wrt the “militantly autonomous brigade” as I said, there are examples of it around which do other autonomous educators no favours. Such as the recent exchange on UKHE where someone describing putting a child in for an exam was told that that wasn’t home education. It is, although it may not be autonomous (it might be autonomous as well, and just badly phrased!)

Also, I’ve come across structured home educators who felt they could not describe how they home educate on local lists for fear of criticism by ppl describing themselves as autonomous, and I think that too is very sad. I prefer this kind of discussion where we are all respecting of each other’s approaches and open to hints, tips and exploring opinions.

It was reading John Holt that led me to choose home education before I even had children to home educate. I find it quite painful to have to move away from what I understand autonomy to be, but it really doesn’t result in a happy household here, so structure, for the moment, it is.

We need to put a large pink, protective tower around what we do, especially right now, and trust that our children have the most investment in their education and future. Once the pink tower is there then maybe we can decide what is necessary, and if our children are convinced of the same, maybe they will find themselves learning it? Better still, we could get on with the necessary learning/skill gathering we need to do in life and live alongside our kids (who often seem to suddenly want to do whatever you are involved in anyway!)

In reality, a home educated child doesn’t need to learn to read until they feel the need. They can find many ways to learn and have plenty folks around them to read stuff for them (unlike in the school setting, where we get our cultural ‘necessity’ to read before 8). Besides, I found that Lani learned to read without ever doing any noticeable reading, and despite her deep resistance to it. It just seems to filter in there unwittingly, despite her possibly disabilities with reading, even. She doesn’t read Harry Potter level yet, but I know of HE kids who didn’t read until 13 or so, but who were quickly reading the same level of text as others of the same age who had been reading from 5.

Until we can escape our cultural context how can we begin to trust that a person’s wants are also generally their needs?
Sometimes we think their needs are the opposite to their wants because our own experience of their company improves when they are doing what we want. I find it very difficult to differentiate between what is really my own happiness with a situation (where intuition is concerned) and the objective fact of another person’s happiness. What we observe of others is always a form of projection and is always subjective.

I do suspect they know what they need as long as we don’t divert them.

My friend has an eldest daughter who seems a lot how you describe Big, Jax. Her focus is socialising, and it always has been. Maybe that really is what she needs, but it doesn’t fit with what our society says she needs. I don’t suppose Big will leave herself illiterate and uneducated. What possible reason could she have to do so, apart from rebellion?

I apologize for my radical belief in autonomy. I think militant requires some sort of action, maybe an action intended to impose a philosophy. Radical will do me.

.-= sally´s last blog ..Daily Journal: 7th – 9th Dec. =-.

Two more quicks thoughts on this, Jax…

First, is there a way to give Big what she needs in such a way that it is also what she wants? I know this is probably grandmother egg sucking territory but I think it’s easy to forget how many ways there are to tackle any bit of learning. I can’t imagine it’s possible to be coming up with very elaborate plans when you’ve got your hands so full but maybe stuff like a board game rather than a sheet of paper – film making rather than a writing exercise – a walk and a talk rather than a solitary exercise with a pen??

Secondly, girls change really fast during the years that your Big is entering. I have learned that sometimes I really think I know something about what our daughter needs and then I find I really don’t – because she has changed. Not very comforting, possibly, but also quite exciting.

Does she have an interest you can use to engage? For instance you mentioned she’s enjoying reading about Ann Frank at the moment – can you use that?

I recognize the difference between “need” and “want”, but I’d say it differs per child.
With my youngest, for instance, there is hardly any difference between need and want.
With my oldest, the two are sometimes completely opposite and it takes a lot of communicating and also often conflict to find the best way of accommodating her learning.
With my son, I’ve learned to see what his wants tell me about his needs.
Some children know for themselves the difference between wants and needs, others might need some guidance.

Instead of calling it wants and needs, I like to call it the open and the hidden questions, it sounds less demanding . And I think my most important “tool” to distinguish between the two is my intuition. The kind of intuition that tells you whether your baby is crying from hunger, pain, distress, fatigue, boredom or something else.

In my view both open and hidden questions should be listened to and acted upon. Some children express their questions through words, others through behaviour or sometimes even through illness.

I think the biggest advantage of home education over school is that we can act on both the open and the hidden questions, because we are in a position to discover both. How exactly we choose to act upon them is entirely up to us and I feel that the great majority of parents is able and capable of doing it in a way that suits both the individual child and the family the best.

BTW, I saw the exchange on UKHE and was completely baffled. I *can* imagine that the term “autonomous militant” stems from that.
.-= mieke´s last blog ..The Final Petition =-.

The down side is – there is noone else to compare them with, and I’m begining to realise, that makes it a little difficult sometimes to evalutate the whole ‘potential’ thing and if I am doing all /need to do anything on that score…

mentioning because i got some sats papers off my maths teacher BIL recently also to see where they’ve ended up skills/confidence/etc wise too!
.-= mamacrow´s last blog ..November non topic round up… =-.

Re this though:

“hm, so by doing the reading stuff with Big when she was where Lyddie is at now, that could have been our problem – ie we did eventually resort to requiring her to practise. Perhaps that set the pattern.”

Possibly, but I don’t think it’s ever irreversible, judging by my older three, although there are still some motivational issues and conflicts there in them. Certainly it seems to be easier to resolve those as early as possible though.

But let’s not beat ourselves up about doing the best thing we can for our children at the time, with the info we have available then and a lot of good intent etc.! It’s something I try not to do and I don’t really know what will change here if clause 26 stays in the CSF bill and is passed, but I suspect some things will.
.-= Gill´s last blog .. =-.

It is a bit heavy Allie, but it’s reflective of life around here atm and I needed to offload – thanks for sharing your thoughts at such length, I shall ponder them

It is the wants/ needs division – I suppose there are times when I feel that they conflict for Big, and that I know better than she does what she needs. I would hope over the years that she will begin to learn the difference and identify and satisfy her needs herself.

Autonomy is complex, isn’t it? None of us make our choices in social isolation. As my children get older we have perfectly up-front conversations about skills and qualifications. This means that one of my children is currently working on a five year plan to get five GCSEs. It is her choice – at the moment. I don’t (can’t) *make* her do any work on that plan and I don’t (can’t) *reward* her for what she does. It’s her plan for her life – at the moment. It takes encouragement and support from us at times – in the form of hugs and cups of tea – but that’s just life isn’t it? I’m all for intrinsic motivation but sometimes we all need a bit of support in the choices we make. If she says, tomorrow, that she’s chucking it in then we’d have an upfront conversation about the possible consequences of that and about other options available to her. But I’m not into *making* my kids do anything. If I can’t make a good case for something then they don’t do it. I guess that might be more about parenting style than anything really. Gosh, sorry for blogging in your comments box. Something touched a nerve…

Anyway, Jax, isn’t this all a bit heavy for new baby Christmas land?? Break out the glitter glue

Anyway, I think we’ve got a similar dilemma here. Lyddie wants to be able to read certain books, but doesn’t have the skill to do so because she hasn’t done the work to develop the skill, so I do everything I can to help her do the work to develop the skill, but she doesn’t really want to do it and yet she wants to be able to read the books! So the conflict is in her own head really, rather than between the two of us, and all I can do is to try to make the hard work bit as easy as possible for her, when she can bring herself to do it.

Is it all about the motivation, do you think? Extrinsic v. intrinsic? It’s what I keep coming back to, though the dreaded CSF bill seems to be trying to outlaw the intrinsic variety.
.-= Gill´s last blog .. =-.

“needs” the things I have discovered improve her overall level of happiness – so although she may say that she hates something, I insist on it happening, and her overall attitude/ level of happiness is better.

nak so sorry if it makes no sense!