un-schooling
we're officially 'counter-culture'. oh dear. it's true. the first day of DISD's school is today and where is my age appropriate daughter? why, in the other room. i absolutely refuse to send her. we visited our local school and were horrified at the propaganda hanging in the cafeteria, the dank hallways, and the MEAN kids. and this is supposed to be a good(?!) school.
i remember back to my own schooling at this age. it was easy, i was bored and ultimately i was shipped off a couple days a week into another, more challenging class because i was so disruptive. i only wanted to go to shake it up, rattle a few bones, including my teacher's. poor mrs. roderick. eva is so much like me, except without quite so much drama in her life. she's so smart and can already do some things kids 2-3 years older than her can do. i can't fathom putting her into a class where she's purposely slowed down and taught to take a test. ack.
we've actually been subscribing to the un-schooling philosophy of john holt. child-led learning. so you wanna know about hawaii this week? ok. so we go the the library and online and check out everything we can about hawaii.... let her discover what volcanoes and hula dancing are... or whatever. possibly a little direction from mama and some scant workbooks, but mostly let her do it. this may not work, and i'm open to it not working. but for now, it IS working. it's been working.
she's such a cool little kid. she's got the best little punk rock hair cut and doesn't eat meat. we pray everytime we see a homeless person. she has no idea what mcdonalds is or what a soda tastes like. she has no clue about 'brand name clothes'. so i should send her to school to have them teach her the contrary? uh, no.
