Rain decides to see if she can fly from the 4th floor back porch. Pretty good try, but a broken foot is her souvenir.
J. announces a few days later he has a broken foot too. I make a cast out of my ankle wrap (sprained my ankle Monday morning, and Rain breaks her foot that EVENING...) and some toys. We discuss bones, x-rays, healing and taking care of ourselves. He gets in character, showing sadness for a minute, learning about emotions. A relevant book here, a Curious George episode (when he breaks his leg) there. Some folks are calling this "Unschooling." It's less about the teaching as it is about the LEARNING.
Children construct their own knowledge of the world with the building blocks they have at hand. Provide more blocks. Teach them where to look for more blocks. And you support their natural love of learning. Especially if you haven't lost your OWN.
1 comments:
I totally agree with you on your last sentence -- about not losing your own love of learning.
When I went to college, I had a fabulous roommate who was so interested in every, single thing. Things that seemed so trivial to me -- like really examining the colors of a rainbow. Trying to paint them exactly as she saw them hanging in the sky. I thought rainbows were pretty, but I never really thought to "study" them like she did.
If only we all could have such an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, especially in things we take for granted.
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