Autumn is my favourite time of year; I love it as the evenings start to draw in, the landscape starts to change, the fire is lit in the hearth, hot chocolate re-appears on the 'essential food' list, and everything just starts to slow a little. I enjoy celebrating Halloween, Bon Fire night and starting the countdown to Christmas. Most of all, I love snuggling in my bed or on the sofa and reading with my children; reading, I am discovering, is probably where my children are doing most of their learning - and mostly without the need for me to 'teach' them anything.
Just like those autumnal leaves are changing and turning beautiful colours, so too this week has seen another time of change, another chance to grow: I often have wobbles about what we are doing (and accept now this is part of home-ed and my own un-schooling), and yet again, this week I learnt a valuable lesson. Noah, if in main-stream education would currently be in Yr 5; he has recently taken to writing to his BFFE (now a pen-pal), and when it came to addressing the envelope, his handwriting was huge and swirly and could not fit on an envelope. I freaked! That is not how to address a letter if your 9, if your in year 5, if you are keeping up with your peers. I took over, re-wrote the envelope and huffed and puffed a bit. Later on, once I had reflected on this episode, I realised what the real problem was; my fear. My fear that people would think 'can't she teach her son to write properly?'; my fear that somehow his writing was 'not up to scratch'; my fear that he won't get into university? Fear, it seems, has a lot to do with schooling and not a whole lot to do with education. Noah can spell amazingly well, he reads for pleasure, he asks (annoyingly) a billion and one questions. He is bright, funny, articulate..... and I allowed my fear to make him feel that his writing was wrong. That is not good.
So, I apologise to Noah for doubting him, for trying to make him 'fit': in future I will make no apologies for his hand-writing; the swirls, the large font, the flaws. That writing is Noah, in all his brilliance and all his creativeness and in all that he is; one day, he will write perfect envelopes, and he will get there in his own time and at his own pace.
The other change a-foot will be in this blog; just a little change, one I hope you will like. I love writing, and can't always get everything down; I now plan to blog twice a week; one post will be about our home-learning, things to inspire, share, let you know what we've been up to. The second will be reflective and more about our journey, feelings, thoughts and the 'spiritual' side of us. You can 'follow' the blog (this makes me feel less lonely!) by clicking on the right hand side, or you can register to receive emails.
What changes will autumn inspire in you?
angela x
hi Angela
ReplyDeleteIt was really interesting to read about the writing. In school, I used to win handwriting competitions for the neatest writing (I wouldn't these days now that all my writing is pretty well typed!)...and it was quite a challenge for me having a left-handed daughter whose writing was, and still is, pretty illegible (to my eye)....but yes, the truth is, the issue isn't their writing, but what whe think other people will think...
It is a challenge isn't it? What was funny, is a couple of days after posting this, a woman was sat behind me in a cafe harassing her young son to do his homework (it was almost 6 o'clock and he was clearly tired); she told him off for messy work as it reflected what people would think of him. Firstly, it was neat writing (I looked) and secondly, who on earth can do neat writing at six in the evening after a day of work? I had to move in the end least I said anything to her!
DeleteHandwriting is directly connected to the workings of the brain. When we change handwriting, we send reverse impulses to the brain which sends out a new neuro pathways. The brain has an option to choose between the old and new pathway.”
ReplyDelete