Copasetic Flow

When asked "How do unschooled kids learn to read?:  My best answer so far is, "Randomly." No. 2, our four-year-old, who is rather uninterested in the whole alphabet thing is learning to sight-read while denying that he can.  He seems to have taken to heart the Spiderman admonition that with great power comes great responsibility and he wants none of it.  He'll look at exit signs, turn to us, and ask "What's that exit for?"  When I ask, "Are you learning how to read," his quick response is "No!"  His most amusing reading slip-up to date has been to tell us throughout our road trip from San Francisco to Wyoming that he'd seen Donald Duck's.  I thought he was perhaps just going pleasantly divergent until we drove through a town small enough that we were right next to a McDonald's when he proclaimed "There's Donald Duck's!  I love the food there!"  He peruses Donald Duck comics frequently, and had put the ...

We had a rare treat yesterday.  The whole gang, all five of us , got to descend upon our local Farmers’ Market together.  Normally, I’m up by 3:30 on Saturdays.  I putter around the house, work a bit, clean a bit, and then, at the still pre-dawn time of 4:22, I  wake up No. 1, our  six year-old, and No. 2 our four year-old to get ready to head out to do our weekly fruit and vegetable shopping.  The kids hit the potty, put on their shoes and socks, a sweater or two, and perhaps a jacket depending on our weirdly cold San Francisco weather, and we’re off.  Our corner buses don’t run at quarter to five in the morning, so we make our way along the eight tenths of a mile downhill trek to the main artery bus that does run through the night. No. 1 re-coined the phrase midnight long ago to mean “the middle of the night”, and tells everyone we got to our Farmers’ Market at midnight.  We trundle along, warming up with the activity of walking, running, and ...

It was Christmas time when the kid and I started talking about number bases.  The air outside was more than normally chill for San Francisco.  In the winter here, thanks to the fog, the air’s still damp, so cold feels really cold, but the chill was compensated for by town being even prettier than usual; sporting all it’s holiday lights.  People on public transit were more tired than in other seasons; the holiday rush, and December’s early sunsets combined to make a sleepy, almost lethargic atmosphere.  The season also seemed to have made our generally friendly fellow bus riders even a little more affable.  Smiles swept across their faces a little more quickly.  People scooched and shuffled to help each other get into the crowded buses. The kid and I were on one of these buses, returning to the house from who knows where when, mostly just to liven up the ride, and with only the slightest hint of an ulterior motive, I asked her, “How many numbers can you ma...

An excellent thought-provoking book that's fun to look at and to hold. Yes, I'll steal the size of this book for my homeschool travel book, and well, that was one of the points! Austin Kleon who serendipitously came to live in Austin, TX wrote this book of http://austinkleon.com/steal/ missives on how to best experience being creative. The book covers more of the how than the what I'd say. Some of the advice Austin offers filtered through my reading: 1. Think of your heros' lives, not just their creative input. Let their lives inform yours. 2. Dress for the job you want. Keep being a kid, keep pretending. 3. Get bigger pockets if you need to but keep a journal(s) on you at all times. 4. Who influenced the people who influence you? 4.a. Who does influence you anyway? 5. Don't worry about your ideas being stolen. 6. Everything that needs to be said has been, but no one listened. 6.a. Say it again. 6.b. Say it your way. 7. Write not what you know, but what...

We practice minimalism in a different way. We’ve applied it to our out-and-about living.  We travel light, and I love it! Minimalism, and thoughts of living mindfully are in the air this week.  On Racheous , Rachel talked about her family’s recent move, and how switched to a more mindful set of possessions on the way.  At Jitterberry , Jessica discussed her family’s transition to a minimalism lifestyle . We practice minimalism in a different way, we’ve applied it to our out-and-about living.  We travel light, and I love it. Before we had kids I was spooked by strollers.  They inevitably seemed to be loaded with numerous items on their bottom tray.  They also seemed to inspire the use of diaper bags, or other parent-laden luggage.  My typical outing at that point involved throwing a collapsible fishing rod, a tackle box about a quarter the size of a shoe box, a few pancakes wrapped in a paper towel, and perhaps a cup of earthworms into a small...

Inspired by the Sara’s recent post about respectful parenting +Happiness is here  vis-à-vis Minecraft screen time .  The end analysis there?  Trust your kids, and parent respectfully. In electrical systems theory, we divide circuits up into two categories, differentiators and integrators.  Differentiators make circuits more sensitive to every little change.  The circuit doesn't miss much, but it might flail around quickly.  Integrators on the other hand cause the system as a whole to be less sensitive to small changes.  Systems with integrators won't respond to a small change, they simply add it to a total response, and wait for more information.  If the changes continue to happen in the same way, ultimately the system will respond, but it takes time and consistency. This is how I view Sara’s description of handling video game screen time.  I would have been inclined to shutdown all the screens after two days spent exclusively on a video ...

  Public transit…  Our living room activities mostly take place on the buses and trains of San Francisco.  If we get on a bus at an early enough stop, we can consume the entire back row of seats; there’s five of us and there’s five seats.  Our deepest conversations happen there, we talk about things like “How do number base systems work?”  “Why is it not OK to pick up food from the ground close to a train station,” (answer Pee).  “Where do puddles underground in train stations come from,” (same answer.)  Some of our conversations like the pee exploration gather other bus passengers.  A young lady with her one year old strapped to her chest figured she’d have to have the conversation with her kid soon enough, and wanted to get the youths’ take on public pee in the city.  This often leads to utter hilarity—our 4 year-old No. 2 wasn’t sure it was such a bad thing to pee on walls.  Most of our conversations draw more quiet audiences—the la...