Can he paint a lush Tahitian chick and just be done with it?

Wait!

This is not about teaching art. This is about using "art" as a means to another end.

This is about using some crazy ass worksheet to learn about the letter "A" and being all nutty about coloring within the lines.

This is about knowing that Mo can do these things - write these words, color things in, read words but not giving a **** about doing it right in school.

This is about me saying "go ahead and do it the way they want you to because while it doesn't matter to me it matters to them" and then having Mo do something "their" way in an attempt to make me "happy".

Really, it isn't about art but instead what I feel is an oppressive way of learning - the go along to get along business of life.

What I'm trying to get at is not about art but about stiffling creativity in the name of "normalcy".

Oh! Wow, you sure catch on quickly. I didn't put all that together for years.

That said, education IS rather stifling, if you want to use that word. I prefer "discipline." Children must be taught to follow directions explicitly and do things in specific ways.Otherwise, subjects like math and science will never make sense. I mean, can you imagine a music teacher saying, "Forget the scales, honey. Just play whatever you feel like"...?

Kindergarten is where the discipline of learning begins.

Does that make more sense?

Well, ok.

I don't see that Mo has had all that much getting along to do, in contrast to some of his peers, with good reason as we all understand. He hasn't been preschooled as such but has had a rich environment of learning at home and outside. He has some squirms with getting along, and is not alone.

What do you want, a fourteen year old nature boy, very self expressive with no control, or more to the point, no understanding of rules and the breaking of them in art, language, theory, science, and so on?

On the worksheet and the coloring, are they really all crazy about getting within the lines or just trying to get the children to aim?

I think that as much as I have a pov, you come in with a bias too, Boomer.
I'll be quiet henceforth (crosses fingers hoping to mean it), not

You are dealing with an explosive fellow, and he needs to be able to express himself. He also needs to learn control fairly soon. And.. the orchestration of expression and control - what we all do with that ratio varies; still, it's a big question for navigating through life.

Adding, I personally probably colored under ten, maybe at most twenty, drawings. Guessing more like five. So I get that there is some kind of
overdoing going on.

Some of us were born to color outside the lines.

You say that, but, still, you can type.

On my earlier post, that hanging 'not' was a typo, some phrase I erased and didn't obliterate entirely.

I'll back off. Not my war to get into, and 'pologies for my vehemence.

Osso, I think you are just trying to temper the conversation. I hear what your saying and I agree in principal. Myt beef with the whole worksheet thing is that there are so many more enticing ways to teach fine motor control that using worksheets. I was Montessori trained, worksheets are evil as far as we are concerned. Discipline must be internalized, as well, not forced on a person by making them sit and fill in apaces on a paper.

A hundred years ago wives of diplomats stationed abroad were responsible for arranging to have their children educated. Many chose to leave the kids with family in the States. Others purchased a series of correspondence courses.

The introductory material for one correspondence school began, "Call your little scholar and instruct him to sit down at the table. If he will not do this our educational material will be a waste of money."

Mo isn't being browbeaten into marching in eternal lockstep--he's being taught to follow directions.

************

As for Mo's Mommie feeling out-of-place among the other volunteers: Welcome to the Club. Life can be like that. There are very few peer groups in which light-hearted cultural references are normal behavior.... and this is a topic in itself.

*************

Little game that may be helpful for the art side of art--because a lot of those Red Apple Kids aren't used to coloring outside the lines and find that experience frightening:

Each kid needs a piece of paper to draw on and something to draw with. Explain at the start that you are going to ask them to draw an animal that you describe--but there are no "right" answers.

I was out walking yesterday and I saw an animal with a big head and a small body.

Its ears were long. One hung down and one pointed up.

It had a short tail.

The legs were short, but the toenails were long.


Of course each kid will draw a different animal--and every single "answer" will be right as rain.

This exercise also works for training volunteers, demonstrating that each of them brings preconceptions and useful ideas to any brainstorming session.

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I'm glad Mo is getting the hang of 2 1/2 hour doses of group behavior. I had one stepson who's mother felt he was a delightful Free Spirit. He never learned to follow directions and he's a useless adult.

Hold your dominion.

Good observation. Soz and i once met for lunch, and the Sozlet attended, fully equipped. I drew a flower for the Sozlet, and suggested that she might want to color it. She whipped out a dark blue crayon and got busy putting blue all over the drawing, without regard for the lines. I was immediate struck by her "failure" to color within the lines of the drawing, but i didn't say anything. It did occur to me to wonder why i cared if she colored within the lines.

The habit of conformity is obviously very strong, and it might not be unreasonable to assert that teachers often enforce conformity without really thinking about it.

That's true. (Funny, I don't remember that part at all -- I remember something about very interesting clouds, don't remember if that was on the blue picture or elsewhere. Obviously, I give her free rein when it comes to art.)


I think "teach to the test" is the overweening thing here, with several implications. It could be as simple as that this whole exercise (draw a letter "A", color an apple red) will actually be on the test, and it is important to the teacher that the children are able to do it "correctly." It could be that so many OTHER things will be tested that it influences a certain right way/ wrong way attitude that carries over to things that don't matter, strictly speaking.

One way you can approach this with Mo is to say that the school needs to find out what he already knows so they can figure out what to teach him. If he already knows how to read the word "apple," they can move on and teach him something more interesting; if they don't know he can already read the word "apple," he's going to sit there learning "apple" even though he already knows it, which is boring.

There are just so many levels to what is learned in school. This kind of communication is one of them. Social skills of various types -- not just peer-to-peer social skills (which is very important) but child-to-authority-figure social skills.

Another excellent observation. In French, the word education refers to what one learns at home, rather than in the school. When i was a child, we colored, drew and played with modelling clay on a daily basis. But even then, one can experience disappointments. When i was in the second grade, i had done a drawing of which i was very proud, and the teacher praised it. I took it home, and showed it to my grandmother, who said it was "pretty good" (and she had always objected to our using "pretty good," saying in so many words that that expression is a case of damning with faint praise), and then asked if i couldn't have done better. I was definitely crestfallen in that incident.

I suppose it's the natural process of learning to deal with disappointment, and especially the disappointment of the crushing of expectations, especially from those whose opinions matter to us. Still and all, i would think that home should be the one place in which our efforts are recognized, even if we don't show signs of becoming Gaugin or Picasso.

The part about Picasso and classical drawing is important, too. We had instruction books of many kinds about drawing in our home when i was a child, including "life drawing" (i.e., how to draw the human body, when it ain't got no clothes on). The book which fascinated me the most was the book on drawing ships. I was already hooked on stories of mariners, pirates and explorers. Becoming proficient at drawing sailing ships, and getting the shape of the hull correct, the rigging and sails correct, taught me a great deal about how ships are built and rigged, and the why and wherefore of effectively designed and built sailing vessels.

Something to recommend on either side of the issue of artistic freedom and the adherence to standards. I think the most important thing, though, is what Swimpy is pointing out, which is that the most important classroom is the home.

OK, I was gonna make a joke here, but really the words speak for themselves....


And re: Paul Gauguin, why are they studying him if they're so freaked out about proper color?!?!?!?

I only read the first page, but I wanted to add something missing from that page. One teacher explained why the 1st graders had to draw their pictures inside the lines and carefully. It builds fine motor skills in the hand that will help with writing later on. That part seems to make more sense to me, therefor, than the color it red or green thing.

I was just rereading some of this and it hit me....

What I've found is that I'm trying to rein him in at home so that he doesn't feel so frustrated by the assignments at school. Instead of helping him spread his wings at home, I'm clipping them so that he can get through his school day with a bit less angst.

This, I think, is at the core of what is bothering me.

I gave him a pep talk about how I knew he could color within the lines if he really tried. And he did it and he was proud of himself and I was proud of him. I bought him a coloring book for crying out loud just so we could practice at home. Instead of home being a haven from his frustration I've introduced the things that frustrate him to home.

I really am trying to help him but I'm puzzled by this weird cycle.

I guess that teaching Mo to go along to get along is the class I'm teaching at home. Like I said earlier, there is merit in this lesson; I recognize that. Getting along with others, playing by the rules, being diplomatic -- all of those things are important.

But imagination is important too.

Of course.

I think you can relax about the "practicing school" stuff at home, and let him spread his wings. Class started what, 2 weeks ago? He'll learn this stuff. No rush.

I do know what you mean, though, and went through a similar thought process re: sozlet and reading. What I've done throughout is encourage her interests, give her tools, let her go at her own pace. This has worked really well in general. Her preschool had a similar philosophy -- part of why I liked them -- and reading lessons per se were not part of the curriculum. She's not really reading yet and I admit that it irked me a bit. She's smart, why isn't she reading?

Then I realized, hey, that's what kindergarten is for. That's what she's learning there. (And she is, she's progressing really fast.) While I do a lot of supplemental stuff and am in many ways her main teacher, that is what school is for. I can let go a bit, let them do their thing.

Yeah, that makes sense.

But Mo hates school. Hates it.

And I'm really trying to find ways to make it easier for him. That is why I've introduced some of the school type stuff to home.

Ah. That's definitely its whole own issue.

I didn't know he hated it in general... oof.

Do you know what he hates about it, specifically?

He hates that it is "so lame".

I'm sure a lot of that is my fault. I talked school up as being so much fun and then he gets there and finds that they read the same darn book all week, sing the same darn song all week and color in the same darn apples all week.

Heh. This from the boy who specializes in digging holes -- something he has never become bored with.

He really does like routine so I'm a bit surprised that he finds school so boring.

That might be an annoyingly big question -- the reason I ask is that it would help in terms of giving advice for how to help him. Does he like the other kids? Is he bored? Does he like the teacher? Does he miss you? All of the above? One thing more than others? Something else entirely? Etc.

The point is, advice for dealing with him missing you (for example) is different from advice for dealing with him being bored (for example).

It could be that he's intimidated, and therefore looks for reasons not to like school.