Making It Work, Not Child-Led

by Tammy

I have three children, and each child has a distinct personality. And, each one’s personality is different from my own. To make it more complex, my husband’s personality is different from all four of us. How can five people, with their own way of dealing with learning, stress, people, sleep, food, and everything else, live together under one roof?

This crazy concoction of personalities and learning styles is one of the reasons we evolved into a relaxed, “whatever works”, “watch and see” kind of education. Basically, my kids gave me the message loud and clear, “I am my own person. I don’t want you to make me into what you think I should be.”

My husband initially, and unintentionally, challenged the way I thought about education. Years ago, before we had kids, we struggled to understand each other. He and I see the world in a different way. The one major difference between us is that I am a communicator. That’s how I prefer to learn, and to interact with the world. My husband is a doer. The thing we both have in common, is we are both thinkers.

When we would disagree on something, I would tell him everything I thought, how I felt about it, and what all the possible solutions were. He’d sit and think. And when a solution was found, he’d do. Maybe. I would get very angry with him for not talking. (I still do occasionally, I admit.) And he would get angry with me for talking too much.

Talking was the way that I communicated. But to understand my husband, I needed to stop talking, stop trying to make him “get it”, and watch and wait a little more. To see his messages to me in what he did. Not expect it so much in what he said. The things he did defined who he was.

When the kids came along, they reinforced the idea that my way may not be everyone's way. To know who my kids are, and understand them, I have to give them space to BE who they are. To know how to teach them, nurture them, educate them, I had to let them BE so that they could discover their own truths. To learn how to be their mom and their teacher, I had to let them be their own persons.

This kind of approach to living and learning can’t really be done if we are bound by a precise agenda. When there are lots of people around who are all different, it’s far easier to let go than it is to hold on.

This is a hard thing for me to grasp. I’m a hold-on-er. I don’t like to let go. I was duly indoctrinated in the Red, White and Blue idea that if you work hard, do things you’re supposed to do and follow the rules, you’ll get that pie in the sky of success. So when people are unhappy, or things aren’t going my way, my first idea is this, “I’m not doing enough.”

When the truth is, I’m probably doing too much.

And certainly too much thinking that if things aren’t exactly how I want them, everything is totally screwed and it’s all my fault (or it’s all the other person’s fault.)

Letting go of expectations of who everyone should be, and what everyone’s personality is supposed to look like, is hard for me. It feels too much like not caring. And often, that’s what it ends up being because I’m still too afraid to truly let go. Instead, I say, “Fine! Whatever!” instead of truly letting go.

Letting go is different. When I’m truly letting go of my expectations, I’m caring even more than if I’m trying to control. It’s a feeling that I like my kids and that they are awesome how they are. I’m caring by respecting their unique selves. I’m even more attentive when I let go. I’m even more “there” when I’m watching with great interest how they respond to things. Letting go isn’t checking out. It’s truly, honestly, checking IN. And not letting my own biases and expectations get in the way of my kids getting their needs met.

I often talk about “understanding” and how important it is in homeschooling my kids. Knowing their learning styles and all that. But truly letting go is understanding-plus. It’s understanding and then giving them permission to defy what I know of them. It’s recognizing the general pattern of their decision making processes, and then accepting that they will make decisions that defy the pattern. Sometimes those won’t be good decisions. That’s OK. We have to make mistakes to learn. It’s OK to fail. It’s not the end of the world. In fact, learning to recover from failure is more important in some cases than learning to succeed.

When we have kids who are very different than ourselves, it’s a blessing in disguise. These are the kids who can teach us how to let go. Because we have no other choice. In order to get along with people who are vastly different than ourselves, we have to let go of expectations and control. Not letting go in the sense of ignoring our responsibilities as a responsible parent (which involves keeping them safe, fed, healthy, etc.), but in the sense of letting go of being the definer of who they are. Letting go of living their lives FOR them, and instead, living our lives WITH them.

If we look close enough, all of our kids are very different than ourselves. They are their own people. We don’t have to be “on” all the time with our kids. Just to be ourselves. And to let them be themselves. And to enjoy who they are. Not trying to make them someone else. This is far easier than any other choice. We’re not always nagging them, or pushing them, or focusing on how they don’t live up to our expectations. Instead, we can take the approach of meeting them where they are at by not expecting them to be anywhere else. And to be with them as they grow. Not to attempt to make them grow. They will grow. We know that, because we’re there with them, showing them the world. They are always growing. The trouble only comes when they aren't growing fast enough for our personal tastes, or not growing in the way we want them to. When we can't let go, and let them be them.

The only way that really makes sense when we have kids who are so incredibly different than ourselves – is to let go of our need to control their universe, or BE their universe. And to let them have their own universe, while keeping them safe, happy and stimulated in that universe. It’s not child-led learning. Nor is it parent-led learning. It’s just learning, plain and simple.

Tammy Takahashi lives and learns with her three children (10, 7 and 4) and supportive husband in California. She is the author of Deschooling Gently: A Step by Step Guide to Fearless Homeschooling. She also serves as the editor of the California HomeSchooler magazine, a bi-monthly publication for the Homeschool Association of California. You can read more from her about education and homeschooling on her website. And you can email her at tammy.takahashi @ gmail(dot)com.

Comments

[tania]

what a lovely post! it's great to read you again!
cheers,
t

[kailani]

What a great post. It's wonderful that everyone in your family has a unique personality and is allowed to express it.

Thank you for sharing this with the Carnival of Family Life. It will be included in the Nov 19th edition at An Island Life.

[Jaimie]

I so empathize with this post. My kids and myself and my husband all have such different personalities and it is ... interesting to find ways for them to all mesh and flow.

Great post.

[Rob at Kintropy]

Learning to fail and learning from failure are important, and I think you emphasize that well in your post. We all get a chance to do that in the working world, but not as often in a typical school (at least, not with the encouragement to fail & learn from that every once in awhile).