutral!" Living out living books means that persons with varying abilities can thrive together.

Children concentrate with focused attention and interest without any effort from them or their teachers. — Effort is required to get them to that point! Lots of patient smiles and awkward pauses and encouragement. Reading short sections. Scaffolding them in how to notebook. Reading fewer books. Skipping long, wordy nonessential passages. Once students learn this kind of concentration, it looks effortless.

All children taught this way express themselves in confident, well-spoken English, and use a large vocabulary. — The boy who came to us labeled non-verbal in August 2013 amazes us. Every morning he spends a half-hour outdoors on a scooter. When we came in, I asked what he was going to do during math and he said, "Work on lessons." For history, he said, "Narrate." Narrate! He is still such a slow processor that it's hard for him to narrate in class. Since he asked for it, the headmaster and I brainstormed how it could be done. Now, he leaves the class with his Kindle and notebook and finds one of us. Then, he narrates and we write what he says. The first day was rather amusing — for the record, he did not have his Kindle that day — he said that Lincoln "was a red car." However, a few days later, Angie took down what he said about their readings in ancient history, "Mesopotamia has rivers. Deserts with dark storms like Egypt." Even speech-delayed children can acquire a large vocabulary when surrounded by living books.

Children are calm and stable. — Last week, I substituted in the elementary class. Since Eman and the boy who narrated Mesopotamia are usually with me, they joined me for the reading, a chapter from Tom Sawyer. Thirteen students and I sat in a circle on the carpet while I read to them. Those with books had their eyes on the words. A prospective family with a spectrum child was meeting with Angie. They wanted to know how their child might fit in, so she said, "In the room next door are four special needs children. You'll be able to figure out one. Can you spot the other three who all have autism?" They quietly opened the door, watched, and listened. They were amazed at how calm and attentive the students were. Building trust, developing good habits, and helping students find joy in learning helps them find meaning their daily work.

Keeping the mind busy with things to think about seems to make children's minds and lives pure. — Our kids find neat things to do outside of class. Several want to do more chemistry experiments at home. Some girls are planning to make a video of The Brendan Voyage over the summer. At recess, the kids are fighting Civil War battles or fighting over who gets to be Robin Hood and Maid Marion. We have a couple of kids whose viewing choices have shifted to history documentaries and trivia shows. When they go to local Mexican restaurants, they speak Spanish and sing for their servers. One boy would rather go to North Dakota to see dinosaur bones instead of Disney.

Parents [and teachers] share their children's interest in their schoolwork and enjoy the company of their children. — Back to my morning substituting, we read the chapter on World War I from A Child's History of the World. First, they gave a lovely narration about the previous chapter on the Industrial Revolution. Then, we read the introductory section on Serbia and Austria, which they narrated well. "Those countries are so little!" We read how France and Russia joined the fray. They were indignant about Germany marching through poor Belgium. When I asked what they thought England would do, they were sure it would side with Germany. They based their reason upon the connection between British royalty and Germany in their biography about Queen Victoria. They were shocked and appalled to learn that the United Kingdom sided with France. "FRANCE?" "They always fight France!" "Have they forgotten Napoleon?" The teacher told me that, the next day, they were still shaking their heads and muttering about England's choice. Teaching is a pleasure when students are engaged!

Children enjoy their books, even when they aren't picture books, and they seem to really love learning. — We are reading a challenging, worthy book for junior high geography. We sample the most tantalizing excerpts, and they are hooked. Two gasped when Josef Fischer found the long-lost Waldseemüller map in a German castle. When each student got a print of one of the twelve pieces, they looked carefully to make one large map. "Hey! That's not big enough!" "Yeah, the book said it was four by eight feet." In drawing a medieval map of the cosmos, done in Latin, they applied Spanish and Aristotle's four elements. "Tierra — terra — it must be Earth!" "Aqua sounds like agua, which is water." "Aer looks like air." "So, ignis must be fire!" In narrating the imaginary races that medieval people believed existed, one girl said, "Those sound like the duffle pods in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader;" a boy decided the barking, dog-headed people were from Egyptian mythology; Eman added, "They're wearing a dog head skin like British wild people." Students love learning when we let them make connections.

Teachers don't have to work so hard making corrections. — One day, I filled in for the junior high teacher for literature. The class narrated their previous reading in an Alfred the Great biography. They were confused about why Alfred would marry when he was only a boy. I was confused because I didn't remember him having an arranged marriage as a child. I quickly realized their error and peeked at the next reading. I decided it contained enough information for them to correct themselves. After reading a section, I heard, "I'm confused." "Why did Alfred call Judith his sister?" "It said Judith married a man four times her age." "She's fifteen, so her husband must be sixty." "Wait, I think I got it! Judith married Alfred's father!" "And she's young enough to be his sister!" "Oh, now it makes sense!" Living books lend well to self-correction when students go astray.

Children taught this way do very well no matter what school they attend. — I suspect that children do very well in school, and, more importantly, do very well in life based upon what I know of CM-taught students who are now adults.

Students don't need grades, prizes, etc., to motivate them. — To scaffold parents in the transition, we assess habits as well as academics using a non-tradtional scale: novice, apprentice, practitioner, and expert. It removes the pressure of "getting all A's" because nobody can be an expert at everything. There is always room for growth! Having gotten over the hurdle of extrinsic motivation, the junior high is starting to learn for the sake of learning. When they drew a T-O map in their notebook, one said, "Hey, didn't we see one of those in a Fra Angelico painting?" When I pulled out Madonna and Child in Majesty, they asked, "Why is the globe upside down?" One is saving up for a copy for the Waldseemüller map for her bedroom. Another mappamundi sparked a lot of conversation. "Mappamundi must be a map!" "Mundi sounds like mundo which is Spanish for world." "I get it! Map of the world!" "Don't you see? Jesus is embracing the world. He's in it and in us!" "I can see why they were afraid to sail west. It wasn't just the end of the world; it was the end of time." "So, let me get this straight. What we're reading in geography is connected to chemistry, history, literature, and Spanish?" One student asked about the antichrist, and other students raised their hands to answer it! The teacher simply guided their conversation.

Since I don't believe in extrinsic motivation, I will offer a hilariously funny natural consequence for making it to the end of this very long post: another quote from The Moonstone, one of the 100 best novels in someone's eyes. It seems that Gabriel Betteredge may adore Robinson Crusoe, but he would not last long in a Charlotte Mason style of education.

You see my young master, or my young mistress, poring over one of their spiders' insides with a magnifying-glass; or you meet one of their frogs walking downstairs without his head — and when you wonder what this cruel nastiness means, you are told that it means a taste in my young master or my young mistress for natural history. Sometimes, again, you see them occupied for hours together in spoiling a pretty flower with pointed instruments, out of a stupid curiosity to know what the flower is made of. Is its colour any prettier, or its scent any sweeter, when you DO know? But there! the poor souls must get through the time, you see — they must get through the time. You dabbled in nasty mud, and made pies, when you were a child; and you dabble in nasty science, and dissect spiders, and spoil flowers, when you grow up. In the one case and in the other, the secret of it is, that you have got nothing to think of in your poor empty head, and nothing to do with your poor idle hands. And so it ends in your spoiling canvas with paints, and making a smell in the house; or in keeping tadpoles in a glass box full of dirty water, and turning everybody's stomach in the house; or in chipping off bits of stone here, there, and everywhere, and dropping grit into all the victuals in the house; or in staining your fingers in the pursuit of photography, and doing justice without mercy on everybody's face in the house.

The Tale of the Sleeping Fish: A Parable of Mental Habits

Attention, the power of turning the whole force of the mind upon the subject brought before it.

Concentration, which differs from attention in that the mind is actively engaged on some given problem rather than passively receptive.

Intellectual Volition, the power, that is, of making ourselves think of a given subject at a given time;––most of us know how trying our refractory minds are in this matter, but, if the child is accustomed to take pleasure in the effort as effort, the man will find it easy to make himself think of what he will. ~ Charlotte Mason

Once upon a time, there were fourteen fish — thirteen swam around while one slept behind a plant. As they were new to this tank, they weren't quite familiar with how things were done. They didn't realize when they were to be fed, much less in what direction their banquet would appear.

One morning, the fish were quite hungry, but they didn't realize it was time for a feeding. They heard a strange creaking sound but hadn't yet connected it to the arrival of food. After the tank lid was opened, a boy and his friend sprinkled fish flakes on top of the water. The two watched the fish and waited and waited and waited for something to happen. None of the fish noticed the food floating above them. The boy and his friend giggled about the fish that were oblivious to their meal.



After several very long minutes, one fish flake slowly drifted down. The boy and his friend began to wonder which fish would spot it first. None of the fish paid attention to the flake until it fell halfway down the tank. Suddenly, the white fish with red blotches spotted the food and gobbled it up. The other thirteen fish didn't even know they had missed something. The boy and his friend began to giggle some more.



That fish remembered where the food came from and swam to the surface of the water. It gobbled up flake after flake. Then, another fish noticed its friend eating food at the surface and joined the feast. Before another minute passed, five fish had gobbled up most of the fish flakes. The boy and his friend tossed in more flakes and, by then, all the fish were at the surface gobbling food — all but one fish — the one sleeping behind the plant.



The boy and his friend watched and watched and waited and waited for that sleepy fish to wake up. It looked awake for its eyes were open. Clearly, it had no idea what it was missing. The boy and his friend waited for several minutes and then the jaws of the sleepy one began to move as if it were chewing. Perhaps, it heard the sound of its friends eating.



Its mouth grew wider and it chewed almost like a cow. It slowly drifted up from behind the plant. Then, the fish realized it has almost slept through breakfast. It zoomed to the surface of the water! Since the food was nearly gone, the boy and his friend sprinkled a few more flakes for the sleepy head.



Morals of the Story

Attention - Children are born with natural curiosity unless something hinders it. Sometimes, physical or brain issues get in the way. Sometimes, the education system encourages them to pay attention to earn cheap rewards (grades, test scores, awards, candy). When offered nourishing food (ideas found in living books and real things) and allowed to explore them with an active mind, they eventually learn to pay attention. Some take longer than others to join the feast.

Concentration - Children who have stayed too long in a stultifying atmosphere take awhile to wake up. My friend who fed the fish in this true fish tale, came to our school, highly resistant. He associated school with people who said "GREAT JOB" and "CALM DOWN". He associated school with long, tedious tasks and nothing that interested him in the least. He associated school with being asked to do things that were outside of his zone of proximal development.

As a result, he had developed the habit of balking when asked to do most things. It took some time and patience but we focused on developing a relationship with him. We kept lessons short and offered interesting things for him to do with free time. We consistently expected him to do little things within his reach and letting him do things he finds interesting — things like poring over animal books and magazines, feeding the fish, replenishing the bird feeders, cleaning the pond, working in the compost bin and garden, etc.

There was a time when a drawing in a nature notebook was "too hard" or "too boring." Now, he draws something and writes a sentence. He even drew a comic of the fish tale because he found the fish tale hilarious. Below is the nature notebook entry he made the day the school got the fish. He has gone from concentrating on how to get out of work to doing it so he can concentrate on what interests him.



Intellectual Volition - Some take a long time to find intrinsic motivation, especially if the education system hasn't been a good fit. Eventually, the sleepiest of minds or resistant minds or unfocused minds will find enough living ideas to find pleasure in the effort.

Anxiety the Note of a Transition Stage––Every new power, whether mechanical or spiritual, requires adjustment before it can be used to the full.... But to perceive that there is much which we ought to do and not to know exactly what it is, nor how to do it, does not add to the pleasure of life or to ease in living. We become worried, restless, anxious; and in the transition stage between the development of this new power and the adjustment which comes with time and experience, the fuller life, which is certainly ours, fails to make us either happier or more useful. ~ Charlotte Mason

Psalm 100

Multitasking thwarts the habit of attention. You can read what it does to health, IQ, learning, and productivity here.

There I was. Friday night. Doing a very tedious task. Making a 137 graphs for a video explaining how to curve stitch a heart on a paper sloyd picture frame. To break up the monotony, I popped on the head phones and "listened" to a John Piper sermon on education. I should say half-listened. To be honest, it didn't make much sense because only a sliver of my mind was paying attention.

One sentence drove me to dig deeper when I had more time the next day. "For . . ." A whole philosophy of education hangs on this word. How could an entire philosophy of education hang on one word? I replayed the sermon on my Nook while falling asleep. It still didn't make sense.

The next day, I put my full attention to work. I copied Psalm 100 into my notebook (thanks for the inspiration, Laurie).

Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful singing. Know that the Lord himself is God; it is he who has made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people and the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him, bless his name. For the Lord is good; his lovingkindness is everlasting and his faithfulness to all generations.

I pondered Charlotte Mason's twenty principles in light of "the old one hundred." I wrote in my notebook. I listened to the sermon, and it made much more sense. A whole philosophy of education rests on for because knowing God is the aim of true education. Both Piper and Mason believe in an education rooted in God. He wrote, "God-centered Exultation is rooted in God-centered Education." She wrote, "The knowledge of God is the principal knowledge, and the chief end of education."

When I turned to the chapter to study for the blog carnival, and joy swept over me as I read this line: "We realise ourselves as persons, we have a local habitation, and we live and move and have our being in and under a supreme authority."

It fits so beautifully with these verses from Psalm 100.

Know that the Lord Himself is God; it is He who has made us, and not we ourselves; we are His people and the sheep of His pasture.

Piper put it like this, "We need to know three things: 1) The Lord is our God. 2) He made us. 3) We are his people, like sheep in the pastures of a shepherd."

Mason's three ultimate facts –– not open to question are, "God is, Self is, the World is, with all that these existences imply, quite untouched by any thinking of ours, unprovable, and self-proven –– why, we are at once put into a more humble attitude of mind."

God has lovingly placed us in a pasture to feed on great intellectual and spiritual ideas and to be active in our exploration. As my pastor pointed out in his sermon yesterday, the pasture has some boundaries, and, within those boundaries, we can play freely. He has given us the Good Shepherd to guide us, protect us, and lead us to living water and rest. He has given us the Whispering Spirit to offer us knowlege of "witty inventions, of man and nature, of art and literature, of the heavens above and the earth beneath," to help us discover, and to share great ideas.

A more humble attitude of mind avoids a great fallacy. Our natural tendency amplifies Self and World and puts God to a small corner in the pasture. We forget that the source of great ideas whether they be scientific, literary, poetic, or artistic is God, who sends the Whispering Spirit in the name of the Good Shepherd to "teach you all things" (John 14:26).

Humility takes me back to the word upon which a whole philosophy of education rests. The last verse of Psalm 100 explains it well. "For the Lord is good; his lovingkindness is everlasting and his faithfulness to all generations. The Creator of Self and World, our authority, is good, is always loving and kind, and is faithful to us all." Knowing these three attributes of God is the point of education.

When we follow the Good Shepherd to the still waters and pay attention to the Whispering Spirit, then we can know something new about God. New to us, not to the Father, of course. That's when we see the glory of God and He fills us with joy.

"Child, know thyself, and thy relations to God and man and nature." ~ Charlotte Mason

"He desired not to assist in storing the passive mind with the various sorts of knowledge most in request, as if the human soul were a mere repository or banqueting room, but to place it in such relations of circumstance as should gradually excite its vegetating and germinating powers to produce new fruits of thought, new conceptions and imaginations and ideas." ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge on Plato's aim (page 24)

Peacefully Guided

In God's wisdom, our Sunday school class read Isaiah 55 last week. Reading from this Old Testament book of the Bible in the weeks leading up to Christmas is quite appropriate because so many passages foreshadow the coming of Christ.

Come, everyone who is thirsty, come to the waters; and you without money, come, buy, and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost! Why do you spend money on what is not food, and your wages on what does not satisfy? Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good, and you will enjoy the choicest of foods. Isaiah 55:1-3

Many think the goal of education is employment, or working for food that spoils. Jesus knew that life is more important for he said, "Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you" (John 6:26-27). What kind of work endures? As we head into a new year, we might want to take a breath from busyness and consider what work brings light and life into the lives of others.



Last Friday, we read Tennyson's "The Dying Swan," so today, we discussed our poem for recitation ("The Owl") before finishing the last chapter of our science book. One student wondered why Tennyson chose the word hay instead of grass. We ended up talking about the last word in each line and then came the "aha" moment for her. Then, we noted what Tennyson was trying to portray (the owl's view from the belfry). Another student added, "Owls can turn their heads all the way around"—implying how much of the world the bird could see while sitting still. I had not intended this for happen, but the section of the science book that we read included this quote,

Other aircraft are a danger as well. Turbulence from a helicopter can slam an ultralight to the ground. When an army helicopter cut in front of Mark south of Numidia, he had a few anxious moments before he knew he was safe. As for swans—they can hit the plane. Mark says, "You have to know where the birds are all the time and be ready to dodge every second. I need an owl’s head so I can turn to see directly behind me."

Everyone's eyes lit up. We were all amazed that an accidental pairing between poem and science book had happened twice in a row! Accident, or whisper from God?

Education is life. A mind awakened to beauty and truth in the world God created. A soul seeking His presence. A person who cares enough to ask, who longs to know.

Pay attention and come to Me; listen, so that you will live. Seek the Lord while He may be found; call to Him while He is near. Isaiah 55:6

In this busy season, we find it hard to pay attention and come to the Lord. Yet, the only way to live is to seek Him and pay attention. This habit is hard to come by in this screen-infested world. Getting outdoors and seeing what God created with His own voice is one way to practice the habit of attention, especially when we are quiet and still. Nearly everyone in our walking group passed this katydid without noticing it. The student who found it explained, "I just saw this tiny bit of green. Everything is so brown right now that green just pops!" She has been walking this trail for almost a year and a half, which helped her develop the habit of attention.

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not My ways." [This is] the Lord's declaration. "For as heaven is higher than earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." For just as rain and snow fall from heaven, and do not return there without saturating the earth, and making it germinate and sprout, and providing seed to sow and food to eat, so My word that comes from My mouth will not return to Me empty, but it will accomplish what I please, and will prosper in what I send it [to do]. Isaiah 55:8-11

Some friends are facing a season of rain and snow because of heartbreaking challenges in life, due to no fault of their own, beyond their ability to change or control. The extreme and exhausting behaviors of puberty on top of autism. Sitting at the bedside of dear ones in the hospital. Waiting in the emergency room watching your child in pain. In the long winter nights of cold, hope is hard to see. God's ways and thoughts are hard to understand when things appear bleak. Somehow, even after tears saturate the earth, God provides and His will is done. Narnia will thaw; it always does. Spring is always around the bend, whether the bend is in this lifetime or the eternal one.

You will indeed go out with joy and be peacefully guided; the mountains and the hills will break into singing before you, and all the trees of the field will clap [their] hands. Instead of the thornbush, a cypress will come up, and instead of the brier, a myrtle will come up; it will make a name for the Lord as an everlasting sign that will not be destroyed. Isaiah 55:12-13

Experiencing the Fuller Life

Pamela and I have just finished our third week at Harvest Community School. We found this week quite hectic because the elementary class teacher enjoyed a week of vacation. That meant the headmaster and I took turns teaching. While I did not engage much with Pamela one-on-one, she still experienced a fuller life. She fascinates children because of her savant skill in calendars, her artistic abilities, her princess lunchbox, and her boldness in telling a teacher—me—, "Director! Director! Cut!" and "You're fired." When I am not working with her, she keeps herself busy, building puzzles and triazzles, swinging on the porch swing, playing with her calculator, and using a laptop. She has far more opportunities to interact with people in an environment similar to the kind of learning environment she has enjoyed for over a decade. Thursday, she helped the elementary class build a water filter for the school pond!







I have thoroughly enjoyed applying Relationship Development Intervention ideas as we help our auties (two full-time students in the spectrum and another part-time in addition to Pamela) adapt to this new way of learning. I glean so much from them in one-on-one moments when they take a break from the classroom. Thursday, I taught one boy who has a mechanical mind and nibble fingers to sew a needle case. On Friday, he hardly needed help in sewing a running stitch in the first line on his tic-tac-toe game. The other boy and I have been sharing many perspective-taking conversations to help him see that what he thinks is not always what another person thinks. Their parents are delighted to have a school where students are doing more than the three R's—where they are engaged with the kind of hands-on, meaningful tasks that Temple Grandin recommends for students in the spectrum: drawing, handwork (right now, sewing), cleaning the pond and surrounding area, building a water filter, etc.

Friday the 13th was delightful! While chatting with a parent dropping off her child, we spotted two hummingbirds seeking nectar from a can of bug spray with a bright orange cap. (Note to self, we need a hummingbird feeder!)



Friday is The Feast, a day in which homeschoolers join us for the whole day if they choose to do so. Pamela joins the elementary class in reading two science books that they only read once a week. She is familiar with one book (Project UltraSwan) but has never read the other book (The Wright Brothers). In this photo taken last week, you can see by the expression on Pamela's face how much she enjoys the class.

Yesterday, after the morning meeting (prayer, pledge, hymn, and Spanish), the elementary students headed to the reading room. Angie walked in and saw Pamela—all smiles—sitting in the teacher's chair. Having observed Pamela and I co-read books, Angie suspected that Pamela wanted to see the text. So, she sat in the chair next to Pamela. Angie was thrilled to see how Pamela felt like she belonged. First, every time, Pamela was asked if she wanted to narrate, Pamela said, "Yes," and then narrated. Sometimes, when other students were narrating, Pamela shifted her attention to the speaker! She smiled and stayed engaged the whole time (about a half hour). Finally, when Angie started reading the unfamiliar book, Pamela leaned in to see the book. Angie and I were so excited for Pamela to take so much delight in learning, side by side, with her academic peers!

Then, the whole school headed out for our weekly nature walk at Santee National Wildlife Refuge. After a little chaos the first week, we learned to assign a group of children to one or two adults and teens. We space out the departure of the groups, some walking the loop trail in one direction and some in the other direction. Last week, one of the school co-founders, who wrote a lovely blog post about nature walks the other day, showed her group how to "fish" for "chicken chokers" (tiger beetle larvae). This week, the children from her group, all assigned to different groups, showed their friends how to lure them out of their holes! None of the adults made this happen: the students figured it out all on their own!

We returned to the school for lunch, and the afternoon was so hectic that I neglected Pamela. The homeschoolers joined us at this point for readings about Egypt (Seeker of Knowledge, Voices of Egypt, and Tutankhamun), a van Gogh picture study, wool felt sewing, living science (projects about flight), and Shakespeare. In time, I hope to fold Pamela in once we figure out our rhythm and everything flows well.

A couple of lovely moments happened yesterday afternoon.

I watched one of our auties marvel over van Gogh's Village Street and Steps in Auvers. He kept staring at it, running his fingers over the brushstrokes, narrating the vivid colors and objects in the painting. The eyes of this boy, who has the same kind of word retrieval issues as Pamela, sparkled with delight as he gazed at the masterpiece.

Before I began reading aloud to the elementary class, one of the students recalled a discussion we had had about how to remember what they read more clearly. He said, "Remember we need to narrate from the beginning of the passage to the end, and not just jump around." In the past three weeks, we have seen greater mindfulness and improved attention.

Shakespeare's Henry V was a blast. Since Act I, Scene I, has only two actors, I broke up the reading into five pages, two students per page. I gave more experienced readers the role of the Archbishop of Canterbury. To help the viewers tell them apart, I made a tall archbishop hat with double horizontal bars on the cross while the bishop wore a shorter hat and a single bar on the cross.

I gave the younger students important actions to perform: posting signs to set up the scene and representing "the church" (by holding a picture of a church), "the angel" (whipping the Adam out of Henry V), "the king" (Henry V) and "the dauphin" (future king of France). Their "acting" was perfect, even though they had not rehearsed. I gave a purse of pennies to "the church" and, when I asked "the king" to try to take it, "the church" tried to take it back from "the king" and said, "It's mine!" That is exactly what the archbishop and bishop were discussing. I gave the "Gordian knot" to the autie with nibble fingers and, while the clergy discussed the studious nature of Henry V, "the king" worked hard to undo the knot. "The angel" giggled at whipping "the king." Our youngest student wore the crown of the dauphin and his lip quivered when "the king" snatched his crown (and I had warned him that is what "the king" was supposed to do).



The past three weeks brings to mind this quote from Charlotte Mason. You can read some thoughtful ideas about one mom's take on this passage here.

Every new power, whether mechanical or spiritual, requires adjustment before it can be used to the full... to perceive that there is much which we ought to do and not to know exactly what it is, nor how to do it, does not add to the pleasure of life or to ease in living. We become worried, restless, anxious; and in the transition stage between the development of this new power and the adjustment which comes with time and experience, the fuller life, which is certainly ours, fails to make us either happier or more useful.

Patience Rewarded

Something funny happened on the way to blogging math. Pamela surprised me again, and several perfectly timed articles got me to thinking.

Right now, our readings address the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. I chose In My Father's House, the autobiography of Corrie ten Boom, as a bridge from the period to World War II. Before leaving for Kansas last week, we read about her encounter with a mentally-ill man named Thys. As a child, Corrie prayed for the alcoholics and homeless people living on the streets near her home. She and her sister Nollie came across a crowd of children picking on Thys. The passage we read began,

I was so full of pity for poor Thys and angry at the cruel children that I shouted, "You leave him alone, do you hear!"

The children stopped at my bold challenge. They looked for his defender and saw a little girl, less than half his size. Suddenly he walked toward me and stooped down. I could smell the unpleasant odor of his unwashed clothes and matted beard. He put his hand under my chin and kissed me on both cheeks.

Corrie went on to say that her sister Nollie, appalled at the kiss, whisked Corrie home. After hearing about what happened, their aunt scrubbed her face. At bedtime, their mama noted that Jesus was the source of her pity and kindness and that praying for street people might be a safer thing for little girls to do.

Yesterday—about a week later—Pamela read the next section. First, she narrated our last reading. Her retelling of the heated emotion of the scene came out in a burst of loud, angry words. "Corrie sees bullies. ANGRY! Leave him alone! Go away! Went to bed. Mom said obey. That's citizenship." Many things struck me about her account in that Pamela:

• Clearly felt Corrie's passion.
• Accurately labeled the children as bullies, a word not used in the passage.
• Recognized what Corrie did as a good deed even though her mother was worried.
• Picked a perfect word to describe Corrie's behavior: citizenship.

We do not work on vocabulary directly. Children glean word meaning from context. They do not need to copy the definition and use the word in three sentences. Is that how you taught babies new words? Is that how you beef up your vocabulary?

Pamela enjoys looking up words in the red discovery book (dictionary) and encyclopedia for fun. Curious about her knowledge of citizenship, I asked her where she read about it. She said, "In encyclopedia." I asked why she thought Corrie was doing citizenship. She explained, "Citizenship stop the war. Corrie stop the fighting." Then, I began to wonder. She reads my planning spreadsheets where I loosely categorize her school books as subjects. I had this book listed as World History, not Citizenship! Her summation of Corrie's action was truly an original thought!

Many students with autism prefer textbooks. Expectations are predictable. Having to answer the questions of others means more black-and-white thinking. Much of the work required is mindless busywork. Even though Pamela would find textbooks easier, I think going the living book route promotes more flexible thinking and more experience sharing.

Several articles that appeared in my Facebook feed yesterday affirm the elements of our approach to education:

• Reading Aloud to Older Children Is Valuable - Pamela and I read books in the manner described in the article, "And they read the Bard’s plays together, divvying up the parts, because 'that's how they are meant to be experienced.'" (We are reading aloud Macbeth right now!) Reading aloud to older children offers academic and emotional benefits. It broadens the menu by adding more challenging books. One mom describes how more pleasurable reading becomes for her daughter with dyslexia, "Reading together–with her watching the words as I read, and then her reading to me–is a way to be together, to experience the world, to enjoy a common pleasure." Retired teachers who reconnect with former students online find the most memorable thing they did as a class was reading aloud.


• Multi-Tasking Equals Failure to Filter - The jury is out on whether inattentive folks are born that way or are the product of chronic media multitasking. When several modes of data stream in, heavy multitaskers cannot ignore the irrelevant. They find organizing and storing information into memory difficult. They do not even switch attention faster. In a nutshell, information overload slows down their ability to process. That sounds a lot like autism!


• The Mind Is Made for Story - Modern textbooks promote multitasking. My son switched to public school as a junior. I was appalled at his precalculus textbook. The math book looked like it had ADHD: graphics, sidebars, pop-ups, font variability, etc. When looking up information to help David with his questions about math, I found it hard to follow a train of thought. Living books embed the information contained in graphics and sidebars into a narrative account. We can follow the train of thought in living books because our minds respond to stories.


• Lingering a Living Book in a Term or Year Supports Long-Term Memory - Modern students have to pack a textbook into one semester, and their classes can take up to ninety minutes. Packing in information over a short, intense period of time is called massed studying. Science backs up common thinking that cramming is ineffective. Yet, students today have to learn that way thanks to block scheduling. My high school spread out a math textbook over two semesters in five fifty-minute periods five times a week. Distributed study is far more effective. My husband's high school offered one math class. It weaved algebra, geometry, trigonometry, statistics, etc. over the course of four years. He never took long breaks from algebra in order to learn geometry. He aced his math classes in college!


• The Real Issue Might Not Be Inattention! - Students today have so many entertainment choices they can avoid boredom. When something loses their attention, they tune into something else. Having no other option forces you to stick with what you are doing. Jennifer Roberts, professor of art and architecture history, assigned her students to write an in-depth research paper based upon a three hour study of any painting in a nearby museum. Continued looking at one thing revealed something new. The longer students the painting, the more they discovered. Patience was rewarded. Living books are another way to encourage sustained attention, and the joy of reading them is the reward.

And, folks, I am not the only person not giving up teaching an adult person in the autism spectrum to communicate! "the neuroplasticity necessary for new language learning that was not supposed to exist in this population, did exist. Many of the students desperately wanted to crack the code of conventional communication, and their brains were capable."

Amen!

Delight in the Lord

Last October, I recapped my efforts at helping children find awe and wonder in the Bible in our church's afterschool program. Our goal was to read the Book of Daniel together. We will start chapter nine next week and are on track to finish the entire book by the end of the school. Over the past couple of months, our group has grown from last year's nine students to this year's twelve, sometimes fourteen. New pupils have folded into the group seamlessly, which amazes me since a Charlotte Mason style of learning is so different. I continue to follow the method described in this post on Bible study.

Very rarely do we have an "off" day. These children are high-energy, and some have labels which means nothing to me because they are all persons first! We do everything we can to let them burn off steam through free play and snack time before lessons begin. Our rhythm of song time and prayers usually settles them down for the Bible lesson. Last week, two new pupils came and the rest, even those who have been coming for years, had a bad case of spring fever. A couple of students were talking, a few looked half asleep, and the others struggled to focus on the text. Instead of slogging through the reading and encouraging more inattentiveness, I cut it short and we shifted to the craft.

I brooded and pondered about what I should do. While I assumed it was a one-time incident, I did not want to let one "off" day lead to more "off" days and eventually the habit of inattention. I also wanted to avoid relying on lectures, artificial rewards, or token systems to encourage better behavior. As pointed out in the New York Times article "Train a Parent, Spare a Child", "offering short-term incentives to elicit behavior is unreliable, ineffective and causes 'considerable long-term damage.'" Why? Once the reward is removed, the desired behavior disappears. I agree with Charlotte Mason's belief that such measures turn children into pawns in a game. She wrote, "Our crying need today is less for a better method of education than for an adequate conception of children,––children, merely as human beings, whether brilliant or dull, precocious or backward" (Page 80).

Not only did she avoid direct manipulation of behavior, Mason had concerns about indirect ways of trampling upon the dignity of a child. Clearly, we all agree upon the dangers of influencing children through fear. What about love and approval from a teacher? Surely, a positive emotion cannot be harmful? The admiration of a teacher often leads to lessons learned, proper behavior, good will, and the development of virtues. But, what happens when the teacher is no longer in the life of the student? Because these positive reactions depend upon an outside influence, ground gained may be lost. What determines lifelong character is ideas that live inside children and inspire them. If nothing has been done to sow ideas that make acts worthwhile, then we undermine their ability to act independently.

The article on parent training offers lame advice: make sure children understand why what you're asking them to do is important, show interest in their point of view, and admit that it is really not but give them a reason why they should do it anyway. Oh, yeah, if you can reward them after the fact, sparingly, preferably something that the child picks (money, treats, or quality time). Blah, blah, blah!

Mason discounted suggestion, persistent influence, emulation, etc. What is left? Letting children fall into slipshod habits may be the greater of two evils. The answer lies within the student. "The work of education is greatly simplified when we realize that children, apparently all children, want to know all human knowledge; they have an appetite for what is put before them, and, knowing this, our teaching becomes buoyant with the courage of our convictions" (Pages 89-90).

I began to realize that spreading a feast of awe and wonder every week had sharpened their appetite for knowledge of Daniel. They desired to know; they had proved to me their habit of attention. However, they needed to take responsibility for managing it.

Then, I began to think about the reason why I study the Bible and how the brain stores memory. Those two big ideas lead to my plan, which worked like a charm!

Before the Bible lesson, I explained to them that Daniel had lived six hundred years before Jesus was born as a man. Since Jesus was born two thousand years ago, the book of Daniel was written about twenty-six hundred years ago. Their eyes grew wide. I added, "That means God kept the book of Daniel safe for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years—just so we could read it." I asked them, "Why do you think God protected this book all of these years?"—which lead to a wonderful conversation. Some of the kids enjoy writing notes on the dry-erase board after we do our craft. I just love this reflection:



Once they realized how precious this book was, I explained to them how memory works. When I asked if anyone had ever made paper chains for Christmas trees, hands flew up. I explained that the mind links together memories just like we make paper chains. "The reason why we talk about what we learned last week is so that our brain know where to put the next link. Every time we read the next part of Daniel, our chain of memory grows longer." We talked about what happens if we miss a week or if we are not paying attention. Our chain will have a broken link. Eying the strips of paper lying on the table, one of the boys asked, "Mrs. Tammy, can we make some chains about Daniel?" Before the reading, the kids drew what they remembered about the sheep and the goat. After the reading, all but two drew more links for their chain. One added links for the previous dreams. Another asked if we could do this every week.

I love how Leslie Laurio paraphrased Mason's conclusion to this chapter.

Knowledge for its own sake is pleasing because it's so fulfilling. When you see evidence that a student in your class shares your delight in knowing, and shares your pleasure in expressing what he knows, and shares your affinity for some wise philosopher or brave hero, you both connect and share a kind of bond. A student who has that kind of satisfaction from learning is less likely to have a compulsive need to be better than everyone else.

Follow-Up on Videos

I have been more careful to focus mainly on one objective and set up situations to film it. The issue is to be more clear about my signals that I am finished talking so that Pamela does not bolt too soon. I brainstormed this with the help of friends and realized that, when we are seated, Pamela usually does not bolt. If it is almost time for something scheduled or the activity is over, she will suddenly bold.

The plan is to spotlight the end of conversation. For example, I could make a big done gesture and give a breathy sigh. If that is not obvious, I could give a verbal hint paired with the gesture and/or sign. I can learn to watch for her signals of getting ready to bolt and be ready to block her by gently holding her hands. This reminds me of being in musicals in college: I need to practice in front of a mirror and block my part!

On Thursday, David filmed five different segments of Pamela and I talking what a chapter from a book reminds us of. She did extremely well: she referenced me beautifully, made comments, and repeated some of my words as if to help them register better. Sometimes, she reacted with emotion or changed the topic to something related. She tried to bolt a few times, but I let her know I was not finished with me and she stayed with me. I was not as clear as I could have been, so I have objectives for myself, too. I found that asking her a question about the next event worked well, but I need to be less obvious as she improves.


Here is the review I wrote about how these five segments went.

Segment One:
Activity: Talking about The Brendan Voyage Objective: Attention, S1A

Pluses: Pamela makes a reasonable connection between sewing leather and her candlewicking animals. She stayed in control when she was upset.

Issues: Pamela thought I was pressuring her for more communication when I was only telling her more about my memory. She regulated by saying, “Cut it out!”

Tips: I need to introduce the topic with different phrasing when we talk about books. I need to wait a little longer to let her process.

Segment Two:
Activity: Talking about The Winged Watchman Objective: Attention, S1A

Pluses: Pamela makes a reasonable connection between the flood in the story and boats in Sand Point. She smiled, responded with emotion, and showed a strong interest in my narration of the May 1995 flood in Destrehan.

Issues: Pamela stayed focused in spite of the barking dogs and my distracting response to them.

Tips: I need to introduce the topic with different phrasing when we talk about books. I need to wait a little longer to let her process.

Segment Three:
Activity: Talking about The Cones Objectives: Attention, S1A

Pluses: Pamela has an excellent memory. She remembers a Hawaiian ice shaver my sister gave to us when we lived in West Newton. We did make snow cones a couple of times and I am surprised at how much she remembered. She stayed focused on my face even while rocking in the rocking chair. Then we talked about stores that carried gf/cf diet sorbet and soy ice cream. She was ready to end the conversation and stayed with me when I transitioned to another story in her primer book.

Segment Four:
Activity: Talking about The Endless Steppe Objectives: Attention, S1A

Pluses: Pamela makes a reasonable connection between Esther’s days in school and her school and co-op days. Then she went from the bug class in Minnesota to a dead butterfly we found in a parking lot. She was ready to stop, but I continued talking to her about movies because the story mentioned a movie. I told her my favorite movie Chronicles of Narnia and, after much processing time, she told me hers, Amazing Grace. That bowled me over because I thought that movie was stunning and fantastic, but over her head.

Issues: She tried to stim on “Airhawks” but was able to get back on track.

Segment Five:
Activity: Talking about a chapter on Alexander Objective: Attention, S1A

Pluses: Pamela maintains her focus in spite of the hyper-active dog. She makes a reasonable connection between Alexander’s horse Bucephalus and her horse in hippotherapy back in 1995. Then we both thought of Peter Pan after talking about the horse being afraid of its shadow. Pamela remembers reading Peter Pan in Sand Point. Then we transitioned to Wendy and a girl named Wendy, who was a guest at Pamela’s fourteenth birthday party. We talked about her birthday party, too, and the “no puffin” sticker at the Harbor Café.

Issues: The cameraman was bored and rotated the camera at an awkward angle.