Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Sunday, October 09, 2011
Crayola
Salaams/Hello!
So I'm logging on today to give, not a product recommendation, but a product Warning...
We love Crayola products. Tried and true are those crayons and markers that our kids have been using since they could hold them. I guess my problem with Crayola these days is their veering into low-quality gimmicky product lines. We don't usually buy that sort of stuff on a day to day basis, but when we left Ottawa, my mom bought the girls a Color-Wonder set for the road. It was similar to this one:
It claims to be a MESS-FREE glitter paper colouring set. The glitter, you are told, is IN the paper and therefore no mess! My girls looooove glitter, so we thought this was a perfect choice. Well, as I opened the packaging, super-fine glitter covered my hands. The dashboard, my knitting, my lap. As I passed back the colouring pages, it covered the back of my seat and the floor. As they coloured, it covered their hands... and then everything they touched. It was what I would have expected from a product involving glitter - if Crayola hadn't already assured me on their packaging that they had (through some sort of purported miracle) removed the possibility of such a giant mess.
The customer service at Crayola, however, is stellar. The woman on the phone apologized profusely for "bedazzling" my van and sent me coupons for Crayola products. Since I had removed the glitter colouring set after just one picture each, I gave the coupons to the girls to make up for it, and this week we were at Target and they went to choose something from the arts and crafts aisle. Maymuna picked super fine tip markers - and as you would expect, they are great, with a wide variety of hues and smells. She has barely put them down.
Hafsa's tastes run a little more... splashy. She picked this:
We've had some pretty good experiences with sand art, particularly some from South Africa which was well made and fun to use. I figured when I saw this that Crayola had caught on to the trend. I was not that keen on the "non-toxic" glow-in-the-dark part, but that was the main draw for H.
There were almost too many problems with this product to count, and you'll see by the pictures what I mean. Once you mix the "sand" with the glow-in-the-dark mixture, it was not dry enough to move around easily. It stuck together in lumps:
The result being you had to shake the lumpy sand over the picture and hope that some of it stuck to the glued areas, or you had to press it down with your fingers, leaving a packed mound on your picture.
Disappointing on both counts. Plus the activity starts to take longer than it was probably intended. 30+ minutes into a project like this, and a 5 year old's attention begins to wane. Also the white areas to be "sanded" need to be covered with school glue with a brush - not the best for a young child's dexterity or attention span.
We finally finished a single picture for each kid, after which we threw the rest of the product out, save the actual picture boards that were left. We headed to the walk-in closet, where the glow-in-the-dark component at least saved Hafsa from complete disappointment.
What you can't see is that half the picture is not filled in, because it was taking too long, and in the case of Hafsa's picture, the details of the dragon were too hard to properly fill in with glue, and too difficult to get good sand coverage. They were pretty amazed.. I was terrified I was going to find neon glow-in-the-dark sand on my clothes....
On the back of the packaging, you would note that the glow-in-the-dark lasts only 4 hours. So by evening this is what we were left with:
Colours faded, with loose sand everywhere... :-(
Needless to say, I do not recommend this product!! I will remain loyal to the quality standards of Crayola art supplies... but I might actually end up calling my friend over at customer service again today....
So I'm logging on today to give, not a product recommendation, but a product Warning...
We love Crayola products. Tried and true are those crayons and markers that our kids have been using since they could hold them. I guess my problem with Crayola these days is their veering into low-quality gimmicky product lines. We don't usually buy that sort of stuff on a day to day basis, but when we left Ottawa, my mom bought the girls a Color-Wonder set for the road. It was similar to this one:
It claims to be a MESS-FREE glitter paper colouring set. The glitter, you are told, is IN the paper and therefore no mess! My girls looooove glitter, so we thought this was a perfect choice. Well, as I opened the packaging, super-fine glitter covered my hands. The dashboard, my knitting, my lap. As I passed back the colouring pages, it covered the back of my seat and the floor. As they coloured, it covered their hands... and then everything they touched. It was what I would have expected from a product involving glitter - if Crayola hadn't already assured me on their packaging that they had (through some sort of purported miracle) removed the possibility of such a giant mess.
The customer service at Crayola, however, is stellar. The woman on the phone apologized profusely for "bedazzling" my van and sent me coupons for Crayola products. Since I had removed the glitter colouring set after just one picture each, I gave the coupons to the girls to make up for it, and this week we were at Target and they went to choose something from the arts and crafts aisle. Maymuna picked super fine tip markers - and as you would expect, they are great, with a wide variety of hues and smells. She has barely put them down.
Hafsa's tastes run a little more... splashy. She picked this:
We've had some pretty good experiences with sand art, particularly some from South Africa which was well made and fun to use. I figured when I saw this that Crayola had caught on to the trend. I was not that keen on the "non-toxic" glow-in-the-dark part, but that was the main draw for H.
There were almost too many problems with this product to count, and you'll see by the pictures what I mean. Once you mix the "sand" with the glow-in-the-dark mixture, it was not dry enough to move around easily. It stuck together in lumps:
The result being you had to shake the lumpy sand over the picture and hope that some of it stuck to the glued areas, or you had to press it down with your fingers, leaving a packed mound on your picture.
Disappointing on both counts. Plus the activity starts to take longer than it was probably intended. 30+ minutes into a project like this, and a 5 year old's attention begins to wane. Also the white areas to be "sanded" need to be covered with school glue with a brush - not the best for a young child's dexterity or attention span.
We finally finished a single picture for each kid, after which we threw the rest of the product out, save the actual picture boards that were left. We headed to the walk-in closet, where the glow-in-the-dark component at least saved Hafsa from complete disappointment.
What you can't see is that half the picture is not filled in, because it was taking too long, and in the case of Hafsa's picture, the details of the dragon were too hard to properly fill in with glue, and too difficult to get good sand coverage. They were pretty amazed.. I was terrified I was going to find neon glow-in-the-dark sand on my clothes....
On the back of the packaging, you would note that the glow-in-the-dark lasts only 4 hours. So by evening this is what we were left with:
Colours faded, with loose sand everywhere... :-(
Needless to say, I do not recommend this product!! I will remain loyal to the quality standards of Crayola art supplies... but I might actually end up calling my friend over at customer service again today....
Friday, October 07, 2011
MHA Conference: Multiple Intelligences
The last session at the Minnesota Homeschooler's Alliance conference was my favourite: "Embracing Your Child's Multiple Intelligences".
The speaker for this session was Michele Wolf. She is the founder/president of Intellego Publishing, who create and sell unit studies that are designed to appeal to all learning types. They look pretty nice, actually, and all done in PDF download-able format to keep costs reasonable. If we take a break from "regular" homeschool to do a unit study, we might try one of these. Anyway, she is one smart woman and she knows a LOT (she is currently on the faculty of 4 different universities to prove it!). She used to work in the alternative education field for public schools in the pre-Bush years.
There is almost too much information to type out here, but I'll do my best and then provide the links to the information I have here in my handout sheet.
Here are the types of intelligence according to this research:
verbal/linguistic
logical/mathematical
spatial
musical
kinesthetic
interpersonal
intrapersonal
To determine which you or your child are, you can print out this questionnaire and see which categories you get the most "yes" replies. But if you can, try to ignore the headings so that you don't pre-judge the questions. A lot of us like to think we are something, or have been told we are, etc... If you are doing it with your kids, you can hold the paper and just ask them the questions. Try to do the questionnaire yourself as well, if you are the one teaching your child most of the time. It will give you an idea of where any possible "gaps" exist in the ways you each view the world.
Not every person is going to be super-concentrated in one particular area. There will be one or two that stand out and then a few that are moderate.
I will write out a little blurb here on each of the different intelligences, but for a really thorough history of this area of research and details about each type, go to this link. Everything is there.
VERBAL/LINGUISTIC
- really enjoys books
- remembers more from a radio program than a film
- like puns and word games
- reads the signs and billboards while driving
- this is AUDITORY not VISUAL even though reading is involved
Suggestions for schooling the verbal/linguistic child: lectures, audio files, worksheets, reading, word games, speeches, storytelling, debates, discussions.
LOGICAL/MATHEMATICAL
- can quickly compute numbers in head
- like strategy games like chess
- looks for structure, patterns, sequences
- thinks clearly, non-emotionally
- finds flaws in logic of what people say or do
- high valued in IQ tests
- very curious and analytical
Suggestions for schooling the logical/mathematical child: computer games, charts, graphs, math problems, experiments, critical thinking activities, linear outlining and timelines, logic games, sequential presentation of information.
SPATIAL
- when I close my eyes I see clear visual images
- responsive to colour
- enjoys visual puzzles/games
- vivid dreams
- navigates well in unfamiliar places
- recall visual images easily
- when asked to recall information, looks away for a moment as she/he looks with their mind's eye at their visual image of the info you asked for
Suggestions for schooling the spatially smart child: charts, graphs, movies, films, diagrams, maps, puzzles, construction and building activities, clay models, art activities, drawing and painting, presentations and photo essays, use storyboards and visual displays.
KINESTHETIC
- like sports
- difficult to sit still
- like to work with hands
- gets insight, new ideas when doing something physical
- includes nail biting, mouthing things
- when very young almost all kids *appear* to belong to this category just because they are so active at that age
- well coordinated
- need to touch or hold objects to learn about them
Suggestions for schooling the kinesthetically strong child: opportunities for touching/feeling, creating murals, wall paintings, movement, drama, cooking, gardening, acting out new concepts, role playing, permission to fidget/doodle, taking walks while working through difficult concepts, mimes, skits, hands- on.
MUSICAL
- have a good ear or voice
- knows when musical notes are out of tune
- often has a tune running through head
- not good with rote memorization
- good to remember context and patterns
- can keep time to a piece of music
- often tap, hum, whistle...
Suggestions for schooling the musical child: playing recorded music, concerts, online performances, background noise, mnemonics using song and rhythm, chanting, clapping, tapping, needs to make NOISE!, don't ask them to write a paper, ask them to write a song.
INTERPERSONAL
- prefers team activities and groups
- enjoys social games instead of solo ones
- comfortable in a crowd
- large circle of CLOSE friends
- when troubled, looks for someone to talk to
- likes teaching others what they know
Suggestions for schooling the interpersonal child: discussions, giving feedback, letter writing, group work, interviews, role playing, working with parent, verbal problem solving, teaching material to others; don't hand them a book and tell them to go read alone, it won't work.
INTRAPERSONAL
- spend time reflecting, meditating, thinking
- likes solo hobbies
- realistic view of own strengths and weaknesses
- keeps journal or diary
- intuitive, self aware
- aware of own motivations
- strong sense of who they are
Suggestions for schooling the intrapersonally minded child: encourage personal reflection, individual work, journaling, story telling, autobiographies, free choice, give a personal connection to what they are learning.
Her closing remarks were basically that you should try to remember to teach in such a way that is FUN, interactive and varied. The more ways you can deliver information, the greater the learning. Varied and multisensory activities teach to strengths and develop capacities in areas of relative weakness.
If you are interested by this don't forget the link I posted above (here it is again) because there is a lot more information there that I couldn't get into here. :-)
The speaker for this session was Michele Wolf. She is the founder/president of Intellego Publishing, who create and sell unit studies that are designed to appeal to all learning types. They look pretty nice, actually, and all done in PDF download-able format to keep costs reasonable. If we take a break from "regular" homeschool to do a unit study, we might try one of these. Anyway, she is one smart woman and she knows a LOT (she is currently on the faculty of 4 different universities to prove it!). She used to work in the alternative education field for public schools in the pre-Bush years.
There is almost too much information to type out here, but I'll do my best and then provide the links to the information I have here in my handout sheet.
Here are the types of intelligence according to this research:
verbal/linguistic
logical/mathematical
spatial
musical
kinesthetic
interpersonal
intrapersonal
To determine which you or your child are, you can print out this questionnaire and see which categories you get the most "yes" replies. But if you can, try to ignore the headings so that you don't pre-judge the questions. A lot of us like to think we are something, or have been told we are, etc... If you are doing it with your kids, you can hold the paper and just ask them the questions. Try to do the questionnaire yourself as well, if you are the one teaching your child most of the time. It will give you an idea of where any possible "gaps" exist in the ways you each view the world.
Not every person is going to be super-concentrated in one particular area. There will be one or two that stand out and then a few that are moderate.
I will write out a little blurb here on each of the different intelligences, but for a really thorough history of this area of research and details about each type, go to this link. Everything is there.
VERBAL/LINGUISTIC
- really enjoys books
- remembers more from a radio program than a film
- like puns and word games
- reads the signs and billboards while driving
- this is AUDITORY not VISUAL even though reading is involved
Suggestions for schooling the verbal/linguistic child: lectures, audio files, worksheets, reading, word games, speeches, storytelling, debates, discussions.
LOGICAL/MATHEMATICAL
- can quickly compute numbers in head
- like strategy games like chess
- looks for structure, patterns, sequences
- thinks clearly, non-emotionally
- finds flaws in logic of what people say or do
- high valued in IQ tests
- very curious and analytical
Suggestions for schooling the logical/mathematical child: computer games, charts, graphs, math problems, experiments, critical thinking activities, linear outlining and timelines, logic games, sequential presentation of information.
SPATIAL
- when I close my eyes I see clear visual images
- responsive to colour
- enjoys visual puzzles/games
- vivid dreams
- navigates well in unfamiliar places
- recall visual images easily
- when asked to recall information, looks away for a moment as she/he looks with their mind's eye at their visual image of the info you asked for
Suggestions for schooling the spatially smart child: charts, graphs, movies, films, diagrams, maps, puzzles, construction and building activities, clay models, art activities, drawing and painting, presentations and photo essays, use storyboards and visual displays.
KINESTHETIC
- like sports
- difficult to sit still
- like to work with hands
- gets insight, new ideas when doing something physical
- includes nail biting, mouthing things
- when very young almost all kids *appear* to belong to this category just because they are so active at that age
- well coordinated
- need to touch or hold objects to learn about them
Suggestions for schooling the kinesthetically strong child: opportunities for touching/feeling, creating murals, wall paintings, movement, drama, cooking, gardening, acting out new concepts, role playing, permission to fidget/doodle, taking walks while working through difficult concepts, mimes, skits, hands- on.
MUSICAL
- have a good ear or voice
- knows when musical notes are out of tune
- often has a tune running through head
- not good with rote memorization
- good to remember context and patterns
- can keep time to a piece of music
- often tap, hum, whistle...
Suggestions for schooling the musical child: playing recorded music, concerts, online performances, background noise, mnemonics using song and rhythm, chanting, clapping, tapping, needs to make NOISE!, don't ask them to write a paper, ask them to write a song.
INTERPERSONAL
- prefers team activities and groups
- enjoys social games instead of solo ones
- comfortable in a crowd
- large circle of CLOSE friends
- when troubled, looks for someone to talk to
- likes teaching others what they know
Suggestions for schooling the interpersonal child: discussions, giving feedback, letter writing, group work, interviews, role playing, working with parent, verbal problem solving, teaching material to others; don't hand them a book and tell them to go read alone, it won't work.
INTRAPERSONAL
- spend time reflecting, meditating, thinking
- likes solo hobbies
- realistic view of own strengths and weaknesses
- keeps journal or diary
- intuitive, self aware
- aware of own motivations
- strong sense of who they are
Suggestions for schooling the intrapersonally minded child: encourage personal reflection, individual work, journaling, story telling, autobiographies, free choice, give a personal connection to what they are learning.
Her closing remarks were basically that you should try to remember to teach in such a way that is FUN, interactive and varied. The more ways you can deliver information, the greater the learning. Varied and multisensory activities teach to strengths and develop capacities in areas of relative weakness.
If you are interested by this don't forget the link I posted above (here it is again) because there is a lot more information there that I couldn't get into here. :-)
Wednesday, October 05, 2011
MHA Conference - Engaging the Early Learner
The third session was called "Engaging Early Learners". This session was not a perfect fit for me. I was hoping it would be geared toward kindergarten and early elementary kids but it was clearly intended for the earlier set. However this woman has been homeschooling a long time, and clearly KNOWS HER STUFF. She had lots of valuable things to say, and I wish that many of you with younger children than mine had been in this session.
Nancy and her husband run Legacy Homeschool Store, probably the only store in the state that sell homeschool curriculum and materials. We end up ordering most of our stuff online, so I was pretty happy to hear of this store so that we can actually go and physically see and touch what we are looking to buy.
Here are my notes in more-or-less point form:
At the preschool age and early elementary, homeschooling is an extension of your parenting.
Your goal at this point is to create a life-long love of learning, not to inject your child with facts.
"Comparison is the death of contentment". Stop looking at what the other "perfect" homeschool families are doing, or what publicly schooled children are doing. You can be overwhelmed with choices and comparisons. Your homeschool is going to be the right fit for YOUR family if you just keep focused on your family's needs.
This is the best time to figure out what kind of learner you have on your hands, since everything they do is pretty organic and natural to them (they haven't learned the conventions of "schooling" yet, etc).
They will learn in time (and maturity) that there are appropriate times and places for sitting still and quiet etc etc, but while they are young and learning at home, let them wiggle! Watching them you will learn how they learn best.
Don't underestimate the value of everyday life experience. This is paramount in these early years.
Build the house of academics on top of a foundation of critical thinking skills.
There can be LOTS of input before you can expect to get output. Her analogy is speech. How long did you talk to your kids before they spoke to you? Even so, they maybe said a word or two, but you kept on talking to them in complete sentences, without losing patience... Lots of learning skills (like spelling, writing perhaps) need lots of input like this before you start getting any output.
Kids are not learning any one thing in isolation. Because everything is new to them, when you ask them to spell the word "bake" for example, they are multi-tasking on how to hold a pencil, where to write on the line, how to form the "b", etc etc... Meanwhile we are just thinking "why can't you just write BAKE??" We need to have extra patience with young children, as they are still perfecting the base skills necessary in "school" and therefore simple tasks are a lot more overwhelming than we think.
Give your young learner a purposeful activity. Particularly if you are homeschooling older kids. That smaller child wants to feel like her "work" is just as important. She had some good ideas for this, such as asking your small child to sort and organize piles of buttons, playing cards, pegs, game tiles, scrabble letters. Ask them to match up tupperware with their lids, do dot-to-dot print outs, and mazes.
Other tips for keeping Little Ones occupied while working or teaching olders:
Fill their tank (spend 1/2 an hour with them first)
Plan their activities ahead of time
Have special toys/games/activities and a special place
Utilize their siblings (have older read to younger or play a game)
Use nap time
Use a timer (give me 15 more minutes)
Use a sheet as their “classroom” (a big bed sheet, put their toy "work" on it)
Have a bin for their “school” activities just for them
Resources:
LIFE! Your curriculum could consist of teaching them the parameters around which they
may play and teaching them the responsibility of putting away and how to do it.
Language & Thinking for Young Children – Ruth Beechick
The Three R’s – Ruth Beechick
Slow & Steady, Get me Ready - June Oberlander
Preschool Activities in a Bag – Paula Reetz & Sherri MacLean
Mudpies to Magnets and More Mudpies to Magnets – Roger Williams
Nancy and her husband run Legacy Homeschool Store, probably the only store in the state that sell homeschool curriculum and materials. We end up ordering most of our stuff online, so I was pretty happy to hear of this store so that we can actually go and physically see and touch what we are looking to buy.
Here are my notes in more-or-less point form:
At the preschool age and early elementary, homeschooling is an extension of your parenting.
Your goal at this point is to create a life-long love of learning, not to inject your child with facts.
"Comparison is the death of contentment". Stop looking at what the other "perfect" homeschool families are doing, or what publicly schooled children are doing. You can be overwhelmed with choices and comparisons. Your homeschool is going to be the right fit for YOUR family if you just keep focused on your family's needs.
This is the best time to figure out what kind of learner you have on your hands, since everything they do is pretty organic and natural to them (they haven't learned the conventions of "schooling" yet, etc).
They will learn in time (and maturity) that there are appropriate times and places for sitting still and quiet etc etc, but while they are young and learning at home, let them wiggle! Watching them you will learn how they learn best.
Don't underestimate the value of everyday life experience. This is paramount in these early years.
Build the house of academics on top of a foundation of critical thinking skills.
There can be LOTS of input before you can expect to get output. Her analogy is speech. How long did you talk to your kids before they spoke to you? Even so, they maybe said a word or two, but you kept on talking to them in complete sentences, without losing patience... Lots of learning skills (like spelling, writing perhaps) need lots of input like this before you start getting any output.
Kids are not learning any one thing in isolation. Because everything is new to them, when you ask them to spell the word "bake" for example, they are multi-tasking on how to hold a pencil, where to write on the line, how to form the "b", etc etc... Meanwhile we are just thinking "why can't you just write BAKE??" We need to have extra patience with young children, as they are still perfecting the base skills necessary in "school" and therefore simple tasks are a lot more overwhelming than we think.
Give your young learner a purposeful activity. Particularly if you are homeschooling older kids. That smaller child wants to feel like her "work" is just as important. She had some good ideas for this, such as asking your small child to sort and organize piles of buttons, playing cards, pegs, game tiles, scrabble letters. Ask them to match up tupperware with their lids, do dot-to-dot print outs, and mazes.
Other tips for keeping Little Ones occupied while working or teaching olders:
Fill their tank (spend 1/2 an hour with them first)
Plan their activities ahead of time
Have special toys/games/activities and a special place
Utilize their siblings (have older read to younger or play a game)
Use nap time
Use a timer (give me 15 more minutes)
Use a sheet as their “classroom” (a big bed sheet, put their toy "work" on it)
Have a bin for their “school” activities just for them
Resources:
LIFE! Your curriculum could consist of teaching them the parameters around which they
may play and teaching them the responsibility of putting away and how to do it.
Language & Thinking for Young Children – Ruth Beechick
The Three R’s – Ruth Beechick
Slow & Steady, Get me Ready - June Oberlander
Preschool Activities in a Bag – Paula Reetz & Sherri MacLean
Mudpies to Magnets and More Mudpies to Magnets – Roger Williams
Monday, October 03, 2011
Make your own Blood!
This was a fun science activity run by a woman in our homeschool co-op. You can find the details to do it too here: http://www.education.com/activity/article/Components_Blood/
I kind of recommend doing this one OUTSIDE before the weather gets cold. It was a wee bit messy. :-)
It was not at all gross, but Maymuna really really wanted it to be....
Saturday, October 01, 2011
MHA Conference - Key Note Speaker
The keynote speech at the homeschool conference was given by Rebecca Rupp. She has written many h/s books, some that were personally SO helpful to me when starting out, like "Homeschooling Year by Year". She has also raised and homeschooled 3 boys, who all went on to go to college and have jobs... :-)
Rebecca is a funny, smart woman, and I enjoyed her talk. Her session was a little more general - I guess she needs to be relevant to the whole audience, young kids or old, regardless of methodology etc. I think that everybody probably got something different out of it. So these are my own reflections for the most part.
For me, I felt she was saying that learning should be about REVELATION and DISCOVERY. And that those discoveries should belong to your KIDS as much as possible. One of the reasons school doesn't work is because all the variables are controlled. A perfection analogy here is a science experiment. You can tell your child "X + Y = Z Now do this experiment to prove the truth I've just given you". Or you can give your child "X" and give them "Y" and wait until they run to you, completely breathless, saying "MOM! X + Y = Z!!" She gives several examples from a book called "Falling for Science" where adult scientists from MIT all tell the story about how they got into science - and most of them had a scientific "discovery" as a youngster that they felt was completely their own, and it got them hooked on physics/chemistry/biology for life.
This was a common theme in her lecture: give your kids lots of free time, let them experiment in play and in all areas of learning. Try to do this *without* controlling the outcome of every exploration. When we control every variable in their learning we essentially control the "lesson" as well, cutting out room for OTHER valuable lessons that would have haphazardly presented themselves. Sometimes things are going to work out and they will learn what you hoped they would - other times it WON'T work out and that is a lesson also. Kids need to learn coping strategies and flexibility and creativity. Do not overprotect them from failure. Wasn't penicillin invented this way?
Beware of indiscriminate praise - this is bad, it makes them risk-averse. Praise for hard work, this encourages persistence.
She had a very interesting take on video games... and I thought of all you mums out there with sons in particular. She said that it is best to actually ignore the content of most of these games (unless they are very violent of course, we are not talking about Grand Theft Auto or Halo here). The content of video games is often fluff. What she actually considers *valuable* is the mode of thinking. Oftentimes you start off a game with no rules evident, and it's up to you to determine the parameters of the game. There is often a list of sequential tasks, etc. She is a firm believer that in appropriate games, entering that mode of thinking is a good thing. She references the book, "Everything Bad is Good for You" by Steven Johnson in support of her thinking. I did not really know what to think about this one, to be honest... Definitely an interesting take...
Resources:
The Element by Ken Robinson
TED lectures online by Ken Robinson
The Mathematician's Lament by Paul Lockhart
Rebecca is a funny, smart woman, and I enjoyed her talk. Her session was a little more general - I guess she needs to be relevant to the whole audience, young kids or old, regardless of methodology etc. I think that everybody probably got something different out of it. So these are my own reflections for the most part.
For me, I felt she was saying that learning should be about REVELATION and DISCOVERY. And that those discoveries should belong to your KIDS as much as possible. One of the reasons school doesn't work is because all the variables are controlled. A perfection analogy here is a science experiment. You can tell your child "X + Y = Z Now do this experiment to prove the truth I've just given you". Or you can give your child "X" and give them "Y" and wait until they run to you, completely breathless, saying "MOM! X + Y = Z!!" She gives several examples from a book called "Falling for Science" where adult scientists from MIT all tell the story about how they got into science - and most of them had a scientific "discovery" as a youngster that they felt was completely their own, and it got them hooked on physics/chemistry/biology for life.
This was a common theme in her lecture: give your kids lots of free time, let them experiment in play and in all areas of learning. Try to do this *without* controlling the outcome of every exploration. When we control every variable in their learning we essentially control the "lesson" as well, cutting out room for OTHER valuable lessons that would have haphazardly presented themselves. Sometimes things are going to work out and they will learn what you hoped they would - other times it WON'T work out and that is a lesson also. Kids need to learn coping strategies and flexibility and creativity. Do not overprotect them from failure. Wasn't penicillin invented this way?
Beware of indiscriminate praise - this is bad, it makes them risk-averse. Praise for hard work, this encourages persistence.
She had a very interesting take on video games... and I thought of all you mums out there with sons in particular. She said that it is best to actually ignore the content of most of these games (unless they are very violent of course, we are not talking about Grand Theft Auto or Halo here). The content of video games is often fluff. What she actually considers *valuable* is the mode of thinking. Oftentimes you start off a game with no rules evident, and it's up to you to determine the parameters of the game. There is often a list of sequential tasks, etc. She is a firm believer that in appropriate games, entering that mode of thinking is a good thing. She references the book, "Everything Bad is Good for You" by Steven Johnson in support of her thinking. I did not really know what to think about this one, to be honest... Definitely an interesting take...
Resources:
The Element by Ken Robinson
TED lectures online by Ken Robinson
The Mathematician's Lament by Paul Lockhart
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