Shower Thoughts

In the shower where most of my brilliant thinkings, writings, and ideas happen, today was no exception. Of course once I am dressed and ready to put it all down it has almost but disappeared. When will a "pensive"recorder be invented? I don't think a hand held tape recorder would do the trick as my thoughts are more like a symphony then one stream of words that would come out fast enough. You know what I mean?

I have recently unplugged the TV in my house. It only gets plugged in so that my husband can watch football. This came at the same time I heard about unschooling. I have been homeschooling my kids for the past 6ish years. I was pretty sure I was on the right path with my kids. I always had the notion that I needed to keep learning when it came to helping my kids grow and learn. I have heard the term unschooling via people's twitter discriptions. They were "unschooling" their children. It was on my list of things to check out. The idea seemed crazy, my kids would not learn if I stopped making them do their school work. Right?

But, then I went to a parenting seminar with my husband. Her name is Joke (Yo-ka) Reeder. She spoke straight to my being. She did not use the word "unschooling," I mean she works at a boarding school. What she did say made me view the term "unschooling," in a whole new light. And so, I turned off the screens in my house and ordered "unschooling," books from the library.

It wasn't like the TV and video games were a constant in my house. There were rules. They had to get their school work done, and their chores. We stayed busy enough that the TV was rarely on anyway, but the weekends and evenings came at my house and the TV was on. especially in my room. My husband would come home from a long day and he would be tired and he would go lay down and flip on the TV. Also, my youngest (2 years old) would wake up in the morning asking to watch Cars or Cars 2 or some such movie, and I would comply. Why? Cause I liked my mornings, I liked heading to the gym for an hour and get "me" time. I had been justifying why it was okay to hypnotize my kids. It wasn't like I didn't do a ton of things with kids to enrich their lives. But, I needed me time. Turns out that I can have me time and still not have the TV on. It took some adjusting but we are on our 2nd week with no TV.

Eventually, they just stopped asking to watch. They started playing together, by themselves. Reading more books by choice and my daughter (9 years old) has restarted writing a book that she started a year ago after we finished listening to all the Harry Potters during our 6 week road trip across the US. Anyway, we have our moments but I have been able to put my time back in. My kids are happier and they are remember their dreams and starting to go for them. Especially, now that I have stopped being the enforcer of school. I still don't have all the answers about how to "unschool" my kids but I do know that I am heading in the right direction. I am not pulling my hair out trying to get through the day. I am seeing my kids happy and pushing themselves to do what makes them happy. Which in turn makes me happy.

Which is why my shower thoughts were so awesome today. I was brain-storming how this whole "unschooling" was going to happen and I was thinking back through my kids drives. Meaning what drove them to learn something new. Surprisingly, enough I saw a common interest running through both my older kids (13 year old boy and 9 year old girl). That was animals, animals of all kind but, they both love the idea of Africa. I have a friend from South Africa and she has shown us lots of great photos of her African Safaris. I love the idea of traveling and seeing the world, shit, I spent months planning the road trip across the country. But, the idea of being out in the middle of wild Africa with 3 kids does not appeal to me, but if it does my kids then hey why not. And so it begins. We plan, ask questions, and budget this trip.

I told the kids that, Payton, the 2 year old, needs to be out of diapers. We also needed to do all the research to go. This was their trip. I asked the questions, how can we get there? Who do we know who has gone before? What questions should we ask to make out trip smooth and get the most out of the trip? What would we need to pack? What do we want to learn while we are there? What do we want to see? How much will it cost? How much do we need to save up for? How can we raise the money to go? Are there programs for people to go there? Where would we stay? What parks should we go to? What animals do we want to see and study? I mean the list can go on and on. Is Africa the place you want to and see? What time of the year is best to go?

And so it begins... Real education. :)