Editor of Life Learning magazine Editor of  Natural Life magazine Author of educational books Small/ Home Business writer Poet Speaker

Welcome to these regular musings, meanderings, wonderings and wanderings by Wendy Priesnitz.  Archives - May, 2004 Who Decides? – May 29, 2004 This morning, I interviewed Mimsy Sadofsky, one of the founders of the Sudbury Valley School (SVS) in Framingham, Massachusetts. Founded in 1968, SVS is a democratically run school community, governed on the model of a traditional New England Town Meeting, which believes passionately in self-directed learning. Mimsy and I have both been involved with promoting self-initiated learning and freedom for kids for over 30 years. And although we were familiar with each other’s work, we had never met. However, although I enjoyed my chat with this warm and funny woman on the campus of The Beach School, a Toronto SVS, I was astounded to find the two of us to be on totally different wave lengths. And I was left with more questions about adult control and kid’s rights. Attendance at Sudbury Valley-style schools is compulsory and separation from parents at an early age is thought to be a good thing. Mimsy told me that is because it works better that way, that it says to kids this is a place to which  you need to make a serious commitment, even if you are little, that you need to go regularly so that relationships can develop, and that not being accountable to your parents during the day is empowering. However, I do not believe that a school can be truly democratic if attendance is compulsory. And I am not sure it makes much of a difference if the dictator is friendly...or a group made up of the participants. I also believe that kids can separate from their parents naturally, at their own pace, in the same way they learn at their own speed. My kids did. There are no black and white answers to these questions and many parents and educational advocates – not to mention Life Learning readers – struggle with them on an ongoing basis. So after the interview, I returned home and started to revamp the July/August issue of Life Learning magazine to include an article tentatively titled: “Who Decides?”. This issue of parental/adult control and kid’s rights has hit me right over the head and made me pay attention to it. In addition to a Naomi Aldort column supporting the parental right to protect kids from perceived dangers, there will be my thoughts on the subject, a selection of Mimsy’s comments, and a piece by unschooler Deb Lewis about how ageism prevents kids from fully participating in society, including from voting. Posted: 29/05/2004 7:05 PM Learning & Electronic Media – May 27, 2004 I wrote an article for Life Learning’s May/June issue called “Computers for Kids – Learning Tools or Imagination Stunters?” It is about a study conducted into the effects of electronic media (including television) in the lives of very young children. Apparently, this is a topic about which our readers have strong feelings, because we have received more feedback about the article than we have about any other piece we have published. As a writer/editor sitting here at my computer sending words out into the world, I very much appreciate the feedback. Life Learning has passionate and eloquent readers/writers, so I have enjoyed reading the responses. Interestingly (to me at least), they have been almost evenly split between praise and irate condemnation for the article. One mother said that while she feels there are lots of benefits to computers (and even some good television shows!), there are also dangers, some of which have not yet been fully explored (as our article points out).  She wrote, “Let them save sitting in front of a box for later and have – as you write in the article – their emotional, social and physical needs taken care of before they are exposed to machines. I say, everything in balance, in its own developmentally appropriate time. However, I am not about to let my two-year-old child play in traffic in the name of freedom; nor will she have unfettered use of electronic media...until she she has the tools to make the decision for herself.” On the flip side of the discussion, another mom wrote in vehement disagreement with my comment that “it is safe to say that very early computer use – like early television exposure – should be avoided or limited”. She said that computers and televisions are just tools and that her 4-1/2-year-old daughter is free to use them both – and to turn them off – at will. These readers seem to feel that because their children have the time and opportunity to muddle about in the real world with their parents and siblings, any negative effects of computer and television usage would be somehow negated or reduced. This, in spite of the fact that the study in question addressed pre-school-aged children. These thoughtful responses have got us thinking once again about the role of parental control (if there is one, and I believe there is) in life learning, natural parenting families. Naomi Aldort’s column in the upcoming July/August issue is about this very topic. So stay tuned. The other debate – the one about the health, social and learning effects of electronic media on young children – will probably also continue, here and elsewhere, in spite of some readers’ belief that “the article has no place in an unschooling magazine”, as if there was a certain set of rules and regulations for this particular philosophy of life. Or even a universally agreed upon definition of the term “unschooling”, which we, by the way, try to avoid using. As always, I appreciate your comments. Posted: 27/05/2004 2:04 PM The Benefits of Boredom – May 19, 2004 Many religions and philosophers (not to mention mothers!) have feared and even damned boredom. Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard called it “the root of all evil”. Wordsworth described it as a “savage torpor”. To centuries of Christians, it was a sin. If nothing else, it was definitely to be avoided at all cost. I, however, prefer the comments of writer F. Scott Fitzgerald, who wrote: “Boredom is not an end product, is comparatively rather an early stage in life and art. You’ve got to go by or past or through boredom, as through a filter, before the clear product emerges.” Many times while writing I have found myself lingering over the keyboard, considering some new procrastination tactic, feeling bored and uninspired with my work and unable to write another word. But I pushed on through those feelings, past that situation, because I am a writer...and thus motivated to write (partly because I love the process). Actually, as I think about it, I did more than push through boredom; boredom allowed me the space and time to rest, to clear my mind and refocus. Sometimes I’d go for a walk or clean the kitchen. But I didn’t stay bored for long, because I began to look around and notice things I hadn’t seen before – including new thoughts. The unfocused time had somehow allowed my mind to rest and my subconscious to scan the horizon for a new perspective. Soon I was back engrossed in productive work. Psychologist and author Mihaly Csikszentmihaly would say I was back into the flow. Csikszentmihalyi is chiefly known as the architect of the notion of flow in creativity. People enter a flow state when they are fully absorbed in activity during which they lose their sense of time and have feelings of great satisfaction. He describes flow as “being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.” In his book Beyond Boredom and Anxiety: Experiencing Flow in Work and Play Csikszentmihaly examines motivation based on a study of a half-dozen groups of people involved in pursuits like rock climbing, composing, dancing and playing chess. He chose these groups in an effort to understand more fully what motivates people to stop watching boring television shows and instead, engage in activities that are extremely challenging or offer few external rewards (like writing a poem, as I was just trying to do). He found, simply (and these are my words – he seldom writes simply), that the answer is in the high they get from experiencing “flow”. This theory applies equally to all sorts of work and learning situations as well as leisure pursuits. At some point, our society engaged in the Puritan Work Ethic and decided that work and learning must be, by definition, unpleasant chores. Csikszentmihaly believes, on the other hand, that people can live richer, happier lives by learning new skills and increasing the challenges they face each day. I remember as an only child being bored sometimes. Inevitably, my mother would nag at me to “do something”, then she would create some busy work to try and alleviate my boredom. It seldom worked, possibly because I was stubborn enough to reject her suggestions on general principle and possibly because I would eventually grow bored with being bored and find something new and interesting to do. I’m glad that I didn’t turn into a passive person waiting for someone to entertain me. Still, I was left with a long legacy that made me feel guilty every time I found myself disinterested, disengaged or not busy. So I didn’t worry if my daughters occasionally looked like they might be bored. I knew that being free to experience and actively learn from whatever challenges arise each day puts boredom to work pretty quickly. Posted: 19/05/2004 6:30 PM Learning To Do Nothing – May 14, 2004 I’ve been absent from this blog for most of this week...and, indeed, from my office and my computer. Even though (or perhaps because of) there are two magazines to finish editing and laying out, with only two weeks to go before a print deadline, I am nursing a repetitive strain injury called Cubital Tunnel Syndrome. Apparently my ulnar nerve (the one that makes your hand tingle when you hit your funny bone) is acting up. Although six weeks abstinence from the computer is recommended, I have allowed myself five working days...OK, with some cheating. The forced vacation has been good for me, since as the owner of the company that publishes Life Learning and its sister magazine Natural Life, I drive myself too hard and seldom take vacations. But at the beginning of the week, I had no idea how to do nothing! So as the weeks ends, my fingers are still tingling, but I’ve learned a number of things, among them the importance of balance, that I can survive without checking email 50 times a day, how to relax and enjoy doing nothing (and not feel guilty about it), and how to harness what we normally call  “boredom”. The latter is something I am working up into an article for a future issue of Life Learning. But for now, I’d better stop typing. Posted: 14/05/2004 12:29 PM Institutionalized Natural Learning – May 13, 2004 One of the “hot new things” in early childhood education is apparently something called High/Scope curriculum. (It was founded a few decades ago, but is recently experiencing a popularity spurt.)  Being used in an increasing number of North American nursery schools and day care centers, High/Scope purports to encourage children to learn the things that naturally interest them at their own pace, and it emphasizes the use of real and natural materials. In a recent newspaper article, a High/Scope trainer who teaches at a community college is quoted as saying that the curriculum is founded on the premise that children should plan their own activities. She also pointed out that good learning comes from making mistakes. How refreshing to see such an enlightened perspective coming from mainstream educators...High/Scope’s founder, the late Dr. David P. Weikart, was a public school administrator. Unfortunately, once these kids move past preschool they will have to switch to learning things that other people want them to learn, at somebody else’s pace, using textbooks and other pseudo-realities. However, this is an encouraging trend (although I have to shake my head at our society’s seeming need to institutionalize everything). Perhaps it will lead more people to feel comfortable with the idea of allowing children to control their own learning.  Posted: 13/05/2004 10:20 PM What is Democratic? – May 7, 2004 Just off the phone after yet another media interview where I was told, somewhat condescendingly, that keeping kids out of school might be fine for me and my family, but that I should be ashamed of undermining the strong public school system that we need to preserve our democratic rights. And yet again, I explained to this well-meaning reporter that there is not much that is democratic or even socially just about our current public school system. I don’t know where people get this theory that a public education system is supposed to form the foundation of a caring, tolerant and democratic society by providing equal opportunity for all, regardless of socio-economic background. Maybe it is a justification for warehousing kids! In reality, compulsory state-run education systems originated in places like Prussia for reasons like creating obedient soldiers. And true to their origins, scratch the surface of any public school system and you will find something quite different from justice and democracy. You will find an archaic institution, which, besides defying everything we know about effective organizations and cognitive development, perpetuates social hierarchies, disempowers people, forces them to do things against their will, and encourages a destructive level of consumerism and consumption. If a democratic society is one in which people are collectively in control of their lives and the lives of their communities, then our present-day school systems are anti-democratic. Posted: 7/05/2004 12:52 PM Interfering With Learning – May 5, 2004 This morning, as I walked through the harborside park near my home, I watched a mother and her young child who were also enjoying the warm sunshine. The little girl had on an immaculate white dress, white socks and shiny black shoes. Oblivious to what her activities might do to her clean clothes, she was excitedly watching some worms wriggle through a puddle of water. Gently and with great joy, she was trying to coax one of the worms onto a stick that she patiently held at the edge of the puddle. Unfortunately, her mother dragged her, screaming, away from her science lesson with the admonition that she would wreck her clothes “playing in the dirt”. I hope (but doubt) that was an isolated action on the part of the mother, since interfering with the natural learning process destroys children’s pleasure in discovery. It also contributes to the compartmentalization of learning and reinforces the myth that we only learn in certain places, during certain hours and when certain people (usually older and wiser than us) are in control. Adult control of the learning process can also inhibit kids’ fearless approach to problem-solving. We have all seen that sort of interference in action. I still remember vividly an incident that took place over 30 years ago when my two-year-old daughter was trying to put her shoes on. She proudly put the left shoe on the right foot, then determinedly spent ten minutes creating a massive knot in the laces. Her grandmother, no longer being able to watch in silence, said in her peremptory way, “You’re doing it all wrong. Here, Grandma will do it for you!” My daughter burst into tears. Fortunately, I had the courage to intervene because the legacy of that type of “help” left me with a lifelong resistance to trying something new for fear of not being able to do it perfectly well the first time. When people are fearful, confused or bored, or have been convinced that something is too difficult or messy, or that they are too dumb, they shut down. The surest way to make someone fearful of risk taking is to demonstrate their chance of failing. It is no wonder our schools are full of bored, frustrated, angry, passive children who have lost their ability to question, experience and learn. Posted: 5/05/2004 11:20 AM Return to current weblog Comments? Suggestions? Email Us copyright © Wendy Priesnitz 2004-2005

Topics & Passions: natural learning green politics simplicity environment parenting books writing ~ What I'm reading: The Rapture of Maturity - A Legacy of Lifelong Learning by Charles D. Hayes (2004, Autodidactic Press) Small Wonder by Barbara Kingsolver (2002, HarperCollins) Off Our Rockers and into Trouble - The Raging Grannies by Alison Acker and Betty Brightwell (2004, Touch Wood Editions)