A stack of books to read

My stack of books to read keeps getting larger. Between PaperBackSwap, a book sale at my local library, and an interlibrary loan which I have to pick up tomorrow, I'm having a hard time keeping up.

I'm in the middle of Teach a Child to Read with Children's Books. So far I am really enjoying it. I'm about 3/4 through, and it is really making sense to me. So E and I have put aside the Now I'm Reading books and have picked up some Dr. Seuss. He is thrilled to be reading "real" books, and even managed to sound out "wonderful" this evening. I am just about to get to the part where the author suggests how to incorporate writing into the reading experience, but so far so good!

Teaching the Three R's Through Movement Experiences is something I requested through interlibrary loan, and which arrived much more quickly than I though it would. It will be interesting to see where it came from; last time I requested a book through interlibrary loan, it came all the way from Florida! I like to borrow the more expensive books this way to be sure they are something I want to spend the money on purchasing for my permanent library. I'm hoping this book will give me ideas for helping me encourage my kinesthetic learner. So far he's been happy with some manipulatives, but he really likes to move. I 'm really looking forward to getting my hands on this, but would like to finish the other one first. On the other hand, I own the other one and can come back to it. So, we'll see what happens.

Nonviolent Communication has been on my wish list at PaperBackSwap for months, and I finally got it! I first heard about it through a Leader Program with La Leche League. The woman who was recommending it could not speak highly enough of it. The description from Amazon.com:

Do you hunger for skills to improve the quality of your relationships, to deepen your sense of personal empowerment or to simply communicate more effectively? Unfortunately, for centuries our culture has taught us to think and speak in ways that can actually perpetuate conflict, internal pain and even violence. Nonviolent Communication partners practical skills with a powerful consciousness and vocabulary to help you get what you want peacefully.

In this internationally acclaimed text, Marshall Rosenberg offers insightful stories, anecdotes, practical exercises and role-plays that will dramatically change your approach to communication for the better. Discover how the language you use can strengthen your relationships, build trust, prevent conflicts and heal pain. Revolutionary, yet simple, NVC offers you the most effective tools to reduce violence and create peace in your life—one interaction at a time.

I have to admit it's closer to the bottom of the pile now, since I own it. But I do look forward to reading it.

One book which I'm anxious to read for myself is Maiden, Mother, Crone. The Myth & Reality of the Triple Goddess. Although I do not believe in a goddess as a deity, I am interested in learning more about her as she pertains to the goddess in each of us, and the stages of life that we go through as womyn. Hopefully this book will bring some of that to me. This also came via PaperBackSwap much sooner that I thought it would. It looks like a quick read, so I might pick up this one after The Three R's.

These days I don't spend much time on fiction. I belong to a book club which makes me read one at least once a month, but I'm about to leave that group. Once in a while I pick up a two-week book from the library. I guess I do better with fiction knowing I have a deadline; otherwise I get distracted with all the non-fiction stuff I want to learn!

I don't remember how I came across this, but it's called The Dawn of Amber. I read the original Amber Chronicles, by Roger Zelazny, when a friend introduced me to them in college. I had enjoyed a few fantasy novels before them, but frankly, these changed my world. They put the ten books into one now, and call it The Great Book of Amber.

Well like I said, I don't remember how I found out about The Dawn of Amber, but I read the reviews on Amazon and decided I had to read it even though most die-hard fans of the originals think it stinks. An excerpt from the Amazon site:

Fans of the late Roger Zelazny's popular Amber series should flock to this workmanlike, authorized prequel, the first of a projected trilogy, by Betancourt (Infection and three other Star Trek novels). Betancourt captures the fantastic nature of the original and peppers his story with Amber-familiar terms...The narrative may lack the sparkling wit of its predecessors, but the cliffhanger ending should leave the faithful hungry for the next installment.

Even crappy Amber is Amber. It will be good to be reading about Corwin again. I just have to wait until my husband finishes it and lets me have it, first!

There are many more books on my pile, but I will stop here for now. Maybe more another day. Perhaps instead of sitting here blogging about them all I could read one...

Radical Unschooling vs. Self-Directed Learning

Learning is not the product of teaching. Learning is the product of the activity of learners.
...............John Holt

From the beginning I have referred to my family as unschoolers, since we don't sit around the kitchen table and "do school". We do have workbooks in the house, but only use them when one of my kids asks to. Okay, I do occasionally suggest we do some pages, but if they don't want to, we don't. Our days are filled with reading, playing, watching TV or DVDs rented from Netflix, playing board games and computer games, doing puzzles and crafts, playing, talking, doing household tasks (yes my ten year-old does his own laundry), playing, and mostly being out in the world. We love museums, libraries, letterboxing, shopping, and playing with friends. We don't even mind having to do errands since we are together.

I remember first hearing about unschooling when my older son was about five, and being appalled to hear that the child of someone I knew, was ten years old and could not yet read. So I appreciate that a lot of people do not understand the concept of unschooling, or are uncomfortable by it. It really takes a giant leap of faith to live this lifestyle.

I've always been proud to call us unschoolers though, since it does require an awful lot of trust in my children to be one. But these days I'm finding myself hesitant to use the term, since I've been on a few unschooling email lists and have been increasingly uncomfortable by how some other unschoolers define us. And the fact that the term "radical unschoolers" even exists indicates that there are others out there who feel the same way I do.

So what do radical unschoolers do that makes me hesitate to call myself one?

Kids who are radical unschoolers watch whatever they want, and as much as they want on TV, all the time. They spend as much time as they want on the computer. They eat whatever they want all the time. They are not required to contribute to the running of the household unless they want to. They don't even have to pick up their toys off the livingroom floor unless they feel like it. They can go to bed whenever they want. And from what I read, they also have the right to refuse when their grandmother, who needs a walker to get around, asks them to get her something from another room.

I'm sure there is a lot more, but the emails dictating that those who don't do these things can't call themselves unschoolers had me leaving the lists before I could learn what they might be.

Now I am an attachment parent, so trusting my children, from the time of breastfeeding, is something I've gotten pretty good at. However I am also clinically obese, along with dozens of family members. So when my younger son tells me that the reason he is so upset that his brother was invited to a birthday party that he was not, is that he is going to miss the cake, I hesitate to trust him to eat what his body needs.

I expect my children to eat the nutritious foods I provide for them. I expect them to stop watching TV and playing computer games when they start to ignore other things that they have previously enjoyed doing. I expect them to do their share of the household chores, since I'm not a slave. I expect them to go to bed at an hour which will assure they get enough rest. And I certainly expect them to respect not only their elders, but all other people, simply by virtue of the fact that we all share the same planet.

And for all this, I "have no right" to call myself an unschooler. Well, if that's what being an unschooler means, then I don't want to! So these days I call us "self-directed learners", hoping that it conveys what we are about without the negative connotation that radical unschoolers have given the word "unschoolers", to pretty much everyone who is not one. I have to admit that I also avoid associating with radicals since these kids, in my experience, do not have the respect for others that I expect from my children. And one of the good things about homeschooling is that I can (somewhat) control the time frame in which my kids are exposed to different things.

Like I said before "I appreciate that a lot of people do not understand the concept of unschooling, or are uncomfortable by it. It really takes a giant leap of faith to live this lifestyle." But when it comes to radical unschooling, that's one leap I'm not willing to take.

For more information on unschooling, check out John Holt's book: