By MJ + PJ
It just so happens that school is out in the US for the summer. Our son is very aware of this, and reminds us almost daily. Upon each reminder we counter-remind him that we are happy to drop him off at a boarding school once the summer is over and we will continue without him. But that’s not the plan – the plan is to school on the road using a mix of resources.
Those resources include: environments, places, people, his topic and library books, his unfinished school workbooks, his imagination, each other, online resources, apps, toys, instruments, maps, tools, cameras, and numerous other informal things. Formally we will utilize charter home schooling which we will submit work samples to, have access to online resources through, and obtain as needed support.
Sounds great. But education is not just things – most importantly it requires personal investment. The teachers and the students need buy-in. On the road this is made challenging due to the absence of set hours or days of regular class, and having no consistent environment – the usual and routine stimuli that cue “time to deliberately participate”.
Other important variables to consider and appreciate that influence buy-in are the developmental stage and personality of the student. Are there more variables? Indeed!
To set the scene on the first day on the road we did some orientation of him to his education for the year, being:
- You will do something academic every day, being a mix of immersion and practice.
- You will like some of it and not like some of it, just like at usual school.
- You need to both maintain and build on old skills and develop new skills.
- We will guide you and help with what we know is new or difficult, but there are a lot of things which you do not need help with and you just need to buckle down and do.
These four rules of play (or non-play as he sees it!) for constraining the threat of “doing work all day” (which clearly his parents have abandoned!) serve to enable buy-in towards academic tasks on the road. We also discussed how this is going to be a very different education and to stay open minded. Despite these intents, as any parent might guess, we have had some battles. Some real good ones. Yeah. The resistance is strong with this one.
A good example of this played out disastrously in week two at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. He had to get his usual 5 maths pages done in the 2 hour drive. This should take no more than 25 minutes at most, but he was choosing to not use recommended strategies in addition to dilly-dallying. Arriving at the aquarium with only about one and a half pages completed and us needing to keep driving north, chaos set in: No one is going! We will eat and keep driving! (But parents also wanted to go and not miss out.) We are going! But once we get in you sit and can’t look until you’re done! But parents can’t walk too far away! Arrrrrgh.
Believe it or not, this occurred one week after one of his plush toys was thrown away at Zion NP for exactly the same scenario. As best you can, heed the lessons of these stories. While reading them won’t make you immune, you will know you’re not alone. Stay the course. In education, just like in parenting, there are lows to weather to enjoy the height of the highs.
Of course it really does help that MJ has a background in teaching to organize, identify and strategize ways for this kid to deliberately learn. Since he carries the label of “teacher” he gets the backlash when the buck stops where the kid doesn’t want it to. Regardless, success will rely on a team effort – a traveling family has to ensure self-discipline is maintained for the teaching parents and student child, and for consistency.
The big picture is that it would be difficult not to learn an extraordinary amount of things on an adventure like this. We all will. The key to maximizing his education will be in deliberacy: having a plan, setting expectations, using varied resources, taking opportunities when they present, following leads on topics, taking time out to sit and teach, encouraging questions, and finding ways and means to answer them.
Be overt and you just might teach someone else something valuable along the way.
