Secrets to DIY Organic Learning : 7-Steps to Effective Left and Right-directed Learning.

Quite a few people wanted to kick my butt when I revealed that being the honorary recipient of a copy of my new e-book, “Secrets to DIY Organic Learning : 7-Steps to Effective Left and Right-directed Learning” was an April Fool prank. I realized that I could be a pretty brilliant scammer if I put my mind to it albeit an overgrown, estrogen-filled, middle-aged Artemis Fowl.

When my daughter saw me typing in the comment the following day that it was a prank she gasped and exclaimed that even SHE was fooled. We live in the same apartment so if there really was an ebook out she’d have some inkling about it since she likes spying on what I’m doing on my laptop every so often. (How many of you have kids like that?)

The folks from Malaysia’s Homeschooling community, my mailing list and my daughter weren’t the only one who got pranked that day. My boyfriend of 6-months got a different sort of royal prank pulled on him. I played the damsel in distress receiving calls and SMS-es from unknown persons “from the UK” and he thought I was being contacted by scammers. “Oh, dear, what should I do????” I lamented with as much drama as can be conveyed by an SMS.  So each time I received an SMS from him asking me to be careful I burst out laughing at my  ”Scam-ception” (a scam within a scam ala Inception). This Scamception got me thinking that of all the pranks I’ve pulled that day the one about the ebook was the best by far.  I don’t even know how I’m going to top my own game next year.

But here’s what the day’s event (Scamception!) taught me :

What will my kids learn in your class?

Each time I get this question I feel like I’m caught in a deja vu loop. How do I answer this question honestly?

I think a lot of parents out there have a lot of presumptions about school and learning which simply just ain’t so. I came across this quote yesterday and it sums up some of the ideas I had in mind about how I’m actually going to answer this persistent question about what I teach, how I teach, etc.

“The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie, deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.”

~John F. Kennedy

Imagination is More Important Than Knowledge

Hi guys,

Just thought I’d share with you what we’ve got planned for this coming holidays. Every year we do something different and this year it’s going to be a focus on learning life lessons through introspection gleaned from literature. This was in a way inspired by the trajectory I’ve been on with regards to my views on what kids today need out of an education and that premise can be glimpsed in this article I wrote a few months ago. Check it out : Love Based Learning.

Nowadays we see two kinds of problems when it comes to developing “thinking people”. First, children are not exposed to great literature. Second, they’re left to their own devices to interpret the multi-faceted layers of what they’re reading. Being children with a limited worldview they often do not have the scaffolding to make the most out of the literature they are reading.

Today after class I discussed with my Teaching Assistant the premise of this year’s Holiday Program. She was so surprised and asked me where I get such ideas from! Well, here’s the story. One of the stories we are using, Charlie and The Chocolate Factory, was something she’d seen on the silver screen years ago when it came out. Recently in the plane back to Malaysia from Switzerland (how come my TA gets to go for European tour and I don’t?) she watched the movie again. She then realized there were so many beautiful lessons about life woven into the story – things that she did not see were there at all when she was a 15 year old teen.

I think it’s worth mentioning that my TA had been my student since she was 15 and is almost completing the traditional 7-year learning curve. She realized at that point that it was because of the other things she had learned over the years in our classes that she was able to appreciate the insights that allowed her to understand the creative morals and lessons embedded in that story. I cannot say the same for most adults I meet.  A lot of people I come across cannot find deep meaning and lessons from the world around them. Our world does not lack answers to solve all its problems instantly; instead, we lack the CAPACITY to process and make sense out of things, to synthesize information and to apply them to our betterment.

We live in a fragmented, segregated world and the way our children have been schooled, in fact, the way WE have been schooled, is a big cause of this kind of piece-meal, myopic, narrow-minded, thinking that cannot dissolve the world’s problems – not even our own. Where do we begin to change?

We cannot attempt more lessons, more learning, more repetition, more hard work. We have been working harder, faster, more but we’re not necessarily getting anywhere. As Einstein put it,

“Imagination Is More Important Than Knowledge.”

Perhaps that’s our clue.

Perhaps that’s where our children can start : with Imagination. And children being children one stroke of inspiration, one week of memories, can end up serving them as a guide for years to come. We know they’re not going to get this experience in school – we might as well try and create some context to give them a taste of living and learning in Imagination and Empathy.

Well, just thought I’d share my feelings about why I do what I do with you. If you’d like to participate just drop a comment. Oh, by the way, that poster’s just for show – that’s the printed out that goes out. Here’s the online version :

Have a great week ahead. And if you’d like, do join our facebook page for more updates like these or subscribe to my blog.

Best,

Sloane Mak

p/s I would be running (yes, this time, not hosting) another FREE talk for parents on the issue of language learning, future of education, etc. Date TBA. If you’re interested, send in questions you’d like answers to so we can include it in the presentation.

Markets are Conversations.

This is a great book. If you haven’t read it yet and you’re either a business or an advocacy group trying to engage people to create the change you want to see in this world – try it.

When one person talks and the rest of us listen, either attentively or with reticence, it’s called a Lecture. When that lecture insists on not only presenting facts and ideas but claims its points to be the absolute truth, it’s a sermon. You get my point.

What inspired me to write this post comes from my inexperienced experience observing how people who want to change education can or cannot use social media for their means and ends. I want to share some observations which might be useful to people who are new to this.

Another Crazy Idea.

It’s half past midnight and about 4 minutes before midnight another random, crazy idea of mine picked up momentum : organizing Malaysia’s, or perhaps, South-East Asia’s First Alternative Education (homeschooling, unschooling, deschooling) Convention. Why?

Why not!

Convention (meeting), a large gathering of people who share a common interest.

I was having a back-and-forth on facebook about – report cards.  Those weren’t the highlight of my primary school days but Canteen Day was.

Let’s play with our Imagination a little. [Yes, ee-mah-gee-na-sion!]

Let’s just imagine for a little while. Oblige me, will you ?

So, let’s say, instead of one localized school canteen day – let’s have a NATIONAL CANTEEN DAY for people who ditch school!  And why stop at food? Malaysians are famous for coming together when there’s food – all racial prejudices stop at the sight of Open House. Malaysians are not united in race, religion or politics. We are united in FOOD. Our motto might just be, “In Food We Trust.”

And when there’s a crowd you can always have a party. Let’s use this opportunity when Malaysians come united on one front (yes, food) to illuminate the masses on the alternatives to education.

We’re going to have by our homeschooling/unschooling/deschooling community:

• food stalls (yes, I think I’ve mentioned food 3 times already)
• stalls from parents who run home-businesses / hobbyists
• jumble sale (sale of used items like books, clothing, toys, etc)
• talks (by popular alternative education bloggers) – I have in mind : HomeschoolMalaysia’s Alicia Ling Horseley, Homeschool Home Frontier’s David BC Tan, Learning Beyond Schooling’s Chong Wai Leng  and at least a dozen others I don’t have their links off hand. (Readers : Please suggest speakers / writers you’d like to hear their thoughts / presentations on during the convention. Leave a comment with their info, why you would like them to speak (or on what topic) and links to their site. Thank you!)
• telematches
• Talent Time contests for our unschooled, homeschooled, deschooled kids
• cook-offs / bake-offs
• book sales by homeschooling authors / book signing, magazine subscriptions.
• relevant 3rd party vendors (non-homeschoolers, other businesses)
• NOT TO BE MISSED :

  Exhibition : Q & A : Let’s get those pesky questions on h/s and 21st Century Education answered once and for all.

i.e. ”Can I send my children to your homeschooling center?”

• Equally important exhibition : breastfeeding, animal welfare education, organic food (for special needs).

And like a Star Trek (or Star Wars) convention – everyone can come dressed in costumes. YES! Our unschooled, homeschooled, deschooled kids can dress up in ACTUAL SCHOOL UNIFORMS they have thrown out or borrowed from their relatives or bought from the Thrift Shop and have a chance to feel like how people normally think of them – out of this world! They can come dressed with badges with numbers on them and pins and school bags and trolleys. Yes, trolleys – the push cart type.

Trolleys.

I’m going to come dressed as Mrs. Trunchbull. I’d like to see a very tall, balding, middle-aged man come dressed as Roald Dahl and do a story-reading session.

Me>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Ms. Trunc

Focus. Focus. Focus. We’re going to try and give the world a glimpse of what the homeschooling/deschooling/unschooling  world looks like – i.e. NOT WEIRD! But our focus should be about bringing our networks together to meet face to face AND to have talks and workshops giving out information.

This is a completely rough draft – typed out in under 15 minutes. Let’s see where this goes!

Venue : PENANG ISLAND! (Great opportunity for the city-folk to come to Penang.) And we can also organize the matches at the beach on a 2nd day. (I’m thinking 3-day convention over a weekend.)

Ideas,input, contributions,  anyone? LOOKING FORWARD to hear what’s brewing in your imagination now!

(We) Dare to Dream!

A Manglish Argument On School.

Here is a response by Laurie A. Couture to CNN Article – What Teachers Really Want to Tell Parents.

My version of it in Plain Manglish. Please note interpretation is mine as a reader. 

Many parents are shaking their heads at the audacity and insolence of the CNN article, What Teachers Really Want to Tell Parentsby Disney-and-Oprah-endorsed teacher, Ron Clark. His article is dangerous because it represents how the majority of traditional school teachers view children, parents and teachers’ roles as authorities over children’s lives. In my post, What Teachers Really Need to Hear From Parents, I challenge Ron Clark to consider the dehumanization of children and the undermining of the parent-child bond in the institution he represents.

That article is stupid. It makes students feel like we are only robots. It also makes parents feel like we are second-class citizens who don’t care about our children. 

Most parents in industrialized societies are conditioned by their own schooling to be obedient and unquestioning of their children’s schools and the so-called authorities therein. A frightening majority of parents are unaware that most everything that traditional school teachers do is developmentally inappropriate and even harmful for youth of all ages. However, a growing movement of parents are parenting through awareness, consciousness and connection to their children’s needs. Many of these parents are opting out of public and traditional schools are are seeking refuge for their children in child-centered and democratic schools or through homeschooling and unschooling. As a mother of an unschooling teen son, and based on the years of complaints I have heard from parents and their children about traditional schools, I have compiled a list of  concerns and presented them to teachers in the context of their own education:

Parents are already brain-washed. So they don’t know that teachers and schools do things that harm their children. They scratch head when their children are depressed, unhappy and jump off building, runaway, have bad habits.  Your parents don’t know that what your school teachers do to you is harmful for your intelligence, growth, happiness and future success. That is why they force you to go to school. 

However, more and more parents are becoming clever liao. (Like me!) So we take our children out of school and we detox them (unschooling) from the torture and harm that school does. Here’s a list of complaints : (You can scroll down to the end for the Plain English version.)

We know Industrial Schooling is inferior but what are our choices?

I’m going to imagine myself as a parent who knows that the miseducation my child is now getting from school and college is not really going to serve them in the future and in fact could be harmful for their development and self-esteem. I’m also going to imagine that I would not be able to afford private or international school. And even if I could I’m going to imagine that I realize the fact that private and international schools are not what they’re cut out to be – they’re perhaps only slightly less damaging on my child’s self-esteem but also completely unreliable for the ROI on their so-called “education”.

I’m going to imagine that I’m just an average parent in an average business / job with an average education. I come from an average neighborhood and I have average friends. I think like most average people do : I think I’m different but I know I’m the same as everyone else.

What are the options for such parents? I’m worried there’s none.