Nice Things To Read To Encourage You With Natural Learning

Photograph by Esther Ball



A friend recently asked me if I knew of any other websites etc I could recommend with regard natural learning.

These are the three that immediately sprung to mind:

http://livingjoyfully.ca/


http://theeducatingparent.com/


http://sandradodd.com/


 Happy reading!

NATURAL EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Nine

Photograph by Debbie Ball


PART NINE

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And now, if you don’t mind I’d like to share another dream I had.

I was a student at a lovely place for people with high functioning autism. I was sitting outside in the sun, having a snack, very excited about going back inside soon and learning some more. The way people were taught was amazing: the classes had only about 5 pupils and the teacher would introduce a subject, talk about it, ask questions in a conversational way, give some more information, making it interesting, it was more like chatting with a very knowledgeable and wise friend. There was no pressure to know something already. There were no tricks to trip me up – no feeling of panic or a hot spotlight being put on me to “get it right”. I was relaxed and happy. When I woke up I had to make a note of that dream because I was sure that God was showing me a picture of how education should be, and how I should teach and learn alongside my children.

That phrase I just said “chatting with a very knowledgeable and wise friend” I love that thought. I would love my children to feel that spending the day with me is like being with a knowledgeable and wise friend. Our older boys, once they reached their mid-teens easily surpassed me in knowledge from their self-directed learning. But I think I still had a little more wisdom. It’s not a competition though.

It has been said that all you need to home educate is the desire to do so, and someone who believes in you and will support you.

In reality there is a bit of research to do starting with yourself, and then looking at your children: their likes and dislikes, your relationship to them … then going outward you start to look at various styles of home education. When I started to research this I remember our oldest was one year old. There was no internet, we didn't have a computer - it was a slow process finding people and resources. Most of the resources were easily available if you were in America, but it was a struggle getting things down here – especially having to get international money transfers and awkward things like that.

However, since I first started all this research 20 years ago things have exploded to the point where they have massive curriculum fairs in the states, hundreds of booths and stalls, speakers and workshops. And it can all be so enticing, sparkly and look like a really good idea.

Thinking along those lines I remember the moment when I formed this thought:

Home education would be so easy and so much fun if it wasn't for the children.

Think about the joy a parent feels researching a certain curriculum or various resources. The excitement of receiving the parcel and going through the resources. And then the disappointment as you present the goodies to the children and they seem less than interested. They may obligingly work through what you present to them, but if they're not particularly interested will they remember it? Are you spoiling the potential for them to be excited and learn about it at another time?

If it's a craft that you find interesting, or studying a famous historical person then YOU do it. Really – you do the research, read the book, draw the picture, make an index card with the main points of the person's life and achievements. Model how you are pleased with finding something out, and how to graciously cope with disappointment when something goes wrong with your project. Some children, and you must learn to read your child, will pick up and run with things by themselves. Other children might want to see you doing something first before they become interested. Or a combination of both.

Something I've learned with our children is that often children on the spectrum need EXPLICIT, SPECIFIC and REPEATED instruction and explanation – more so than other children. But the tricky bit comes when some children who APPEAR not to be getting the point actually got the point right at the beginning, and they get VERY CROSS with you for going on and on and on about it.

But we’ve seen the need for some skills to be specifically taught like: “what someone is thinking”. Some people on the spectrum might not have a clue about what someone else is thinking. A good tool for this might be an old TV programme with an acceptable story line and script – perhaps some good guys and some bad guys. Perhaps one of the characters is scheming and his kind words don't match his sneeky facial expression. If the child isn't annoyed by the interruption then you can pause the programme and discuss that briefly – it might only need to be a few words “Ah! He wants the man to think he's kind, but he's not.” Imagine what is going on in a child's mind if all this is new to him. Beware an overload as all this information starts to be processed in a child's mind. Strangely, some other people on the spectrum are PAINFULLY aware of what other people are thinking and feeling. The whole autism thing is a minefield of extremes. Tread gently. Also, just thinking of that – try to find each child’s preferred method of affirming or congratulating them. Not everyone wants streamers and party poppers for every success they get. One of our children HATES a fuss, and has very challenging behaviour sometimes when the spotlight is turned onto him.

There might be a misconception that unschooling or natural education is a total hands-off style of parenting/education. For some people it is. For the most, however, there is a period of going back and forth over various other styles before a comfortable, satisfactory and successful place is found.

Something I had never come across until a few years back – is a theory called self regulation. It’s something that I guess parents worry about when their immature youth leave home for university. Will the child remember to keep clean, do laundry, to eat properly (not beer on cornflakes for tea), will they study instead of watching TV all hours. Without the regulating influence of their parents, will these children go wild?

Some people are totally comfortable with giving a child control of how much tv they watch/sweets they eat/what and when they eat/what and when they wear/when they sleep and wake up. If this appeals to your family beware that it isn't possible for a child to reach a natural place of self-regulation if you have an undercurrent of disapproval or lay large hints in opposition to their choices.

Apparently – oh I haven’t explained about “Apparently” yet have I – bear with me, but apparently, children who are allowed to self-regulate do learn their own lessons as in 4 hours on the computer hurts your eyes, or sleeping until noon can give you a headache and make you feel like you've missed out on things. Moving from total control to self-regulation will require an “unlearning” period where a child may become extremely absorbed in something they were restricted in previously. If, during this time there is any control taken away from them it won't work. It may take some times – months perhaps for things to settle to a place where everyone is comfortable and it is working. Even then, if you were to have to explain to someone outside of the family about how it works you could feel defensive, or suddenly unhappy with it, or unqualified to explain it especially if your child is intensely interested in one certain area and seems to only be doing that one thing. This could either be viewed as unhealthy, or if you respect the child's passion it can be a wonderful opportunity for them to immerse themselves in whatever learning is going on.

So if this is something you want to try, for the health of your family or your child or children, then do a bit of research on it and get someone on board to support you.

NATURAL EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Eight

PART EIGHT

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One of the first steps in dealing with a problem behaviour is to ACKNOWLEDGE that it IS a problem. There is a certain relief and empowerment when a problem is acknowledged. Then when the next step is ready to be taken, whatever it is, the person may be more confident having a go at a therapy or facing a challenge if they know their problem is REAL and believed by others. Imagine a child who struggles with handwriting. When it is revealed they have dysgraphia or dyslexia everyone has permission to go “Ok, that’s the story, let’s go from here now.” That same person, undiagnosed may grow more and more unhappy, confused and in a state of mental bashing themselves up every day knowing that nobody understands or believes the issue. They may receive completely unhelpful, and vague advice like “you’ll just have to try harder” or “perhaps glasses would help”, “stop worrying” “ah well, we all feel like that”. Reminds me of something that used to urk but also amuse my Dad - those people who say “How are you, good, good” and they don’t care at all. Just like the verse in the Bible that says “And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled, notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body, what doth it profit? Our buzz word over the last few years has been STRATEGIES. We’ve got to work out what an issue is, and then think of a good strategy to help, and then the hard part ACTUALLY DOING THAT STRATEGY when the challenge comes along.

Unfortunately some people may think “If I accept this behaviour then I am enabling that person to wallow in their challenges, I’ll allow them to feel hopeless, I’ll give them excuses for not trying ...” On the whole this is pretty dangerous and destructive thinking.

I read recently of a young man named Ryan who said the following:

“Now that I know I’m an Aspie, I focus on the “how” instead of the “why”. For example, if I was in a class with a lot of other people and everyone was “getting it” I used to think, “Why am I not getting it”. Now I think, “How is the best way for me to get it”. In other words, what strategy can I use to catch on? For me, the focus on the “how” instead of the “why” is much less emotional and much more rational. Instead of blaming myself for something I didn’t understand, I am now strategically coping with the neurotypical world.

http://www.aane.org/asperger_resources/articles/friends_family/journey_into_aspieland.html

I was a participant in one of Celeste Littek’s autism seminars and she taught me that strategies and resources for a disability or challenge are a wonderful way to enable people to cope. One mistake is that people will think “I’ll give you this resource to help now, but I think we aught to phase it out in time.” Would we build ramps for wheelchair access but then take them down little by little so we could “phase out” the wheelchair use? A neurological difference is always going to be a neurological difference. We might find strategies that help, and we may overcome some challenges to a degree, but quirkiness can’t be CURED, it will always be there. The degree to which the quirky person and those around them will rejoice in those quirks or suffer with them is very dependent on tiny little choices made daily in how to deal with situations.

I guess the over-riding feeling for the quirky people I’ve heard from is CONFUSION about the rules of society. The unwritten rules that they are just supposed to know, understand, remember and follow. And if a quirky person experiences problems with remembering and following these rules then quite a few regular members of society can be intolerant and hurtful. If you are not quirky – if you are “regular” please try to be considerate of quirky people.

A quirky child at school has so many other things pressing upon them, and I guess the most obvious and sickening challenge will be bullying, that figuring out how to cope with their quirks comes way down the list. And parents don’t necessarily have enough time with the children, or perhaps even realise the magnitude of the challenges, to work on them one at a time

I’m just thinking here of one of our children – a real sweetie pie, very tolerant, loving, forgiving, imaginative and artistic. He has tremendous difficulty concentrating sometimes and needs just a little more time to process things. If I constantly thought he was just being lazy or not trying I would be at my wits end. If he was trying to keep up with peers, or the hubbub of school activities, or dodge bullies … well, I don’t want to think about that.

Everybody who works with quirky children will tell you that you have to become a detective to figure out what is going on with your child. However, there is a saying: “The hallmark of a neurological disorder is it's inconsistency” A child who can’t tolerate noise and movement in one situation might cope very well in another situation when perhaps they are more comfortable, not hungry, just had a sleep, just had some happy exercise, the noise was not unexpected – or when they are making the noise themselves.

So - to be a detective we need to look very closely at our children and their behaviour, in many different situations, and even set up certain situations to see how they cope and where their triggers are.

Have you ever packed a neglected toy away into a box and put it on a high shelf, thinking that nobody was playing with it, then later have someone in tears because their favourite toy was missing? You might say “You never played with it!”

They might say “I did – you just never saw me!” You realise just because you never saw a big demonstration of their appreciation for something then you didn’t think they HAD any appreciation for it. Some children fly so low under the radar that it’s very hard to pick things up!

Some children, kindly, exhibit their challenges in a way that is easier to spot – hand flapping or jumping, rocking or staring. But not all self stimulating or calming behaviour is easy figure out – whistling, humming, shouting, hitting and other “annoying” behaviours can be a child’s way of expressing a challenge they’re coping with. It can be difficult to separate this from plain old annoying, antagonising behaviour (which in itself, with any child is a sign that something else is going on, but it can be easier to unpick that behaviour in a regular child).

Dr Temple Grandin has said “Obviously if (a child) has got sound sensitivity, he’s going to cover his ears. (with visual processing problems) They do a lot of flicking around with the eyes. That’s a tip-off. They’ll tend to tilt their head because they can see better if they look out of the corner of their eye. Oftentimes, they’ll hate escalators because they can’t tell when to get on and off the escalators. They may have problems catching a ball. When you go in and do eye exams they’re going to be normal. Their problem is INSIDE THE BRAIN. Don’t get hung up on diagnostic categories.

I admire and respect what Temple Grandin has to say, and recommend her work to anyone interested in learning more about autistic challenges.

So, yes, it can take a very close examination of a child's life to really define where quirky problems stem from. With natural home education you have oodles and oddles of hours to learn about your child, making a mental or an actual file of challenges they have. If you physically write them down it can be a great encouragement to you and your child to see any progress they are making, no matter how slow. Our older two boys have made terrific progress in the last two or three years. We say to each other “Leaps and bounds!” when they achieve something – at first it was our oldest getting the bus by himself, but since then there have been pretty major achievements like drivers licences and David buying a motorbike and taking trips to Blenheim and other places. Just the other day our oldest bowled me over once again when he told me about a conversation he’d had with his support worker. He had shown so much discernment when he very rightly and tactfully disagreed with her that he made me burst with pride.

Some people believe that quirky children should be alongside neurotypical peers – integrated into regular schooling, given the same opportunities. If you are of this belief then it is best to find someone to come alongside you and support you with that. I don’t have any personal experience with that, and to be honest I can’t see it being entirely the best idea.

I don’t really have to apologise for being outspoken on this issue – when I thought about it you probably wouldn’t want to attend a talk about natural education if someone was half-hearted about it, saying that home education and school were both really great options, and it kind of didn’t matter at all which you went with.

But Yes, I am very passionate about home education, especially natural learning – especially for quirky children who more often than not in a regular school situation are puzzled or bored, drained of energy, and not allowed the time and freedom to become as wonderful as they could be – having to deal with curriculum, social rules, noise, confusion and constant restriction on how much noise or movement they need to make.

The alternative to regular (or public) schooling might be a private school. However, there are similar problems there too – this article is something I REALLY recommend you reading.

NATURAL EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Seven

PART SEVEN

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You know how people say “It’s important to listen to your child’s hopes and dreams.” I thought of that when our older boys were little and they used to wake up in the morning and tell me exceptionally long portions of their dreams that involved spaceships and getting to a planet and finding it was a supermarket but at the back there was a tunnel, and Sonic said “ZZZ is waiting for us with Mario” .. and I patiently sat and listened. What a good Mummy. This, of course is not what the inventor of the term “hopes and dreams” was meaning.

And now I shall bore you with a dream I had a few years back. I was selling things at a market stall, and everything I was selling, all the little trinkets and games and fiddly things – they were all iridescent. Actually, that’s all I’ll tell because that was the most important thing - the word was impressed upon my head, iridescent … iridescent … even after waking, and apparently, just as a side note, people with normal brains – neurotypical people tend not to be able to hold onto tightly to music or ideas from their dreams quite so easily as quirky people. It seems that the reality of life is “more real” to them, and it presses down upon their dreams after they wake and the dreams burst like thin soap bubbles. But quirky people, for whatever reason, may be able to hold those ideas, snatches of music, whole songs, computer information for a game they are making etc, and even after waking and starting their day, if they are not overly stressed or made anxious (and, unfortunately a lot of people on the spectrum become anxious as soon as they wake up – especially children on the spectrum who have to go to school), the idea can formulate and grow in their minds.

Well, back to my dream with IRIDESCENT – first I looked it up, thinking that if God had impressed this on my mind there would be a meaning. And I found that iridescent means:

Showing luminous colours that seem to change when seen from different angles – or

shining with many different colours when seen from different angles.

In Latin iris means ‘rainbow’, and escent means ‘I become’.

Quirky children are iridescent.

When I figured this out I was once again so grateful that God had directed me toward home education 20 years ago, and more than that, he showed me natural home education where our children can indeed shine with many different colours when seen from different angles. There has been no muddying of their rainbows, their bubbles have not been popped, they are bright and shining. And if people look at them and can’t see that, then they’re looking at them from the WRONG ANGLE.

Just recently I received a very big compliment from a psychologist who had been working with one of our children. She said it was a joy to meet our family and that our children were so ALIVE. I was boosted and encouraged greatly hearing this.

Speaking of psychologists I'd just like to say a quick note on diagnosis and labels.

Quirky is not a problem in itself, but if it gets to the stage where it starts to ruin a life, gets in the way of relationships, makes others have to walk on egg-shells around them, or you have a persistant and nagging thought that something isn't quite right and you're worried that ignoring or denying that there is a problem will lead to bigger problems later in this person's life, then you might need to find someone to help.

Finding the right person to assess and diagnose yourself or your child, or your husband or wife, is still rather a hit and miss affair as so much is still being learned about the wiring of the brain. In a nutshell, apparently, and I'd like to come back to that word APPARENTLY in a bit, but in a nutshell, it seems that quirky people, those on the higher functioning end of the autism spectrum have all the right bits of the brain there – it's the connections that are either missing or wired up differently. This may not be a problem at all for some “differently wired” people, but in today's society problems ARE going to happen at some point.

For myself I remember it starting when my mother took me to a playgroup. It was held in a large church hall. Each corner of the hall was set out with exciting activities or play equipment. The noise and the action were too much for me. I clung to my Mum. I think she stayed with me for a while to see if I'd like it, but then she took me home. Home was wonderful! A place of quiet and calm, familiarity and predictability. The next big shock for me was school. We'd just moved from London to Nelson and were staying in a motel until Dad's work could get the company house ready for us short-term till he bought a house. Over the road from the motel was Hampden Street school. I felt dizzy and sick, and cried and sobbed like my heart was breaking. I felt like my head was going to explode and it’s a wonder I could even breath. I remember the feeling even now. My Mum had to leave. I didn’t get any better. The school called for my big brother to come out of his classroom and sit with me – very tiresome for him. Then joyously but rather painfully, I fell down some concrete steps and fractured my collarbone and was off school for quite some months.

Over the years my quirkiness remained, but I was quiet and quirky, not bothering anyone much. Mum and Dad said they were always worried that I didn't have friends to do things with. I was much happier on my own, reading, making dolls houses but not playing with them, teaching myself to type, daydreaming, writing, writing and more writing - I didn't see a problem with it.

I didn’t think my quirkiness noticed too much – but Steve noticed it. He loved that I was different and I am very grateful that he chose me. Well, he said that he had no choice, I was pursuing him. I fell in love very quickly with Steve. He was different too. Subsequently we have been blessed with seven quirky children. Well, perhaps the baby is neuortypical, we'll see – but the 5 year old right up to the 21 year old are Aspies or Aspergians – my darling, beautiful children.

As I said, being assessed and diagnosed isn't an easy path. I believe it will get better as the experts get their act together and consult more with adults who are on the spectrum or wired differently themselves. There still seems to be a big gap between what the professionals know about Aspergers and what the Aspies themselves have figured out, especially in relation to women and girls on the spectrum.

There are only TWO things are known for sure about quirkiness – this is my own deep and intelligent theory – I came up with it one day whilst feeding the baby: “Quirkiness is either genetic – or it's not”. So, I was wondering, are quirky children happier if they are raised by quirky parents? Only if they’re quirky ACCEPTING and SUPPORTIVE parents. Regular parents can be accepting and supportive too I guess. I DO know that children are not happy when the parents major on intolerance, unhealthy authoritarism, lack of interest, neglect and criticism. Regular children are unhappy in this situation, and quirky children are EXTREMELY unhappy and could EASILY be driven to drastic measures which would break your heart to hear about.

Apparently – and there's the word “apparently” again, I WILL come to that in a minute, traits of the autism spectrum can be likened to puzzle pieces. One piece may be “uncomfortable in crowds” another may be “exhausted by social contact” another may be “interest bordering on obsession with particular subjects for extended times” and another might be “not able to work out what other people are thinking” or “becomes anxious very easily” etc. A person may have one or two of those traits, and they also may have worked out ways to deal with those challenges in everyday life. However, when a person has many of those traits – so many puzzle pieces that the picture of autism starts to be come very clear, then they are sure to have problems with life – either obviously – showing on the outside (yelling, screaming, hitting things, self-harm) or turned internally (lack of self-respect, eating disorders, inability to form relationships, dishonesty to avoid confrontations, beating themselves up about not coping, withdrawal from society etc). That's when a diagnosis CAN help – someone acknowledges the severity of the symptoms, and is able to give it a name which then, in theory means you can seek assistance, research ways that can help, find others who may have real-life solutions for you and hopefully move ahead.

However, even if you only see a few puzzle pieces – a few traits then those things are still deserving of REAL acceptance, not denial. If someone does not like crowds then it is respectful to nut out what exactly is going on. Does their pulse race, do they sweat, is their mind buzzing annoyingly, are they unable to think or move? Or are they tired in a crowd, enjoying the social contact but it makes them weary? Do they WANT to learn how to deal with being in a crowd? Then help them take steps to that result.

NATURAL EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Six

PART SIX

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There are two ways to interfere with the natural blossoming process that I can think of: first - by not providing any opportunities or equipment – think of the classic and heart-wrenching example of babies in 3^rd world orphanages who are not given any stimulation, minimal body contact etc – and closer to home those babies who are strapped into their carseat or highchair and parked in front of the television.

Secondly – the natural blossoming process of a child can be totally wrecked by putting them in school. The saddest thing is when you hear a parent, or a grandparent tell you how full of life and excitement for learning a child was, asking questions and watching people working, how bright and funny they were - until they started school. People have said it to me, and I feel a heavy burden about this. That is one reason why I have spent so many hours preparing this talk. If there is someone in this room who has a child at school, and there is any reason to think that child is unhappy then please consider home education – either natural education, or if you think it would work better for you look at using a curriculum – just as long as your child isn’t wrecked by being in an environment that is hostile to their senses or their personality day after day. I know that schools can be hesitant to let children go once they start school – they want to believe that they can make the situation better for the child, but they can’t.

I also know that some school personel, perhaps without realising it, can bully parents at times – make them feel they don't know just how good a school can be for a child, bamboozle the parents with edu-speak and the offer of various progrmmes which may or may not happen or work out. If you want to remove your child from the school system and home educate them, for any reason, then get someone to support you with this.

Getting down to the nuts and bolts of natural education – I guess there are two ways you can go about it. One is to strew the path with resources and opportunities and just pretty much get up each day and see what the day brings. The other is to have a loose plan of things you’d like to study, and bring them to your child’s attention in a natural way and go from there. I’d like to do this, and we have done it in the past, but this season we’re in right now we tend to have to take the first approach. I often get into a muddy pit about that and wonder if the children are advancing at all, if maybe I am holding them back. But in my heart I know that for our children, in this season of our lives it is the absolute best thing for them.

I am astounded, although I shouldn’t be surprised when the children show evidence of learning and I love the excitement they get from discovering things themselves.

The other day our five year old asked “How does wood burn?” I said “That’s a Daddy question. Perhaps you can draw a picture to remind yourself to ask him tonight.” Our seven year old said “I’ll draw one!” and he raced off and did a very nice picture of some logs burning. Later on the picture was found, and the question was asked. “Ah” said Daddy “How does wood burn, well …” “Do you want a whiteboard Daddy” someone asked, and they provided Daddy with a whiteboard and a marker. Daddy then drew a picture and explained about wood fibres and fire burning things. I noticed that the original asker of the question had lost interest, or he APPEARED to have lost interest, but the others were listening because it had become interesting to them. This bit of knowledge has become their own, and I wouldn’t be surprised if our five year old actually took in a lot more than I thought he had. If you force a child to sit and listen and stop fiddling it could be that you are effectively switching their brain off. Just recently our 19 year old was talking to me, and as he likes to do, he was bouncing on the exercise ball. When he finished speaking I asked him “What’s it like when you’re talking to me and you have to stop bouncing.” He thought for a moment then said “It’s like a room full of computer screens, and when I stop they all start to switch off till there’s no information at all.”

Something that I researched for a long time and produced, and have used on and off is what I call a spiral plan. Through looking at many educational systems and their curricula for various ages and stages including Montessori, Steiner, Charlotte Mason, Pikler, Thomas Jefferson Education, Democratic schools, free or liberal schools, Enki Education, Reggio Emilia and a few other places that I’ve forgotten I came with a list of good ideas, crafts, topics to study, various life skills to learn and I wrote them all down in one big list. Then I separated the list into what could be looked at in each season of the year for example, it is good to learn about deciduous trees in autumn and study pond life in summer. I wrote it into a book, and then added some memory verses to learn in each month, and any poems that came to mind. The reason it is a “spiral plan” is because each year you can come back to the same plan and briefly go over what you’ve learned before and then embark further into areas of interest. I’d love to work on this some more, and perhaps publish it eventually, but right now I don’t have time.

If you want just one pocket of “structured learning” per day (Natural Learning does not necessarily mean the complete absence of structure) then right after breakfast seems to work for a lot of people. For quite at around 9 o’clock each day we’d do what I called “Cozy Time” – modelled on what might perhaps be called “Circle Time” in a preschool. I put all my Cozy Time ideas into one book to make it easier for me. We sang a few songs, finger plays, rhymes, some foreign language verbal work, memory verses, a couple of easy games that exercised and expanded the children’s ability to remember and follow instructions and pretend. Then I looked at my spiral plan and talked about the topic I had chosen – whether it be road signs or magnets, and the children told me things they knew already. Then it was over. Sometimes if everyone was still calm enough we would read a chapter or two from a book we were enjoying. Reading aloud has always been a HUGE part of our lives. During the rest of the day I would keep in mind the topic we’d talk about and if something naturally came up to do with it I’d discuss it with the children. Or if they were particularly interested we might look it up in an encyclopedia, or on the internet. Of course, looking things up on the internet ESPECIALLY if you’re a Highly Distracted Person can take you down all sorts of lovely rabbit trails. Robert the Bruce can lead you to bagpipes which takes you to fife and drum recitations, and from there we want to see people reinacting battles from the civil war, and we wonder why the Battle of Cowpens was called the Battle of Cowpens…

When we do Cozy Time one of our children finds it very difficult to join in and often spoils it for the others. Another child is challenged by sensory processing issues and it’s often hard for him to take things in without moving a lot and banging against things and making everything fast and bangy (it’s hard to explain). I could labour the point and ENFORCE the participation of these children, but I really feel that would not be healthy for our relationship. These children are not just being naughty for the sake of it, they genuinely have problems, and enforcing participation is not going to address the problem, or help overcome it. I haven’t done Cozy Time for a wee while now, but we will return to it one day. And then I must remind myself to let go of my idea of how it could be, with perfectly happy, joyful, obedient children participating correctly, not spoiling it for anyone else. It doesn’t help if I watch carefully edited youtube clips of laughing children dancing in a circle with graceful and dedicated teachers leading a lovely action song. I can’t make our children like that, God didn’t make them to be like that, and I shouldn’t berate myself about this.

NATURAL EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Five

PART FIVE

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NATURAL AND UN-NATURAL LEARNING

Sandra Dodd is an unschooling mentor of many years. She coined the phrase “strew the path” this gives me a vivid picture of a life filled with wonderful learning opportunities and resources – from trips to the beach and the park, farmlands, clifftops, mountains and gardens to owning and using books, paints and other beautiful art supplies, computers, culinary equipment and ingredients. All these are “real life” things – and can provide much fodder for natural learning not contrived, forced, readily forgotten facts. Of course, even natural resources can be (in my opinion) “wrecked” by squashing the joy out of it – take for example cooking biscuits. A small child will happily stir, lick the spoon, roll out their own piece of dough, use a biscuit cutter, watch as the biscuits are put on the tray, eat the left-over bit in the bowl, as long as they know they are involved in some way they will stick with you. Yes, even if it’s like Michael aged 3 playing with the water in the sink. But that same child some years later could have the process spoiled by being required to write the recipe out, draw a picture, discuss the scientific process happening when the baking soda and the warm milk are mixed together – which I could call “turning something lovely into a school project”.

I remember going to Lake Rotoiti on a school camp, which I hated because I always get extremely homesick, but this memory stays in my mind for the fact that it clearly illustrates that for me “learning” had become something I only did at school. We went for a walk around the lake – it was drizzling with rain and we all had clipboards with sheets of information, tucked inside plastic bags, that we needed to fill in as we saw certain plants and trees etc. So what could have been a very nice walk in a drizzly, dramatic real life sort of a day, was turned into a “now we stop, and we look and we talk too much, and we get our clipboard out of the plastic bag, and we read through the instructions and we write this information down, don’t get it in the wrong place, careful with your answers, no not in that section, we have to draw the leaves in that box, are you even following what we’re doing, yes, that’s right, and then we put the clipboard back into the bag – don’t forget to put the pencil in, and on we go, talking and rushing because we only have a limited amount of time …”

Contrast that now with the most natural and beautiful walk you could take with your children. I have a wonderful memory that I can’t quite put together properly, but speaking to my mum about it I must have been about 3 years old and we went along on a school trip my brother had, deep into the English countryside. Possibly it wasn’t hours away, but living in the middle of London it was a rare treat to go to the country. All I remember is the feeling of freedom, sunshine, warmth, trees, a stile to climb over, wildflowers … I think my mind may have embellished the memory to keep it sweet – my Mum doesn’t remember it so well. Possibly it was a lot more work for her, especially as my brother was rather difficult when he was younger. I hope my children have a store of lovely memories like this.

In a perfect fictional example of an excellent and worthwhile nature outing, the sort you read about on the blogs of picture perfect mothers who make everyone else feel guilty because their lives are not that neat, ordered and satisfying, your children would walk nicely, respectfully and quietly, stopping to photograph and examine anything that caught their attention. You would stop and have a neat and picturesque whole food lunch, sitting on a handmade picnic rug. They would recall certain facts by themselves from books they had read, and if you were interested in something you would ask their advice, and offer any information you had, making a quick sketch in your nature notebook because you wanted to, which action was then admired by a child who later on asked for their own notebook to take on the next walk. Actually this is entirely possible if you have a daughter like mine, with a friend like Amber and if it was just those two plus Amber’s mummy we could have a lovely time. But real life for us includes quite a few little boys.

So in real life we’d have children who didn’t walk so quietly, there’d be a certain amount of whooping and yelling and zealous running back and forth, a dropped camera, tears, a quiet child who wanted to examine everything and a rambunctious child who wanted to get to the destination hardly noticing the darling little curled fern fronds. Lunch would be dug out of backpacks and you would be stifling great annoyance at the fact that someone had put the drink bottles on top of the very ripe bananas. BUT even in that scenario the children would be learning naturally. ESPECIALLY if the parent had a positive and excited-about-learning attitude, and was able to maintain that attitude during the course of the adventure. I struggle a little with this when there are arguments and stress between the children.

I’m not saying that clipboards and charts are wrong – just the other week our children came racing in looking for clipboards and paper because they wanted to chart the stars. I suspect it was because their big sister had started that game off, and usually anything she does is going to be fun. But it was their game – nothing I had made them do. The same could be said if you model the act of taking photos of a trip, and then compiling them into order and writing a short story to go with it. Don’t spend hours over this, a child who enjoys your work may have a go doing their own with the next trip you take.

For a quirky child, or a child with sensory problems a walk in nature might not be their first choice in activity, but still – handled naturally, rather than forcing anything “educational” it will be enjoyable to some degree. That same quirky child, even years later might remember a schooly trip vaguely as a drudgery that had to be endured, like my memory of the Lake Rotoiti trip. Our oldest son has reminded me that quirky children may feel that many trips are spoiled by too many people. Don’t feel that you always need to get together with a group – you don’t need to make every trip into a “social” event. We figured this out very early on as we stood looking at the back of other children’s heads in Broadgreen, waiting for our turn to look at what the lady was holding up and talking about. Field trips are still counted as “field trips” when it is just your family, or yours and one other perhaps if the children enjoy that. For children on the spectrum “social” things can be very stressful. The best thing for social contact for quirky children may be a special interest group – a group of people getting together FOR A REASON – the social contact is secondary and happens far more naturally.

Spending time outdoors is vitally important for children, every day should be an outdoor day no matter the weather. This is something that we haven’t been doing recently, but now the weather is cooler, and the wasps situation is less threatening we will be outside more.

I just saw a quote recently that said “The best way to get a child outdoors is to go with them.” Very simple, and very true for some children. Even if they don’t need you outside, they will mostly likely enjoy you being there with them. If you recognise that boredom comes from within a child you may need to put more effort yourself into providing things for them to do, long past a time when their peers start to find their own activities. Sit with them outside. Don’t turn it into a “lesson”, just drag a stick around in the dirt making shapes that please you, or gather little stones and make a house for an acorn man. Depending on the personality of your child they may want to join in, or more than likely if they are on the autism spectrum they may want to play alongside rather than WITH you.

On that note, I’d just like to share a certain strategy we have been introduced to: It is called FloorTime Therapy where you encourage your child to interact with you during their play. Apparently it can reduce the fixed thinking and need to control a situation that people on the spectrum can be inclined towards. We will keep this therapy in the back of our minds, and bring it out once in a while, but for now it isn’t a priority – the energy units expended to practice this therapy outweighed any noticeable success at this time. A mother with two quirky children once told me that any sort of therapy comes at a cost, I found that to be true.

It is obvious in the manner of the child whose behaviour becomes loud and defiant and he can actually tell you now that he doesn’t like a certain therapy, or people coming to our house. It is less obvious in the child whose sensory behaviour changes, especially when the people leave. But there are no guarantees with any sort of therapy. When I first heard that I felt disappointed and exhausted even before I had begun. I wanted to cancel the whole Aspergers thing and make my children neurotypical, because it was all too hard. But I can’t do that. And even if I could it isn’t up to me. God doesn’t make mistakes. He has made these children, he chose me as their mother, and there are big lessons to be learned here. The first time I met a psychologist who would be working with one of our older boys I asked him “Why do you do this work?” He said that “I love working out how these young people think, how their brains work. And I have a feeling that one day, more than one of them will achieve great things and I’ll be able to say “I know that person!”

So having said all that, and please excuse me when I go off down various trails – having said all that, natural learning is really accepting that most children learn perfectly happily and joyfully by themselves from the time they are born and there is only one way you can wreck that for them and that’s to interfere with their natural blossoming process.

HOME EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Four

PART FOUR

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Often very young children WANT to do the sweeping and the helping and I would never suggest pushing those little ones away. Slow down with your tasks and take your eyes off the personal things you'd like to get done in a day. Quirky children, and especially those gifted or on the autism spectrum may need to be taught over and over, and over and over for years and years in relation to life skills. You must keep your relationship with them sweet and close for those lessons to be of any value.

Montessori education is a good source of ideas for life skills – make a list so you can revisit it from time to time. There are things such as dusting, carrying a chair correctly, opening and closing drawers, weeding the garden, first aid, cleaning up dropped food, setting the table – so many skills that we presume children will pick up, and sometimes they do, but we mustn't presume they will. I have included some ideas on the handout to get you started with your own list.

Just a note that our older boys are now extremely competent with many aspects of life skills, despite my lack of early training with them. I attended a session in a flatting workshop with our oldest that he was encouraged to do. I was shocked at the skills they need to teach the young people – things we took for granted as being part of normal life (like how to use a 2^nd hand shop, looking for flats on trademe, how to consider other people that you live with) – but there are young people who have never been taught these things. It confirmed to me that I had done ok even though in the early years I thought I’d dropped the ball on these issues.

It can be very difficult with some children to get them interested in learning these skills – and there is no use pushing them. Internal motivation is required. Figure out for your child what motivates them. One of the best internal motivations is for a child to want to be with you, spending time talking, relaxing and discussing something with you whilst the task is being done. This is the sort of safe and comfortable environment where a child will learn and retain much of what they do. It also builds strong and pleasant memories for them. If YOU are doing the task, and they are free to come alongside you, even if they forget what they are doing and sit and talk instead, then they are still learning and seeing the task take place.

Gifted and quirky children need to see the value in what they are doing, they should care about how and what they do, be really engrossed and interested in the subject, see a reward of some sort awaiting them – short and long-term goals set by themselves, but they might need you to figure that out for them.

Just a note there on motivation. When I first learned that children on the spectrum can be very hard to motivate, that they tend to automatically think “What’s in it for me?” I was unhappy with that “I don’t think that’s good enough!” was the thought that sprung to my mind. However, most frustratingly I have found it to be extremely evident in a couple of our children. It can look like extreme self-centredness, or selfishness – but it’s not. Maybe people could say it’s a character flaw, or something needs to be overcome. Yes, and yes – but the biggest challenge is knowing HOW to overcome the “What’s in it for me?” In the case of one of our children I know we have come a long way, but it is still a great struggle for him – and I’m not sure exactly HOW we overcame the problem. I’d say it had a lot to do with keeping our relationship healthy, gentle pushing – just the right amount – but overall not expecting him to do more than he was able to do.

I’ve heard that gifted children can be caught up in a cycle of arguing and looking like they are underachieving because people are trying to motivate them to their highest potential. I remember our oldest seemed to have what I called “a holiday from using his brain” from around age 8 to about 18. In my heart I knew that backing off was the right thing to do, and it was a blessing that with lots of morning sickness and babies in those years I did back off a lot. When he appeared to switch his brain back on it was revealed that A MASSIVE amount of learning and figuring out had gone on all those years. I was so blessed that I hadn’t pushed and pushed him. When I look back on the written work (the “proof” that we were doing “schoolwork”) that this boy produced during those years it was pretty minimal, and half-hearted, and I realise now that it even that work wasn’t necessary for this particular child. In fact, in consultation with our second oldest he gave me this absolute gem of information. If you get nothing else out of this talk I hope you will remember this. My son said that rather than reading through a textbook (a good, carefully chosen textbook, like the science books by Dr Jay Wile – highly recommended ) and then writing questions and answers – it would have been much more beneficial to read the book through, as though you were reading a lovely novel. Discuss things that come up naturally, not labouring the “educational value” of the book - allow children to interrupt with questions or comments (this used to drive my husband mad when he first started reading to the children – I had forgotten to warn him that children “interrupting”, respectfully, was actually an incredibly effective way to read a book together) – so you read the book through, chatting comfortably, and when you finish the book you put it on the shelf and get it down next year or after some other space of time and read it again, enjoying it like a classic piece of literature. When my son told me this it was like scales fell from my eyes and I realised how solid this piece of information was he was giving me. Of course! If you’re learning a foreign language you don’t try and rush through book one and say “There – I’ve read it, now onto book two”. That would be hopeless if you hadn’t digested and remembered everything from book one. As soon as a new concept came up in book two you’d be thinking “Vas vollen ze what?” And so, would it be good to push yourself on, finish book two and go onto book three? No, no no! Read the book, enjoy it, digest what you can. Put it on the shelf then bring it out again.

It reminds me of the Five In A Row series where each day, for five days, you read a picture book, and at the end of the reading you look at one aspect of that book – whether it be the artwork, or where it was set in the world. Once this is learned it can be used quite naturally with any book you read. The book and the learning becomes the child’s “own”, and they often joy in sharing what they remember from it when the subject comes up again. Beware of spoiling the book for the child if they don’t want to do this though.

I just thought as I wrote that “I WANT” and “I DON’T WANT” are a nasty part of human nature. We can squash that down in a child, like the little boy who was told to sit down several times, and then finally did but mumbled “I’m still standing up on the inside” – or we can lead the children gently away from these I want, I don’t want battles inside by building a positive relationship with them where they feel they can really communicate with you.

Back to life skills – another excellent way to have the children learn life skills and do a share of work is to schedule the tasks before a desired activity. Most of you will know this tactic, but it can really requires some detective work on your part to know what sort of activity will be exciting enough to keep the motivation going. I use this for myself as I am what I've called an EVHDP which is Extremely Very Highly Distracted Person. If I am writing or drawing or listening to music I can stay on task beautifully! But changing sheets, drying the dishes, getting all the socks, books, toys and papers out from under the bed of the child who struggles with organisation, making a shopping list, putting washing away … those things are very hard for me to stay on task with. So I keep in mind a nice treat that I will allow myself when I have finished – it might be doing a bit of knitting, or some art. I fall down on this so many times in a day that I completely understand when the children get distracted. I endeavour to bring them back cheerfully and without guilt, so they will learn to do it themselves eventually.

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HOME EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Three

Part Three

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Our children like having “Theme Tunes” which is something started by our eldest. The other day one of my older boys heard a song and said “This is the driving for miles in the country song” – apparently I had played that tape in the car rather a lot during our “looking for a house in the country” phase. The little boys have theme music for playing with the Playmobil – it is a record of jolly swiss musicians singing in swiss-german, and we have a Roger Whittaker tape that we listened to a lot at one stage because I kept forgetting to change the tape in the van – that is now the “going to the Richmond re-use shop” tape – who else misses the Richmond re-use shop? This is just one way of building memories for the children – a way to link the pictures in their head of their childhood. If you have an old record player I would encourage you to collect records for your children to play – there is so much good music from the old days. Not everything old is good mind you – stay discerning, but if the children have a lovely stack of nice music to choose from they can make their own theme music for different times of their lives.

Now,

If you’re wondering what natural learning looks like I thought I’d start at the beginning, and try, in my waffley way, to share my thoughts for you.

Before a baby becomes mobile, if you are physically able it is best to carry them a lot, or have them propped up where they can see the action of the household. If they’re not noise sensitive they can sleep where everyone is playing quietly too. As they get more mobile they can be more involved in what the family is doing.

As an attachment parent I totally believe that a baby will tell you when it is hungry, and you can learn to spot when they are tired too if they can give you clear signals. This can continue as they get older too, and within reason if someone is very hungry at 4.30 and tea doesn’t look like it will be ready till 5.30 then I’m happy for them to have the choice of two or three things such as a carrot, an apple or some yoghurt. “Wait until tea time” isn’t a phrase I give the children very often, if they are hungry at 4.30 then they might be past hungry when tea arrives on the table, and too tired to eat properly. I’ve also learned that children and adults on the autism spectrum often need to drink more water than neurotypical people. A lot of their behavioural challenges can be through being thirsty.

Ideally children should spend the most part of the day working alongside you. If you are making breakfast, then everyone can make breakfast. If you're washing up after breakfast then everyone can do that too. Right through the day children should be able to come and go as they are able, working alongside you. This sounds beautiful and perfect and it doesn’t happen like this in our house sadly, but I encourage you – whatever age your child is to have a go at this.

When our older boys were little I didn't train them to work and do chores – I was struggling enough getting through the days as it was without any extra stress. My little boys were certainly quirky, but I didn’t know anything about Aspergers at that time. If I had known, it would have been a little easier, perhaps a little less confusing, but the challenges would still have been the same. For many years I felt guilty when I heard about other mums training their little ones to sweep and dust and wash dishes. I was always mindful about teaching them good character qualities – truthfulness, kindness, gentleness and things like that, and we did play a lot – puzzles, construction, heaps of reading, going for walks, collecting nature finds - but I felt like I had short-changed the boys, and been a very bad mummy with regard life skills.

Now I realise that I may have laboured over that training to no avail, and ruined our relationship. Early training works for some mothers and some children, but don't feel bad if you haven't done this. There is so much that is more important in those early years. If you have children with other challenges and they are balking at certain chores, then give yourself a break and try again in a few months, or a year. As long as you can keep a good attitude about doing the work yourself, and as long as you don’t have so many children that you are running yourself into the ground doing everything yourself then don’t listen to the nagging voice in your head that tells you you’re enabling them to be lazy and unthoughtful, and they’ll grow up to be useless and self-centred. If your child really does have challenges in these areas then pick and choose what is most important RIGHT NOW. It might be personal hygiene or managing to eat foods of different textures, or putting their energy into reading. Your child, your decisions.

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HOME EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part Two

PART TWO

So what is “Natural Education”? John Holt said “Learning is as natural as breathing”. But somewhere along the way learning became a chore, a task, a drudgery – and for a child who is on the autism spectrum, or quirky, or gifted, or a bit different, learning can be either joyfully easy in some areas, and at the same time painfully tiring in others.

To learn something new requires a certain amount of energy. If one is excited about the learning, motivated in some way, then the energy expended is hardly noticed. But if the learning is hard, slow, confusing – more energy is expended and often the learning is forgotten.

For me Natural Home Education means finding each child’s comfortable place with how they learn using just the right amount of “energy units” (which I will explain about later), and figuring out how I can facilitate and celebrate that learning appropriately.

Natural education starts for a baby at birth, well, probably before birth, but we can see it start at birth. There is so much gentle and unrushed learning that happens for a loved and nurtured baby. At this stage I would encourage the use of natural materials for clothes, bedding and toys. As a baby grows older try and keep them away from electronic and harsh toys. In fact anything labelled “educational toy” can probably be avoided. Everything is “educational” and items from nature are the best toys – sticks, pine cones, mud, sand etc. I don’t agree that every child benefits from preschool or kindergarten, it is something we decided against. Apparently, from what I have been hearing in America, and I guess it’s filtering down here, preschool teachers are becoming more and more despondent about the “academics”and testing required of the children, and the increased paperwork. A play-based, natural childhood is getting further and further away from these precious little ones who are put into the system.

Speaking of little ones - I’ve noticed a trend to create “sensory tubs” which look fun. They are themed large plastic containers – for instance an undersea sensory tub may contain marbles to represent water, and some plastic fish hiding, shells, little bucket and space - or a dinosaur sensory tub might have kinetic sand, plastic dinosaur figures and some farm set trees and bushes. Yes, Sensory tubs look wonderful, and a child could indeed enjoy playing with them, but I am concerned that they’re part of a www movement to trip mummys up and make them feel guilty for not providing such wonderful goodies for their children. If you pick the Sensory Tub idea apart basically you have to spend money on the plastic tub and the boys, put time into making it, get upset when it is scattered or lost or not played with nicely, store it all somewhere and then end up throwing it out or recycling the toys in a different game. I don’t have the time or energy for something like this, and when I see lovely ideas like this I can be inclined to feel guilty that the children are missing out on something - until I talk it over with a friend and I come back to what is important, what is natural, and the reason why I’m doing things this way.

So, our house is not completely void of toys - and after collecting and using them for over 20 years we’ve worked out which are the ones most appreciated by our children. Our toys are considered to be “resources” because the children still have to DO something all day, and as much as I’d like to spend most of the day outside, it just doesn’t happen. I’ve put a list of our favourite and most appreciated resources on the handout you have.

Just recently I saw a beautifully photographed blog post where the mother had made a “Maths Investigation Area” for her children. There was a lovely little wooden table holding a small blackboard with the numbers from 0 to 50 written on it, some nesting dolls, a basket of shells, one of smooth rocks, handmade maths gnomes with felt rainbow hats, a basket of plastic shapes ... lots of lovely things. It LOOKED lovely, but it made me a little cross as I thought about all the mums may feel guilty because they couldn’t provide that for their children, and I was cross about another thing – which I’ll explain in a minute.

I wondered if I was just getting a little cantankerous and intolerant in my old age, so I asked my daughter what she thought of the picture.

“Well” she said “It looks nice, but it would all be scattered in a minute” (remember she has four little brothers, she knows about things getting scattered) “and” she continued, still looking at the picture “I wouldn’t want to play with the things afterwards because knowing they were there for maths would spoilt them for afterwards.”

Wise girl.

And so, my additional cross thoughts that I said I’d explain later were that a mother could get quite upset if a child won’t play with the items presented in the prescribed way – in a maths sort of a way – putting the sea shells from smallest to largest, making patterns from the plastic shapes. It’s a pretty sure thing that a quirky child with good play-skills will probably do something like bring four small cars to the maths investigation area, make a road out of the shells, pile the pattern pieces on top of each other to make a tall tower and then run the cars into them. The dolls will be ignored, the blackboard might be rubbed out to get rid of all those pesky numbers so a target can be drawn on, and the rainbow hatted gnomes will be lined up and have the marbles rolled at them.

And why do I think this? My first lesson in this sort of disappointment came when Michael was 3, I know because I’ve written it into my homeschool mumblings book. I wrote “Today is the 1^st day of REAL realisation that I HAVE TO DO WHAT THE CHILDREN WANT TO DO if I want them to be learning and happy. Have been reading the Glen Doman books on Teach Your Baby To Read etc. Thought it sounded SO GOOD. *I* wanted to do it. Spent $10 on a thick red marker pen, Steve cut some cardboard into giant flashcards. I figured out a good list of words, wrote out quite a few flashcards, tried to get Michael’s attention. Failed. Felt like I might not be able to cope, picked myself up, decided to leave it for a while. Michael just wanted to play with the bits of cardboard, running cars up them, and taking the one with “SAW” written on it and using it as a saw. “No” says me getting a little frustrated– it’s not supposed to be that way. Lesson = listen to your child. Later wanted to make biscuits with Michael, he just wanted to play in the sink with the water. Ordered info on the ACE pre-school programme as I think earlier is better, but they say don’t start reading till at least SIX! Then I realised that I don’t want to do the programme. LISTEN TO MY INSTINCTS! Talked to Steve about it and it became clear that I really wasn’t happy about the way it seems to be too structured for what I want. Then I found a book called ‘Homeschool Burnout’ and YIPEE it’s great. NO CURRICULUM is best. Leave learning till a child is ready! Stuff I had read and heard before but now I really believe it. So the deal now – leave any “formal” learning till Michael shows his readiness. Reading, maths etc could be 6 or 7 – even 10. Hope I don’t waver when the time comes. I know there will be plenty of doubters but hopefully my support network will be strong.”

Well, I wish over the years I had returned to those thoughts more often. I wish I had heard a talk like this at the beginning of my journey. I did waver, I did push the older boys, I guess I got worried that I was failing them by allowing them so much freedom. I am blessed that we came through it relatively unscathed, and I am also blessed that I am so passionate about natural education now that these next children are benefiting from that passion.

End of Part Two

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HOME EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD - Part One

Here are the notes from a talk I did in relation to:

HOME EDUCATION and the QUIRKY CHILD

Part One:

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First I’d like to outline what I mean by “quirky”. A quirky person may be quirky due to Asperger’s or Autism Spectrum Disorder, PDD-NOS, anxiety, depression, nervousness, hyper-sensitivity, hyper-emotional, intense, emotional regulation dysfunction, Tourette’s Syndrome … I guess there are more and there are heaps of quirky people who haven’t worked out why they are quirky, and are possibly quite happy that way.

There is also another term I picked up recently – twice exceptional or 2e children. These are the children who are gifted, but also have other challenges such as Aspergers, Tourettes or anxiety it seems. I was very keen to learn about this as we have one definite, perhaps two or three of these children. I don’t want to portray Quirky People as having only challenges and hurdles in their lives. I have consulted other quirky people on this and have come up with some of the most well-known and wonderful strengths that, specifically, people with Asperger’s Syndrome (because that is what I am most aware of myself) may have: not everyone with AS will have these strengths, but they could: honesty, sincerity, attention to detail, STRENGTHS

I think most people would agree that QUIRKY may often have trouble fitting into “normal society” - whatever that might be. Perhaps you could say “regular society”. Quirky people, or those who are neurologically different, often don't WANT to fit into regular society because they look at it from the outside and see a lot of people who are nasty, two-faced, lying, conniving, intolerant, impatient, hostile, confusing people in regular society. That’s not to say that quirky people are all patient, passive and pleasant to be with – but on the whole they tend to be more straight-forward and any dishonesty is usually from misunderstanding.

Well, a bit about ourselves, and some background on why my passions are natural learning and quirkiness.

Our first child, Michael, was born nearly 22 years ago. He was extremely high need, a very unhappy baby, difficult to get to sleep, easily woken, crying when awake most of the time. I thought I was doing it all wrong and that I was a bad mummy. I remember crying to my mum saying “The book says you’re supposed to know what their cry means – whether they’re hungry or tired. I can’t understand him!” The first six months were nightmarish. For some reason, when he was around 15 months I totally forgot how horrible it had been and we decided to have another baby.

So when Michael was just over 2 years old his little brother David came long. I noticed something startlingly different between Michael and David. Even as a tiny baby David stared right at me, he looked at me like I was the most beautiful person in the world. It took my breath away. Later I realised that Michael didn’t make eye contact. In later years I would coach him in how to make eye contact, not too much, not too little. I’ve learned that many mothers do this with children on the spectrum and as a result the children’s eye contact is still not “natural” and oftentimes they have an almost unblinking stare. It is best, if your child finds it painful or difficult to make eye contact with people to discuss with them why it is important to other people when you’re talking to them, but leave the child to find their own comfort level as they get older. Another difference was that David loved cuddles and squeezes. His rages (which were quite often) could be calmed by “Squeezing his angries out”. Michael on the other hand avoided any body contact at all.

As the boys grew they were Hard Work. Very busy, extremely intelligent and creative. Steve has said that I was so frazzled and worn out with them, and frequently very unhappy by the end of the day, that often he didn’t want to come home from work. He would get into the van at 5 o’clock (or 6, or 7) and fight against the urge to drive in the opposite direction. We’ve sadly discovered that parents with special needs children have so much pressure on their marriage that it is a miracle for them to stay together. By God’s grace, we have now been married 23 years, it is a truly a miracle which I am ever grateful for.

If you find yourself in a situation where your marriage is getting at all shaky you MUST seek SOLID help, or ask a friend to find a counsellor or someone else who can help you if you’re not in a position to go and look for yourself.

Sadly I see so much selfishness in marriages, and too many people willing to give extremely unhelpful and selfish advice to those going through troubled times. We don’t necessarily need a friend to agree with us if we complain about our spouses or for that matter our children. We need someone who understands, can listen to us let off steam, and then remind us gently what we could be doing to help the situation. I am blessed with friends like this, and I pray that you can find some too because having quirky children or a quirky husband, or being quirky yourself can throw some huge challenges into your life.

So, speaking of spouses I know that some husbands are extremely sceptical when they first hear about home education. When I first suggested it to Steve he certainly was. I was the one doing all the research and talking to people – he didn’t know anything about it, and I have subsequently realised that he felt a little out of the loop. He also had some very negative ‘advice’ coming from people close to him about how much the boys would miss out on things from not being at school etc. However, I was extremely passionate about it – I had no doubt at all that it would work. I just knew this was supposed to be.

I had been wanting to move to the country for several years when we finally found a piece of land to put a house on. During the time of waiting for the title to come available and to sell our house in the suburbs God convicted us about having more children. Very long story short, 9 years later we were living comfortably in a partially renovated relocated Villa on 2 and a half acres. Our family had grown from two children to six children. We were unschooling and on the whole loving it.

So now we arrive in the story to the time Michael was 17, and having previously had no interest in social contact, decided he’d like a circle of friends and maybe a job. This was completely natural timing for him – he was ready. Unfortunately this is where everything in the story went difficult and wrong – starting with no suitable jobs, going on to Michael being very brave and working in a couple of jobs that were unsuitable for his sensory and neurological issues, major problems and massive amounts of stress dealing with Work & Income, and it went on from there. Over the next three years we had all six of the children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder – it is actually Asperger’s Syndrome that they have, and I had made a zillion phone calls trying to get relevant therapy and help. Most of the time I was confused and drowning in challenging behaviour and lack of support. I wavered back and forth between “I can handle this myself” and “I need help!” I wanted someone to march in and take over – giving everyone orders and sorting out the whole mess – everything from meals and laundry, education, discipline, schedules, routines, chores, bathtime and bedtime. But I knew this wasn’t possible, and even if it was it wouldn’t solve our problems or suit our family.

Over time, because I needed to, and then later because I was driven to, I have learned more and more about quirky children, and at the same time, very naturally I have abandoned more and more traditional schooling methods. My mother has supported us with this – she has always told me to pick my battles, and right now, with these children, our focus is on character qualities and life skills. Academics come way down the list, but strangely, or perhaps NOT so strangely even with academics way down the list these children are wonderfully intelligent. Hmm, can it be that natural education works just as well, if not BETTER than traditional methods?

End of Part One.

This series will be continued in blog posts to come!

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