What do you wish your children were taught?

[spirulina28]

What do you wish your children were being taught at school?
Or what do you wish you had been taught when you were younger?

When I look back to my school time, with all the time that I spent there, there were only a handful of things that stand out to be useful and that I'm glad I learned.

Apart from reading, writing, counting I'm so glad I learned about Philosophy; philo= love , sophia= wisdom. We had to write great dissertations were we had to argue both sides; it taught me that a subject can be looked at from so many different angles and to search for "what is the whole picture?"

My little girl is only 2 years & 2 months and I don't intend to send her to "usual school", maybe Rudof Steiner or homeschooling...

Those are some of the topics I'd like her to learn:

- The principals of health : raw food ( of course! :rolleyes: ) what raw foods are, the benefits, the preparation...clean water, clean air, sunshine, exercise, loving relationships, yoga, meditation ...

- Organic gardening : going back to basics, back in touch with nature, our biggest teacher.
from growing sprouts and wheatgrass, to identifying and using edible weeds and herbs ( she already goes out into the garden, picks chickweed and eats it :D ), to composting, keeping a worm farm, making your own fertilizers and natural pesticides, companion planting and planting by the moon, beekeeping, pruning and grafting.. and yes, humanure! :rolleyes: which was the thread that prompted me to start this thread.

- Consciousness and awareness of the Sacreness of life, nature, and the environment and realizing your connection with and to everything; seeing the beauty in all and with that developping a feeling of gratitude and having an awareness of the consequences of your actions and taking responsibility for them.

_ to use her brain I feel that school is trying hard to cram all kinds of "worthless" iinformation into our kids brains often before they are ready and "training" them to repeat it rather then encouraging them to think for themselves.... :(
I would like them to dicover the joy of learning and find out things, to have their inate, natural curiosity fostered and to find out where to look for the solutions.

- knowing herself : like some "vision quests" in the US where troubled teens go into nature without modern comforts and have to "survive" I would like my child to experience situations that push her boundaries and comfort zones so finds out about herself and her strengths .She will gain a deep belief in herself and her skills and a strong , healthy self esteem.

- Emotional intelligence and spirituality : to trust and listen to her intuition.to understand what her emotions mean and how to express them. How to communicate! and understand her powers of manifestations as a co-creator.

Ok, I better stop there before it becomes too long ;)

Please give me your thoughts on what you'd find essential to have taught at school...

[Lay-Lay]

how to balance your checkbook, how to pay bills, organizational skills, a trade, how to deal with stress.....I'll think of some more later

[spirulina28]

Iloverawfood, excellent suggestion!
Very true, in this day and age where everyone seems to be living from paycheque to paycheque and/ or on credit, handling your financial situation is a great skill to master! Thank you :)

[juliebove]

how to balance your checkbook, how to pay bills, organizational skills, a trade, how to deal with stress.....I'll think of some more later

I actually learned those things in school. The class was called "Family Living".

[juliebove]

My daughter will be going into 3rd grade. At this point, I can't really think of anything she hasn't learned in school that I think she should. They really do push the kids to learn a lot these days though. She is so much more advanced than I was in the 3rd grade.

I really like her school too. She goes to public school. But they seem to realize that not everyone learns things the same way. In many cases, there is no right or wrong way to do things. If a child is having trouble, they take the time to find out what they can do to help the child.

They learn about food safety, nutrition, health, etc. Can't see that teaching them about organic gardening would do much good though since many of the kids live in an apartment with no place to grow stuff. And there are kids from all different cultures in her school so they see all sorts of cuisine there.

We moved back to WA from NY. Totally different school system there. She hated school and I hated sending her there. The teachers had absolutely no freedom in the classroom. They had to teach by a specific system or lose their jobs. In NY, the parents could only visit the classroom on certain days. And that was not very often. I was shocked to see that the teacher did nothing aside from turn a tape recorder on and off. The kids had to do the assigment according to the timing of the tape. And it was a perfectly silly assigment. The timing on the tape was such that most of the kids had finished the one part and began daydreaming and stuff. If they went ahead too far into the assigment, they were reprimanded for not doing exactly as they were told. Each day, my daughter came home worn out and depressed and then had two hours or more of homework on top of it all! And this was only Kindergarten.

The school had armed guards and when you did visit, you had to sign in and show ID. There was rarely any recess and when there was, it was in the gym. They were only allowed to dance or play duck, duck, goose for fear of them getting injured by running. Even during duck, duck goose they could only skip and not run. I got the feeling that the kids were like robots. There was so much sameness there. They parroted back what they were told to say and do and they were not to think for themselves. My daughter went to some birthday parties and there was also a class picnic. At each of these events a certain song was played and all of the children began doing a dance I'd never seen before. But they all did it as though they were taught to do it as soon as they hear this. Freaky!

The children were not to speak up in class except for certain times when they were expected to say things. Luckily they changed the "assembly" thing the year that she went there. Prior to that they had to wear a white shirt and navy blue pants or skirt every friday for this silly assembly. They still had the assembly. But they finally learned there was no point to making the kids dress like this!

Here, I can visit the school any time I want. Everything is so much more laid back. There is homework, but at this point the teacher said it is just to get them into the habit of doing homework. He said to have them try it but stop if they are getting stressed out. Said it just wasn't worth it.

They get recess. They take P.E. They run. They do different things. They're allowed to check out books from the school library. I don't even think there was a school library in NY. One of the few field trips they had was to the public library where they got the kids library cards and sent them home with tons of books that we parents had to take back.

I'm just hoping we don't have to move from here because I really do like the school system.

[sport]

First Aid and CPR

[juliebove]

First Aid and CPR

I learned that in school too. 9th grade health class.

[Pierre]

Various ways of doing arithmetic, including a binary finger method I invented.
Several languages, starting with sign language.

When I teach my kids physics, I could make up problems like this: You put 90 grams of frozen fruit pulp, a 200 gram tomato at 20 °C, 100 grams of broccoli stem from the refrigerator at 4 °C, and a frozen 300 gram orange in a 2 kW blender. How long can you run the blender if you don't want the smoothie to thaw? If you don't want it to go above 45 °C?

[tinystrawberry]

I learn anything I want, whenever I want (I am 15yrs old)! I go to Upattinas, which is a private school in PA, go to the website to read the philosophy. www.Upattinas.Org

This year I'm planning on taking the following classes:
Art
Science (earth and space)
Gardening at a local garden
Some type of history class
Creative writing
+ others that I forget..

[Green Life]

Kindness and love toward others. How to respect others and to not run over someone else to get ahead. To be true and honest and to love God.

Horticulture.

Homemaking and Motherhood skills and the arts like crochet, sewing, ect.

and, of course, meal planning and shopping and preparation the raw food way.


Green :D Life

[Lay-Lay]

I actually learned those things in school. The class was called "Family Living".

they didn't have that at any of the schools I attended.

[Lay-Lay]

Iloverawfood, excellent suggestion!
Very true, in this day and age where everyone seems to be living from paycheque to paycheque and/ or on credit, handling your financial situation is a great skill to master! Thank you :)


exactly they need to learn it young Sure would help then in dealing with real life. I was also thinking about a relationship class. How to be a good friend, how to communicate, etc...

[spirulina28]

Hi Pierre!
I see you joined recently so I bid you a warm Welcome :)
Were are you from? "Pierre" sounds very French ;)
"Various ways of doing arithmetic, including a binary finger method I invented." sounds very intriguing... can't say math or physics were my fortes; and I'll blame my teachers for not putting the subject across properly ! ;)

Several languages, starting with sign language." yep, several language is great. I know 3 and it gives me an appreciation for words. Back in Europe it was very handy to know different languages but in NZ you don't get much opportunity to practice them.


Tinystrawberry, Ahhhh the internet; it sure is an amazing tool of discovery and handy for widening your knowledge! it wasn't really available when I was at school...

Greenlife , "the arts of crochet and sewing" now those and other practical subjects are not as easily taught online and are easier learned demonstrated.

My mother learned sewing at school and although she hated it at school she made herself amazing clothes when she lived in Nepal and Tibet, so it came in very handy for her. Me, apart from buttons I can 't sow to save myself :rolleyes:

I was wondering.... if instead of being so outside knowledge and brain orientated, what it would be like if school would be a place of "trying out", whatever your interest is, like making your own natural creams & toothpaste, whatever sport , music, art you want to try out, you could.
In my school, we did have art and music and we did draw and learn songs but with 1 or 2 hours a week it didn't provide the opportunity to learn much of anything.

"how to communicate" Yep! That's an important one that I would like to see taught in school too. how to respect each others opinion without either having to compromise themselves...

[dreamrawalwz]

Financial things, I wish I learned about raw earlier, and social/speakig skills.

[Pierre]

Hi Pierre!
I see you joined recently so I bid you a warm Welcome :)
Were are you from? "Pierre" sounds very French ;)
"Various ways of doing arithmetic, including a binary finger method I invented." sounds very intriguing... can't say math or physics were my fortes; and I'll blame my teachers for not putting the subject across properly ! ;)
I'm from New York, California, and Ohio. My father is from France. I heard about raw from Lissomllama; we're both part of the Long Hair Community.

Several languages, starting with sign language." yep, several language is great. I know 3 and it gives me an appreciation for words. Back in Europe it was very handy to know different languages but in NZ you don't get much opportunity to practice them.
What languages do you know? What about Maori?

Greenlife , "the arts of crochet and sewing" now those and other practical subjects are not as easily taught online and are easier learned demonstrated.
Needles to say...

[Ariannah]

Without having read the other replies...
We homeschool, so everything they need to know for their current developmental stage(s) is taught by me, my husband, and those around them.

[Sharon in Colorado]

The public schools do not get into the heart issues, loving the Creator and others in the same way that parents can. So we home school.

[Green Life]

We homeschool, too.

I misunderstood the question. I thought you were asking what subjects would I like to have seen offered at school when I was attending, not online nowadays.

So that our children learn everything we want them to know, we homeschool.

Cheers!
Green :D Life

[Biff]

I think that something schools should focus on is honesty and "keeping your word." Do all that you agree to do, and do not infringe on anybody's property. The whole "keeping your word" line of thought is the reason why I like to watch the movie "Rob Roy" once a year. Rob Roy taught his children that "keeping your word" is one of the most important things a man can do.

[Sharon in Colorado]

Aside from learning to read and some basic facts, I'm afraid the majority of my education came to me after I graduated high school!

[greeninlosangeles]

I would love to homeschool too, but my husband is a teacher and is not very fond of the idea. We still have two years untill kindergarden so I hope he will change his mind.

[Ariannah]

Aside from learning to read and some basic facts, I'm afraid the majority of my education came to me after I graduated high school!

Ditto! The saying "Don't let school get in the way of your education" comes to mind here.

:)

[Denise Nicole]

Finances! Things like credit cards, saving, retirement, compound interest, investment, and the importance of these things as something in your life time not MAY but WILL come up!

Also, insurance and wills and how tom make them and the importance of such (where I am the state gets 1/3 if you don't have a will).

It wasn't until I was in my 30's that I was able to understand (albeit not fully.....yet) many of these things. And had already, from my early 20's, gotten into huge debt effecting over a decade of my life in financial recovery. I want to save my little one's the pain of having to go through this.

[lodestar]

to borrow from the YW theme...

faith

divine nature

individual worth

knowledge

choice and accountibility

good works

integrity

I have eight children...four are married productive parents...one a drug addict at the moment...three still under my room. All amazing people! I am indeed blessed and even though I have been their teacher; they have been mine as well.

[Live Free]

Financial things, I wish I learned about raw earlier, and social/speakig skills.


If you would like to learn how to public speak, I know a great group that you could join the cost for the membership is really reasonable.

I was a member about a year ago and I hope to get back to the group because I only got to go through one speech. I have at least nine more to go.

If you want to email me, I could give you the information.

teresa@tandmwebsites.com

[Pierre]

If you would like to learn how to public speak, I know a great group that you could join the cost for the membership is really reasonable.
I'm a member too, but inactive, because I've been too busy at work to attend. I'm an ATM, I forget what metal.

[spirulina28]

Pierre, I speak French, german and english.
No Maori yet although it is a beautiful language, lots of vowels like Kawakawa (the name of a bush that I eat the berries from).
Pierre, what is an ATM?


Naturalandraw, could you pinpoint what the reason is for homeschooling your children? How many have you got?

I'd LOVE to hear from parents who homeschool ( rawandnatural & greenlife )as that might very well be the path I'll choose for my little girl, so if you'd like to share the joys and challenges it would be very much appreciated! :)

I'm sure there are other threads about homeschooling but I believe it is related to the subject of the thread when you decide to homeschool because you can do a better job, teach them what you feel is worth knowing.
So here is the question again " What are the most important GEMS you gathered along you life's experience that you want to pass on to your children?"
or put differently " What do you wish someone / school had taught you that would have made you're life a lot "easier" and saved you time & effort to find out for yourself?

Sharon: "The public schools do not get into the heart issues". I agree, they don't go into the heart of issues, like deepth wise , they don't teach the important subjects and they don't teach about the language of the heart. Then again, maybe they "think" that should be the territory of the parents like other "controversial" subjects ( sex education, politics, religions...) where some say the school should teach them and others say they shouldn't.

[juliebove]

I know we all learn differently, but I can't think of a thing that I wish someone else had taught me. And even if they had tried to teach me, I probably wouldn't have paid attention. I'm one of those people who has to learn things on their own. My daughter is the same way.

[Ariannah]

Edit: after reading what I wrote - it doesn't even begin to touch on the myriad of reasons for our homeschooling - I could write a book about it, and this would cover less than 1%.



Naturalandraw, could you pinpoint what the reason is for homeschooling your children? How many have you got?

We have 4 at home with us. It's actually quite a long story about how we got into it.

I always wanted to homeschool, as to me it's more than a "method of education", but a philosophy of life. We actually did send the 2 oldest to school for a while and it was a compromise that we regretted. (I'll touch a bit more on that later)

Our philosophy of life is that human beings are hard wired learners. Learning is how we survive and grow in every aspect of our lives. With most healthy babies, and encouragement and love, they learn to walk within the first year of their lives. It's the drive to grow. Another philosophy we hold (as Christians) is that families belong together.

We see homeschooling as a part of parenting. Much like raw eating requires a whole new mindset to "get" (our culture is so ingrained in "so who is going to COOK dinner tonight?") it takes thinking outside the box to realize that it's a parent's prior right to choose how their children will be educated (it's actually NOT thinking outside the box. It's in the Universal Declaration of human rights article 26 point 3 (http://www.unhchr.ch/udhr/lang/eng.htm)).
(linked)

Homeschooling continues the flow for us, of the way our family's journey is going. When we had our children in school, we saw that pattern interrupted with a jolt. Our lives suddenly revolved around this institution. Family activity was determined by whether or not homework was done (they just spent 6 hours IN school and they needed homework?) Our children were told, either directly or implied, that school was their first priority. Fundraising for activities took money that we'd rather have used for other things. Clothing was very expensive, school supplies were expensive, and they promoted junky eating, survival of the most popular (eyeroll), etc etc, and a whole bunch of other issues that we didn't want our children being taught for 6-7 hours per day, undermining our parental guidance.

I felt like a divorced parent, only getting to see my children after school hours and on weekends, when they're already tired and worn out and then STILL after school *we* didn't get them, they had to do homework!

So 4 years ago DH and I (and the children) decided enough was enough, we wanted OUR lives back, we wanted to get back to our original hopes and dreams, and we just did it.

While we are not 100% "unschoolers" by definition, there is an excellent article about it here (http://www.naturalchild.com/guest/earl_stevens.html).

Everyone around us has seen a vast improvement in everyone in the family since homeschooling. We are less stressed, children are happy, have lots of friends, a well-rounded life. They get constant examples of how people should behave and they get treated like human beings by those around them. It's refreshing.

They're also self-motivated and enjoy making new discoveries all the time, and it sticks. I'm on a list for Canadian and Nova Scotia homeschoolers, and some have children who have grown, and some are second generation homeschoolers. We have the benefit of those "fringe" people from the early 80s who homeschooled when it was considered "weird", and bravely went before us and showed us it can be done.

The before and after pictures (mental) of our lives is enough motivation for us to never look back.

[Pierre]

Is Kawakawa in the pepper family, or is it something else?

Advanced Toastmaster, IIRR. It used to stand for Able Toastmaster, but they changed it.

[Sharon in Colorado]

Homeschooling continues the flow for us, of the way our family's journey is going. When we had our children in school, we saw that pattern interrupted with a jolt. Our lives suddenly revolved around this institution. Family activity was determined by whether or not homework was done (they just spent 6 hours IN school and they needed homework?) Our children were told, either directly or implied, that school was their first priority. Fundraising for activities took money that we'd rather have used for other things. Clothing was very expensive, school supplies were expensive, and they promoted junky eating, survival of the most popular (eyeroll), etc etc, and a whole bunch of other issues that we didn't want our children being taught for 6-7 hours per day, undermining our parental guidance.

R&N, completely agree and understand this! I tried a homeschooling "program" through the school district one year. It was a twice a week program that covered 4-5 subjects so we didn't have to at home.

There was a huge expense on uniforms, curriculum, etc. and then every time they came home, they had tons of fundraising papers, HOMEWORK!, questions and concerns, and then there was the lack of communication and having to call the teachers because my child wasn't giving me the information properly. Not to mention the headache and heartache of having to fill out all the medical forms, dealing with food issues, etc.

It is just great to be in control, know what is going on, not "giving" the kids away to society to learn and socialize.

That is another thing.

Socialization is a bad word to me.

It means my children being influenced by people and situations which I often find inappropriate.

It means putting my children out there before I'm done with my given job of disciplining their minds and hearts.

It is an interruption in a sense in my parental teaching. These are my children, not the state's, not the neighbor's, not the school's, not their peer's. I'm not willing to lose them to everyone else while I am still put in charge of them.

It just makes things confusing and causes unnecessary problems. I see it all around me. And it is fine for others to make the decision to do as they wish, but I think it is wonderful that I live in a country where I have the freedom to exercise my parental rights.

[Ariannah]

(minor disclaimer for me. My reasoning for homeschooling has more to do with my own life than being a "vs" for any other system that other people are happy with. I fully respect everyone's choices and am only speaking for my own experience and our family's thriving)


and then there was the lack of communication and having to call the teachers because my child wasn't giving me the information properly. Another biggie for me. Lost
notices, notices not being sent home, children misunderstanding information and me having to puzzle out what the teacher really meant.

Eyerolls because I didn't want my children participating in pizza day unless they could order the vegetarian option.

Having to go through a hierarchal system to get problems with my children being bullied resolved. (lack of jurisdiction or difficulty getting said jurisdiction in that area was a MAJOR one for me.) Not to mention the fact that my son stayed home from school after an injury and I caught him up on his work in no time flat.



Socialization is a bad word to me.

It means my children being influenced by people and situations which I often find inappropriate.

It means putting my children out there before I'm done with my given job of disciplining their minds and hearts.

Another big one... Our children now get healthy socialization and healthy doses of good times and bad (yes, folks, we do have bad times ;) ) The definition of socialization in our culture is "dump them in a classroom full of kids who have little interests in common aside from their birth year and see what happens." I am not a fan of peer dependency.

Also, not all children are extroverts. Some children need more peace and quiet to function. My children have had a much better time calling the shots as to when and who they see. Human beings, even among the more introverted that I know (like myself) are social creatures, and will seek out social and real world interactions. I've had no trouble finding people to interact with since I left school, and neither have my children.
On the flip side, even the more extroverted among my children found the constant surrounding of kids kids kids to be too much for them.

The first year my kids were homeschooled they were so relieved they had room to "breathe" and the pressure was off, so they were more relaxed, more "themselves" and thus attracted more friends. Friends of all ages, just like in the "real world".

[Lay-Lay]

Neither my husband nor I wish to send our kids to public school, yet we both work.We don't have children yet so I guess we have time to figure it all out, LOL. In the near future we plan to adopt special needs childrens, but we are up in the air as to what we be best for them. I don't want to quit work, yet I don't want to miss anything when it comes to my children. My husband would stay at home, but he is our source of insurance and I am more of a source of income.

[spirulina28]

R&N : thank you for the post on your homeschooling , informative and inspiring. I love reading about actual experience versus the theory of it :)

"I felt like a divorced parent, only getting to see my children after school hours and on weekends, when they're already tired and worn out and then STILL after school *we* didn't get them, they had to do homework! "
what a apt description!

and how you describe your family life, how it "flows" makes a lot of sense as your life doesn't revolve around school hours, when the school bus arrives... a lot more flexibility possible

I get the "mother magazin" written by a wonderful woman and mother of 2 daughters and I enjoy reading her column "radical unschooling". She mentions how she uses daily activities & practical experiences to "teach" her children.

Iloverawfoods, I understand where you're coming from with work-family and the balancing act. Two evenings a week I work in a healthfood store. My partner used to be a manager for laptop services but started to get bored with it and didn't want to miss out on our daughter. So we took a leap of faith, shuffled things around and created a raw food delivery service, the first one here in New Zealand. it is slow going but so worthwhile as it is the lifestyle we want and health is one of our major interests.
Wishing you all the best with the adoptions and I'm sure you'll find a way to make it work :)

Pierre: yes, Kawakawa macropiper excelsum ( pepper tree). how did you know that?? :eek:
there is another one "horopito" ( pepper tree) which is one os the ingredients of Kolorex which is sold for candida.

Sharon: interesting what you say about socializing, it being a bad word for you. My mother tried to use that argument against homeschooling, saying that children need other children and need to learn that there are other people with different opinions ....
If I want to socialise my girl , I can enroll her into sports or other activities, doesn't have to be school where there is a lot of bullying and where competition is encouraged instead of cooperation; at least that was my experience back then .

[Pierre]

Pierre: yes, Kawakawa macropiper excelsum ( pepper tree). how did you know that?? :eek:
there is another one "horopito" ( pepper tree) which is one os the ingredients of Kolorex which is sold for candida.
It sounds like "kava kava" (Piper methysticum, sometimes placed in Macropiper). Betel is also a pepper; the "betel nut" is actually the areca nut (type genus of the palm family).