5 Strategies to Nurture Your Child’s Curiosity→

A friend showed me a clip of her nine-month-old baby.

I looked into the baby's eyes as I watched the video. The intense alertness that I witnessed, the acute observation of each facial move she saw in her mother's face, was fascinating.

The baby wanted to know how to make the same expressions her mother was making.

It's the intense desire to know that all healthy children possess, yet what happens to their curiosity as they grow a little older?

Why do so many children forsake that infinite sense of wonder that’s so innate to each of us? 

“No thief, however skillful, can rob one of knowledge, and that is why knowledge is the best and safest treasure to acquire.”

— L. Frank Baum

One of the reasons for this is because too many children start school at young ages. By the time they reach kindergarten or first grade, the light of curiosity begins to dim.

Think about it. If your child has a small shovel in his hand, but every time he tries to shovel something his teacher tells him to stop, he will eventually stop picking the shovel up.

When a child cannot follow the lead of his curiosity, or is not in an environment where he can exercise his desire to know, he will put his curiosity on the shelf.

Yet, the level of his curiosity is related to his intelligence. The more curious he is, the more he will exercise his mind to discover or learn something. To lose his curiosity would be a tragedy because it means he would never fully develop into all that he can be.

We cannot let this happen! Therefore, if you want to encourage your child’s natural curiosity, whether it has been dimmed or not, here are five things you can do:

1. If you have to put your child into an outside program, look for a daycare or preschool that is play-based and ideally held in the outdoors, such as a Forest School. Make sure they are operated by people who understand what children need at these tender ages.

2. Do not entertain your child! It is not that you don't ever play with your child, but only that you do not become his full-time playmate. Allow him to follow the dictates of his curiosity and figure things out for himself, so he develops his mind. Children are little scientists by nature. In the right environment, they will learn how to entertain themselves. 

3. Be curious yourself. Take your child into the outdoors and explore with him. Let him walk barefoot on fallen leaves and dip his feet into spring water to awaken his senses. Bring his attention to the songs of birds and the rustling of the trees as the wind blows through them. Collect a bug or two and read about them when you get home.

4. Immediately remove all screens from your child's life both inside and outside the home. Under no circumstances should you hand him your cell phone to quiet him because you are busy. Screens are a cause of a dimming curiosity; not only that but they will thwart your child's brain development. 

5. Lastly, if you can, don't put your child into any school programs until he is at least ten years old. Until then, teach him yourself because so many learning problems take root during those early years. The first few grades of elementary school are easy to teach when you know what you are doing. 

Here’s a thought: our ability to excel, to become the best version of ourselves, begins with our desire to know.

“An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.”

— Benjamin Franklin

Let’s work to keep our children’s curiosity alive—even if that means teaching them ourselves— so they can become all that they can be.

☞ Disclaimer: This is not a politically-correct blog.

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents, Elizabeth will guide you in homeschooling with the classics to raise brighter and more creative children.

Enroll using the link below and feel confident knowing you have the guidance and support you need to homeschool successfully.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with Elizabeth’s original online course, Raise Your Child to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is a homeschooling thought-leader and the founder of Smart Homeschooler.

As an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach, Elizabeth has 21+ years of experience working in education.

She has developed a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child, and she devotes her time to helping parents to get it right.

Elizabeth is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.

*****

“Elizabeth has given us counseling and guidance to help us succeed with our home school planning. When I feel overwhelmed, scared, or lose my confidence, she offers words of wisdom and support.”

— Sherry B., Pittsburg, PA

5 Facts You Should Know About Virtual Homeschools→

The number of “homeschooling” students learning online has grown exponentially during the past decade, and it’s been no accident.

The US government has contracted private businesses such as K-12 to provide an online education for your child. And virtual schools are nothing less than capitalistic enterprises with marketing budgets large enough to convince you that virtual schools are best.

BUT ARE THEY?

There is overwhelming evidence that virtual schools provide a sub-par education.

THE FACTS

1) One need not look very far to find the evidence. Consider this: 54.6% of virtual high school students graduate within four years compared with 85% of high school students nationally, according to the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado Boulder.

But even if virtual schools did provide a good education, what effect does online learning have on a child’s social and emotional development?

Social Development

2) A lack of proper social development is a matter that should concern us tremendously. To develop excellent social skills, one must socialize.

To put your child in front of a computer all day, and expect that he'll grow up to be a socially-adept person is wishful thinking. 

It would be like confining a child to a playpen and expecting him to learn how to run.

Daniel Goleman first pointed out in the 1990s that emotional intelligence, which includes good social skills, is vitally important to a person's ability to do well in life.

People with high EQ tend to function better in their personal and professional relationships leading to less stress and greater happiness. Let us not forget that personal relationships also include the parent / child relationship.

Ancient philosophers understood the importance of emotional intelligence, and many modern studies have confirmed Goleman’s findings.

Even if we had no studies, we have our common sense. 

Screen Addiction

3) Another oversight by us is the idea that a child can study at a computer all day and not develop the habit of using the computer. What we do every day becomes our habits and forms who we are.

Who do you think will be at a higher risk for gaming or internet addictions: the child who plays sports, reads, and has an active social life or the child who spends a large part of his day in front of a computer?

We want our children to form good habits when they are young, so they grow up to live good lives.

 The Virtual Teacher

4) What about the role the teacher plays in the child's learning process? A good teacher inspires a student to love the subject, and a good teacher motivates a child to work harder.

A good teacher influences a child to become a better student because the teacher develops a meaningful relationship with the child.

How can a computer screen with a teacher staring at you from the other end be a replacement for a teacher in the room? Can the image of you in a mirror ever replace you? Both have a real person behind them, but there is only one real person in the room. 

Health Problems

5) Sitting in front of a computer all day causes health problems. Adults suffer all sorts of ailments from time spent in front of computers such as musculoskeletal injuries, headaches, poor vision, inability to focus, obesity, cardiovascular illnesses, and declining memories.

Why do we ignore the potential health risks for our children when they are in even more need of physical activity than we are?

Here are only 3 health issues we should consider, but there are more.

a. Myopia

Children who use the computer are at higher risk for developing myopia (nearsightedness), according to researchers. In the past few decades, as computer use has become more and more common for children, so has the necessity for reading glasses.

(Too early reading may cause this too.)

Myopia when young can lead to eye diseases long before a person is old. Sadly, myopia in students increased significantly during Covid when many young children were in front of computers and continue to be today.

b. Effects on Posture

Posture is also a problem because sitting at the computer causes us to slouch forward and tilt our heads back, which can lead to headaches, muscle strain, and chronic neck and back problems.

c. Obesity

Obesity amongst children has become a significant concern amongst pediatricians because of the physical and psychological health problems that accompany it like heart disease, musculoskeletal issues, and a lack of self-esteem, to name a few. 

The Alternative

We have this idea that only "accredited" teachers can teach, but there isn't a proposition more ludicrous than this one.

As parents, we are always teaching our children.

Rather than using the virtual schools riddled with so many unwanted side-effects, why not homeschool your children with real books instead? 

Learning from real books and a real teacher is more engaging, more fascinating, and more rewarding which will lead to overall better academic success.

Remove the computers, and your homeschool will become a place of constant social interaction with everyone in the family, naturally leading to closer families too.

It’s a win / win.

☞ Disclaimer: This is not a politically-correct blog.

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents, Elizabeth will guide you in homeschooling with the classics to raise brighter and more creative children.

Enroll using the link below and feel confident knowing you have the guidance and support you need to homeschool successfully.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with Elizabeth’s original online course, Raise Your Child to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is a homeschooling thought-leader and the founder of Smart Homeschooler.

As an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach, Elizabeth has 21+ years of experience working in education.

She has developed a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child, and she devotes her time to helping parents to get it right.

Elizabeth is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.

*****

“Elizabeth has given us counseling and guidance to help us succeed with our home school planning. When I feel overwhelmed, scared, or lose my confidence, she offers words of wisdom and support.”

— Sherry B., Pittsburg, PA

Are You Educated Enough to Homeschool?→

As women, we tend to think we are not enough just the way we are. Add homeschooling into the mix and our list of not enough now includes neither smart nor educated enough to homeschool.

The thought of homeschooling conjures up fears that we may fail, we may disappoint our families, and, worst of all, we may hinder our children's chances of success.

We wonder how other homeschooling moms do it?

The truth is that even if you didn’t go to college, you could still succeed at homeschooling if you put your mind to it.

What follows is my defense that any well-intended parent—with the right understanding and the right tools—can do a better job educating her children than public school.

I'm Not Smart Enough, Nor Educated Enough

To this, I would ask, who is? My father was in the category of truly learned men of the 20th century, and he never considered himself educated. My father's position used to baffle me until one day I understood that the more you know, the more you can comprehend how little you know.

“It’s an irony of life that the most simple questions contain the greatest mysteries.”

Most homeschooling parents went through public school and did not start out with a good education.

However, it is never too late to correct this problem.

The good news is that when you homeschool, you will correct it by developing your mind alongside your children. Becoming more intellectually savvy is a by product of homeschooling.

So is developing your brain to a greater degree.

We used to think the brain became fixed at a certain age and didn’t change after that other than to decline as you aged, but neuroscientists have shown that this isn't true. The brain continues to wire itself which is why homeschooling also keeps our brains nimble. 

When you have conversations with homeschooling moms, you'll find that they usually have a lot of general knowledge (if they do not have their kids in virtual schools). This is because the more children they have, the more they teach, and, therefore, the more general knowledge they gain—without even trying.

And don’t forget that we have many brilliant self-taught people in our history including William Blake, Frank Lloyd Wright, Mark Twain, The Wright Brothers, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, Karl Marx, and Frederick Douglass, to name a few.

We are so well-trained to believe in the magic paper one receives upon college graduation, that we forget most famous people in Western history were self-taught to some degree.

“Libraries raised me. I don’t believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because most students don’t have any money. When I graduated from high school, it was during the Depression and we had no money. I couldn’t go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years.”

— Ray Bradbury, author

Even without a college education, you will still do a better job homeschooling your children than the public school system can do. In fact, if you have no college education, your kids may have a better chance of excelling academically if you homeschool them.

The reason for this is that parents with less education will not be able to help their children with homework, and these children will fall behind in school. Once the children fall behind, they begin to do poorly in school, putting them on a negative academic trajectory.

“There were no significant differences in children’s SAT scores based on the education level of their parents. Mothers who had not completed high school were able to teach their children just as effectively as mothers with college degrees.”

— NHERI

When you homeschool your children, you will have the books on hand to understand the material yourself, and you will make sure your child understands it before he moves onto the next lesson. He will not be under pressure to keep up with his classmates which will help him focus better and learn more.

What parent wants their child shuffled through a system where after 12 years of schooling, the child is still unprepared to do well in life?

“Children learn what they live. Put kids in a class and they will live out their lives in an invisible cage, isolated from their chance at community; interrupt kids with bells and horns all the time and they will learn that nothing is important or worth finishing; ridicule them and they will retreat from human association; shame them and they will find a hundred ways to get even. The habits taught in large-scale organizations are deadly.”

— John Taylor Gatto, Dumbing Us Down

One last thing, don’t forget that you are the person who loves your child the most and cares most about your child’s future. How can anyone else ever trump that?

So please, please, please do not let a feeling of intellectual inferiority stop you from homeschooling!

You will rise to the occasion and become a better educated person yourself because you were a homeschooler. 

And your children will have a solid foundation upon which to build the rest of the lives.

☞ Disclaimer: This is not a politically-correct blog.

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents, Elizabeth will guide you in homeschooling with the classics to raise brighter and more creative children.

Enroll using the link below and feel confident knowing you have the guidance and support you need to homeschool successfully.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with Elizabeth’s original online course, Raise Your Child to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is a homeschooling thought-leader and the founder of Smart Homeschooler.

As an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach, Elizabeth has 21+ years of experience working in education.

She has developed a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child, and she devotes her time to helping parents to get it right.

Elizabeth is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.

*****

“Elizabeth has given us counseling and guidance to help us succeed with our home school planning. When I feel overwhelmed, scared, or lose my confidence, she offers words of wisdom and support.”

— Sherry B., Pittsburg, PA

The Six Purposes of Schooling by John Taylor Gatto→

When people ask me why I homeschooled, I tell them I had no choice. If they knew what I know about public education, they would homeschool too.

John Taylor Gatto was the man who opened my eyes to the nefarious agenda behind institutionalized schooling. What follows is a transcription of the key section from John’s classic speech and opus, The Underground History of American Education.

John was a brilliant and well-researched man. I have read what is below in Ingles’ book myself; it is all true.   

Transcription of John’s Talk

“I have something here.  I have the six purposes of schooling [from the book Principles of Secondary Education by Alexander James Inglis] as laid down in 1917 by the man whom Harvard named their Honor Lecture in Education for. 

So far from being a fringe individual, this guy is the reason the Harvard Honor Lecture in Education is named as it is:  The Inglis Lecture.  I would like to read you the six purposes of schooling.  I moved heaven and earth as it took years to find this book [Principles of Secondary Education]--just like trying to find in past years a copy of the Carol Quigley [book] Tragedy and Hope.  

I learned about Inglis from a twenty year President of Harvard [1933-1953], James Bryant Conant, who was a poison gas specialist in World War I--and was in the very inner circle of the Atomic Bomb Project in World War II--was High Commissioner of Occupied Germany after the War. 

So he [James Bryant Conant] wrote--there must be 20 books about the institution of schooling--of which he was completely a proponent.  And he is a very, very bad writer.  I forced myself to read most of these books, and one of them he says that if you really want to know what school is about, you need to pick up the book that I’m referring to Principles of Secondary Education. 

Two years it took me to find a copy of the book [Principles of Secondary Education by Alexander James Inglis]--750 pages, tiny print and as dull as your imagination can be.  And furthermore, it is not till you get to the very middle of the book--in an unlabelled section--that he spills the beans.  Let me spill them for you.  

 There are six purposes, or functions, as he calls them.  The first he [Alexander Inglis] calls the Adjustive Function: Schools are to establish fixed habits of reaction to authority.  That’s their main purpose--habits and reactions to authority. 

That is why school authorities don’t tear their hair out when somebody exposes that the Atomic Bomb wasn’t dropped on Korea, as a history book in the 1990s printed by Scott Foresman [did], and why each of these books has hundreds of substantive errors.  Learning isn’t the reason the texts are distributed.  

The Adjustive Function

So, first is the Adjustive Function--fixed habits.  Now here comes the wonderful insight that being able to analyze the detail will give you.  How can you establish whether someone has successfully developed this Automatic Reaction because people have a proclivity when they are given sensible orders to follow. 

That is not what they want to teach.  The only way you can measure this is to give stupid orders and people automatically follow those.  Now you have achieved Function #1.  

The Integrating Function

Have you ever ever wondered why some of the foolish things that schools do or allow to continue?  [Function] #2, he [Inglis] calls it the Integrating Function, but it is easier to understand if you call it the Conformity Function. 

It’s to make children alike as possible--the gifted children and the stupid--alike as possible because market research uses statistical sampling, and it only works if people react generally the same way.  

The Directive Function

The Third Function he calls the Directive Function: School is to diagnose your proper social role and then log the evidence that here is where you are on the Great Pyramid, so that future people won’t allow you to escape that compartment.  

The Differentiating Function

 The Fourth Function is the Differentiating Function.  Because once you have diagnosed the kids in this layer, you do not want them to learn anything that the higher layers are learning.  So you teach just as far as the requirement of that layer.  

The Selective Function

 Number five and six are the creepiest of all!  Number 5 is the Selective Function.  What that means is what Darwin meant by natural selection: You are assessing the breeding quality of each individual kid.  You’re doing it structurally because school teachers don’t know this is happening. 

And you’re trying to use ways to prevent the poor stuff from breeding.  And those ways are hanging labels--humiliating labels--around their neck, encouraging the shallowness of thinking.

 I often wondered, because I came from a very very strict Scotish-Irish culture that never allowed you to leer at a girl.  But when I got to NYC, the boys were pawing the girls openly and there was no redress for the girls at all, except not showing up in the classroom--high absentee rates. 

Well, you are supposed to teach structurally that sexual pleasure is what you withdraw from a relationship and everything else is a waste of time and expensive.  

 So, the Selective Function is what Darwin meant by the favored races.  The idea is to consciously improve the breeding stock.  Schools are meant to tag the unfit with their inferiority by poor grades, remedial placement, and humiliation, so that their peers will accept them as inferior.  And the good breeding stock among the females will reject them as possible partners.  

The Propaedeutic Function

 And the Sixth is the creepiest of all! And I think it is partly what Tragedy and Hope is about--a fancy Roman name, the Propaedeutic Function.  Because as early as Roman bigtime thinkers, it was understood that to continue a social form required that some people be trained that they were the custodians of this.  So, some small fraction of the kids are being ready to take over the project. 

That’s the guy--the honor lecturer [Inglis], and it will not surprise you that his ancestors include the major-general of the siege of the Luknow of India--famous for tying the mutineers’ on the muzzle of the cannons and blowing them apart, or somebody who was forced to flee NYC, a churchman at the beginning of the American Revolution, because he wrote a refutation of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. 

They were going to tar and feather him.  He fled and was rewarded by the British by making him the Bishop of Nova Scotia.  Those are Inglis’ ancestors!  

 So, Al Inglis is certainly--when I learned of this and wrote to Harvard, asking for access to the Inglis Lecture.  Strike me dead, Lord, if I’m exaggerating at all.  I was told “We have no Inglis Lecture--hasn’t been for years, and we have no records. 

It was the same that happened when I discovered that Elwood B. Cubberly, the most influential schoolman of the 20th century and the bionomics genius had been the elementary school editor of Houghton Mifflin, and I wrote Houghton Mifflin--Is there any record? And they said, “We have no record of anyone named Elwood P. Cubberly. 

Now Harvard is telling me, “There is no Inglis Lecture.  A week passed and I got a call from Harvard, from some obscure office at Harvard, saying “What is your interest in the Ingles Lecture?”  I knew that I was on thin ice. 

And I said, “Well, James Conant referred me in his books to the man the Inglis Lecture is named after, and I was just wondering if I could get some background on this fellow, and a list of the lectures.  

 And in due time, I got a list of the lectures and instructions [on] how to access the texts, but not easily. Enough hoops that someone who has to mow the lawn and burp the baby wouldn’t jump through those hoops.  I was able to prove Harper’s [magazine] wouldn’t publish [it in] the cover essay I wrote, which Lew Laflin [?] named Against School, but I had called The Artificial Extension of Childhood because I think that is the key mechanism at work here.  

 So, they wouldn’t print the information about Cubberley because Houghton Mifflin denied it.  It was only months after that I looked through my extensive library of incredibly dull books about schooling, and I opened [one]--and on the facing page said Elwood B. Cubberly, Editor and Chief of Elementary School, publishing arm of Houghton Mifflin. 

By the way, the secondary Editor and Chief was Alexander Ingles.  So you see how this cousinage works.” 

*****

Download your free copy of 10 Surprising Facts About Homeschooled Kids.

*Video transcribed by Roger Copple. To watch the full 12-minute video: The Six Purposes of Schooling [Video]

☞ Disclaimer: This is not a politically-correct blog.

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents, Elizabeth will guide you in homeschooling with the classics to raise brighter and more creative children.

Enroll using the link below and feel confident knowing you have the guidance and support you need to homeschool successfully.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with Elizabeth’s original online course, Raise Your Child to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is a homeschooling thought-leader and the founder of Smart Homeschooler.

As an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach, Elizabeth has 21+ years of experience working in education.

She has developed a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child, and she devotes her time to helping parents to get it right.

Elizabeth is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.

*****

“Elizabeth has given us counseling and guidance to help us succeed with our home school planning. When I feel overwhelmed, scared, or lose my confidence, she offers words of wisdom and support.”

— Sherry B., Pittsburg, PA

3 Reasons Why American Schools Are So Violent

 Schools are the scene of far too much violence for a parent's comfort, and I would expect them to get worse if we move deeper into a recession. 

In 2022, as of November, there were already 68 school shootings, and the year is not over yet. There will be more. The year before Covid, in 2019, there were more mass shootings than days of the year.

People blame guns, but that's ridiculous. We don't blame knives when someone gets stabbed or poison when someone gets poisoned, so why do we blame guns when someone gets shot?

Guns don't pull the trigger; mentally-sick people do. 

The problem is not guns. We have always had guns in the US as a constitutional right to protect ourselves against a tyrannical government, but random mass shootings on such a scale are relatively new. 

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

— 2nd Amendment

What is wrong with Americans? 

Here are 3 facts to consider that may hold a key:

TOO EARLY EDUCATION

Children are put into school too early. We know there is a direct correlation between the absence of play in childhood and sociopathic behavior.

Children who go to early education centers are not engaged in enough play or the kind of play a child needs in his early years to foster humane qualities such as empathy.

“Play allows us to develop alternatives to violence and despair; it helps us learn perseverance and gain optimism.”

— Dr. Stuart Brown, Contemporary American Psychiatrist

Playtime outside has decreased by 71% in one generation in both the US and the UK, according to Dr. Brown..

MOTHERS ARE COMPELLED TO WORK

Too many mothers have no choice but to work, and young babies are left in daycares where strangers take care of them. How can the transmission of empathy occur when the child has is left by his mother in infancy?

This isn't to criticize working mothers, either; I was a working mother too. It is a criticism of a society that does not recognize the importance of a mother in her child's early life.

We use euphemisms such as "primary caregiver" to pretend handing our babies over to strangers is of no importance.

If babies could speak, they would clue us in on this societal delusion. No one can replace the tender love and care of a mother for her offspring.

MULTIMEDIA VIOLENCE

Our multimedia industry promotes violence. Jerry Mander published a book in 1978 titled, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television. One of his arguments was that when we watch television, our minds cannot differentiate between reality and what we see on the screen.

When children watch violence in films, they become desensitized to violence.

Since the 1960s, we have known about the effects of violence on our hearts and minds. Why have we not curbed the violence in the media, especially for children? On the contrary, it has become even more pervasive in our lives.

It is so pervasive that when a bomb went off on a busy street in Istanbul in November of 2022, the Americans were unphased. I was there to witness it.

On the contrary, the Turks were devastated. Violence is a part of an American's daily life. I have never felt safe in America, but in Turkey, I have never felt unsafe, even while walking home late at night.

VIDEO GAMES

Video games are a national hazard to a child's mental health. Internet Gaming Disorder is now an entry in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

Is this not enough to prove that our kids should not be gaming?

Grand Theft Auto is a game that involves prostitutes! The more violent acts you commit in the game, such as binding, gagging, torturing, and killing women, the more points you win.

What mentally-deranged individual came up with this idea? Leonard Sax points out, as have many studies, that playing games like this over and over again desensitizes our boys to violence, especially against women.

Talk about an easy way to breed misogynists. Geez.

There are other factors to consider with the rise in violence, too, such as the epidemic of narcissism, the breakdown of the American family, and economic disparity. Still, the above three are clearly factors in a society that has become “Rated R” for violence.

FINAL THOUGHTS

There is something fundamentally wrong with a people when their kids are no longer safe in school. Next year there will be a whole new set of statistics and more aggrieved parents who will bury their kids.

It's a sickening thought.

Do everything within your power to stay home with your kids when they are under the age of six (seven is even better), keep them off of technology, and don't enroll them in school.

If you think this sounds extreme, remember that it was the American way of life only 60 years ago.

And if you are able to keep them home during their school years, homeschool them. You CAN do it; millions already have.

 ☞ Disclaimer: This is not a politically-correct blog.

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents of school-age children, we guide you in homeschooling with the classics to raise more intelligent children of a better character.

Enroll using the link below and feel confident knowing you have the guidance and support you need to homeschool successfully.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with our online course, Raise Your Child to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and a Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach with 20+ years of experience working in children’s education.

Utilizing her unusual skill set, Elizabeth has developed a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child. She devotes her time to helping parents to get it right.

She is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.

“Elizabeth has given us counseling and guidance to help us succeed with our home school planning. When I feel overwhelmed, scared, or lose my confidence, she offers words of wisdom and support.”

— Sherry B., Pittsburg, PA

Should We Ban Trick-or-Treating?→

I took my kids trick-or-treating on a few occasions, but the more I thought about the messages we were communicating to our kids, the more I began to think trick-or-treating might not be such a great idea.

Ironically, while growing up, Halloween was one of my favorite holidays. What kid doesn't like candy? Having a free-for-all candy night with no adult supervision was the equivalent of kid Heaven.

But now, I stand on the side of those who think we should ban trick-or-treating.

#1 Reason to Ban Trick-or-Treating

Letting our children trick-or-treat contradicts our position that sugar is bad for their teeth and bad for them. We limit the sugar our children eat all year, but one day a year we give them a free rein to eat as much sugar as they want.

Do you have any idea how much sugar they consume? The average kid consumes three cups of sugar on Halloween!

Eating Halloween candy is not limited to one night, either. For however long it takes them to get through their bag of candy, that's how many days they are filling their bodies with harmful amounts of sugar.

The gross amount of sugar consumption creates severe sugar spikes in our children's blood levels, leaving them feeling not so well.

Overeating candy comes with the underconsumption of wholesome foods, which only exacerbates the problem.

Allowing our children to trick or treat on Halloween and eat so much candy is not practicing what we preach, nor is it responsible parenting. I'm guilty too, but when the facts are on the table—wow.

I read that one dentist pays children $2.00 for every pound of Halloween candy they give him. While I can appreciate the intention behind this gesture, is it sending our kids the right message?

We buy the candy, the kids knock on our doors, we give them the candy, and then the kids sell it to the dentist.

How can turning our kids into greedy candy peddlers be a solution? Greed is the #1 problem in the world today, and we are all suffering because of it. We don't want to encourage greediness in our children, do we?

#2 Reason to Ban Trick-or-Treating

We teach our kids not to talk to strangers, and we teach them that it isn't polite to ask people for things, yet, one night a year, we let our kids knock on the doors of strangers and ask them for candy.

One shameful moment for me as a kid happened one day on my way home from school. I had just turned twelve, and my best friend Bridget and I were famished after a long day sitting in classrooms.

At about 3:20 in the afternoon, as we were walking home with grumbling stomachs, we had this bright idea.

We could trick-or-treat!

We knocked on the door of an apartment near our school, and an elderly woman opened the door. Very surprised to see us, she asked, "Isn't it a little early, girls?" She gave us some candy anyway.

As an adult looking back, not just on that isolated incident but on the idea of knocking on a stranger's door and asking for candy, isn't this a contradiction?

We teach our kids not to speak to strangers and NEVER to take candy from a stranger, yet once a year, it is permissible. We teach them that it's not polite to ask for things, yet once a year, it is permitted.

#3 Reason to Ban Trick-or-Treating

But here's the crux of the matter: Halloween is a creepy holiday; it has gotten even creepier since the corporate world has taken it more seriously.

In my old neighborhood, a neighbor had gravestones on his front lawn and skeletons that moved and looked like they were coming out of graves. When we drove up the hill at night, my kids used to get scared because the scene looked so real.

So did I!

And that was a mild scene. My friend's neighbor in the town next to us would spend a fortune decorating his lawn until it looked like the scene out of a horror movie. I used to wonder what on earth that man was thinking.

Halloween is supposed to be for kids, not psychopaths.

I like the idea of carving pumpkins, but should we be wasting food like that? With so much starvation and deprivation in the world, it seems insensitive to waste pumpkins for a night of amusement.

For Halloween, about 22.2 million pumpkins go to waste! At your average price of $5.00 per pumpkin, that's 111,000,000 dollars of food that we waste. The average cost to feed one person per day in the US is supposed to be about $11.00 (seems very low); divided by 111, 000,000, we could feed 10 million people, roughly.

My god, that's shameful.

On second thought, we should ban Halloween.

☞ Disclaimer: This is not a politically-correct blog.

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents of school-age children, we guide you in homeschooling with the classics to raise more intelligent children of a better character.

Enroll using the link below and feel confident knowing you have the guidance and support you need to homeschool successfully.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with our online course, Raise Your Child to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and a Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach with 20+ years of experience working in children’s education.

Utilizing her unusual skill set, Elizabeth has developed a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child. She devotes her time to helping parents to get it right.

She is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.

“Elizabeth has given us counseling and guidance to help us succeed with our home school planning. When I feel overwhelmed, scared, or lose my confidence, she offers words of wisdom and support.”

— Sherry B., Pittsburg, PA

When Is Online Learning Recommended for Kids?

It is physically, emotionally, and intellectually superior to teach your kids without computers.

Yet, there are times when we can justify online learning for our kids, but these times should be the exception, not the rule.

The Problem with Screen Use

Sitting in front of a computer for long periods during the day is unhealthy, regardless of age. Yet, it is even worse for children because they are still developing the habits which will become their way of life. 

Their brain is also developing and needs exposure to environments that don’t hinder its development. 

We want our children to be physically active, socially competent, and intellectually sharp.

To accomplish these goals, we need to put our children in environments where they learn to enjoy physical activity, engage socially with people of all ages, and develop their minds, including their memory, which is a vital component of intelligence.

IT'S ALL ABOUT HABITS

Yet, a child who develops the habit of sitting in front of a computer for long periods during the day is not getting physical activity, social stimulation, or developing his memory. 

He is developing the habit of using the computer, which requires almost no moment on the user's part. It is an anti-social activity requiring no social skills and virtually no use of our memory.

As one young person said, "Who needs a memory when we have all the information we need at a push of the key?"

“Neurologist and Oxford professor Baroness Susan Greenfield believes that video game addiction can cause a form of what she describes as “dementia” in children.​”

Given that our memories are a part of our brains and that a good memory is always present in highly intelligent people, it would be prudent to develop and protect our memories by using them. 

We don't want to waste our or our children's minds sitting in front of screens tapping keys.

The Social Factor

Another parent noted that "online pupils tend to abandon manners that most would adhere to in the classroom."

One of the concerns, when a family is considering homeschooling, is the social factor. "Will my child develop good social skills?" Yet, we put our kids in front of computers and call that homeschooling without connecting the dots. 

Online learning is not homeschooling; it is anti-social schooling. 

Kids growing up in anti-social environments will most likely become anti-social adults. Online homeschooling, with kids sitting in front of computers for too many hours per day, will produce anti-social kids.

Developing social skills and learning to enjoy other people's company is a result of

1) being taught manners when young, so we don't offend others, and

2) having ample opportunity to practice social skills, so we learn to be comfortable and confident in social situations.

We also learn to enjoy the company of other people, and we discover much about ourselves by interacting with others. 

We are social creatures; living these technology-consuming, anti-social lives is unnatural!

Dumbed-Down Schooling

An in-person teacher provides a socially-active environment for children where they engage and develop their social skills. A teacher also creates an intellectually-stimulating environment for children where they can ask questions and search for answers. They hold books and learn to read well so they can tackle subjects independently.

If we aren't raising kids who know how to ask the right questions, who know how to find the answers, who know how to teach themselves, then, as Dorothy Sayers said in her essay on education, "...whatever instruction fails to do this is effort spent in vain." 

Online learning is effort spent in vain.

“Steve Jobs was not a proponent of tech in the classroom. His kids read real books. ”

— EYH

Even Steve Jobs was on to the problem with technology and children. Have you read his interview about it in the New York Times?

Lastly, let me briefly mention the ill effects of screen use on our physical, emotional, and intellectual health, according to the Mayo Clinic:

• Obesity

• Inadequate sleep schedules and insufficient sleep

• Behavior problems

• Delays in language and social skills development

• Violence

• Attention problems

• Less time learning

With attention problems also comes learning problems. Who’s fooling who?

“In a 2010 Iowa State University study published in the journal Pediatrics, viewing television and playing video games each are associated with increased subsequent attention problems in childhood.”

We know kids have died from blood clots after gaming for too long. We want to protect our kids from the habit of computer use until they are older when they can no longer avoid it. Hopefully, they'll be able to exercise sound judgment and self-control by then. 

When can we let our kids learn online?

We can let our kids learn online when we have exhausted all other options. 

Below the age of nine, I would not let my child near a computer. The brain is still in a crucial stage of development until a child reaches adolescence, when the brain does a self-pruning of any weak pathways. 

Age Nine

At nine, I would make an exception and let my child study Latin for half an hour online, one day a week. The rest of the week, I would do my best to help my child study, using the lessons for instruction and inspiration.

Age 13

Around the age of thirteen, if there were any subjects my child needed, such as more advanced mathematics, and I could not teach them, I would hunt high and low for a teacher.

I would try to find other homeschooling parents who might understand the subject and could teach my child. I might ask qualified neighbors or put an ad up in a local bookstore for a tutor. I would do everything I could to find a natural teacher.

“In a 2015 University of Utah School of Medicine brain imaging study published in the journal Addiction Biology, brain changes were measured in video gamers that are correlated with increased distractability, impulsivity (hallmarks of addiction and ADHD), schizophrenia and autism”

Once I had exercised all options, I might look online if I still could not find a teacher. But my goal would be to keep my child off the computer if I could help it, and if I could not help it, to restrict online learning as much as possible.

Age 16

If my child were older, say 16, according to my state's law, I might consider graduating him from high school and moving on to college or dual-enrollment in our local community college. 

College is our best option for an older child when in-person teachers are unavailable.

☞ Disclaimer: This is not a politically-correct blog.

Don’t miss our free download, Ten Books Every Well-Educated Child Should Read.

When you join the Smart Homeschooler Academy online course for parents, I guide you in homeschooling with the classics to raise intelligent children without computers. You can enroll using the link below and be confident knowing you can and will homeschool successfully.

For parents of children under age seven who would like to prepare their child for social and academic success, please begin with our online course, Raise Your Child Well to Thrive in Life and Excel in Learning.

Elizabeth Y. Hanson is an Educator, Homeschool Emerita, Writer, and a Love and Leadership Certified Parenting Coach with 20+ years of experience working in children’s education.

Utilizing her unusual skill set, Elizabeth has developed a comprehensive understanding of how to raise and educate a child. She devotes her time to helping parents get it right.

She is available for one-on-one consultations as needed.