Learning in the Absence of Education
Essays on Homeschooling
© Beverley Paine
Index
Homeschool
Australia
Conversation Is Learning Too!
(continued)
Some of the ways in which I try to encourage conversation in our family are:
- By making our conversation relevant to what we are doing - that is, talking about what we are doing, why and how. This is often hard for Robin and I - our preferred learning and working styles are in silence! But to facilitate learning in the children we try hard to remember to talk to the children while we do things.
- Giving answers to what I have been asked, no more - leaving lots of room for the children to initiate more questions in their own words. I usually ask a leading question to encourage the children to come up with more questions.
- Invite the children to think of their own answers.
- I try not to turn every answer into a mini-lecture, exploring in-depth every little interesting thing or event. I gauge the child's interest and only answer as much as he or she wants to know at that time.
- I hold back information to see what the children can think of before I give the most correct answer - sometimes the kids hate this, if accuracy is what they want immediately (like when spelling a new word!) But often the guesses are far more interesting, creative and inventive, and lead to wide and varied discussions, or an in-depth exploration of the topic. I constantly challenge concepts and ideas wherever we find them - it usually starts with me saying something like "and who says that is true?" or "does that hold true for every example you can think off - what about ...?" This really promotes respect for diversity, and generates tolerant attitudes.
- We've tried to develop some active listening skills. This has proven to be my greatest educational challenge, and has taken more than a decade to fully understand and implement. We still have a long way to go, but are improving exponentially, at last!
- I have a collection (somewhere) of useful conversation starters, like "what if something else happened..?", "how could we do this differently?", "what do you think about ...?" and"imagine if ....". There are many more. All are leading questions that can't be answered with a simple "yes" or "no".
- And finally, there is always the much maligned "why?" I know a lot of parents cringe when they here this word, but I turn it around and ask the children back "why do you think?" This helps develop their language skills, not mine! I love the answers the children 'invent', which demonstrate just how much my children understand their world and what they know. Often I don't correct them, unless pushed for an answer - their ideas are so creative and imaginative, and I know they will work things out by experience soon enough.
However, I know we don't talk enough in our house. Probably more than many others and about a lot of very interesting things. But not enough. I love a quiet house, and find it suits my own learning style as I am emotionally sensitive to noise. I can't stand conversation and music at the same time, and definitely not conversation with talk-back radio or television in the
background. I know a quiet house has had an slight negative effect on my children's language development.
I also recognise that my children also need more people to talk to in stress free situations, different types and ages of people for different purposes. For many reasons we have been unable to access a variety of suitable social situations, and this hasn't helped. Not that most people notice, just their fussy mum!
Given that things could always improve I am still amazed at the amount of knowledge my children have accumulated through conversation alone.
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Excerpt from Learning in the Absence of Home Education: Essays on Homeschooling
© Beverley Paine, 1999
