Category Archives: College

When Love is Blessed

Posted on July 5, 2010 | 2 comments

I don’t believe in coincidences. If I notice what others consider coincidence, I recognize it as the hand of a loving Heavenly Father pouring out His blessings. I haven’t blogged since mid-April because my daughter, Abbey, returned from her year at college on April 22. She is my only daughter and I adore her and our relationship, so I was reconnecting with her in person. However, within a few weeks of her return, a love interest captured her attention, and thus I have been enjoying watching her journey unfold.

So, here are the evidences that Heavenly Father is blessing Ben and Abbey’s love:

The timing is perfect. Abbey did not have much if any dating experience before going out to college. She attended two semesters and a term and was able to date frequently, including a couple young men from whom she was able to learn a lot. In the end, she had figured out what she was looking for in a relationship.

Ben converted to the church 2.5 years ago and has been searching for a love that is meaningful, fulfilling, and with eternal depth. He switched housing last September which meant that he needed to attend the ward (building) that our family is in. Initially, he thought about requesting staying where his friends and support were, but his bishop counseled him to go where he was meant to go, so he did. Though he didn’t really make any friends, he came every week and faithfully served in his calling (assignment) to teach a Sunday School class. His obedience and patience paid off when he met Abbey.

They both felt a strong initial attraction, physically and spiritually, when they first saw each other that first week. Smitten at first sight really does exist!

Ben signed up to join the military a year or so ago, but a long story short, paperwork wasn’t completed to sign off on a particular situation, and basically he was not able to continue with it. In fact, he is still working through completing the process of being discharged without incident because the fault was in the hands of the military administration. So, if that had occurred, he would be stationed who knows where.

I had become really disenchanted this past winter, realizing now that I may be affected from time to time with seasonal changes. It was a much colder winter here in North Carolina last winter, and it was wearing on me emotionally. My hubby and I were very close to requesting a transfer ourselves into another church ward in order to “start over”. Upon much prayer and consideration, we felt we needed to stay where we were. Thus, Abbey and Ben were able to meet.

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As another timing element, Ben’s commitment to his conversion of the gospel of 2.5 years through action has proven to Abbey his strength, his desire to change and grow, and the depth of his character.

As they contemplate marriage together, Abbey will most likely postpone college to work full-time and continue pursuing the writing and publishing of her books again. It comes at a time when I am looking for full-time workers in my home that she has done before. Further, there was a glitch over the past year wherein a family member in the home cannot work with her own siblings under 18. She was grandfathered in for this year, but one of her brothers will become an adult in September, who will also increase in hours/need, and his worker is having a baby, so she can just roll into working with that brother. Coincidence? or blessing?

I talked of the physical evidences of blessings received so that they would come together just at the right time in their lives to recognize a perfect match. But it doesn’t even include the perspectives that line up such as Ben wanting to work with Abbey’s brothers who have autism (he didn’t even bat an eye at their differences, but was rather intrigued), or that he enjoys our family and likes to hang out with us (our bond is important) and they should be able to live near us since he’s a North Carolina boy and the career he’s pursuing is nursing (lots of opportunities nearby), or that he totally supports the idea of homeschooling because he admires so much how Abbey represents her upbringing (he finds her clever and talented), but that Ben also wants to learn and grow alongside Abbey and carve out a path they can create together in a mindful way (which lifelong learning is so important to Abbey as an unschooler and true follower of Christ).

Though Ben’s and Abbey’s journeys start from almost opposite spectrums, they have come together at the right time on that journey with attributes, experiences, and perspectives that blesses one another. What a blessed love they have!

Of course, Abbey says that his being tall, dark, and handsome, his smelling wonderful, and his being a great kisser doesn’t hurt!

2 Comments

Posted in Adulthood, Beginnings, College, Family, Homeschooling, Spiritual, Unschooling

About Being Beautiful

Posted on March 20, 2010 | Leave a comment

I’ve been thinking about my daughter, Abbey, a lot lately as she traverses her time at college. We have an amazing relationship and she gifts me access to her journey. Recently on my Homeschooling Creatively list, a concern was shared about someone’s daughter and how she was socially different from the other girls. I believe this is one of the benefits of homeschooling. On the other hand, one has to have a strong foundation to stand unique among a sea of cultural conditioning on what beauty is and standing for who you are.

I feel I did two things to buoy up my children: Our learning environment is strengths-based and gift-centered, so they each have had an anchor of their specialness and knowledge of their gifts going into the teen years. And we did a lot of talking and discussing and exploring as anthropologists of sorts as to why young people do the things they do and believe the things they believe and adopt the things they adopt. Through this process, each of my children were able to mindfully choose what they believe, adopt, and do. Because of this, each of my children seems to be able to embrace their differentness, allow it to shine out as they stand tall, even as they travel the road to finding their place in the world. It seems to exemplify the idea of “being in the world, but not of it.” Choosing to unschool requires it; having been unschooled naturally unfolds into it.

Anyway, I listen to music as I drive, and this song grabbed my attention as I thought of my daughter. I told her about it, and she immediately asked, Is it “Beautiful to Him”? She loves the song as much as I do. Here are two YouTube videos using the song from two different young women (whom I don’t know) in our worldwide church that I thought did a nice job. Enjoy!

(Anyone want to share with me how to embed videos?)

watch?v=BE5KBtePL90

watch?v=0WL6T04L7U0

Here are the lyrics:

“Beautiful to Him”
by Rachel Thibodeau

So much noise, so much peace destroyed,
I can hardly hear the voice, leading me through the void,
So much noise.
The world’s little lies,
Destruction in disguise, opportunities to compromise,
To make me beautiful in their eyes,
But I’m not gonna buy the world’s little lies.

‘Cuz I define myself and find my beauty in the light He gives.
I’m refined by His divine intentions every day I live.
It doesn’t matter what the world believes,
Or what they say that beauty means,
It comes from within,So, it is too much safe to use and found http://aimhousepatong.com/item7476.html commander cialis to be 100% effective too.
I want to be beautiful to Him.

He’s given me His trust, so I’ll be strong enough,
To run from a dangerous touch, I don’t need that kind of love,
I don’t need that crutch, He’s given me his trust.

I define myself and find my beauty in the light He gives.
I’m refined by His divine intentions every day I live.
It doesn’t matter what the world believes,
Or what they say that beauty means,
It comes from within,
I want to be beautiful to Him.

I know how to shine, my life’s not really mine.
It’s not about a worldly climb, it’s all about His design.
So in His eyes, I want to shine.

I want to live to have His peace,
And feel the holiness He seeks.
It comes from within.
I want to be beautiful… to Him.

High School – Learning versus Credits

Posted on February 17, 2010 | 4 comments

Recently on my Homeschooling Creatively list, there was a discussion about what kind of learning counts for high school credit. Although I know what is being referred to since I attended high school, this vocabulary doesn’t really show up on my radar based on how we home educate our children. Frankly, even when I was in high school, I was completely unaware of the whole credit thing, so maybe I’m ahead of the game that way. It wasn’t for good reasons as apparently my high school counselor didn’t consider me college material enough to mention anything to me, and neither of my parents have a higher education (one only has a tenth grade education) to tap into it through them.

I remember some time when my oldest son was in the 11-13 year timeframe, or maybe it was from Loretta Heuer during a Growing Without Schooling conference, but it was mentioned that I should “keep track of” the things my children do that would be high school transcript noteworthy. And, when my oldest was 14-15 years old, I did do that for a while. And then life happened. And learning. Besides, I found myself getting tediously involved in defining the nitty gritty trying to get it to line up with what I saw other high school students doing. But why should I do that? I am not replicating high school in my home. We are a strength-based life learning home environment. When my children decided what they wanted to do, college or something else, we would figure out what to do in order to have them achieve that goal. And so life continued.

So what did we do for high school if not thinking about credits? I describe it in my Collaborative Learning Process. My children continued to strengthen their gifts (60%), and I provided support in helping each person improve any weaknesses from where they were in order to take it to the next level based on how it affects where they want to go (30%). There were never any conversations about, “okay, so you want to go to college for computer programming, so what are you going to do for high school credit to show that.” My son loved to computer program, so he did so, because he loved it, and was intrigued by it, and wanted to know as much as he could figure out. My job was to keep feeding in the resources so that the interest would grow to its fullest capacity. My daughter spent her last few years writing fantasy novels. She learned by doing. A few adult friends shared their favorite writing resources with her that got her looking for additional resources that would help her along her learning curve. Interestingly, she knew when she was ready for more information and knowledge, and when she just needed time to sweat it out herself. All of this could be translated into “credits” later; yet, it never entered my mind to think that way either in the moment.

Then there is the category of either “not that interested in it” or “difficulties learning or understanding it” subjects. Each child had subjects they never gravitated to in some way by the 11-13 year old stage. It was during this first stage of formality that I would introduce these topics to them in a way that could work for them, just so that they had some kind of positive interaction with it at least once. For my oldest, it was math, and some formal grammar. For my daughter, it was history and math. For my third child, it was science and grammar. These fell into the category of “just not that interested in it”. It wasn’t that they couldn’t do it; it just didn’t have much meaning for them to pursue. Yet, each I thought would benefit from a short-term exposure. So, I found a resource that would match how they like to learn, and each felt positive about learning it to the level they took it. Again, I didn’t think, “alright, you need a well-rounded education and in order to get credit for high school, you have to do x, y, and z.” Now, take my daughter’s math as an example; she decided to learn up to algebra, and then decided it was sufficient. In her transcript for college, I gave her “high school credit” for pre-algebra, geometry (since what we used incorporated it throughout), and algebra I (since she had to do a serious study of it for her ACT test, which she scored solid on). She is an English/writing focus, so math was not relevant to her getting accepted into the university for which she applied. Her ACT score “proved” that she had the “competency” for which I recorded. But again, the reason we did what we did had nothing to do with high school credit or a transcript to get into college. It was able to be worked out as we needed it.

I think there are two types as it pertains to the “difficulties learning or understanding it” arena. There is the difficulty with a subject that is important to the child’s strength goals. My daughter is a writer, and spelling and vocabulary didn’t come naturally to her. This would be important to her, so we came up with resources and strategies that would help her improve these areas. We didn’t create a “course” for her to receive high school credit for if she “passed”. We took her from where she was, found resources that matched how she learns, and helped her improve step by step over a period of a few years. We collaborated to identify these areas for each child so that their strengths could continue to flourish.
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I have children who have a hard time learning certain subjects because of a biological difference. This is different from not learning it well because there just isn’t an interest or natural inclination toward it. The two that I asked to do math later don’t take to it easily. But I don’t think everyone is meant to be good at everything. I think a person has strengths and weaknesses. And the weaknesses don’t have to mean “difficulty learning based on a deficiency”. I’m not that keen on history and would have to work hard to do well in it in a school setting. I don’t have a natural inclination toward it. I’m not talking about “school created labels”, either. Those typically are all about a different learning timeframe and learning resources, and if those are valued, it can either eventually be learned easily or if not, usually be put in the previous category of “difficulty with subject because of lack of natural inclination”.

My sons with autism are who fall into this category to which I am referring to as “biological differences to learning”. My third child struggled with learning language as a child. So, it would make sense that reading comprehension, vocabulary, spelling, and writing not only didn’t come naturally to him, he had to learn it in a way that takes a different way of focusing and learning. Strategies may need to be employed based on their particular biological difference. Or, he’s simply just going to have to think about it a lot more, and put a lot more time into it, because of it’s “unnaturalness” to his nature. So, again, he and I would sit down and I would come up with some resources that I thought might help him, or some strategies that I thought might be useful, and let him know that if he wanted to improve in this area, he would need to put the work into it. We discussed the ways not having these skills could interfere with his life plans, and to what level he might need to take it to circumvent that. We used hands-on supports, resource supports, mentor support, and modeling supports in order to help him achieve his goals. You notice we didn’t “remediate”. He had a positive view on these areas because he was never labeled negatively as it pertains to them. And, as has been said throughout this post, high school credit had nothing to do with what we were doing. We were collaborating on goals and learning. That was the focus. It still is the focus as we navigate the high school years with each of our children.

For us, there is no “high school”. There is simply a continuing learning process, based on stages of growth.

4 Comments

Posted in Autism, Collaborative Learning, College, Homeschooling, Learning, Special Needs, Unschooling

Let’s Get Real About Socialization

Posted on August 11, 2009 | 5 comments

How our homeschooled children present socially is always the first thing those who don’t homeschool bring up. And we then defend the position with the activities our children are involved in and how many friends they have and how many parties they are invited to. I have even heard people mention that they can tell if a person has been homeschooled, both from homeschoolers meant in a positive way, and from public schoolers meant in a negative way.

So, let’s get real. When I chose to homeschool my children, let alone unschool them, I assured the idea that they would be considered “different”. Choosing to unschool sets ME apart as “different”. Why wouldn’t it set my children apart as being “different”? And wasn’t that the point? Different means not the norm. The norm is the socialization received by those attending mass institutions of learning, in any shape or form. I was reminded again of what that socialization looks like when my two younger boys insisted upon attending a YMCA day camp for the summer. Last year they went every other week; this year they went every week for the entire summer. The dynamics among the children is the same thing you will see in the public schools, charter schools, and private schools. And my children don’t fit in well. Let me explain.

Large groups of children are managed by staff. In fact, when it is free play, they reduce staff ratio because their intent is to “keep them safe” and “let them go”, not to support or help with social skill development. It’s to give the adults a break as well. You will see this at any recess time or lunch time in any school. So, all these children get together with no role models on how to treat each other. At the beginning of the day camp in June, the staff were eager and engaged themselves with the children. The children didn’t know each other yet, the counselors, or their boundaries, so they all were fairly cooperative with one another and especially worked together when an adult was involved and giving gentle reminders of positive social conduct. By the second half of camp, significant disintegration in all realms occur. Because the counselors are not really trained in being social supports and mentors, and as the children become familiar with each other and the boundaries that can be crossed with each counselor are known, the negative behaviors of the children increase and the apathy of the adults are palpable. Children know whose buttons are easily pushed and there will be a segment of children who enjoy pushing them and then denying their role in it; the children have established a pecking order and those at the top do as they please without regard to others; groups of children pack together to create strength against any assault; grabbing and pushing are commonplace because no structure or expectation of common courtesy are established or modeled; fighting and name calling result when a child has no recourse when changes of circumstance occur outside of their repertoire of knowledge (this is known as repair skills). These are the things I witnessed off the top of my head as I would try to support my children the first hour of free play by modeling and sharing good social information based on the dynamic of environment for which they were a part. As for the counselors, the first few weeks there was high energy, excitement, a desire to join in the play and enjoy the children, and consistent positive interactions. By mid-season, I literally see counselors with blank faces, many leaning against the trees staring off in space or simply hugging on the child that will approach them and want attention, and little commitment to intervening on obvious difficult circumstances escalating nearby.

As a homeschooler, I am as much a part of the social learning environment for my children as a model and mentor as I am in the academic learning environment. This holds true for the emotional learning environment or the familial learning environment. I recognize as a homeschooling parent that there are many facets of learning that my child is picking up every minute of every day, and I am privileged to walk the journey alongside them. I want to share as much information as possible to help them find their place in our society that works for them. So, what this means is that I believe in adult mentoring as one of the foundations of our learning environment. That said, even though the boys are in a group setting where no parent stays to watch or observe, I stay that first hour as an opportunity to share my observations with my boys. However, that is not enough to counter the dynamic of an unprincipled social environment of little people with no skills, experience, or power.

Joseph, my 8 year old, has done well the first half of the season, both last year and this year. But, likewise, starting midway through the season, he is constantly fighting, disrespecting counselors, and having a negative outlook on everything around him. As I observe him, and assess the situation based on Joseph’s perspective, I find several factors in play. I believe the most important difference is that he has been respected in his life and knows he has a lot of choice. As an unschooler, I just don’t know how to change that dynamic I give my child although he enters an environment full of people without most of those points of view. So, when the children treat him as they do everyone else in that circumstance, Joseph is easily offended and feels disrespected, whether by the children or how the counselors are taught to be punitive against children who do not conform. So, with a lack of social skill at this stage, and after it weighing on him over a half summer, Joseph resorts to his base reaction of fight or flight; his being fight. These mass institutions of childhood group management use punitive measures to keep children in compliance. I notice Joseph’s self respect is not for sale and no level of punishment they can dole out is worth trading it in. So, I come to a standstill. Unless I attend with him, or send someone with him that I have shared my philosophies with (William, 10, did have someone attend with him, so he has been successful), he cannot succeed in that environment. But, not because he is unsocialized; but because he is socialized toward an adult society.
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This is what I mean about getting real about socialization. Our children ARE different socially than those who are socialized in an unmentored, unguided mass institutionalized group setting of children. And I’m not dissing those children in these environments. They do the best they can with the circumstances in which they find themselves. It is human nature to do what they do. I always say that if I sent my children to school, then I would do as the Romans do. You can help your child find the best fit in the setting to which they are placed, but they will not change the setting and dynamic it creates. Thus, when I tried school a time or two for certain reasons and circumstances, it didn’t last long because truly I am incapable of understanding how to be a parent that supports the impacts of that environment on my children. I actually don’t know how to do it. My entire perspective would have to change, and I don’t think I can delete what I believe about my role in the life of my children.

This is what people are referring to when they say they can tell when a person has been homeschooled, particularly when they are still of mass institutional age. My only daughter, Abbey, 20, is finishing up her first semester at BYU. The first few weeks were interesting socially as she was constantly being corrected by her roommate with the words “people just don’t SAY that”. My daughter is extremely comfortable with who she is and she quickly realized that what her roommate was trying to say is that Abbey doesn’t know the typical way of speaking among her peers who have been schooled socially. She speaks like an adult would. She and her roommate had some conversations about the corrections, and it stopped. However, upon reflection, my daugher realized that her autonomous lifestyle lived and learned as an unschooler was not necessarily helping her develop friendships in the way her peers were used to creating them, and if she wanted to be part of some of that, she needed to shift a little as well. The biggest thing she adjusted was making herself available in joining their group in all they did (school think is always stick together in everything), versus deciding what she wanted to involve herself in (unschooling think is decide what interests you and join in as you would like and it doesn’t offend anyone). After making that one simple change, while maintaining her “nobody talks that way” perspective (because she likes that about herself), she was fully accepted into the group. After accomplishing that, she decided two things: one is that the friendship structure it creates is somewhat shallow, but the other is that it creates opportunity to serve others in various ways and learning of others’ perspectives. And, she really likes the individual girls, and understands and has decided to conform to the way they know how to be together. At the same time, she realized how much she will enjoy our continued familial relationship because she quite literally can talk about anything with me, in a deep way, and work out the way she wants to be for herself. She also has learned to value her journaling as she can process all that she is learning and choosing to adjust with as she embraces all that college life offers.

So, let’s be real about socialization. There is a noticeable difference between those who are public/private/charter schooled and those who are home/unschooled. I am a realist, but with that comes non-judgment. I know plenty of young people who have been mass schooled, and they have value. I know young people, especially my own, who have been home/unschooled, and they have value. It’s apples and oranges people. It’s a choice each of us makes. I quite literally cannot do the school thing socially, academically, or otherwise. Others can and believe in it. Others cannot fathom the home/unschooling thing. It fits us perfectly, and my children wanting to continue the tradition with their own children is testimony enough to their own experience.

Different makes us interesting!

5 Comments

Posted in College, Homeschooling, My Opinions, Unschooling

Auditory Processing

Posted on August 10, 2009 | 3 comments

I’ve been thinking about the whole idea of “auditory processing disorder” and/or “central auditory processing disorder” and how it relates to the right-brained learner. It appears that at least half the people I meet with right-brained learners think their child also has an auditory processing issue. So, as always, I’ve been filtering that thought through all the good information I share about the perspective shift on right-brained learning.

Mass institutions of learning generally teach in a left-brained fashion using a left-brained scope and sequence. The right brained learner has their own preferred scope and sequence, but it is not well known what that looks like. In fact, sometimes I think people are completely unaware that right-brained learners would naturaly have their own scope and sequence. Thus, it is one of my missions in life to share what that scope and sequence looks like, so it can be valued, let alone even recognized.

That said, some people choose to categorize a left-brained learner as “auditory-sequential” and a right-brained learner as “visual-spatial”, based on those attributes being prevalent in the respective learning styles. I don’t like that differentiation because it assumes right-brained people cannot be auditory learners or left-brained people can’t be visual learners. I think these are input modalities: some do well with auditory input, and others do well with visual input. I have six right-brained children and 1 right-brained husband. Four of them do well with auditory input (Weston, Eric, Alex, and Joseph). Three of them do quite poorly (Eli, Adam, and William). It seems they either do very, very well, or very, very poorly as it pertains to auditory input.

So, does that mean my children who do poorly with auditory input mean they have “auditory processing disorder”? It is true that they can barely process any auditory information effectively . . . or do they? I started looking closely, especially as I noticed a few things with myself. I am a strong left-brained learner. My daughter is more whole-brained, but learns in a left-brained manner, and mainly uses her visual skills for creating her fantasy novels. I have noticed lately, when my builder right-brained son, Eli (who doesn’t prefer the auditory input modality), has read things aloud to me from his computer, wanting to ask me a question, I cannot for the life of me process that auditory information without having to get up and go look at the words. My daughter has mentioned that she cannot concentrate on talks at church without doodling or taking notes (a common way for a right-brained learner to attune to left-brained or non-creative tasks).

So, I started thinking about how schools are set up. They are lecture based with note taking. This would go along the lines of how a left-brained person could process auditory information effectively. If they can write or see words (many times, notes were put on the board or on overheads or in outlines as the lecture was given) as they receive the auditory input, they are able to effectively and efficiently process that information. Because a right-brained person’s natural gift is not in words, many times those who do not prefer auditory input cannnot take notes and listen at the same time. However, Eli, who also is a natural at math, he can easily follow a lecture in his math class because the instructor inevitably is working out math problems as she explains. Thus, a visual that makes sense to my son is hooked to the auditory in order that it makes sense to him and can process it effectively. If Eli goes to a class at church where the teacher brings in picture visuals and hands-on activities, he processes the auditory information fine. If they do not, he struggles to pay attention and process the auditory input.

In our instructional world, we tend to use three of our five senses extensively: auditory, visual, and kinesthetic (touch). Smell and taste certainly come into play in such professions as cooking and general environmental assessments. Therefore, I challenge the idea that there are “glitches” in some right-brained learners who do not prefer to process input auditorially. Eli prefers to process visually and kinesthetically. That is 2 of the 3. He can do that third one when paired with one of the other two. I realize I may be similar. I need words involved in order to process auditory information, but because our society is set up to favor the left-brained processing structure, I do not need to figure out creative ways to accomplish the ability to process auditory information.Others buy levitra online cute-n-tiny.com believe that acid reflux is related to aging.

Eli is working out creative ways to accomplish the need to process information auditorially while in college by finding other sources to accomplish the same thing utilizing another of his input modalities. Taking on-line classes is a great option for him in lecture based classes. Because auditory input and words go hand in hand, he can take his time reading and processing the information at a pace that works for him. Yes, he has the option of getting a disability plan in order to tape record his lecture classes, but why? Eli subconsciously resents the idea that he needs to have a “disability plan” when he feels he is quite capable of learning the information if it is presented in a way that works for him. So, isn’t the learning environment “disabled”? It works for certain people, but not for others; yet, if it were structured differently, bringing in all the three input modalities, I think there would be less problems involved with most people. Eli received a high A for his online class for Psychology quite easily. And he really enjoyed the material and talked about what he was learning all the time.

The last thought pertains to processing auditory input from a conversation or if a friend or such is explaining something to you. Then, there is often no visual or kinesthetic hook to the auditory. I asked Eli how he processes our conversations. We have had discussions about the idea that looking at someone tells them you are paying attention. A young person, who attended public school worked for me this summer shadowing my son, William, at a day camp. It was apparent the first time I gave this young man instructions that he had “ADD” as he would not look at me when I spoke, and would not remember half of what I said to him. I asked Eli if it would be easier to not look at me when I spoke in order to process the auditory input more easily. He said it wouldn’t because if he looked off, he might become visually distracted by something and that is when his ears would shut down. I noticed that exact thing happening to this young man who worked for me. I told the young man he needed to come up with some strategies to help him, but he has no tools to pull from, and he has just graduated high school with high grades! After bumping into his mother, she has been concerned that he has relied upon the medication to learn, and after doing a few “placebo experiments” with her son, she has found that he is reliant upon it.

I am grateful for the homeschooling environment. While young, I could center Eli’s learning around his strengths and his preferred input modalities in order to create a strengths based, gift centered learning environment. Once he hit around 11-12 years old, his brain shifted once again (as most people do) in order to start taking in more abstract information, which includes having a greater awareness of what is working and not working in one’s life, and being willing and able to partner with a more knowledgeable person in order to create tools and strategies to improve weaknesses as they negatively impact strengths. (In other words, the improvements or skill development made sense as it related to what he needed to work for him in what areas.) For conversations, if it is a topic of high interest and background knowledge he already has accumulated, he can hook the auditory conversation to the ready visuals in his mind. If it is entirely new information being discussed, he has found looking at the person creates the ability for him to concentrate on what is being said. In real life, I don’t foresee this being a constant need, as the area of work he will go into will be one based on his strengths. The friends he associates with will be those who have commonalities.

I am more than pleased at how Eli is finding his place in our society, whether it is based on his strengths or his weaknesses. We live at a time there are many options, and he’s not afraid to take them. He doesn’t see it as a deficit that he chooses another alternative, but as a smart choice that allows him to enjoy the experience because it is based on areas of strength for him. In other words, he knows how he learns, and he’s not afraid to use it 🙂

3 Comments

Posted in Adulthood, Collaborative Learning, College, Homeschooling, Learning, My Opinions, Right-Brained/Visual-spatial Learners, Unschooling

Update in our Household

Posted on August 1, 2009 | 2 comments

As a blogger, I find that I go through life after an experience saying, “That would make a good blog post”. And then it passes me by and I’m sad that I’m not capturing the moments or the perspective on paper. (As a side note, I’m using my blog as my journal. Every year or two, depending on how much I wrote during that period, I print everything off into a large binder, putting everything in protective sheets, and labeling the front.) So, to try to get going again on a consistent basis, I’m going to update everything happening around here in synopsis format, or better yet, in hopeful blog post options, and hopefully I will blog about each individual thereafter over the next couple weeks.

Cindy (that’s me!). I’ve been continuing to work on my right-brained book. I carved out time this summer to finish it, but worry it won’t happen. I also worry that I’m my biggest enemy to completing it. How do authors do it?! I’ve been a support person to my oldest son, who seems to suffer from bipolar as we now see it. At times, this has brought me to the edge of cracking under the pressure of doing all that I’m supposed to do as the center of this family. We’re currently in a good place. I am in the middle of organizing this coming year’s family focus for everyone. My plate definitely runneth over in that category, but it should be an exciting year of growth for many! So, at least three posts there.

Weston (my hubby). I’m blessed to have the husband that I do, who learns and grows with our family, and supports me as best he knows how. We both know in our particular family that we had to divide and conquer. I take the emotional, educational, and therapeutic roles; and he takes the financial role with key support positions in the home, with particular children for certain areas, as parenting relief for me for high time consumption children, and overall involved father, particularly with community activity involvement the children are in (like coaching soccer and leading the youth group at church, etc.) He is also the one in charge of beautifying our home front and keeping track of our overall vision for it. He’s also a great father who shows our boys how to be men of substance, and show our daughter what a husband can be for a woman. Staying on top of things with his job in this economy takes a lot of stress, and we have had our adjustments in that arena over the past year. Also, this is a creative man who has always needed to be challenged intellectually, so he has discovered an excellent match for him to continue some education. This looks like another three posts!

Eric, Age 22. We have partnered together to continue to understand his anxious and depressive state from the time he was 16. Since my last post, I have come to realize he is battling bipolar. So, that is definitely several posts right there. Anyone who lives with bipolar can attest to my statement that it is the center of his life right now as he figures out how to effectively manage it. When he can be plugged into his life that he desires as well as consistently engaged in his creative outlets and life’s passion, I will know we are on the right track. Baby steps at this point; hopeful progress with our current knowledge.

Abbey, Age 20. Big changes for Abbey as she has left to live out in Utah at Brigham Young University (BYU) in Provo starting this summer. The first weekend of orientation was evidence to her that she would learn and grow tremendously in this new venue she has chosen for her next stage in her life. She has already had many ups and downs that has provided growth opportunities for her. It has been fun to discuss how her unschooled life impacts her life at college, both academically and socially. That should be several posts and more.

Eli, Age 18. Has this young man ever wowed his mother this past year! In his “senior year” of homeschooling, he wanted to start attending community college in order to grow more in his passion of math and computers. He also wanted to face his weak areas and discover what he may still need to do in order to succeed at his life’s plans. Eli is diagnosed with high functioning autism and could have had many other “learning disabilities” attached, such as ADD (big time), CAPD (big time) (central auditory processing disorder), as well as how his ASD (autism spectrum disorder) affects his ability to speak, read/comprehend, and write English well. Eli is also a strong right-brained learner, a builder with a specialty in spatial awareness. Many of you know my passion about the right-brained learner and that there is another legitimate, valid path to how they learn. It is not uncommon for a right-brained person to not prefer auditory input as well as have a difference in attention factors. Many also know I have a particular perspective on how these learners should be valued for how and WHEN they approach learning. I believe in a strengths based foundation and coming to formal academics and learning starting at 11 in order that they can understand the need to build weaknesses as it effects strengths, as well as being able to be truer collaborators at that stage. Well, Eli has shown how well all of this has worked out for him! He is truly coming into his own and flourishing. I have also had an opportunity to work with someone who attended public school who is “ADD” and how that impacts him. I want to do a whole set of posts sharing Eli’s journey to give hope and insight to all the people who have young people with “learning differences”.

Adam, Age 16. Adam is now my TALL young man, as he has reached about 6’1″ on his tiptoes. He lives with moderate to severe autism (moderate because he is partially verbal and can learn to a certain level, and severe because he battles extreme sensory bombardments on a minutely basis and it’s hard not to be consistently agitated and on guard) and he has always toe-walked to some level. Well, it caught up to me and now we are scheduled for foot surgery this September. I’m committed to making sure it doesn’t happen again because I expect this recovery to not be easy based on his limited cognition. However, Adam also had his first emergency room trip this summer after putting his hand through our front window which required 40 stitches. He was amazingly calm and cooperative, so backward blessing as it was, it gives me hope for his recovery from surgery. In NC, the compulsory age for school is 7-16, and because Adam will not ever drive, he is no longer legally required to school. Of course, he enjoys being mentally engaged and loves math and spelling and books, so we do as we want in that arena. With Abbey going off to college, he has lost his therapeutic tutor from the past 1.5 years and transitioned quite well to Ashley this summer. I knew this was temporary as she is a school teacher, so Adam will once again transition to someone else soon, probably a man named Russell. Adam enjoys working with his tutors! So, there are definitely some posts here on behalf of Adam.
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Alex, Age 14. Alex has really matured this past year. He has successfully navigated the stage of my Collaborative Learning Process by the same name; the collaborative learning stage. He is fully independent with his formal academic work, and actually reminds me to get it for him! He has a system that works for him, and me, and this year I want to start challenging him subject by subject past his comfort zone, but still embracing his learning style. He also has incorporated daily chores into his life that he, once again, ASKS every day which part of it he should do. I definitely want to use my recent foray into this stage with Alex to share with readers how this stage looks and what and why I do what I do. There is often MUCH resistance in this stage, but it has to do with being gently, but firmly, guided into the arena of self-awareness, self-determination, and a solid work ethic in order to translate toward the ability to set one’s own goals to achieve purpose with one’s passion. Once they get through this first stage of shifting by collaborating with me in what works for them and what doesn’t, it always amazes me what awaits on the other end of this stage: the Gift Focus Stage. And the independence and self-initiation that occurs is phenomenal!

William, Age 10. I forsee big changes for William this year. Since turning 10, I saw the beginnings of the 11 year old shift in that, for him, it is more that he may be able to cognitively make strides. This is another son with many, many labels attached, and would create much worry if I didn’t know better. We have dabbled here and there, but he is now ready to make some leaps. I am fortunate to have helped him qualify to receive CAP services here in NC (a Medicaid disability waiver program), so I will be training a therapeutic tutor for him soon. Up to now, William has been learning where his strengths are, and for most people, looking at someone like him would be hard pressed to feel he has any. But, if you ask him who he is, he’ll let you know that he is the best pretender there is, he loves to cook and to garden, and he generally wants to learn how to be in control of himself. In fact, last night, Weston, William and Joseph watched Merlin on recorded TV (William LOVING soldiers and knights and swords and weapons), and my husband actually thought he could then put him to bed. But, as I know SO well about William, right after watching the show, he was in costume within seconds and prepared to go into his imaginative place. I corrected my husband as it pertains to this child and William was given space to expend his need to process what he saw through role-playing, and ending with some drawing at the table (which he would be considered to be “dysgraphic”). I suspect William will be reading in his 11s somewhere, maybe 12. Same with math. It’s all good. It all works out. William is much more capable of putting in effort and understanding at his stage now, and he has a solid foundation of his strengths, which we will continue to grow and nurture 60% of his time. Lots of posts with this child pending!

Joseph, Age 8. He is one of my most naturally social children of all my children. Interestingly, he also cares deeply about what others think of him, and he is my first child who cares what he is wearing and looking like. It’s really interesting and fascinating to me. The YMCA in which we attend holds a summer day camp each year, and William and Joseph both wanted to attend last year (I had them go half of the time), and this year (they went almost the entire summer). For Joseph, it starts off fairly well, but by mid-way, trouble starts a-brewing. He is easily offended and hurt by typical child playground tactics as well as typical adult punitive, rule-based consequences and interactions. When Joseph gets hurt, he gets physical. We’ve been working on that a lot. I definitely want to write a post about how the way I parent affects their ability to interact with “schoolish” types of interactions successfully. It’s tricky when my child wants to be part of this type of thing for a season. Usually when we hit this point, though, he’s ready to be done. We both recognize the limitations of his expectations and understandings with the environment and how people behave from those settings. Joseph is also showing that he is more than ready to tackle reading and math things, so we have already somewhat started, and he should be able to finish the process of starting and going by the end of the year. At the beginning of this year, I started William and Joseph in group activities, especially because Joseph is so social. They have done swim team two times a week, karate one time a week, and YMCA sports year round. Joseph is a natural at most things he does, though being small, he probably should concentrate on areas he could continue to progress in to the level he would probably want to later on. Karate is a good fit for him, as is soccer. We think wrestling would be a great fit as well, so we’re working on that. We still encourage all things, naturally, like swim and even football, which is what he is wanting to do as of late.

Pets. At current count, we have 8 cats (indoor/outdoor): Socks/17, Belle/12, Sunflash/11, Xena/9, Ellie, Hanabi, Wally, and Sammy (brothers and sisters)/all 1, two dogs: Spencer/9 and Precious/7. Abbey lost her tree frog she handraised from an egg from the wild, Tasolen/5; and the boys lost their three rats: SugaBuga, Stripe, and Squeeker/all sisters/3. We still have our large fish tank, but our pets are diminishing all and all as to variety.

We are still living on our 15 acres in the log house and loving every minute of it. We finally found a renter who contracted to buy our other house, though it will be a 1-3 year contract period. But, with this economy, they were good renters to find as they repair all things and take care of the house as if it is theirs, which is what we wanted. It will still be nice to have it sold. I guess that could be a post.

Now, I need to commit to posting as indicated in his post. Lots of good stuff happening! Oh, I’m going to try to get a new family photo when my daughter comes home at summer break!

2 Comments

Posted in Autism, Collaborative Learning, College, Depression/Anxiety/Bipolar, Family, Homeschooling, Learning, My Book, Right-Brained/Visual-spatial Learners, Unschooling

Visiting Abbey’s College Campus

Posted on March 18, 2009 | 5 comments

There are so many different aspects I need to blog about as it pertains to Abbey’s path to college. I may be able to touch on a few in this post. Abbey has never attended a formal class before, unless you count driver’s education classes at the local high school. As mentioned in a previous post, Abbey decided suddenly last summer that she wanted to pursue college. As mentioned in that post, she was late by a few days in the colleges of her choice receiving her ACT scores, so she officially missed the deadline. She applied to Brigham Young University, Idaho, as her primary choice, and they asked her to reapply because of the missed deadline. We didn’t pursue what that meant because of what happened to her second choice: Brigham Young University, Provo (the main campus). This institution simply qualified her for the next available term or semester, which happened to be Spring Term, and she was accepted! Provo is fairly competitive, so we weren’t sure she would be accepted. Plus, Idaho had a great creative writing program, which is what she thought she would pursue.

(The “Y” on the side of the mountain near BYU, Provo.)

However, because of the immediate acceptance into Provo, we decided to look around their site and see what kind of Creative Writing program they offered. But, we couldn’t find it anywhere. So, we ended up looking at every category of degree until we found a “writing emphasis” degree under a General Studies category. Yuck! But, this process got us thinking. If she were to pursue a creative writing degree, the type of job she would need to pursue would be something with magazines or newspapers and the such. But, she wants to write novels, and there really isn’t a job out there except as an entrepreneur, which is the way Abbey wants to pursue it. Soooo, as we had perused the site, we ran across special education teacher, and it really popped at us. Abbey has been working officially through an agency with her brothers with special needs for the past year, and she’s a natural at it! We got to talking, and some of the benefits I pointed out in pursuing this degree as it pertains to getting an actual job are these: it is not year-round and one gets liberal vacation time (scheduled, though); she wants to homeschool, so a teaching certificate often bypasses certain legalities; she could tutor from home; it is in high demand so if she does it temporarily or needs to move often, she should be able to find employment easily. Those were the things that came off the top of my head.

Abbey wants to be a stay-at-home mom. She wants to homeschool her children. She wants to be an author of novels. All of these things she knows she can do as an autodidactic. Pursuing college has a couple of purposes: she wants to have more of a social life. Having been a homeschooler all her life, she just was different. It was hard for her to find teens that wanted to be associated with different. Abbey was comfortable, but she is really interested in the dating scene. She started off thinking of unschooling her career path into authorship, but finding peers in her position was hard to come by because so many go off to college. Sooo, thus, her decision to put herself where everyone is. Again, she thought of pursuing her unschooled career next to a large university, but she decided against it because of her second reason: the world values degrees, so she felt that it might be useful to have one in case she needed it. In other words, it gave her options if she needed it beyond her career of choice. And, special education appears to be a perfect way to enhance her ultimate goals as a stay-at-home, unschooling mother.

Because Abbey was not able to start university for Winter Semester like she had hoped, she had time between November when she found out, and June (we ended up postponing to Summer Term, which made the most sense) when she would start. I suggested that she take a couple of classes at the local community college in order to have at least one experience with a classroom setting before going into such a competitive schooling environment. So, she chose Expository Writing, since so much of college is writing, and Spanish I, since it had been a while since her self-taught Spanish learning in her unschooled years, and BYU has a requirement to pass a second year language level. So far, Abbey has learned to budget studying time, learn study skill habits, and understand the logistics of a classroom setting and the requirements of an instructor. She is receiving top scores at this time, which she feels good about since she anticipates that BYU will certainly be an increase in difficulty from a community college level.

So, that brings us to our recent trip. It was spring break for community college, and I decided last minute that Abbey and I should take a trip to BYU, which she had not visited yet. Airfare rates were good, so we jumped on it. It was just what she needed to make more informed choices about on-campus housing choices and meal plan options. Abbey also enjoyed just getting to “feel” the student environment as we walked around the campus amongst the hustle and bustle of the student body. We started off with a tour of the campus. We waited in their visitor’s center for our student tour guide:

(Abbey standing in front of an aerial photo of the BYU campus)If PE can be controlled with herbal treatment for overweight. selling here generic levitra

Naturally, the student tour guide was a well-spoken young man who drove us around in a zippered protected golf cart (back to a winter state!) and answered any of our questions. Some of the extra-curricular programs Abbey may be seriously considering once she gets out there is intramural sports and working on the BYU newspaper.

The BYU Bookstore was awesome. The first thing we saw when we walked in were a table of modest undershirts. Abbey and I have clocked in hours at the malls trying to find these! And, here we are, in modest city, with a whole table laid before our eyes in all different colors. We snatched up several. Naturally, we also had to buy something to get her in the spirit of her next adventure:

(Isn’t she adorable?!)

My latest repetitive question I get from people are, “I’ll bet you’re really going to miss her, huh?” These people know how close Abbey and I are and she is absolutely my best friend. But, it’s funny. At this time, I don’t feel like I’m going to “miss her”. I’m totally excited about her next stage and this adventure she has chosen. As I have contemplated why I don’t feel like I’m going to be crushed with her leaving is this: I am confident in our relationship we have. It is strong and solid. Distance will not threaten it. We know we will be as close as ever. She already has me set up for Skype and her Christmas present was a cell phone on our calling plan. She will share her journey every step of the way as she always has. I have always enjoyed the privilege of walking alongside my children on their own personal journeys, and it will continue when they leave our home as when they are here.

The strength of our relationship bonds us across the miles.

5 Comments

Posted in Adulthood, Beginnings, College, Family, Unschooling

Life Without School Post and Comments

Posted on March 4, 2009 | Leave a comment

I have received a few “blistering” comments on a few of my Life Without School blog posts over the past month. Usually, when someone comments in a highly negative and generalized manner, it can be best to leave it be. This was true of one of the comments when I followed the link to his blog that was all about taking various topics and “tearing it up”. So, it wasn’t worth responding.

Sometimes, even though a negative comment seems to be filled with common misconceptions and generalizations, it is worth considering a response because of the commonality of the generalizations. This was true of this comment. And so, I decided to take my time and write out a response to all those people out there who may hold the same perceptions without taking the time to understand the topic. That response is my Life Without School post called The Myth of Credentialism.

And, sometimes, I respond to a comment expecting absolutely no resolution, but I decide to make at least one well thought out comment in return, with maybe a follow-up to anything that is said in response, and you get totally surprised, like in this short exchange. (Find the comment from “I Put In The Legwork” near the bottom, and my response that follows, and the follow up remark that concludes.) What this exchange showed was that the person had been legitimate in the comment created and was really wanting to understand why it looked the way it did to them. Since it was a recent comment made to a post that was significantly older, a search of “unschooling college” must have found the commenter at my post.Gamma knife surgery and endoscopic surgery is done for ED: To implant a prosthetic device recommended for you buy levitra surgically implanted inside the penis.

Anyway, negative comments are always interesting. Sometimes it can be used as fodder to help clarify; sometimes it’s just best to leave it lie, and still other times, surprise resolution may occur. Blogging is such fun!

“Senior Pictures” for Abbey

Posted on October 29, 2008 | 4 comments

Abbey laughed when she saw my previous post with the words “senior pictures” in quotes. That’s because our “senior picture” timing is quite different from the mainstream tradition. First, it seems to happen around 19 some time because that’s when the shift seems to occur for my children in moving away from the home-based lifestyle.

Let me back it up a bit more than that. It goes back to that age-old question we hear all the time as parents of school-aged children, “What grade are you in?” My children have never known how to answer that question; heck, I’ve never known how to answer that question. Just yesterday, I took my 17-year-old son, Eli, and my 7-year-old son, Joseph, to get their medical physicals done. One of the questions: “What grade are you in?” Joseph immediately said, “kindergarten.” He has said that for three years now . . . LOL! Because he heard that “Oh, are you going to kindergarten, question, so often at 5, it has stuck with him as the answer to the question. It works for now 🙂 For Eli, we looked at each other, and said, “I don’t know, are you a senior? Are you a college student? Put, first year college student.” He’s taking community college classes this year as he has been my child that has desired college since he was probably 14. We have mapped out “a plan” that should work very well for him with his strengths and weaknesses. He’s excited. But, we both still consider him a home-based learner, though he takes community college classes . . .

. . . he isn’t ready to transition yet out of the home. And that is what seems to constitute my idea of “senior picture” time and/or “graduation time”. Because I don’t have “criteria” for them to pass in order to be out of our homeschool, because we don’t grade or test, because we don’t sift and sort, we have allowed life to let us know when we feel a desire to celebrate a new beginning. And that seems to be when each child is ready to transition away from home, whether short-term or long-term.

For instance, Eli was more than ready to take community college classes, but he views it as the next step of his learning path from home. Abbey was tentatively ready to work full time last January, but also viewed it as the next step of her life journey living and learning from home. Neither of these indicated a “transition” from their home-based life learning path.

This past summer, Abbey decided suddenly that she was ready to pursue a college track and desired to leave home to seek her adult path. Her eyes were set for leaving in January. So, that prompted me to schedule her “senior pictures”. Because I set a precedent with her older brother, I went all out with a local professional photographer where she could change outfits and bring in “props” that represented her personality and style. Here is the pictorial result:

This is the pose she chose as the picture she will send to everyone. She has always been a casual-type of gal, so she loved the color and being outdoors; both of which reflect her personality.It is estimated that sex health dysfunction affects more than 40% of men appalachianmagazine.com viagra price ignore consulting doctor for impotence treatment, and most of the affected individuals are above 40 years may encounter this problem and it may increase the risk of drug reactions.

This is the pose, obviously, with her guitar, but she thought her particular style of jewelry, which she doesn’t wear often (neither do I), would go well together. Though she says she looks like a “rocker chick”, she and I know it is actually reflective of a different style altogether that is all “Abbey”.

These are two of her bestest friends: Precious (on the left) and Spencer (on the right). This was at the end of the shoot, and the dogs weren’t that thrilled (Precious was highly suspicious of the photographer!), we were able to capture this moment that Abbey liked the most, though her smile was not typical, it still reflected a natural moment from her perspective. I chose a different pose that had it’s pros and cons. There were also a couple other outfit/poses that we chose for various reasons. Overall, she had a lot of fun and found shots that we could be excited about as reflective of who she is.

Because she didn’t make the October 1 deadline, she has been postponed to enter college in the spring (though she’s looking now to postpone to summer for logical reasons) (more on this in another post). So, we may postpone sending out the transition/graduation announcement until closer to her time to leave. As always, Abbey took the postponement with grace and optimism. Everything happens for a reason!

4 Comments

Posted in Adulthood, Beginnings, College, Family, Unschooling

Unschooling Transcripts

Posted on October 3, 2008 | 3 comments

To continue from my previous post about my daughter’s natural path to attending college, I thought it would be interesting to share my responsibilities as the administrator of our homeschool as it pertains to the application process. When my children were younger and we were just still in the young years of unschooling, I would periodically listen in on workshops and conversations from those further down the path. In particular interest was the college application process. Talk of how to keep track of studies that would go on the official transcripts would ensue. It always seemed too overwhelming to me, and frankly, too packaged for the freestyle learning life we were experiencing. I questioned my ability to be that organized.

Fast forward to my oldest son turning 14 and thus, being of high school “age”. I still couldn’t get myself to be that organized. I chose the unconcerned path that it would all work out in the end. I think the biggest reason I felt comfortable with this approach is that my hubby is an academia enthusiast. He LOVES to learn and often contemplates trying to work out his ability to return to his favorite environment: university. And he’s good at it. He knows how to work a resume as much as a university application. He sells himself well. During my business college years, I also discovered I had a knack for selling things. I did an externship at a radio station where I started off as the sales secretary, moved to personally generating donations to the station myself, and finally ended up as the personal assistant to the owner of the station. In three months! During my employment stints, I also discovered that I knew how to sell myself both on paper and during the interview process. So, I guess I went into this arena with some confidence on both ends backing up my laid-back stance.

Admittedly, I’m still probably on the learning curve on how to present the unschooled transcript on paper at its best, but I’m satisfied with the level in which I intend to present it. There are certain things I’m willing to do to accommodate our different educational choice, and there are certain things I’m not willing to negotiate. Taking the GED, for instance, is one thing I’m going to discourage my children to do. Each state has regulations regarding home education and its legal status which includes the administrator having the right to graduate its students, so I refuse to be required to jump through an additional hoop outside the given law. It’s like they say, “Yes, we give you the right to homeschool, but we will not give you the respect or validity without some connection to our system.” Tough. I force the validity to occur by refusing their extra hoops. That said, because our learning environment is different from the school system, our transcripts will look different as well. I decided not to replicate the traditional transcript.

So, here’s Abbey’s transcript as submitted to Brigham Young University, both Provo and Idaho:

Drat the formatting on this site! (If anyone can direct me as to how to turn off the automatic double spacing upon hitting the return, I would be much obliged.) Ha! I decided to upload it as a photo and forget the cut and paste . . . tricked the system 🙂

Anyway, my new addition to my transcripts is to depict “advanced placement courses”. These are any subjects studied that there was either a significant amount of time dedicated to it (giving value to process) or a significant amount of physical output (giving value to product). To give a brief comparison to the world’s measurement standard (the ACT scores) and my daughter’s actual experience with learning, I give the following information:
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For her perfect grammar score, Abbey worked through all five Daily Grams books from the age of about 13-16 years old. No formal work before or after that except that she wrote novels from age 14-19. Daily Grams is supposed to be a “supplement” to a real grammar program, but I disagree. Most grammar programs just try to make something that is simple, hard.

Abbey had no formal English (34 score-excellent) or reading comprehension (28 score-above average) programs or exercises. She read voraciously, although “below her level” by what others would think. She also re-read books hundreds of times sometimes. She wrote very simple stories when young, never more than a couple paragraphs. She started journaling around nine years old. She started writing novels at 14 years old.

For her average math score (20-average), she worked her way through a conceptual math series (out of print, called Real Math) that took her through pre-algebra. She worked through some of Saxon algebra and stopped.

For her science (25-above average), she never used a formal textbook or even read many science-related books. She was huge into nature and loved animals. She learned a lot from experience.

Many of the classes listed on her transcript were from experience. How I came up with the classes was to remember what colleges are looking for: science, history, foreign language, math, etc., and put educationese to what she did in those categories. The reason I started there was because my children really do a whole lot more than those types of subjects. However, I don’t want to overkill the point of a transcript. After putting down the required courses desired from colleges, I then generously sprinkle their gifts and passion throughout the transcript to highlight that. Last, I add a course or two that shows diversity in experience.

I refuse to “gather proof” throughout the years because it would then take a beautiful emergent life of discovering one’s passion and purpose and water it down to dotting i’s and crossing t’s. It will turn something that is multi-dimensional into a one-dimensional depiction. Luckily, my children feel the same way and are willing to forego a college who doesn’t recognize this to find one that will. Hopefully, if we “sell ourselves” well, which could include an interview if necessary, though I don’t think that will be necessary for her college of choice (BYU-Idaho), her life as it really unfolded will be more than enough. And, of course, it is 🙂