Pumpkinbear

Pumpkinbear rated a book 4 of 5 stars

The Spark: A Mother's Story of Nurturing Genius
by Kristine Barnett

read in May, 2013

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I have a thing for works about gifted kids. Searching for Bobby Fischer, Little Man Tate, that Oliver Twist retelling about the kid who's a musical genius and it turned out that Felicity is his mom--watching precocious little kids is like watching th...more I have a thing for works about gifted kids. Searching for Bobby Fischer, Little Man Tate, that Oliver Twist retelling about the kid who's a musical genius and it turned out that Felicity is his mom--watching precocious little kids is like watching the extra-smart chick who's the first one of the clutch to figure out that potato bugs are for eating; you're all like, "Look at you go!" AND "Awww, how cute!" all at the same time.

This book strikes me the same way. I hit up Youtube after I finished reading, because I HAD to see what an eleven-year-old looks like delivering a lecture on quantum mathematics, or whatever the kid was talking about--went right over my head. But the whole time that he was talking, I was thinking, "Look at you go!" AND "Awww, how cute!" all at the same time.

I was much less interested in the parts of the book in which Barnett describes how she helped her son and other kids mediate their autistic traits and learn to function, communicate, and enjoy life in the world. I don't know anyone who's autistic, and so I'm not even going to touch an evaluation of her methods for working with those particular kids. I *want* to say that it seems pretty dicey to believe that she could teach a completely non-communicative autistic teenager to communicate in one session, or get an autistic preschooler to build tiny little model boats with her when his occupational therapist couldn't even get him to draw a circle, but hey, she says she did, and that's awesome for the kids and their families, so there you go.

I am, however, totally on board with Barnett's methods, and this is the part that I did find fascinating, because they're methods that many (if not most) homeschoolers use. You teach kids to do stuff that they don't want to do (in my case, pencil-and-paper math, in her case, sit through a public school day), but you also spend a ton of time engaging them in their passions, and sneaking in ways to teach them loads of other stuff through those passions. For instance, she and I both give interested kids old appliances and tools to take them apart with; the difference is that the kid SHE taught later built himself a computer or something, and the kid I teach is now just really good with a screwdriver. She and I both do a lot of baking with interested kids; of course, the kid SHE taught now decorates cakes for a bakery, and the kid that I teach messed up the cornbread that she made to go with dinner last night by accidentally putting in a cup each of salt and baking powder, instead of .5 tsp.

Because of this, I do find it weird that Barnett didn't homeschool her kiddo until a college-related scheduling kerfuffle basically required it for a semester. Unfortunately, based on just a mention or two, it seemed like it was that erroneous "socialization" myth that precluded it for them. Although it seems as if the kid got plenty of friend time, free play time with other kids, organized sports time, formal education time in lectures he attended for fun, etc., he was still required--a kid who could probably have done college-level work as a six-year-old, if they'd thought to offer it to him--to sit through kindergarten, first grade, second grade, and so on. It wasn't until the poor kid was having his IQ evaluated for college admission (he scored REALLY high, obv.) and the professor administering the test manipulated the mom into sitting alone and bored in an empty office for almost five hours that she was apparently made to understand that that was basically public school life for her kid, all day every day.

Life got LOTS better for the kiddo after that, it seems. So yay.

Another compelling theme to the book is the relationship of blue-collar America to the educational system. This book takes place during the recent recession, and the author, an at-home daycare provider, and her husband, an employee of Target and then (gulp!) Circuit City, are severely affected, as are their entire social circle and neighborhood. They're desperately poor for a while, until the economy picks back up, and then they're employed again. Throughout the book, however, they make some seemingly questionable financial decisions, which, it's implied, are influenced by their blue-collar backgrounds. For instance, the author starts a highly successful kindergarten prep program for autistic preschoolers and shells out a ton of personal time and personal finances for it, and refuses to charge families anything. No fees, no sliding scale, no donations, nothing. To explain this decision, in light of the extra hardships it entails for her family, she explains that her family raised her to do service like this. However, not only does she already do community service in other areas, but a career/financial/life skills/ANY kind of adviser would tell her that there's no shame in getting paid for what you do well. In fact, that's what you're SUPPOSED to do. There are other iffy financial decisions, of course, but that's the one that really struck me as cultural.

The author's description of her insistence on public school for a kid pretty unsuited to it also sounds culturally based. Public school is an excellent goal for many kids, but being blind to any other options better designed for a special kid can be very detrimental, especially in the case of the author's kid, and especially from her very few anecdotes about it. Seriously, her kid's math instruction for an entire school year consisted of him reading a book in math class because he already knew the material. The author submitted to school authority in a lot of these ways, but wrote herself as combative and unwilling to talk through issues with school authority in a lot of other ways, speaking to an unfamiliarity with how to manage the administrative system. The family's quick dismissal of homeschooling based on a false trope also makes me very suspicious about the fact that the author never mentions private schools, magnet schools, or the like, places where a gifted child could have the school day experience they apparently wanted for him while having his learning accelerated. She seems to operate through a lot of received assumptions about schooling in general, despite her willingness to trust her instincts about childhood learning, and this is why I suspect cultural bias.

Regardless, all's well that ends well, I suppose, and I was thrilled to end this book with a happy kid thriving in an intellectually stimulating environment. Interestingly, this kiddo's work has already advanced his potential and current income levels, both with the higher education that he's receiving and with his ability to be employed in higher education as a little kid. Also interestingly, as the family has been taken through this journey of transformative educational experiences, the author notes towards the end of her book that her other two sons, neuro-typical children the both of them, are also taking advantage of at least one of the special programs for accelerated learning that her son's needs led her to. It's also a pricey program, she's mentioned before, so I'm betting that it's a program that high-income families use a bunch, just like it was always the rich kids in my schools who got to go to the special science programs at the university and get tutoring to score super-high on the PSAT (earning them college scholarships that some of us whose parents couldn't care less about the PSAT, much less help us score high on it, might have liked, but whatever).

So... read the book for the story about the smart little kid, I guess, but come away with many thoughts about income and education. How fun is that, right?(less)

Pumpkinbear rated a book 5 of 5 stars

American Bee: The National Spelling Bee and the Culture of Word Nerds
by James Maguire

read in March, 2013

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Let's see...a book about kids who study more than they play, who know more orthography than most PhDs in English, who compete in a publicized, televised event that celebrates a VERY obtuse field of study?

What's not to like about that?

Documentaries ab...more

Pumpkinbear rated a book 4 of 5 stars

A Montessori Mother
by Dorothy Canfield Fisher

read in January, 2013

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I requested a gorgeous edition of this little-known classic just to see what Dorothy Canfield Fisher could have to say about Montessori. It's funny, because when I read Understood Betsy I just KNEW she was describing a Montessori lifestyle, but I had...more I requested a gorgeous edition of this little-known classic just to see what Dorothy Canfield Fisher could have to say about Montessori. It's funny, because when I read Understood Betsy I just KNEW she was describing a Montessori lifestyle, but I had no idea how passionate Fisher really was on the subject.

Fisher is VERY passionate about Montessori, so passionate that she traveled to Rome to visit a Montessori preschool, back when if you wanted to visit a Montessori preschool, you had to travel to Rome. My favorite parts of the book are her first-hand descriptions of this Montessori school, run not by Maria Montessori herself, but being run during Montessori's lifetime. For an academic interested in the history of Montessori education, it's worth it to find a copy of this book, simply for the black-and-white photographs that show a classroom that actually is pretty different from the contemporary standard of a Montessori classroom. It's small and tight, with most of the workspaces being at long child-sized tables. Of course, much has been the same from the beginning--the pink tower is there, and the dressing frames (complete with buttonhook dressing frames, to teach children how to do up their antiquey little shoes!). Fisher spends several paragraphs describing a conversation between herself and the teacher, after watching the teacher demonstrate to a child how to put his napkin in his collar (!!!), in which it's clear that her mind is blown by this instructed independence as much as my mind was blown the first time that I realized that someone else on this planet other than myself wanted my preschoolers to be able to put on their own shoes and get themselves a drink of water, too.

At first, after this scene, I was VERY wary, because often in some Montessori schools there's a vibe of "get your kids out of your house and into our school before you mess them up for good," but Fisher, yay for her, immediately looks past the Rome schools' habit of keeping kids from sun-up to bedtime, practically, and begins to discuss ways that we real-live American mommies can do Montessori right here in our very own parlors (hee!).

I was overall less interested in this part, since, as a parent, I'm way past adapting Montessori-at-home for preschoolers, but I remained in love with Fisher's can-do, improvisational attitude. "Make your own dressing frames!" she says, and "Hey, they don't have clothespins in Italy! I wonder what Montessori kids could do with those?" Mostly, Fisher is describing in these chapters not necessarily Montessori, but rather play-based, child-led learning, but hey, considering that she's trying to encourage moms to let their little kids just splash around in a bowlful of water sometimes, it's all for the good.

How inspiring it must have been to be an eyewitness to an exciting new educational movement (and one that actually works for a change)! I was inspired, myself, just from reading about it.(less)

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Pyramid
by David Macaulay

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Wild Tracks!: A Guide to Nature's Footprints
by Jim Arnosky

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Savvy (Savvy, #1)
by Ingrid Law

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The Accidental Hero (Jack Blank Adventure, #1)
by Matt Myklusch (Goodreads Author)

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The Candymakers
by Wendy Mass

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Homeschooling Our Children, Unschooling Ourselves
by Alison McKee

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Games for Writing: Playful Ways to Help Your Child Learn to Write
by Peggy Kaye

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Pumpkinbear rated a book 4 of 5 stars The Spark: A Mother's Story of Nurturing Genius by Kristine Barnett read in May, 2013	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
I have a thing for works about gifted kids. Searching for Bobby Fischer, Little Man Tate, that Oliver Twist retelling about the kid who's a musical genius and it turned out that Felicity is his mom--watching precocious little kids is like watching th...more
May 10, 2013 09:35am · see review
Pumpkinbear rated a book 5 of 5 stars American Bee: The National Spelling Bee and the Culture of Word Nerds by James Maguire read in March, 2013	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Let's see...a book about kids who study more than they play, who know more orthography than most PhDs in English, who compete in a publicized, televised event that celebrates a VERY obtuse field of study? What's not to like about that? Documentaries ab...more
Mar 28, 2013 02:48pm · see review
Pumpkinbear rated a book 4 of 5 stars A Montessori Mother by Dorothy Canfield Fisher read in January, 2013	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
I requested a gorgeous edition of this little-known classic just to see what Dorothy Canfield Fisher could have to say about Montessori. It's funny, because when I read Understood Betsy I just KNEW she was describing a Montessori lifestyle, but I had...more
Jan 27, 2013 03:25pm · see review
Pumpkinbear wants to read Pyramid by David Macaulay	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Jan 22, 2013 10:37am
Pumpkinbear wants to read Wild Tracks!: A Guide to Nature's Footprints by Jim Arnosky	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Jan 22, 2013 10:37am
Pumpkinbear wants to read Savvy (Savvy, #1) by Ingrid Law	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Jan 22, 2013 10:36am
Pumpkinbear wants to read The Accidental Hero (Jack Blank Adventure, #1) by Matt Myklusch (Goodreads Author)	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Jan 22, 2013 10:35am
Pumpkinbear wants to read The Candymakers by Wendy Mass	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Jan 22, 2013 10:35am
Pumpkinbear wants to read Homeschooling Our Children, Unschooling Ourselves by Alison McKee	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Jan 22, 2013 10:35am
Pumpkinbear wants to read Games for Writing: Playful Ways to Help Your Child Learn to Write by Peggy Kaye	Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Jan 22, 2013 10:35am

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