Homeschooling: A Word About Religion

December 22, 2013 Angela Harrison Leave a comment

One oft lobbed criticism of homeschooling is that it’s done to isolate and promote a narrow world view based on the family’s religion.

While this may be true of some homeschoolers, isolation is not the primary reason that most families choose to homeschool their children. Certainly, teaching your children your religious viewpoints, doctrines, values and beliefs is the parent’s responsibility and something that is going to occur with or without homeschooling.

If religious isolationism is the intent, homeschool isn’t needed. Parents can opt for a religiously based private school or even monitor closely who their public school children associate with outside of school hours.

Sure, some people choose homeschooling in part because it allows them more latitude and control in regards to what their child is exposed to. This, however, is not the sole purview of the religious. Many homeschoolers who would identify as non denominational, secular, atheist, agnostic etc, choose to homeschool, in part, to allow themselves this same latitude and control over what values their children learn and what they are and are not being exposed to (drug use, violence, sex, foul language to name a few and sadly, this isn’t just at the highschool level).

In short, the reasons any given family chooses to homeschool their children are many and varied. This topic, like most, cannot be boiled down to one particular issue or another. To accuse homeschoolers of religious isolationism is incorrect. At any rate, any given family’s choices are really no one else’s business.

breastfeeding, parenting

Breastfeeding in Public

December 22, 2013 Angela Harrison Leave a comment

Oh no, run for the hills, she’s gonna talk about boobs! Seriously, I do not understand our national discomfort, disdain and downright hostility towards breastfeeding and breastfeeding mothers. One of myFacebook friends posted a link to a blog where a mother posted her thoughts about breastfeeding, along with (gasp) pictures!

And now while I realize that a blog is posted publicly, you still don’t have to read it if you don’t want to. Seriously, if breastfeeding is so offensive to someone, then just avoid it I guess. But I truly don’t get it.

Breastfeeding is the best thing you can do to feed your baby. It is the most nutritious thing to give a baby, it is full of antibodies to help them stay well and healthy, it promotes the best oral motor development as well as developing the part of the brain that tells us when we are full/hungry. One could make the argument that a primary cause of overeating is being forced to finish the bottle or clean the plate when full or denied food when hungry due to some arbitrary schedule, we train babies not to trust themselves to know when to eat or not eat. And then there is bonding and attachment and comfort that all come from the breastfeeding bond. Where, in all of this, is there something wrong or bad to find?

Yet people find it. The evil, horrible dark side to breastfeeding (according the American public in general) is that someone might see a glimpse of a breast! Shocking I know. Forget that fact that every bathing suit at the beach or the pool, half the advertisements that you see and even just the day to day fashions that are in style now ALL show more breast than you generally can see during a feeding session. Somehow people are horrified, offended and outraged at the sight of a breastfeeding mother because a man or a child might see some breast. My response to that is pretty much, so what? If a child sees a mother breastfeeding her baby, what idea might they get? That breasts are for feeding babies?

There is truly nothing sexual about feeding babies and the only reason I can find that people get so uncomfortable about it, that they find it so offensive, is that, in their minds, they link the breast to sex and only sex. And that is their issue, not the issue of the infant or the mother. Why should mothers and babies be held hostage to someone elses misguided and wrongheaded thinking? Why should mothers be forced to hide what they doing, like it’s some dirty secret? Why should babies be deprived of something that is so good for them, to make some grown adult who should know better, more comfortable?

Babies are innocent, helpless and unable to add their voices to the debate and as seems to always be the case, the weak get run over by the strong. Might makes right. Babies have no voice and mothers can often be bullied and harassed into complying with what’ s “socially acceptable” at the expense of what is biologically appropriate for their child. Not all mothers can overcome such strong persecution and hostility. They need support, information, education and the knowledge that they are not the only ones.

Which brings me to the other upside of breastfeeding in public: letting the world see that this is normal, making it become a commonplace sight. Bringing widespread acceptance to it requires visibility and requires making some people uncomfortable. We all have times when we have to confront things that make us uncomfortable and question ourselves about WHY it makes it feel that way and hopefully be able to see all sides of the situation and overcome our own prejudices.

ADHD, Behavior, parenting

ADHD and So What?

December 22, 2013 Angela Harrison Leave a comment

My six year old is ridiculously loud! He screams at top volume for no apparent reason. His sister locked him out of her room last night for that exact reason. I’m on the other end of the house and it’s too loud for me!

He is my loud, active, rebellious, overly sensitive, always on the go child. My oldest was like this, but he is even more so. It’s like he needs noise and movement to focus, to think, to concentrate and maybe he does. I have often thought that, were I to pursue it, I could easily get a diagnosis of ADHD for him. Yet I don’t pursue it, top of his lungs screaming, constant messes and all, I don’t. Why not?

Well, I have no desire to put him on the medication, that’s why and unfortunately, that’s about as far as traditional medical treatment goes. Here are your pills, goodbye. I happen to know that there are other ways of helping him that won’t put his health and life at risk. I don’t think most people realize that those ADHD drugs are often not approved by the FDA for what they are being used for and even when they are, come with a long list of side effects. No thank you, we won’t be having any.

First of all, I’ve done this and my oldest turned out fine. Sure, he still has some sensory issues to this day, but he graduated high school with honors and has held down a job for the last year quite admirably. Second, he’s not the only one. Thomas Edison was kicked out of multiple schools and his mother was told he was unteachable and stupid. Yep, Thomas Edison (now believed to have had ADHD).

I’m not saying that the drugs are never useful, I know people who swear by them and I am not judging their decision. I just hate it when people judge mine. Sure, my kid can be annoying and loud and obnoxious and make a ridiculous mess. But he is also incredibly smart, creative, original, loving, caring, sweet etc. I have no desire to mute any of his qualities. They are ALL what makes him, him. Special and unique. So we take the loud messy child in constant motion because it comes hand in hand with his brilliant, creative joyous self.

We just don’t go out in public much.

unschooling

Open Letter to Educators

Video December 21, 2013 Angela Harrison Leave a comment

I was just forwarded this video by my boss, along with her daughters written response to it and the whole thing really got me thinking.

What’s funny is…I was JUST thinking about that exact thing the other day. I was thinking, is it ironic to anyone that I feel the way I do about institutionalized education and yet have multiple college degrees? It may seem a bit hypocritical, but it’s not and I can tell you why.

I do agree with everything he said. I see with my unschooled children how much more organic learning is than schools want to make it. How artificial and irrelevant much institutionalized learning is. How it teaches you to memorize and regurgitate facts, not to think for yourself, much less outside the box, not to actually learn or be engaged with your subject. How my favorite teaches and professors were those who engaged us, encouraged dissent, nurtured debate, fueled classroom discussions. Unfortunately, those were the minority.

So why then bother with the whole thing at all? Precisely because our society demands it. You may be self taught and actually know more than someone with a degree, but society confers respect and authority on the person with the degree. Because we see the degree as a measurement of your knowledge.

My ex husband is a chef, learned on the job, and his biggest pet peeve is the culinary school graduates who are clueless and mess up his kitchen! Yet, they go on to positions he can’t get considered for, though it was HE and not the culinary school that actually taught them how to cook in practice, in real life. I use to tell him to just go get the degree, no matter if he already knows more than the instructors, that “piece of paper” is a foot in the door. Sure, you may get your foot in the door then not be able to keep the job because despite your education, you don’t really have the skills, that is true. But even if you have the skills, you may never get to put them to use without that foot in the door.

That being said, perhaps Dan Brown is the next Bill Gates (a very famous and very rich college drop out) but for most of us, we need both the skills and the credentials.

So, back to why I feel institutional education is a joke and yet I have multiple college degrees and keep going back for more? Because I am a biologist who knows that survival equals your ability to secure your share of the available resources. For humans, this no longer means hunting or grazing territory, money is what secures our basic resources like food and shelter. Because I’m a sociologist (specifically a structuralist) who understands that that structures and institutions of our society are what we have to work with, even when we want to change them and in the society we have, a college degree, certifications and other forms of validation are what let us access the money. And because combining those two things with the fact that I’m also a realist tells me that despite all its failings, I still need institutional education to secure validation (in the form of a degree) so that I can access my share of the resources (in the form of a good job that provides a higher income to purchase food, shelter, clothing and the like). So, I plug away at getting my degrees while I home school to try and give my children a competitive advantage when they reach this stage because I AM teaching them to think, not memorize.

And while we’re on the subject, I will be teaching them the metric system because the entire rest of the world uses it and if they want to go into any medical or scientific field, even here, they will have to know it and our public schools do not teach it. It is so much harder to learn at 41 I’m here to tell you! (Even though it is more intuitive and easier than our system). Change comes from within and you have to start somewhere. I believe that the huge surge in families pulling their children out of the system is a step in that direction. Colleges are now actively recruiting homeschoolers precisely because of their ability to think outside the box. Private and charter schools all over the country are piloting curriculum that more closely resemble homeschooling than institutionalized schooling. The fact that this movement is gaining momentum can be seen in the backlash against it. In many states legislatures are trying to move backwards and outlaw homeschooling but it isn’t working. Families are taking back their children’s education. The revolution is afoot!