More faces

Zoe really loves drawing faces right now. She loves to make girls with big eye lashes and she is starting to try different effects to make them more expressive. The one at the bottom with black around the eyes is suppose to look angry.

“Children do not need to be made to learn to be better, told what to do or shown how. If they are given access to enough of the world, they will see clearly enough what things are truly important to themselves and to others, and they will make for themselves a better path into that world then anyone else could make for them” ~ John Holt

Rocket fever

 

I helped Austyn make this rocket the other day. He gave me directions and I helped him put it together. He wanted it to really fly. I have to admit that I wasn't as confident as he was. I really didn't think it'd fly well at all, but it really flies well. When he throws it it works about as good as a paper airplane or better! It use to have a point on the nose but he took it off and found that it flew even better. I tried to capture it in flight with my camera but was unsuccessful. Here is a picture of it caught in one of our trees. 

  

"Of course, a child may not know what he may need to know in ten years (who does?), but he knows, and much better than anyone else, what he wants and needs to know right now, what his mind is ready and hungry for. If we help him, or just allow him, to learn that, he will remember it, use it, build on it. If we try to make him learn something else, that we think is more important, the chances are that he won't learn it, or will learn very little of it, that he will soon forget most of what he learned, and what is worst of all, will before long lose most of his appetite for learning anything."
~John Holt~ Teach Your Own

She knows what she's doing!

A couple of days ago Zoe came up to me all excited holding out a piece of paper. "Mommy! Mommy! Look! I made a perfect B!" I looked and there before me was an absolutely perfect capital letter B. It was really great, especially for a three year old. I was so excited for her and hugged her and said "Good Job!" Then I went back to my old way and asked "Do you want to practice B's? I can print some sheets off for you to practice more." She looked at me all puzzled and said "But mommy... I am practicing!"

She was SO right!! She was practicing. I can see that. She knows what she is doing and doing it in the most natural way. She took her sheet of paper back to the table and continued to make B's including a really tall B with lots of bumps on it. I'm so proud of her, and so glad that I'm learning as much from her as she is from me.

"We who believe that children want to learn about the world, are good at it, and can be trusted to do it with very little adult coercion or interference, are probably no more than one percent of the population, if that. And we are not likely to become the majority in my lifetime. This doesn't trouble me much anymore, as long as this minority keeps on growing. My work is to help it grow. "

~John Holt~ Teach Your Own

Book Sharing Monday

 

  

  

The People Could Fly by Virginia Hamilton is a common folklore. There were many accounts of Africans and slaves who could fly. We've read a couple of stories similar to this one but we like the way this one is written the most. You can almost hear the sound of the person recounting what they witnessed while reading along. The story evoked hope in those who had no hope left. From suffering to magic power to freedom and hope. It's an inspirational story.  

"He raised his arms, holding them out to her. "Kum... yali, kum buba tambe," and more magic words, and so quickly, they sounded like whispers and sighs. 

The young woman lifted one foot on the air. Then the other. She flew clumsily at first, with the child now held tightly in her arms. Then she felt the magic, the African mystery. Say she rose just as free as a bird. As light as a feather."