Guest Post By Dana Bettwy, LePort Parent

I have two children currently enrolled at the LePort Montessori campus in Woodbridge (the Irvine – Lake campus.) Our son just completed his second year, and our daughter, her first. 

Beyond finances, however, there are other factors as well—some that may not appear all that dramatic on the surface.  Still, I think these "less obvious" differences are critical to making an educated decision, one that is in your child’s best long-term interest.  Different aspects matter more or less for different parents.  For me, certain factors such as parent fund-raising, and the food they serve at school are incidental.  Social development, the learning environment and overall happiness of my child are the most important considerations for me.  Academics are important, but I am more interested "how" my child learns to learn at this stage in the game, as opposed to "what" they learn, per se. 

Read more: http://bit.ly/1auJ4cw

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• Toilet Learning the Montessori way...was not what we did...
• Let the children choose
• Montessori Wisdom
• Montessori Reading: Phonetics First, ABC's Second
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Child independents

When toddlers and young preschoolers start in Montessori, parents are often amazed at the sudden spurt in independence and skill their children display.

If your child is starting in a Montessori toddler or preschool program, and you want to witness this incredible development in your own child, it helps if you are able to prepare your home environment in ways that support your child’s new skills and desire to be independent.

Here are some ideas to consider:

1. Provide simple storage spots for belongings right inside the front door.  A small rug to place shoes or a basket to put them into and some hooks to hang jackets are a great start.  This can help your child get out of the house and back in more independently, and maybe prevent some meltdowns!  A little stool to sit on helps, as well.

2. Make your kitchen accessible to your child.  Find a low shelf or drawer to store cups, placemats, and utensils within your child’s reach.  Buy glass cups and inexpensive ceramic plates (IKEA is great!) that you don’t mind getting broken.  Invite your child to set his own place at the table.  A bigger step stool, or a learning tower can be a great help to little people who want to join you in the fun cooking activities at counter height.  And, of course, when it comes time to sit down and eat, encourage your child to feed himself:  Even young toddlers can eat finger-foods on their own, and start using a spoon; this is what they do in their Montessori classrooms, too.

3. Organize and simplify the play area.  Fewer toys, displayed on open shelves, are preferable over lots of toys in boxes that the children can’t see.

4. Small chairs and tables facilitate independent snack time and organized playtime.  Provide some buckets, sponges, rags, and child-sized brooms, and your child can even clean up after himself.

5. Facilitate getting dressed independently.  Low open shelves, low racks, a mirror and a bench with brush or comb can enable even 2- or 3-year-olds to begin to dress independently, especially if you pre-select an outfit the night before, or lay out two simple choices for a younger child.

6. Consider a floor or other low bed.  Some Montessori parents never have cribs; instead, they baby-proof an entire room and let even infants sleep on a floor bed.  While this may not work for every parent, a low bed or a twin mattress on the floor can be a great step up after a crib, instead of a toddler bed.

7. Make books accessible and create cozy reading areas.  The more that books are all over your house, the easier it is for your child to grab a book instead of asking for your iPhone or the TV when you are not available to play.

To see growth in your child’s independence, it’s not necessary to reorganize your entire house (who has the time and energy for that?!).  Just pick one or two ideas and make little changes over time.  You might think your child is too young to take advantage of these kinds of opportunities for independence—but once she starts school, you might be just as surprised and thrilled as the LePort Montessori parents who wrote the Facebook posts above! 

Thanks to Bernadette, a LePort parent of three children, ages infant to preschool, for inviting us into her house to take many of these beautiful pictures!

Related Posts

• Transitioning to Montessori: Independence (Part 1 of 5)
• What's the big deal with independence in Montessori preschool?
• The Dual Purpose of Montessori Preschool Practical Life Activities

The four key attributes of a great infant teacher

Article written by Heike Larson, LePort Schools

The training of the teacher who is to help life is something far more than the learning of ideas. It includes the training of character; it is a preparation of the spirit.
Dr. Maria Montessori

The most significant relationship in your child’s life is his or her relationship with you. Your connection with your baby is uniquely special, and at some level your child is aware of that irreplaceable bond.

But after you (and your child’s other parent/guardian), the next most significant impact on your baby’s development will come from the childcare provider you choose. She will be a major role model for your baby, and will contribute to his developing view of the world. She will impact his use of language, his social bonds with other children, and other areas of his growth. When you’re not there, it is her he’ll rely on for understanding and nurturing.  When looking at childcare centers, this means that the type of people the center chooses as caregivers will determine how joyful and educational your baby’s time away from you will be.

In contrast to most childcare facilities, who look for caregivers, LePort specifically hires infant teachers. We believe the time we spend with your baby is too important to be viewed as mere childcare: we look for teachers who can nurture your child and help him mature cognitively and behaviorally, in addition to comforting him and keeping him safe.

All of our teachers meet the base standards required at childcare centers: every teacher has completed her early childhood education units; teachers are CPR trained, and undergo a complete background check and health exam. What makes LePort different is that we go beyond this minimum standard.

We look for four key attributes in our infant teachers, both when we initially hire them, and as we develop them while they work with us:

• A passion and love for working with babies.At LePort, we strongly believe that you have to be passionate to do a good job: we want students to be passionate about learning, and we only hire teachers for whom being with children is a passion, not just a job.  This is especially important for our infant teachers. In contrast to the typical childcare center, which often hires low-skilled caregivers, and as a result experience high staff turn-over, we hire people who are excited to be guides in a young child’s development; who view their role not as a temporary job, but as a career requiring thought, reflection, professional growth. We believe this passion is visible in their day-to-day interactions with the babies in our care: come and see for yourself!

• Infinite patience and a calm, centered personality.Providing childcare to an infant is hard work, with many emotional challenges (and, of course, immense joys!). We have found that patience—infinite patience—is essential to working well with babies. Because our infant teachers love this age group, they delight in observing each baby, in discovering his unique temperament, and in responding to his individual needs. This focus on observation, and the knowledge of the importance of the early years, helps our teachers be unfailingly patient (and admirably more calm and centered than many of us are with our own children at home!)

• An explicit, thoughtful approach to nurturing and guiding young children.Our Montessori-trained lead teachers love working at LePort, because we offer an authentic Montessori infant program. In many childcare settings, there isn’t an explicit approach to guide the day-to-day life with infants. What happens in one childcare room may be different from another one next door; and as childcare providers are often short-time employees, it often changes from week to week, or month to month. This can be very confusing for babies, who urgently need consistency to bring order to their world. In contrast, our program consistently applies Montessori ideas, such as following the child, encouraging independence, observing and individualizing instruction, and using positive approaches to discipline.Our Montessori-trained lead teachers guide those staff members new to the program, and help them to consistently implement this positive, respectful and loving approach to caring for babies and young toddlers.

• A thoughtful, educated and intelligent individual.In her book, The Good School, author Peg Tyre quotes a preschool teacher who explains why intelligence really matters for teachers of young children:
  

  The best preschool teachers turn out to be ones who are very smart. “There’s a lot of things that you have to figure out. Preschool can be more difficult than the other grades because a lot of your teaching has to be embedded in other things. Understand that when you are playing with one child you’re working on their vocabulary, and with another child that you’re facilitating social skills and you’re teaching it through indirect ways.”Peg Tyre

  That’s one of the reasons we look to hire smart, university-educated individuals to become teachers, even in our infant classrooms. Yes, childcare providers for babies don’t have to demonstrate mastery in algebra—but they have to be able to think on their feet, to be creative, and to be able to observe and respond to each baby’s needs and personality. They also are one of baby’s key role models, which means they need to speak in simple, yet rich and grammatically correct sentences.

---

Hiring the most talented and dedicated teachers, and maintaining a 1:3 ratio isn’t the cheapest way to run a childcare center. To the contrary, it’s expensive. But our goal at LePort Montessori isn’t just to run a childcare facility. Our aim is to offer an enriched, Montessori educational environment as your baby’s home away from home.

This means only intelligent, high-energy, passionate yet patient individuals can qualify to work in our program. Hard to find? Yes—we review scores of resumes and conduct dozens of multiple-round interviews. But then that’s our responsibility: finding the best possible individuals to guide your child during his critical early years. Luckily, with our reputation as the highest-quality, most authentic Montessori school in Orange County, and one who provides an excellent, supportive work environment for teachers, we usually have our pick of applicants!

Education Around the World - 11 Facts

1. As of 2012, 31 million primary-school pupils worldwide dropped out of school. An additional 32 million repeated a grade.
2. In the sub-Saharan, 11.07 million children leave school before completing their primary education. In South and West Asia, that number reaches 13.54 million.
3. While girls are less likely to begin school, boys are more likely to repeat grades or drop out altogether.
4. According to UNESCO, 61 million primary school-age children were not enrolled in school in 2010.
• Of these children, 47 percent were never expected to enter school, 26 percent attended school but left, and the remaining 27 percent are expected to attend school in the future.
5. Children living in a rural environment are two times more likely to be out of school than urban children. Additionally, children from the wealthiest 20 percent of the population are four times more likely to be in school than the poorest 20 percent.
6. In developing, low-income countries, every additional year of education can increase a person’s future income by an average of 10 percent.
7. Children who are born to educated mothers are less likely to be stunted or malnourished. Each additional year of maternal education also reduces the child mortality rate by 2 percent.
8. Women with a primary school education are 13 percent more likely to know that condoms can reduce their risk of contracting HIV/AIDS. An education can help decrease the spreading of this virus by promoting safer sexual practices.
9. 53 percent of the world’s out-of-school children are girls and two-thirds of the illiterate people in the world are women.
10. Education empowers women to make healthy decisions about their lives. For example, women in Mali with a secondary level education or higher have an average of 3 children, while those with no education have an average of 7.
11. The youth literacy rates in South America and Europe are among the highest with 90-100 percent literacy. The African continent, however, has areas with less than 50 percent literacy among children ages 18 and under.

Tips to Educate Your Child

Parents can use the following tips to educate your child (2-3 years).

Make Your Child A Good Listener
Before you give the instruction or talk to your child, it is best to reduce the distraction from her. Before you talk to her, you can call her name to get her attention. Only begin to talk when she has eye contact with you. Remain eye contact all the times when you speak to her. While you are reading to her, you can ask simple questions such as "Where did the boy go to?", or "When are they coming back?"

Develop your child's basic knowledge and expression skills
You can help your child learning colors, numbers, concept of sizes, concept of space and place through games, actions or talking. You can try the following methods:

Use blocks to teach your child to learn colors
Get her to speak out the colors of different blocks. Or, find the block with the specified color. You can also ask her "What color is this block"

Establish the foundation on numbering
You can get her to give you one object. When she understand the concept of 'one', you can continue to get her to give you more things. You can encourage her to count her five senses, arms or legs, toys or even the cars on the road.

Teach your child the concept of size
You can let your child use the crayon to draw on the paper with different length of lines or different size of circles. Or you can use the clay to make different sizes of balls. You discuss the size of objects such as "Giraffe has a long neck and tortoise has short leg", "Get me that long rope", "where is your short pants?"

Teach your child the concept of space
To teach the concept of space, you can design some activities to be participated by her. For example, prepare a big box, let your child stand inside and outside the box or walk around the box. You can play the bubble with your child, while your child is playing the bubble, ask her to observe which bubbles are falling in front and which are falling behind. Which bubbles are close to you and which bubbles are far from you. Which bubbles are flying high and which bubbles are flying low.

Develop your child's memory skills
You can improve your child's memory skills by teaching your child about a rhythm, a short poem or a song. After repeating few times, you skip the last word without saying it out. Encourage your child to speak out that missing word. Slowing increase the number of skipped words. Finally, see if your child can say out the whole sentence. After repeating this exercise several times, you child can quickly memorize all the contents. This is a good way to learn a language and pronunciation.

Reinforce your child's newly learned words and concept
When your child just learn a new concept or word from the story, you can reinforce using natural way. For example, after reading a book about the bread. Next time when you pass by a bakery shop, you can bring your child into the bakery shop and if possible, let her look at the process of making the bread.

8 Tips to help you monitor your child’s education and progress

EXPERT ADVICE FOR PARENTS
Parents have a responsibility to know how their children are doing in school, and that entails more than signing off on a few report cards each year. Busy parents shuffle work, activities and a host of other obligations, and monitoring your child's education should be at the top of that to-do list. Use these tips to make your child's education a top priority.




BE PRESENT AT SCHOOL
"Be involved," encourages Stacey Kannenberg, author of Let's Get Ready For Kindergarten! "Volunteer, attend events, chaperone field trips."

Many schools welcome parent volunteers. "Sign up to help in the classroom," suggests Esther Andrews, author of How to Develop Your Child's Genius. "You can observe lessons, how your child compares to other children, how your child behaves and socializes, and the teacher's performance."

Not every parent can commit a full day to volunteering at school, but Andrews believes small time commitments are just as effective. "Visit the classroom once a month or whenever you drop off or pick up your child at school," says Andrews. "Stick around for a few minutes and observe." What you see may be very different from what your child describes to you at home.

GET TO KNOW YOUR CHILD'S TEACHER
"A lack of communication with the teacher is one of the biggest problems parents face in terms of monitoring their child's educational progress," reports Angela Norton Tyler, an educational consultant with Family Homework Answers.

The teacher is your partner in educating your child. Communicate with the teacher through face-to-face meetings, phone conferences or email exchanges. Chat informally when visiting the classroom. "Ask if there is anything you need to know, how your child is doing, and what you should work on at home," advises Andrews.

EXPRESS YOUR INTEREST AT HOME
When your child arrives home from school, stop what you're doing and ask about the school day. Begin this routine in kindergarten and it soon becomes a habit. "They can't wait to share their day with you," advises Kannenberg. "You are now involved in the school conversation!"

As your child matures, add a regular time each week to discuss accomplishments and set goals for the next week. Make these discussions a positive experience. "Begin and end with your child's achievements," suggests Candace Lindemann, an Educational Consultant and former teacher. "Praise any effort in the right direction."

INSPECT THE BACKPACK
Empty your child's backpack every day. Look at everything -- notes from the teacher, completed work, homework. If your child receives a weekly calendar or syllabus, post it prominently, suggests middle school teacher Hilary Morris. "Help your child map out the week, especially if there are other activities going on."

The backpack makes it easy for the teacher to communicate with you, and easy for you to see what your child is working on at school.

ESTABLISH A HOMEWORK ROUTINE
Children become involved in activities at young ages. Since they have specific start and finish times, extracurricular activities are easy to manage. Unfortunately, many families try to fit in homework around them.

Emphasize the importance of school work. Establish daily homework or reading time. "Regularly scheduled, consistent study time helps train your child's brain to learn at that time," advises Cari Diaz of Club Z Tutoring.

"Establish routines and enforce them," recommends Dr. Richard E. Bavaria, Ph.D., senior vice president for Education Outreach for Sylvan Learning. "Kids need routines to make them feel safe, secure, and structured."

GET ORGANIZED
"Organization is fundamental to creating good study behaviors," advises Cari Diaz, and it begins with having everything -- pencils, paper, supplies -- in place before study time.

Create a regular study area for your child where all the essentials are readily available and easily accessible. Not only should the study area be well-stocked, it should be conducive to concentration. Choose a quiet location, free from distractions.

KNOW THE GRADES
You established open communication with the teacher and taught your child good study habits. Ultimately, however, your child's success is measured by grades and test scores.

When you're closely monitoring your child's education, formal grades should come with no surprises. If the grades don't meet your expectations, address your concerns with the teacher.

Leigh Leverrier, a Family Life Coach with Allways Learning, encourages parents to understand standardized testing scores as well. Knowing how your child ranks among peers will enable you to make adjustments where necessary.


NETWORK WITH OTHER PARENTS
"Networking can give you insight to other issues that might be going on in the school community," suggests Kannenberg.

Get to know the parents of your child's friends. Maintain contact with substitute teachers, PTA members, and regular classroom volunteers.

Knowing that academic success leads to greater opportunities in life, parents should do everything they can to help their children be excellent students.

http://www.sheknows.com/living/articles/809398/8-tips-to-help-you-monitor-your-child-s-education-and-progress

Why Don't Students Like School?

A Cognitive Scientist Answers Questions About How the Mind Works and What It Means for the Classroom by Daniel T. Willingham

Anyone who is engaged in the process of teaching and learning in formal settings - as a teacher, as a student, or as a parent - knows that education is a complicated, messy endeavor. Those engaged in trying to make school work better for children try to learn from as many resources as possible. Daniel T. Willingham's Why Don't Students Like School attempts to use insights from cognitive science research to shed some light on teaching and learning. As he says, "We all read stories in the newspaper about research breakthroughs in learning or problem solving, but it is not clear how each latest advance is supposed to change what a teacher does on Monday morning." This book is Willingham's attempt to make those connections clear for teachers, and to help others think about policy arguments around educational philosophy and practice. He explains how students' minds work and how this knowledge can lead to better teaching and learning.

The book is organized around nine "principles" of how the mind learns. Willingham selected these principles because they are significant (they don't change regardless of setting), they are supported by many credible research studies, and they have the potential to significantly impact student learning.

In presenting the principles, Willingham demonstrates one of his own principles in order to make the readers' experience of the book more effective. He suggests that to deepen interest and improve learning about any given topic, it is important to develop the questions rather than just the answers. Thus, each chapter is organized according to a question about learning. Some of his questions are of more interest to teachers specifically (such as a chapter on the effectiveness of drilling and practice), while others may be appreciated by a larger audience, particularly of parents interested in how their children think and those who enjoy reflecting on their own learning experiences. Other questions/principles include: "Why is it so hard for students to understand abstract ideas?" and "Why do students remember everything that's on television and forget everything I say?"

To begin, Willingham offers a basic explanation for how thinking works. People are naturally curious, he argues, but not naturally good thinkers, so the conditions have to be right for good thinking. The book is filled with examples from daily life illustrating how the mind works. In explaining working memory vs. long term memory, he talks about why travel is tiring (because we need to make so many decisions consciously rather than relying on things we already know). The scientific explanations are enlivened with images and photographs, often humorous. In a book about brain science and education, the engaging tone offers accessibility to a general audience. In each chapter, Willingham offers a brief bibliography with less technical and more technical suggestions for further reading on each topic.

The book's weaker passages are when Willingham moves out of his own core competency area of explaining how the brain works, offering accessible summaries of research, and trying to explain why some intuitive or commonly accepted educational theories may not be effective. In an effort to show how powerful his principles are, he seems to occasionally overreach without providing sufficient follow-up or explanation. For example, at the end of a lengthy description of why background knowledge (concepts, definitions, facts, procedures) is essential for future learning, he casually mentions that books, magazines, and newspapers are the best place to develop background knowledge, and television and social networking sites are unhelpful. He claims that scientists verify this, but unlike other claims which are supported with research, he doesn't explain why or provide studies. Without offering reasons for his comment and other statements in support of traditional practice, he comes off as curmudgeonly.

More troubling are his attempts to weave in politics. When he dips his toe into large-scale policy arguments (linking a discussion of learning background facts to the backlash about standardized testing, for example), he offers vague suggestions or dismisses real and legitimate concerns quickly. In the same section on background knowledge, he explains that even if we are concerned that most background information referenced in newspapers has been created by what he himself calls "dead white males," that's what's important, period.

In perhaps the most controversial and interesting chapter in the book, "Should I adjust my teaching for different types of learners?" Willingham takes on the theory of multiple intelligences (and related theories about learning styles). This chapter has received much of the attention about the book, as it takes on a cherished set of beliefs that have been incorporated into general discourse about schools. Children bring different strengths and preferences to school, and they should be honored as individuals and each helped to achieve great potential. Willingham argues that though these beliefs themselves are true, matching instruction to learning styles is not supported by scientific evidence.

He claims that scientists have not determined that there are "categorically different types of learners," and parses out the difference between abilities (our capacity to learn or do something) and our styles (the tendency to think in a certain way). He discusses Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences as the foremost cultural example of different learning styles, and correctly notes that Gardner himself does not support many of the claims now associated with it. Willingham offers the example of a misguided teaching strategy of teaching about commas by looking for objects in the woods shaped like a comma, writing songs about commas, placing bodies into sentence shapes with commas, etc.

Interestingly, at the end of this chapter Willingham admits that he feels like a grinch. He suggests that though science doesn't have much to say conclusively about differentiation, in this case it may be that "craft knowledge trumps science." Sometimes the wisdom of teaching practice is more valuable than science when a teacher is faced with a decision about how to reach or teach a particular child.

Throughout the book, Willingham refers to what he calls "Bubbe psychology" - principles or ideas that your grandmother would know. Near the end, he asks, rhetorically, if a good and sensitive educator (or her grandmother) already knows to pay attention to her students, "can cognitive science do no better than that?" His answer is that cognitive science can "offer elaboration that puts flesh on the bare-bones slogan." Education is too complicated to be reduced to maxims or to policy ideas produced by cognitive scientists, subject matter specialists, politicians, or even experienced teachers themselves. Taking some insights from cognitive science into consideration for those who think about teaching and learning can only help give a richer perspective on important decisions. In this way, Why Don't Students Like School? can offer an important voice to the discussion.

3 Tips for Educating Young Children

Many parents fail to realize the teaching opportunities that exist in the day-to-day routines of a child. That's okay, much of what I've learned, I've learned with the benefit of hindsight, and in my job as a Child Development Specialist.

These are just a few tips any parent can implement throughout the day. Teaching during routines is one of the most effective methods to teach a young child because of the repetitive nature of routines.

So, number one, yes, reading. I can't emphasize enough how important it is to read to your child on a daily basis. Many parents know this but fail to include reading to their child for one reason or another. The best opportunity can be found with setting a bedtime routine. If lack of time is a factor, then try starting your bedtime routine earlier.

Keep in mind that story time needs to be a positive time for both the child and parent. To make it fun, include books that the child can choose and then some the parent chooses. Keep a limit of 2 books maximum per night. This is plenty for a young child.

Observe your child as you read, if your child struggles to listen or tries to play then the book, it may be too high a level to keep your child's interest. Try a book that rhymes or is shorter. A favorite book of ours was Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown. Another favorite is The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle.

Make sure if the child is under 8 that the book contains many pictures to go along with the story. Try to pick books with things that are familiar to the child. Also, try to include books, which are non-fiction as well. There are many good books to choose from these days, which have realistic photos and information.

With any child, make sure to snuggle up with them in their bed and that all other bedtime routines are completed before reading. A good routine to follow will include a light snack, bath, brushing teeth, pajamas, and a story followed shortly by lights out.

Number two tip for including education in your day is mealtime. Mealtime tends to be a stressful time for parents of young children. This is because children tend to be picky eaters and parents feel responsible for putting good foods inside the child. One way to help this be a more peaceful time is to include the child in the preparation of snacks and lunch. Not only do many science concepts occur in the preparation of food, but also math.

All parents want their child to eat good foods. So, rather than picking a meal and setting it in front of the child, ask the child to pour some dressing in a bowl for dipping of veggies or have the child stir in a bowl or chop some of the veggies. Snapping green beans is a wonderful task for a child. This will help his fine motor skill along with perhaps discovering what is inside a green bean.

Pizza making permits a child a many options in being included from the placing of the veggies or cheese to the spreading of the sauce. As the child is working, make sure to name the veggies and note the colors, shapes and counting when appropriate. A simple guessing question like, "How many pepperonis will be on this pizza?" can be a fun way to introduce number concept. Many young children do not know what 1 through 10 look like even though they can count to ten.

Tip number 3; try to play with your child for 15 minutes on the floor. This can be the most beneficial way to observe your child's learning style. It is also great for building language skills.

Sometimes, all a parent needs to do is be there. Try to let your child lead the play. If your child rolls a car, then you roll a car. Suggest things to enhance playing with cars such as building a ramp. Also, make sure to name different things a child is playing with. Introduce new words such as headlights on the car, or ramp while rolling the car up the ramp. It's ok to teach a child a new way to play with the toys, but if the child resists, then back off. Observe some more and imitate the child's play with language.

School of hard blocks: educating children through gaming

Penelope Trunk, an American mother, has allowed her sons to educate themselves with video games. David Owen speaks to the woman who used Minecraft as a spelling tool.

“Why aren’t people worried that kids go to school all day, then come home and do homework for hours? It’s unnatural. If you look at what’s better for kids, homework or video games, it’s video games. Hands down.”

Remember the days when your mum insisted that you skip school and play video games all day? No, neither do I. Yet for the children of Penelope Trunk, controversial US blogger and entrepreneurial life coach, it’s an everyday reality.

While other children traipse off to school five days a week and occupy their evenings with homework, Penelope’s two sons, aged seven and ten, remain at home on their Wisconsin farm, their education left entirely in their own hands. More often than not, this involves playing Minecraft.

“I started doing research into school reform because I was so pissed off about the state of our schools,” Penelope tells me. “All the research pointed to homeschooling. It pointed to self-directed learning. Kids learn best when you let them learn how they want. So I took my kids out of school and, surprise surprise, they wanted to learn by playing video games all day.”

As a product of a traditional education, I was ready to balk at Penelope’s contentious approach to homeschooling. Yet it soon becomes clear that it isn’t merely a fanciful protest against a struggling US education system. Penelope is adamant that video games are giving her sons a more effective education than they would receive in school.

“One of the scariest things I did was not teach my son to read. He learned to read from video games. The only way he could tell when a Pokémon was going to evolve was to find out at what level that happens. He figured it out. In Minecraft the only way to progress is to enter commands. If they don’t learn it, then they can’t get where they want to go. My son learned to spell from Minecraft.”

It’s a bold claim that has been met with derision from some quarters. Indeed, it’s difficult to believe that as a child I could have learned to read from the likes of ‘But our Princess is in another castle!’

Penelope is defiant, and attributes much more to video games than just teaching her sons to read and write. Her sons have learned how to run their own small businesses from their game-playing experiences.

“If you think about it, all video games are little businesses. They have their own economies. You have to figure out how to get people to do what you want.” As a result, Penelope’s sons now earn their own money to put towards their gaming costs. “My older son sells pigs and goats, my younger son sells eggs. It’s not enough to buy all the stuff they want, but they contribute.”

The theory begins to make sense when I realise that, although Penelope believes unequivocally in the educational value of video games, her ideas are not exclusive to them. It’s about incentivising children to learn in a way that they find engaging – something that can’t always be said about school. Brimming with natural curiosity, children will seek learning on their own terms. Video games just happen to be an appealing option.

“If you worry about kids making bad choices, the first thing you should do is give them the option to make good choices. Clearly you can learn to type faster by playing a video game than what they teach in school. Clearly kids will learn to problem solve if you put them in front of a video game instead of spoon-feeding them class material and giving them a test.”

Good problems, bad problems

I begin to worry that we’re dealing too much in generalisations. While Penelope’s sons favour games with more pronounced educational and creative virtues such as Minecraft, can other genres, such as shooters, be educational? Penelope prickles at the question.

“What are good problems and what are bad problems? Anything that makes you solve problems and work hard to figure out the game and progress is educational.”

In some ways it sounds like a contemporary take on archaic walkabout rites of passage, the classic Pokémon trainer leaving home scenario, liberal parenting gone mad. Certainly Penelope will have a hard time convincing people of her methods. Statistics show that only 58% of parents believe that video games are educational.

“They’re morons,” says Penelope of the sceptical. “Those parents are morons. There’s plenty of academic research that shows the educational value of video games. What’s the difference between a book and a video game? If your kid reads books for 18 hours a day, is he a social loser? Yes. So in the same way if your kid plays 18 hours of video games a day, maybe your kid’s a loser. But there’s no difference in the value of the material.”

In fact, Penelope doesn’t believe that kids will choose to play video games all their waking hours, in the same way that she doesn’t think it’s healthy for them to be stuck in school all day. “I think the best thing you can do is respect a kid’s ability to choose how they want to learn. Kids won’t play 14 hours a day. Their necks will hurt, they’ll want to eat, play with their friends.

“Why aren’t people worried that kids go to school all day, then come home and do homework for hours? It’s unnatural. If you look at what’s better for kids, homework or video games, it’s video games. Hands down.”

While tough to swallow at first (for parents, at least), Penelope’s views are merely at the more extreme end of a nascent body of research.

In February, PhD students at The University of Padua published a paper showing that playing action video games (they tested using Rayman Raving Rabbids) helps dyslexic children to read more quickly. Penelope herself refers on her blog to a study from Iowa State University which shows that surgeons made fewer procedural errors if they played as little as three hours of video games a week. The Netherlands-based Leiden University has just released a study showing that FPS games can improve memory capacity of players.

Such research is not enough to vindicate Penelope’s idiosyncratic approach to homeschooling. Yet beneath the abstruse ideas and spiky rhetoric, it offers a fascinating, relevant case study.

Penelope sums it up for me. “Kids learn best when they’re self-directed. All learning is about incentivising a child. Each of us is an excellent learner if we’re learning in a way that interests us. For kids, that can be video games.”

It’s hardly time to dismantle our school systems and replace textbooks with PlayStations. Certainly there needs to be more thinking in terms of differing financial circumstances, availability of working parents, the dangers of children left to their own devices in different environments. However, it seems that there is something to be said for the promotion of heterogeneous learning, and video games are perfectly positioned to play a prime role.

Games have been stigmatised for so many years as the scourge of youth in countless different ways, but Penelope’s success with her own sons, coupled with a growing body of mainstream research, shows that it might be time to reconsider how we think about the application of video games in our children’s lives.

http://www.vg247.com/2013/05/03/school-of-hard-blocks-educating-children-through-gaming/