I am going to wind up my thoughts on leisure with this short post on how to apply it to our children's education.  This stream of consciousness that I have been subjecting you to as of late has been very helpful for me to organize my thoughts and to see life's truth.

     I mentioned in my first post that a CD lecture by James Daniel on leisure was what got me started on this path of thought.   Mr. Daniel's recommends taking time out of your day and present your child with a question based on what he has been learning.  Give him time to just think about his answer.  Don't rush him because you have to move on to Grammar.  Just let him ponder and muse about all that your question entails.  Giving him this time to think is considered leisure.  He isn't being lazy during this time,  he is thinking.  His mind is being productive in contemplating every aspect that is evident in your question.  Then give him time to answer your question.  Discuss his answer.  Meet his answer with more questions to cause him to think more deeply.  This is leisure.  Giving a person time to think.

     After listening to this tape,  I thought of another way to lay leisure down  in your learning days.  Usually we, as teachers, try our darnedest to squeeze as many reading books into our chidren's year.  Whether they be read alouds,  books that your children must read, history, literature, science, etc.  We push as many books as we can towards our children.  I am guilty of that as well.  My reasoning towards this is that there are so many books to read and I want to give my children every opportunity to read them all.  Do you see it, though?  Do you see the busy-ness  poppiing it's ugly head up even in our children's reading schedule?    It is everywhere!  

     I think that this is where Charlotte Mason had the right idea.  She advocates reading books slowly so that the child can inhale and exhale the book as he/she reads it.  When a child runs through a book at breakneck speed,  he rushes past any connections he might find if he had gone through it slower.  He has no time to simply enjoy the book and think of all that is buried deep inside its pages.  He misses out on the most important part of reading. 

    I think that it is okay to race through books on occasion,  but I believe that there should be some books that are taken to ramble through slowly.   That is why Mia has her own books that she gets from the library that she races through.  The books that we read, just the two of us together,  are read  at a snail's pace so that we can enjoy it all the more.   We haven't started discussing literary elements with our read alouds but that is my plan for this coming year.  I don't want to discuss the book to death, but I do want Mia to be aware of the various elements of a story and it's devices.  I also think it is better to familiarize her with them now than to wait when she is in high school.  Teaching her these elements will give her a strong foundation for  thinking in leisure about the characters and the plot of the story. 

     In thinking about this concept of leisure, I have been given much food thought as to how I want to educate my children.  It has given me a starting point.   Thanks for letting me share my thoughts with you.

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Posted by Jacqueline

Posted by Laura A http://morningsidefamily.blogspot.com/