Wow, this really triggered some people's buttons.
A few clarifications:
- Hanni has never voiced a feeling that it's "unfair." In fact, when I told her we'd be doing some homework over break, her reaction was along the lines of "Okay, cool!" We're very fortunate that she's not in a school with a culture of hating schoolwork.
- I don't really consider arithmetic to be the apex of intellectual fun. It's a skill you have to learn to get to the fun stuff, and yeah, learning it is work. I consider this "learning the basics" to be very different from all the other learning that goes on in our house, which is pretty much endless. This is a kid with insights into science, history, and literature that, at a rough guess, I would say are at least a 6th grade level. I'm totally happy to unschool these topics, because this is where deep intellectual play really happens.
- Several of you are concerned that by asking her to do math practice according to my time-frame, I'm going to destroy her enjoyment. Really no signs of that happening so far. In fact, she is getting a total kick out of her increasing math skills, when she's not battling me. The point I'm trying to make here (and have been trying to make from the beginning) is that there is a total disconnect with this kid between how hard she fights me about something and what she really wants or doesn't want or likes or hates.
- Learning self-discipline is a very difficult thing and a long road. I don't believe that you can toss kids into the deep end of this particular pool and expect them to figure it out. (From my own experience, my parents insisted on academic rigor, but let us be in charge of the state of our own rooms. I've turned out as a passionate academic who has serious problems figuring out how to keep my house clean.) I believe in starting the process with baby steps, in which the child is given an incentive structure that gets them to do the behavior, and then they discover that they *are* capable of making themselves do X, when they decide to. Then you gradually move the goal-posts as they get older. I have absolutely no interest in teaching obedience for obedience's sake.
- "you risk your disciplinarian role displacing your being a happy shelter for Hanni." Really not a problem here. Thanks for your concern.
- Why would I want to keep the momentum going over the summer? I guess I would turn that around ask, why wouldn't you? The idea that spending an entire 1/4th of the year without learning is somehow both an entitlement and a mental neccessity is engrained in us from our own childhoods, but it's a by-product of our agricultural past. There's really nothing natural or neccessary about it.
- Why would I "push" my kid to do more than is being required by the school? Because she is ready for it. And because, as wonderful as this school is and as nimble as they are, they're still not quite managing to get out in front of her. I will also confess to one ulterior motive here: I want her to be showing her stuff clearly by the start of Fall so that they place her in the 1st-2nd classroom, not the K-1st room again. She would wilt there. She is already complaining to me that the older groups get to all the fun stuff -- by which she means the more complicated science, the book-writing projects, etc.
