Schools are designed for Left-Brained Learners, as are almost all homeschool curriculums.
(I know that the brain may not actually store personality traits on the right or left sides, but this is a term that is recognizable and we will use it to keep things simple.)
(p.s. the photo above is my husband and son in red)
Anyone with a child who struggles with schoolwork should spend some time on this website ↝ The Right Side of Normal. ↜
And if what you read there sounds anything like the way your child learns ...
... then you MUST buy Cindy Gaddis' e-book.
Understanding and Honoring the Natural Learning Path for Right-Brained Children
The way that I see it, right-brained children are DISCRIMINATED against in schools. To me it's not much different than racism or sexism and I won't send my children to that kind of an environment.
You see, right-brained children learn a different way, and learn things in a different order at different ages.
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One of the biggest differences is that a right-brained child does not naturally learn to read until between the ages of 8-10, unlike the left-brained child who will usually start reading between ages 5-7. And his writing and spelling skills will come around age 11-13.
Actually, in the case of my eldest child those skills came at the far end of the spectrum. This was predicted in the book, as my son falls into the category that she calls the "Builder/Lego" type. This type of child, especially when they are boys, will be the latest readers of all.
Cindy's observations in "The Right Side of Normal" have proven to be exactly true for my children!
The right-brained child will likely focus on science at a younger age, and Cindy explains how all of these things that the child is naturally learning first are the foundation that they need for the other skills like reading to develop properly later.
But all of this normal, natural development in right-brained children is NOT considered acceptable by the school system.
Homeschooling will not help the child either if the parents use a curriculum based on the same school system standards.
When the right-brain child resists the parents attempts to teach them in a "left-brained" manner, the parent becomes frustrated and thinks that homeschooling is a failure or too hard to force upon their child.
The author explains how our education system has a Left-Brained Value System
Our Left-Brained Value System
Most of us were mass (public) schooled, and most schools primarily utilize left-brained teaching methods, resources, and time frames. It’s human nature to repeat what we experience. In other words, what we know is what we believe to be true. So when we graduate from school, we’re inclined to give value to left-brained traits in educational settings.
That’s why we value the left-brained learning style of early memorization using short-term memory skills, part-to-whole scope and sequence formats of building upon the previous information, and symbolic skill development.
That’s why we value it all in a particular age time frame, too, beginning at the ages of 5 to 7. Any child who doesn’t function according to this supposed norm may receive academic learning labels.
Chapter 8 of "The Right-Side of Normal" is called:
Loves To Learn; Hates To Be Taught
I quickly recognized my eldest child in that statement. If something that I am trying to teach my son lacks relevance to him, he won't put in the effort.
Resistance is also a way to express that something isn't working and they aren't able to learn this yet or by this method. Since children lack fully developed communication skills, they can't articulate the problem and instead they resist.
These children are not being bad -- they are being true to themselves and doing the best that they can.
My son has always LOVED to learn. He absorbs information like crazy if it is something that interests him. But trying to use a curriculum with my son was a problem. I tried a bit at Kindergarten age and quickly abandoned the attempt.
This is why I chose Unschooling.
If I hadn't chosen to unschool my son, I feel that we would have been constantly fighting and I would have been pulling my hair out. So it really was the logical and sensible conclusion for me.
In reality, I didn't choose unschooling ... unschooling chose me.
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