By Heather Sanders.
Kenny’s Human Anatomy course continues to be a topic of discussion around the house. He is primarily an auditory learner which, among many other things, means he enjoys and learns more when others will carry on conversations with him about whatever he is learning.
As you might imagine, the girls are not as excited about his Human Anatomy lessons as he is, so Jeff and I are his primary audience, by default. Just yesterday when Kenny wanted to share a fun fact he learned with Meredith, she offered a less than encouraging response. After an overly exaggerated eye roll and exasperated moan, she said, “Kenny, school is over. I am tiiiiiired of learning!” Of course, I had to hide my smirk because at that very moment she was in the midst of picking out a challenging piece on the piano – more proof the “work” of learning is subjective.
After failing to entice Meredith into a conversation on neurons, he came into the schoolroom where I was catching up on my Google Alerts. I looked up and smiled, which he received as an invitation to sit down and continue his line of thought.
Deciding to record our conversation, I clicked open my favorite text editor and started typing, or is it called “keyboarding” now?
Kenny: “Momma, did Daddy see the model of a neuron I made in my co-op class on Monday?”
Me: “I’m not sure if he saw it in person, but I texted him a photo of you making it.”
Kenny: “Oh.”
Me: “He’ll be home in an hour. You can ask him then.”
Kenny: “Okay, what are you doing?”
Me: “I’m reading a post about how California is failing to provide high-quality science education to public elementary school students.”
Kenny: “Maybe they should let them do things like make clay models of neurons.”
Me: “Maybe so, because one of the links from that article reported that 40% of elementary teachers said their students get 1 hour or less of science teaching a week.”
Kenny: “A week?”
Me: “Yep.”
Kenny: “We get waaaaaay more than that.”
Me: “Yep.”
Kenny: “What else?”
Me: “What else, what?”
Kenny: “What else do they say about Science?”
Me: “Just that the US has increasing concern over the country’s youth in areas of science and math.”
Kenny: “Math too?”
Me: “Yes, Math too.”
At that moment, Emelie hollers from her room, “I’m concerned about Math too!”
Me: (Hollering back) “You are?”
Emelie: (Still yelling from her room) “Yea, I’m concerned I’ll never finish it today. I HATE MATH!”
We all laughed, but it makes me wince. Emelie despises Math, and while Kenny enjoys it, negativity is contagious. I decided not to take the bait and turned back to Kenny.
Me: “The hot topic right now is rethinking how kids learn science.”
Kenny: “Well you know without neurons we couldn’t think about anything.”
Me: “True.”
Kenny: “Then, there are the neurotransmitters.”
Me: (knowing this is why he came and sat down by me in the first place) “Tell me about the neurotransmitters.”
Kenny: “Just that we need them to send information from one neuron to another.”
Me: “Through the synapse, right?”
Kenny: “Well yes, but using interneurons.”
Me: “So let me ask you a question.”
Kenny’s face lights up as he waits for it.
Me: “Interneurons in the brain connect through learning and experiences, right?”
Kenny: “Right.”
Me: “And they form better connections the more times a person is exposed to something or experiences something, right?”
Kenny: “Right.”
Me: “So, based on what you know, what would you recommend to all of the educational experts who are trying to help kids learn science?”
Kenny: “That’s easy. Have them DO more Science.”
Me: “My thoughts exactly.”
Kenny: “And it’d be cool if they did more projects and experiments because those are fun.”
Me: “That too son, that too.”
A few minutes later Meredith came into the schoolroom, pulled out her Science notebook where she has kept observation recordings for two of the experiments she’s doing for General Science. Kenny left his chair and followed Meredith out of the schoolroom, asking her questions about her experiment.
As they rounded the corner I heard Meredith say, “Oh no, I’m totally done with school today. I’m just writing in my observations for my Science experiments.”
I love how seamlessly life and learning merge in our homeschooling family.
OMSH/Heather L. Sanders is “Momma” to three kids, Emelie, Meredith and Kenny. When not homeschooling, or writing about homeschooling, Heather is busy designing websites or going on dates with her husband Jeff, the love of her life.
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