Sometimes I feel like Wendy with the lost boys around here, but it doesn’t really matter how you teach kids to learn things on their own as long as it gets done. If you’ve hung around Classical education circles at all, then you’ve read or heard about Dorothy Sawyer's essay titled “The Lost Tools Of Learning”. (it’s a quick read and I highly recommend it). I’ll admit, I read and ingested the information while my kids were still in diapers and it seemed like a laughably far off abstract goal, but a worthy one?
Then I had one boy after the other who struggled with writing, reading and everything in between...basically poster children for those who do NOT do Classical education. My personality gravitates more naturally to the Charlotte Mason school of thought (and I still like it in theory and intuitively teach that way), but I was too unstructured of a mom to use it well. Classical Conversations is where we ended up, which is like the McDonald’s of the Classical education world. Franchised and systematized. Not going to lie though, it’s been a struggle. Nothing about homeschooling has come easy, last year Charlie memory mastered for the first time and it was through blood, sweat and tears. I googled ways to make things stick, I sat with him for hours, we tried all of the tricks. Over the years I’ve read enough books to fill a library on how to utilize working memory, how to work with kids with dyslexia, apraxia, auditory processing disorder, ADHD etc. One of these days maybe I’ll write my own curriculum with all of the things I’ve picked up from a hundred therapists, books and research, but for now… if anyone feels like they try to explain a concept to their child a dozen times and it’s not sticking, or if you’re in CC and have a kid who is struggling to memorize their grammar work, here are a few things that work around here.
Flashcards with stick figures and pictures. This was the game changer last year. Last year I had to sit down and figure out where all of the holes and struggles were and then make up silly mnemonics and draw them onto flashcards or white boards. The three rules are: It has to be colorful. It has to be silly/funny. It has to be IN and ON the words themselves and not above it or beside it (i.e. “The Progressive Era” gets turned into a car with a giant ear riding on it).
Laminate things that need to be memorized. Homeschooling moms are like Monica Gellar when it comes to laminators. We will laminate anything. We love laminating. It’s more satisfying than picking dried glue off your hands. Add some wine and a few friends and it’s my ideal party. Laminating memory work was the game changer this year. I let Charlie take it outside, on a skateboard, in the mud, in the shower or wherever else. Since he’s an active boy, this is really what made the difference this year. But since he already learned how to memorize last year, it was a lot easier this year.
Cross the mid line. With younger kids you can do this with hand motions. With older kids, you either have to sit down with them and learn a bunch of Fortnite dance moves, or do those hand slappy things… or bribe them. Whatever the case, taking a drink of water then breaking memory work into moves that cross the mid line really works. And don’t ask me why the water thing is really important, but it’s a scientific thing.
I’m so proud of Charlie because while I dragged him through memorizing last year, this year he took ownership of it and did it himself. I remember when Jamie finally figured out how to memorize things and it’s almost better than the moment a kid is truly potty trained...almost.
It gives me hope for Robbie and Will even though we’re still in the trenches.