Curiosity is the Essential Ingredient in Our Kids' Learning -- and ours!
Photo Credit: Richard Steih via Flickr Creative Commons
Like everyone else, we are homeschooling during the lockdown for COVID-19. But maybe a little different to others, we come to homeschooling from a patchwork background. My kids have been at school for the last 18 months. Before that we took part in a collective forest school and after that we went off travelling, sometimes called worldschooling. I’ve rarely had them at “home home” with me so I always thought I just wasn’t cut out for it. When we’re on the road there are so many new things to experience each day, learning just comes naturally the moment you open your eyes. I love that.
But now we are learning at home I’ve had to stop to examine what I mean by “it just comes naturally”. I think I’ve found an answer. What I mean is that what they’re seeing inspires questions. And there are plenty of opportunities for questions at home. We are lucky enough to have a pond so there’s a lot of hunting for frogs and newts. There’s also a lot of pretending to be superheroes and transforming the garden into a magical realm. I love watching them turn cardboard boxes into rocket ships. It feels like childhood as it should be. Too often school is about fitting in, performing well, and staying on task. But there’s so much learning to be had in exploring, mucking around, and dipping into the stuff that makes you go, “I wonder why…”
Photo Credit: Subash BGK via Flickr Creative Commons
We’ve borrowed an idea called “I wonder Wednesday” and it’s been a big hit. We pop questions into a jar throughout the week and on Wednesday all we try to answer them. Last week Arthur asked, “Is there a vehicle that can fly, drive on the road, and in the water?” and Zoe asked “How many universes are there?” They’re basically impossible to answer. Instead of trying to get an answer right for a test, they learn that the question itself is important, and that they can lead to so many exciting new places. They learn about ambiguity and complexity, a quality that they will have to become increasingly familiar with in their adult lives. Preparing them for the kind of jobs that may have been available to us after school, University, or grad school, is just wishful thinking. According CUNY professor Cathy Davidson, 65% of jobs that kids will have after school have not yet been invented. That’s pretty wild to contemplate. If that’s the case, maybe the conversation itself becomes as important as the right answer. For our children, the chance to defend their thinking or to challenge someone else’s may be more closely correlated to success than the ability to produce a correct response when prompted.
Photo Credit: Ballookey Klugeypop via Flickr Creative Commons
I think this time is also showing us all how much there is to learn in our everyday lives. When we measure milk and eggs in the kitchen, that’s learning. When we take a walk with our kids, that’s learning. When we do household chores together, that’s learning. The idea that learning happens in one building and not another is a fallacy that too many of us spend years unlearning in adulthood. The truth is, we have always been our children’s first teachers. The time we take to brew our tea teaches them about taking a moment to look after yourself. When we loose it and have a meltdown about something and we have to bow our heads and apologise later, we teach them about forgiveness and the art of an apology. When we draw with our kids we show them we have the courage to make mistakes and carry-on. When we learn in the home, questions come up more naturally. “Why didn’t the cupcakes rise?” “What can make now I’ve made a mistake on my drawing?” “How can I make it up to my sister or brother?” These are child-led questions and they give our kids unique learning opportunities. A far-cry from the “summer slide” phenomenon, these are the lessons our kids will never forget.
