July 4, 2025 • 56 mins
Burnout doesn’t become you—but if you’re homeschooling more than one child with Montessori, it might feel inevitable. In this episode, you’ll learn how teach more than one child in different planes of development at the same time without exhausting yourself. With the right expectations and support, Montessori can do the heavy lifting so your kids grow and learn together, and you're able to sit back sometimes and laugh with them.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Hey there friends, I'm Aubrey Harkis.
Today's episode is a replay fromthe Child of the Redwoods live
show that I host with my husbandand Montessori homeschooling
partnering crime David Harkis. You can watch the full episode
on the Child of the Redwoods YouTube channel.
Here's the clip. You can absolutely have
(00:24):
peaceful, beautiful, productive homeschool days even if you're
teaching more than one child in a different plane of
development. Trying to teach a toddler and a
preschooler and maybe an elementary kid in there in the
mix can be really, really tough and unfortunately, can sometimes
lead to homeschool burnout. It's a real thing.
(00:46):
We're going to talk about it today.
We're going to give you tips andsome strategies for what to do
when you start to feel that exhaustion creeping in and if
you're not feeling it yet, hopefully how to stave it off or
to recognize the signs of it when you start to feel that
overwhelm creeping in. This is something I think that
(01:08):
every homeschooler who has more than one child at home at the
same time has felt. So this is, you know that you're
not alone. That's right.
So how do you go about teaching children at different levels,
often different ages, but not necessarily but without burning
(01:29):
out? I mean, it is a question we get
a lot, many homeschool families have multiple children.
They're some, some families of course, have an only child, but
we know that a lot of families have too.
We know when we were at the conference just a few days a
couple weeks ago in Texas, we met people with five, four or
five kids. Some of them.
(01:49):
Yeah, and they had a huge range.I would say it's the it's
probably if you have only one child, then just like let this
one slide over your head. But I would say it's like the
norm for a lot of homeschool families to have more than one
child. I forget what the average
American household is now, but it.
Was 2 1/2 right? Something like that now.
(02:10):
So if you do have an only child,just, you know, maybe come back
in 20 minutes for Mr. Bunny. But if you don't have an only
child, you're probably. Just hang out and listen to a
lot of only children end up playing with other kids.
And if you're teaching more thanone child at a time, maybe you
have a homeschool Co-op. All of this applies to you too.
That's right anyway, so if you are ready to take some of that
(02:33):
stress off your plate, we have some techniques that can help.
Last week we started this serieson multi age children talking
about why Montessori is particularly good for families
that have more than one child ofdifferent ages.
Now again, it works for all families, whether you have a a
single child or you have a wholebunch of them.
(02:54):
It's really, really good either way.
But for those who do are are homeschooling multiple kids at
the same time, Montessori is really, you know, precisely made
for those circumstances. And go back and watch last
week's episode if you like some of those techniques.
This week, what we want to talk about is how do you do that
(03:15):
while keeping your sanity? Yes, exactly.
And we came up with four strategies that we want to share
with you today. And I know we have a pretty good
crowd out there. Welcome everybody who's joining
us live. If you have thoughts or
suggestions or comments on any of this, please pop those in the
comment in the in the comments. We love reading your chats.
(03:40):
OK, so let's start. I would also say even if you're
not watching live, we come back and get the comments later too,
so we will respond to you. Reach out anytime.
That's right. OK, so first, the first strategy
we came up with was respect eachchild's needs.
Now, this sounds kind of straightforward and obvious,
(04:01):
duh. But it's actually an important
mindset. I think what we, I think what we
often do when we try to homeschool, you know what we
have? We have two boys.
And it can be really tempting. And I think because this is what
we see in schools is to segregate the children apart.
(04:23):
Like you're going to work on your stuff here because you're
3, and you're going to work on your stuff here because you're 5
and you're going to work on yourstuff here because you're 7.
And that's not the way we would suggest you organize your home.
Like there are times for that and there are times not for
that. And the mindset really needs to
be, we're going to have family lessons, but we're going to
(04:45):
respect each child's needs through them.
So for example, if you have a little guy, you're going to want
to make sure you're leaving space in that activity for them
to feel included without the expectation that they're going
to learn a lot from it. Like they may actually learn a
lot, but you're not setting out to have make sure that the
(05:05):
three-year old is getting the same level of information and
understanding that the five or six year old is, but you're
going to include them both. Even though the three-year old
isn't going to get the same thing out of the same amount of
information from the lesson as the six year old, you include
them both. It's not going to hurt this 3
year old event. It's going to help them.
(05:27):
Conversely, you also want to make sure that you're giving
your big kids, the six year old in this example, time to go work
in private. You don't, you don't want to
force them to work together all the time.
And this is reflective of the developmental stages.
You want to give your 3 year oldtime to feel part of it.
I mean, all of us who've got kids, you know, a Big Brother,
(05:49):
little brother situation or whatever you might have, the
little brother always wants to be doing what the Big Brother is
doing or the big sibling, right?They just want to be part of
their world in a real way. Yeah, our kids, we used to tag
team actually, if you remember, like it usually started with the
little one would want to do whatthe older one was doing, but
then you'd finally get the little 1 settled in something
(06:11):
and the older would abandoned their work and then just want to
come over and play with whateverwas going on over here that
looked more interesting. That's right.
And that's so this is where respecting the child's needs
comes to life, right? The three-year old needs to be
with the five year old or 6 yearold or or the other child and
following along. They don't want to feel left
out. And we're going to, we want to
(06:33):
resist the temptation to say no,no, no, this is too advanced for
you or you'll find this boring, or this is inappropriate for you
and to say, yeah, let's, let's all learn together.
And you we've, I've used this analogy many times.
A child is like a cup. Actually humans are kind of like
cups. They'll hold as much as they can
and you can continue pouring information into them like water
(06:55):
into a cup and it'll just overflow and it's not going to
make a mess. It doesn't cause a problem.
They're going to hold what they can.
Your 3 year old will get from the lesson what the what the
three-year old can get. The six year old will get more.
You don't harm the three-year old.
Now the six year old. This again goes to respecting
each child's needs. The six year old is going to
want in a 7 and 8 especially is going to want to have time to go
(07:18):
off, maybe sit quietly, maybe read, do their own work.
Hey. He's always in my stuff.
Get away from me, you know, go back and watch Mr. Bunny from
last week for some examples of that, right?
Respect that too, right? The three-year old can't always
be with the six or seven-year old.
The six and seven-year old needstime to go off and explore
(07:39):
because developmentally, that's also where they're at.
They're in a journey into the mind, it's the journey to
abstraction and they need time to practice abstract thinking
internally. And so respecting them means
also giving them time to go off and learn.
So the way you might actually see this in practices, you give
a common lesson, let's say a lesson about a scientific
(08:02):
lesson. Let's say I know this coming
month we are doing smile and conservation.
We're going to do an experiment with egg shells.
We're going to put them in different kinds of acids or, or
base, like we're going to put itin water and lemon juice and
vinegar, I think, right. So you have various types of
liquids at least I'll say, and you're going to see what
(08:25):
happens. An older child is going to
really be able to make keen observations and keep a chart.
The younger child is not, but the younger child can still
participate in that activity. And we would encourage all the
children to participate, even ifthey're older teenagers, to
participate in the activity itself, and then to let each
(08:45):
child's need particular needs tobe expressed in the reflection.
Part yeah, I'm going to give another example, this one from
the theme that we're currently doing this month, which is pets.
A lot of our families are doing the pets poll and you actually
created like a little lab sheet for that.
And it's a classic elementary school activity where you graph
(09:08):
your favorite pet. You can pull people.
Fish. Dog, what kind of pets is your
favorite, right? It's very, very common to see
this in first grade or second grade especially.
I'll ask a neighbor, ask somebody, right?
And then you put a check mark. And you can make a little bar
graph of the favorite pets. So classic, but actually like a
really great activity because itcan easily be scaled up or
(09:31):
scaled down. And for those little ones, like
it's important to allow them to participate.
Even if they don't understand the concept of graphing, they
can still understand the conceptof people making an affirmed,
opinionated choice. Yeah.
And also the practice of asking somebody a question and then
(09:54):
receiving their answer. I mean, there are just
innumerable valuable lessons fora little 1.
So often people will look at ourcurriculum and they'll say,
like, oh, I think this is too advanced for my toddler.
And I will say Montessori is very advanced.
It's a really, it's a high levelcurriculum is how I like to
(10:16):
describe it to families. Like you're going to look at
this and and you're going to saylike I've got a 2 year old who's
mostly like throwing their fish crackers across the room.
What are they going to get out of this graphing activity?
Actually, a whole lot. A whole lot.
But not the same thing as the seven-year old.
Not as much. And that, yes, totally different
things for different ages of children, but it's an example of
(10:38):
the way that one of our lessons can just easily be scaled up for
the older child to maybe be interpreting this graph in
different ways. Like you can make a bar graph,
pie chart or a line graph. And older kids will be more
ready and receptive for that, especially like your 8 year old.
(10:58):
But for your 6 year old, for your five year old, they might
be more interested in a physicalrepresentation of graphing using
Legos, or I think it was using your goldfish to graft with and
your youngest, like you've got your toddler, they're still
learning all those great lessons.
(11:19):
You're just paring down the choices.
Maybe you're proposing to pull people for whether they like a
cat better or a fish better, youknow, and just see those
results. It's enough, you know, to to not
have to have the whole scope. But this is like on that lesson
giving level. But I'd also like to talk about
kind of on that macro level of thinking of your home school
(11:42):
rhythm and your routine. And in Montessori, we have a
concept called the prepared environment.
That's right. And this when we talk about like
teaching children at different levels by respecting their
needs, you're going to need to make sure that your environment
is reflective of your children'scurrent needs.
(12:02):
And so that means that if you'vegot a little one who's really
into pretend play, you need to make sure that that need is
representative. Yeah, the exactly you've.
Got. The exactly whatever you pull
your I, you know, I promise you pull your toddler and your older
preschool aged child. Say you're you're four or five
(12:24):
year old into a Montessori homeschool room that's outfitted
specifically with primary and lower elementary materials for
your older kids. Your toddler is just going to
throw the blocks across the roomand it's going to be a big mess,
right. So we want to make sure that if
we've got a baby on our hip, that there are things in the
(12:45):
environment for the baby. And we see this in public spaces
all the time. Dave and I are always constantly
looking, you know, public libraries or in libraries
actually do a pretty good job. They do better than they used
to, but we actually. Museums are not.
The often museums are ahead. Yeah, they do struggle, but a
(13:07):
way, a good way to think about this would be to think about
adult spaces where people often have to bring their children or
do bring their children. So I'm thinking like coffee
shops, libraries, museums, churches, like places that where
we generally think of as like places for adults who already
(13:31):
know how to behave well to go inand engage in public.
But I'll tell you, I've been in coffee shops that are very adult
oriented. There's no like there's no place
for children in them. It seems that there was one
coffee shop I went into with a homeschool friend.
The whole place was just set up for laptops for people to do
their work. And it was dead quiet in there.
(13:53):
There was no talking. It was absolutely silent.
And we went in there with our kids and we were like, we're the
only people talking. And of course, our kids are
like, you know, they're eating their croissants and getting
crumbs around. And the adults around us are
like, frowning and like, I'm on a work call or, you know, I'm
doing my doing my work. What are you bothering me?
(14:16):
And I'm like, this is a public space, and children should be
welcome everywhere. Maria Montessori firmly believed
in this. And she just decried it
constantly in every one of her lectures.
She was like, the world is designed for adults.
And no. And have people forgotten that
children, I don't know how many children there are in the world,
(14:36):
but it's like an enormous amountof the population of people on
Earth, right? So like, why are we creating
these adult only spaces or children only spaces?
So another example is you go into the library with your kids,
say you're an adult and you actually are also interested in
(14:57):
reading some fiction or non fiction for yourself.
There is a clear children's areaand a clear adults area.
And we just firmly separate the 2.
So when you think about an adultgoing into a space that's only
designed for adults, this is very, very anxious because
there's nothing for the kids to do there.
(15:18):
So Dave and I play this game allthe time.
We're out in public spaces and we're like, where's the basket
full of toys for babies? Or, you know, like, where are
the children's books here? I'm in.
I'm in these adult books. And it's just like you, you're
welcome to carry on this missionof Montessori to evaluate the
environments that are in your public areas.
(15:40):
And so an emphasis that you might think about thinking in
the same vein is, is your space set up?
Is there a space for your baby to engage with?
Is there a place for your toddler to freely play without
being reprimanded all the time for not using the materials
appropriately? Is there a space for your older
(16:02):
child? As David has mentioned, older
children need private spaces andthis generally starts around age
4. For 4 1/2 or so, there's kind of
a transition happening there. If anyone who has a four year
and a half year old is watching now, you know, 4 1/2 is it's a
big transition period. That is when children do start
(16:23):
to need some space away from a little 1A.
A three-year old will generally,you know, engage more.
Your older child really needs that preserved space.
Sometimes your 3 year old does too as well.
But I noticed it much more just becomes more important with the
older children. And so is there a space in this
(16:43):
room or this area where you are with your kids and your home
where your children can fully betheir full selves, working on
their skills that they need to develop and need to work on that
is fully appropriate for them. That's special, right?
And so a lot of families will have like the one shelf for the
specifically with toddler toys, one shelf that's very
(17:07):
specifically for primary age toys.
They think their family kind of works it that way.
I remember, I know a lot of our families will actually put a
baby gate up. And usually we think about the
baby gate as or a playpen or whatever is like to contain the
toddler, right? Put the baby in the playpen.
But actually what our families have been doing is putting the
(17:28):
older child in the playpen or the older child within the baby
dated area and the baby on the outside so that they can freely
explore the rest of the environment.
And yet there's still a preserved space for an older
child. So.
I'm going to bring these two ideas together with the
respecting each child's need. The concept would be we would
(17:52):
encourage you to give common lessons and then have prepared
your environment to allow the children after that common
lesson to go off and explore in whatever way is right.
So for the older child, maybe it's going off to a private area
to do the work, to read, to journal, to draw to whatever, to
do the math lesson for the younger child.
(18:14):
Play with Legos is very common. For the younger child, maybe
more of the tactile, get the play 6 silks out, maybe just
actually do something completelydifferent.
Movement. Which actually goes to the next
tip, which is be realistic with yourself.
All right, you're going to set the table.
You're going to give the common lesson that for example, let's
say the one on the pet, you say we're going to do this lesson on
(18:37):
pets and pet popularity. And then we're going to you're
going to go off an interview andyou've set the table and your
two or three-year old or 4 year old just doesn't want to do like
even though you've scaled it down, you've made it simpler.
They're just not it. They want to go and get the
little. They want to get their little
toy stuffy dog and make them talk or play around with them
(19:01):
like, oh, Pat, yeah, I love my dog, right?
Be realistic with yourself. You can set the table, but you
can't make the meat. Or as the old saying goes, you
can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink,
right? You can't force learning.
Now you can force compliance to somebody.
You can make people sit. You can make them complete work.
(19:23):
You can do all kinds of things. Schools are very good at that by
using the various forms of punishment and incentives, but
to actually force somebody to learn has to come from within.
The spark has to start within for it to actually take.
Especially if you're trying to do something much more advanced
than a root skill. Like if you want somebody to
(19:45):
learn how to sew, you could probably force them to do that
because it's a mechanical skill that they can repeat.
You want them to think abstractly and design a new
outfit that has to come from within.
And so you cannot force learning.
You, the parent, the teacher parent.
(20:07):
You have to accept that at the end of the day, the child is
responsible for the learning. Be realistic.
You can set the table. You can give the common lesson.
You cannot force them to do it with joy, with an outcome that
you want. They will find ways to defy.
(20:28):
All parents know this. It's not your fault.
It's not your fault, It's just how learning works.
So on being realistic with yourself, I love that you talk
about setting the table and we would in Montessori, we would
often call this like you preparethe environment and you prepare
(20:51):
your lesson. You like you prep your lesson,
you print out your materials, you read through, you know, we
have all of our lessons are scripted.
So like, what does that mean? You read through the script.
You familiarize yourself with the last.
That is your responsibility. Exactly.
Yeah, all of those things, preparing the environment,
choosing what toys are in the room or what materials are out
(21:15):
or or not. Picking interesting things.
All of those are your responsibility.
But on this note of like being realistic, I want to be really
clear that most Montessori parents will fail if they
believe that they are 100% responsible for what the
learning outcomes are going to be.
(21:37):
And so Davis''s words are reallyright on the money here.
You cannot control what your child learns.
You can't control, you can control what you teach, you
know, you can say, hey, I'm going to teach you, I'm going to
teach you about pets this month and you're welcome to do these
activities or, or just watch me do them.
You know, which a lot of our kids in our program do anyway.
(22:00):
That's great for them. Observing is 100% participating
in a lesson, even if they're notthe ones doing the writing,
watching it counts. All right, you can control that,
but you cannot control how quickly they progress in skills
and you can't control what they take out of a lesson, you know?
(22:20):
So what your toddler takes out of that pets poll popularity
contest might be the grace and courtesy, right?
Or it might be the value of making a choice in decision
making, or it might be the differences noting the
differences between those two kinds of pets.
You don't know, you don't know what learning outcomes are going
(22:43):
to happen. And when we taught in a
traditional school, I remember being required to state the
objective at the beginning of every single lesson.
And you know, we, we sort of do that, you know, here in our
constellation themes as well, for example, Oh, I just opened
it up to the pet popularity poll.
(23:03):
How fun is that? We've categorized this, even
though we've talked about it could be practical life, it
could be all these other things.We've categorized it under math
and we've said your child is learning how to collect data,
count with telemarks, organize information visually using
graphs like these are all possible outcomes.
(23:26):
Yeah, the lesson was designed byus instructional designers to
reinforce these concepts, right?If you do this do the activity
as described, then these outcomes are possible.
Right, But whose job is it to actually have these learning
outcomes? It's the child.
(23:46):
It's your child. I mean, you can make them do the
tally marks whether they'll remember it or care about it or
apply it like that might not even in some cases be within
their complete control because there's planes of development
they may. That's where sometimes parents
get in trouble too, is they expect things from children
because they'll read a book or they'll go, they'll see a source
(24:09):
online or they'll see a video like oh, all 5 year olds are
supposed to be doing X and then your child isn't doing X and
you're like, Oh no, I must be failing.
That's just not how learning works.
If you're preparing the environment, if you're supplying
the child with rich, good, focused activities that are
creative and inviting, then you are doing the part that's
(24:31):
important, like the part that the child has to learn and is
essential for success in all life, is self, is self
regulation and determination. They have to learn to want the
out. They have to learn to want the
outcome themselves. And when we teach children,
that's a big part of what it's about is helping a child learn
(24:51):
that we want children to developthis fire inside it, this
intrinsic motivation that then propels them to the rest of
their life so that they are successful and happy and
independent and creative and allthe things that we value as
humans, That's what we're tryingto do.
And so these lessons, you can set the table you must, but you
(25:14):
have to be realistic that it's up to them to eat.
Yeah. And this being realistic about
these, the wildness of possible learning outcomes that could
happen and the the progression of skills that's on a timetable
that you can't control is going to help prevent that burnout
(25:34):
that you might feel. You're much more likely to feel
burned out when you have very specific learning out yourself.
To an impossible. Stand Exactly.
And so part of the strategy is, yes, you're going to respect
your children's needs. That is going to help you
prevent burnout because you're going to be honing in on your
child's developmental levels. And the other piece here that
(25:55):
we're talking about is taking the pressure off by being very
clear about what your responsibility is with each of
your children or all of your children, and what
responsibility is not. And we talk about this all the
time inside our courses, in our Foundations of Montessori
courses. But you are welcome to learn
(26:17):
more about it. Child of the Redwoods.
Over to our website, childoftheredwoods.com.
Our complete and unlimited plansinclude the full scope and
sequence and all the foundational foundations of
Montessori information. You need to kind of start to
understand the philosophy that makes this happen.
OK, so we talked about you want to invite everyone in, but then
(26:37):
give them a place to learn. You want to be realistic that
you can do all of all of that and you won't necessarily at the
moment see the outcome. Doesn't mean that they're not
learning. You as the parent are the 1st
and best teacher in your child'slife always.
The third tip though, feeds ontothat it's you need to know where
(26:57):
your child is at in terms of their level, right?
So, for example, a little guy needs a lot of, not a lot
actually, I'm going to take thatback.
A little guy needs no talking, just demonstration.
You need to know where your child is at in the developmental
plane and in the level curriculum to know how to
(27:19):
present the lesson best for them.
An older child, they need conversation, they need moral
quandaries to work through. They want to challenge and
think. You need to know where your
child is at through the developmental stages and where
they fit on the scope and sequence.
So we have our, our scope and sequences available.
(27:43):
We put them on these cards and then you use a different, you
use the cards to essentially deal lessons each week for your
your kids to work on. They cover all the foundational
lessons and they are all integrated back into
Constellation. So by doing Constellation,
you're also doing the foundational lessons.
And if you know where your childis at in this level curriculum,
(28:04):
we've leveled the scope and sequence one to six.
You will be more prepared to give the child where they what
they need. You'll be able to more correctly
respect what the child is needing at that moment.
You'll also be able to tell whenthe lesson is just not hitting.
You're being realistic with yourself and you're like,
(28:25):
something's not working and being able to recognize like
this is just too advanced and actually the child is getting
out of the lesson. What the child can your child is
getting from this lesson on the shell experimentation or the pet
popularity poll, what they can get, It may not be what you
expected, but actually your expectations may not align with
(28:47):
what's realistic for a child of that age.
And this is where you would lookat the level curriculum and your
understanding of the planes of development and say, you know,
for a three-year old, that's actually right on the money.
And for if I was seeing that from a 7 year old, then I might
interrogate that a little further.
Is it just not hitting the mark?Is there something else that I
(29:09):
should think through? Again, this is where
understanding the the foundations of Montessori come
to play. But knowing that level is a key
to helping you set those realistic expectations.
Correct. And in our curriculum, we have
levels. We have two actually two ways
that you can kind of determine your child's level.
One is inside our thematic curriculum where we have our
(29:31):
everyone can play section and wehave it broken into toddlers
primary and elementary. And you know, we we say our
curriculum is for ages roughly 2to 9, OK.
Because there's definitely stuffthat works for all of those age
groups inside every single theme, if not every single
(29:52):
lesson within everything. And you would be surprised at
how some of the older children reinterpret some of the more
basic lessons that you would think of as introductory for a
toddler. Like a practical life lesson
that seems right on the money for a three-year old.
You could put it in a nine year old's hands.
It can be very fascinating. Super interesting, yeah.
And incredibly beneficial for children to revisit these
(30:15):
concepts. So we take that approach and so
this is a very easy way that youcan look and say, OK, well,
what, what level is my child at?We'll give you a little bit of a
guide here generally for a toddler, try these things.
And a lot of our parents will look at these and they'll say,
my, I have a primary child. But actually they're they are
(30:37):
more capable, like they are moreadvanced in this particular
subject area and we can start doing some of those elementary
lessons. And that's why we don't and
that's why we don't say ages or grades, right, say toddler
primary and elementary because they're a bit looser.
And it really goes to this, respecting each child's needs
and then getting much more macrowith micro with.
(30:58):
That and I was going to say on the converse, we also have some
older children who are special needs and who interact much more
in a way that is more sensory, like a toddler would interact
with something due to their developmental nature and their
just the way they are perceivingtheir world.
And there is absolutely nothing wrong with your children having
(31:22):
different skill levels in different subject areas.
In fact, Montessori prides itself on this concept of
individualized differentiated instruction.
All right, so we are already having, we're going to give you
a high level curriculum that works for a variety of age
(31:44):
groups with every single theme. And we're gonna guide you
through like if you've got a toddler, you're kind of looking
in this direction. If you've got an elementary kid,
you're like, you're gonna extendit in this particular way.
And of course, you as the homeschooling guide have the
power to take your child up, up a level or down a level.
(32:07):
And you should be doing this with every lesson you give.
And this is one of the, the one of the things that we dislike
the most about traditional curriculum is it tends to be
very prescriptive about age, la age groups.
And in Montessori, we are not prescriptive about age.
Instead, we are encouraging you to constantly modify for your
(32:31):
individual child's needs. And the second way is.
That goes with this. So in the constellation we have
3 ranges and then in the foundations curriculum we get
more specific and we have 6 levels.
And so for example, here's a level 2 reading car.
This is fluency is the key. So these would be lessons we
(32:53):
have reading short phrases, reading beginning of your books,
reading beginner sentences. You would go look up the steps
to do those different lessons and the objectives that go with
it in the material. But those are the kinds of
things that level 2 child would work on.
A level three child, as an example, is we're going to work
on. In this case, this is a spelling
card. This is also from reading.
(33:15):
So spelling silent E words, bossy R words, tricky R words,
etcetera, etcetera. There's a number of lessons.
Doesn't matter really what age your child is.
We're not saying this is for four and this is for five.
We're saying this is a predecessor skill.
It's a level 2 skill. This is a Level 3 card.
These are skill. This, the skills represented by
(33:37):
these various lessons aren't come after this.
You'd want to be comfortable. In fact, you'd want to be at the
B level, which means building. So your child is really
comfortable. Can apply this in these ideas
and creative ways before progressing to this because it
will help and it doesn't matter if your child is 3, your child
(33:59):
is five, your child is five, your child is 6.
It doesn't matter you're following the child through the
different levels. So going to tie this in as we're
thinking like these three thingsso far that we've mentioned in a
sequence you're going to again first respect the child's
individual needs. Give a common lesson, but
prepare your environment and leteach child's specific
(34:23):
developmental needs and intellectual needs and creative
needs come to life. Private space maybe for the
older child to go. For your older child to go and
read and study. A more open, tactile, sensorial
space for your younger child to play around with.
After you've presented a common lesson, you're going to be
realistic. Just because you presented this
gangbusters lesson that's super fun and everybody else in the
(34:46):
community seems to be having a great time with it and the kids
just aren't getting it, that's not on you.
If you've prepared the environment and you've presented
the lesson, it's up to the child.
They have ownership. In fact, they have chief
ownership over the learning. Yeah, your child always has
ownership over their learning. That's right.
Third, you're going to then lookat that situation and you're
(35:08):
going to say where are my children level wise?
Where are they are their predecessor skills that we might
need to introduce. So maybe the pet poll is going
back to that one. Maybe they're not.
Maybe my 7 or 8 year old is not able to do the graphing.
And I thought that they were supposed to.
Well, that's where you would come into the level curriculum
(35:29):
and know like, oh, you know what?
There's some actual predecessor skills in the math curriculum.
I think graphic would be a math.So what are those skills?
OK, that's a level 50. I see there's some level 4
skills in math that just aren't there yet.
That could be why they're not doing the graphing work.
There could be other reasons, but that is a way that you would
(35:52):
start to troubleshoot it. So knowing your child's level
can then help you approach that situation.
And then let's go to the last one, which I think we too often
underestimate the importance of,and that is self-care, right?
You've done all that you can. You've created the right
environment. You are being realistic with
(36:14):
yourself, or you're trying to beat all times.
You are studying and thinking and noting and still you go to
bed and you feel like a failure.It happens.
Burnout is real. It is and it happens.
Teaching is hard. Parenting is very hard.
What do you get when you put those two things together?
(36:37):
The impossible sandwich, right? I mean, it's just really,
really, really hard. You've got to have a community
and you've got to have friends and you've got to have practices
that will keep you going. When you feel that nagging doubt
that we all feel, every one of us will feel.
That yes, in our community, I will say that our members do a
(36:58):
really great job of sharing their self-care strategies and
also that there is, there are some tried and true general
strategies that work for almost universally for everyone.
You know, And you already mentioned one of them, which is
like peer support and the the social support of others.
(37:18):
It doesn't have to be someone inthe same age group as you.
It could be multi generational rights type of support, but
having a social connection, justbeing with another person is
extremely powerful. I remember reading in, I
remember reading or learning a while back, the power of the
(37:40):
hug, like the social hug is so strong and powerful.
It's it's basically universal. I mean, I'm I'm going to say
there are definitely exceptions to every single rule.
You know, there are someone, some people who just cannot be
touched, right? But for most of us, like a a
32nd long hug actually does havea significant impact on our
(38:04):
mental well-being. Another one is exposure to
nature. And so I mean, children are
really great. I will say it, giving 32nd hugs,
they'll give you like 32nd and then some, you know, like the
never ending hug. You know, it's still like every
time I get one of those for my kids and like, don't, don't
(38:26):
break the hug, respect the need for connection, even though I'm
like in the like, my hands are in the middle of those.
Right. But yeah, it does have a
physiological effect. Is that social and nature as
well? Like it's, it's very common.
Like almost everybody knows about the forest bathing effect
(38:47):
or the plants in a hospital roomor even the window where a
patient can see a tree outside. They just do better physically,
they're more likely to recover. And so people can, you can get
in that self-care through naturein the ways that work for you.
And I will say, some of our members do this by really
(39:09):
getting into nature. We have some members who are
just constantly out hiking with their kids, constantly doing
forest playgroup type of stuff. And they find it very
restorative. And others are not really so
much about the hiking, like there's bugs and ticks out there
and like some people, it's just not for everybody, right?
But maybe those people have a plant at home that they take
(39:32):
care of or? Maybe pets that is a part of
with their family or. Yeah, I mean.
Garden. Pets are nature as well.
You're right. Yeah, sure.
Absolutely. Yeah.
A. Trinity Garden maybe?
A garden, or maybe a little garden outside.
Botanical Garden in their city that they go to from time to
time. Or just an herb on the
(39:54):
windowsill. I mean, there are lots of ways
that we can use these bigger concepts of caring for our
mental and emotional well-being in ways that work for us.
And I think often parents, especially, like new parents,
new to this kind of feeling of overwhelming failure, tend to
(40:14):
feel isolated and like, you know, like.
I'm trying everything. Nothing is working.
And I think it's important to recognize that self-care
strategies are very individualized.
You know, like we all benefit from reflecting on our
experiences. Some of us do that reflection
(40:36):
and find it more beneficial to write it down in a journal
style. Some of us hate journaling,
don't want anything to do with it and find it better just to
tell another person, you know, their journal.
Like feelings is someone that you trust and, and love or to
say it in a prayer or, you know,like they're just many, many
ways. But it's very, very important
(40:59):
that you find what works for youand that you not just think, I'm
supposed to be doing this, you know, to take care of self-care
and recognizing that if you're engaging with something that's
supposed to be self-care, but it's actually not serving you,
that you just let it. Go and.
Find the thing that works for you, OK?
(41:20):
Our members in our community, they are into a variety of
things that nourish them. Right now, what's nourishing me
is pottery. I'm finding it very, very good
for my mental well-being. I'm also a journaler.
I like to write things down. But we have members who are into
crochet and knitting. I know we've got some big
(41:41):
knitters in our community, a famous crochet or in our
community. We've got members who who
express their creativity throughclay or through creative arts.
We've got parents in there who really are into pretend play
with their kids, which is great.Also, parents who don't want
anything to do with pretend playwith their kids, and they need
(42:03):
to have that quiet space. Oh, I know a parent who swears
by bath time. Yeah.
And every single night like thisis the bottom line got lots of
kids in the house don't want to experience burnout and she
preserves like this is the 30 minute bath that always happens
regardless of whatever else is happening.
(42:25):
Unfortunately has a a partner who can help take care of the
kids during this time so she cantake that self that bath
self-care for herself. It is just like an unquestioned
this is this is what's going to happen every day and it is the
thing that saves her sanity. So there's something out there
for everybody. You don't have to do all the
things, but you do have to do something.
(42:48):
You have to do something to refill and replenish yourself.
And it doesn't have to be it doesn't have to look like
traditional me time, you know, in parents speak, it can look
like whatever it looks like. That's realistic for you at
this. Point time for you to
decompress. And I want to under score
finding your people, whether youare more of a lurker in a
(43:09):
community or a really active participant, having a community
that you can be associated with gives us that sense of
belonging. And I think we often put it in
terms of won't my kids miss out on social activities if I
(43:29):
homeschool? And I think the equally
important question or maybe the underlying question is won't I
miss out? And the answer to both is you
will if you don't try. But if you make a little bit of
an effort, there's a lot of folks out there.
Your kids will have a robust social life just like they would
if they went to public school orprivate school.
(43:50):
And you had to find plenty of like minded, supportive moms and
dads and mentors out there who will guide you along the way.
On that note, we have a comment from Ted Lee Ever After, the
producer of our favorite bear themed teddy bear themed YouTube
channel. I think.
(44:11):
Yep, says your community. Your community is gold.
I'm constantly running into posewhere I fully relate in this
exchange of ideas and solidaritymake all the difference in our
homeschooling journey. Aw.
That's wonderful to hear, I I feel the same way.
Yeah, it's really gratifying to see that interaction.
(44:31):
And when you see community members connecting and solving
problems with each other as a teacher, like that is kind of
the goal, right? Like you, you want to see your
students, in this case our members, making real
connections. Like, it's gratifying on its
(44:52):
own. And the same way that is for,
you know, all educators. So I love hearing that.
Thank you so much for sharing and being with us today.
OK, Now if you like these tips, remember we talked about thank
you wrong way. I just want to.
So we talked about respecting each child's particular needs.
(45:14):
We talked about setting realistic expectations for
yourself. We talked about knowing your
child's level and we talked about practicing self-care, and
you can master all of these techniques.
We've created a program, a set of programs over the years that
can teach you and enable you to bring all this to life at home
(45:35):
using the Montessori approach. You can find out all about it
over on our website, childredwoods.com.
We have several. We have two really big plans
that we would prefer that you think about if you're wanting
the full experience. One is the complete curriculum,
which will teach you the philosophy of Montessori.
It's going to give you the full foundational curriculum and
(45:55):
access to the themes. And if you want to go to the
next level, we have our unlimited plan, which includes
live coaching and a bunch of other awesome benefits.
New benefits come out every month.
And in addition to that, like I said, you get that live
coaching. Live coaching for primary and
for the lower elementary classesstarts in September.
(46:16):
Actually, the orientation is in August.
So if you're interested in learning how to really bring
primary and lower elementary to life in your home school, join
us. Join at the unlimited level,
take a full, it's a full year program of coaching.
You get everything that's included.
Yep. And you can just really bring
your home schooling to the next level, just like our friend
(46:38):
Tedley. Yeah.
Yes, all right. Beautiful.
OK, well. Cowabunga dudes.
Cowabunga dudes. Cowabunga dudes.
That's right. Oh, that's surfing Bunny.
Surfing Bunny. Surfing Bunny.
(47:00):
Wipe out. Wipe out.
Well, Mr. Bunny, well, you're really on fire.
I sure am on fire. I'm on fire with my excitement
for. The.
Beach, I'm so excited. I wrote a song.
Are you ready for my song? Yes.
Say Cowabunga surfing party. Cowabunga surfing party.
(47:23):
Cowabunga surfing party. Yay.
Isn't that good? I'm going to sing that the whole
time that I have to drive to thebeach with my family.
Yeah, you know what? It's a 12 hour drive and I'm
sure we're all going to enjoy mesinging Cowabunga surfing party
for 12 hours. Yay.
Wow, that's a long time. No, now it takes a long time.
(47:47):
Do you have any idea how small rabbit cars are?
Because we're only about half a mile to the beach.
Oh, wait. Right, aren't we?
Maybe I should look at that map again.
You have to go through Idaho first, right?
Oh, you're going to go this way to the beach?
(48:08):
Well, I'll double check that. Oh boy, I'm so excited.
You know what I love the most about going to the beach?
What I love? Building sandcastles.
I love that too. And then I love tearing down my
sand castles. Yep, that's awesome fun.
And then I love building them again.
Yes, I do love it all. There's one thing I really
(48:29):
wanted to try, but I have to be honest, I'm a little nervous.
And that is I, I'm, I'm scared of surfing.
I want to learn to surf. Oh, and I'm scared.
I'm a lot scared. I thought you were already a
surfing Bunny. No, I'm just.
I'm just hoping that if I sing my surfing Bunny song, it'll
it'll give me the confidence to do it.
(48:51):
I've been I've been going all over asking for help and
everything. I I asked the shark for advice,
but I just don't trust him, you know?
He's a great white liar. Yeah.
And the shellfish, they weren't helpful at all.
Oh, no, Sir. No.
They were too crabby. The shellfish.
(49:12):
Weren't crabbed, but not all of them.
Some were a little shrimpy. I just didn't hold it too hard
to you. And then I'm just like, ocean,
ocean, help me learn to serve. You know what Olivet do is wave.
Well, it sounds like. You're I've never learned to
(49:33):
serve. You're on the right track, Mr.
Bunny. You're asking people for support
and advice, and that's a great first step to take.
Yeah. Well, do you think, do you think
I could learn to surf? I I mean I learned to sing a
surfing song. Yes, I do think you can learn to
surf. Well, how would I do that?
(49:54):
Well, I mean, you've already asked advice and you made-up a
surfing song, so you're buildingup your confidence and that's
always a good way to start. And it seems like, well, I've
been kind of wondering about what your actual plan is.
I know you're going to sing yoursurfing song, you're going to go
to the beach, and then what? Like, do you know what happens
then? Do you have a plan for getting
(50:15):
into the ocean? Well, no, I don't actually.
I'm just going to say I don't. Well, I was just going to walk
into the ocean and then, you know.
OK, so I I do have some advice. When you're learning something
new, it's often a really good idea to have a lesson.
And so if you want to learn to surf, maybe while you're at the
(50:39):
beach, you could find an experienced surfer or maybe you
can ask someone if they would bewilling to give you a lesson
because a lot of people that arevery experienced and good at
things love giving lessons to other people.
Even to little bunnies. Yes, especially little bunnies.
Wow, yeah. So I would say a good plan is if
(51:01):
you don't do it before and you get to the beach, find somebody
who has experience and then ask them if they will just show you
like show you how it works. And I bet that I bet you'll find
somebody who's willing to and then you can have your lesson
and then practice what that person taught you.
(51:21):
Okay, and then what if I fall off my surfboard?
Oh, you probably will, Mr. Bunny.
Yeah, you should expect to fall.That hurt.
I'll be hurt. Well, and I don't, I don't think
so. I mean, sometimes when we try
new things, we do fall down and get hurt.
But I don't think you'll get very hurt.
You know, the the ocean is very forgiving and.
(51:44):
Not if you lend it in money. It never.
You know you're not going to fall very far from your
surfboard. You probably actually won't be
standing on the surfboard right away when you're in the ocean.
When I've noticed beginning surfers, they usually begin kind
of holding the board and swimming along it on their
(52:05):
bellies and just learning how topaddle on the board.
And that'll keep you very close to the water.
And then when you feel like you,you are confident with your
surfboard and you're really ready, then you learn to stand
up on it. OK, yeah.
So it's all in little steps. Yes.
All right. Wow, I'm going to try it.
(52:27):
No, I am going to do it because you know what it it's what I
want. I want to try it and I should do
things I want to try. Yes, now I have a very important
question for you actually, before you go.
Well, I want to know if that pesky little cousin is coming
with you on this trip. No, boy is he ever.
(52:51):
Now here's the worst part of it.He is an extremely talented
surfer. What?
Yes. You're kidding.
No, but I thought he was youngerthan you.
I mean, he is, and that's why it's so annoying.
Oh, they do. A cousin of mine.
I'm not going to teach him my song.
Mr. Bunny, you already have an experienced surfer to teach you
(53:17):
a lesson. You'd.
Have to ask him and he's. Less you just have to ask him.
It doesn't matter how old you are, you can be experienced and
very good at things even if you're very young.
Well, I guess that makes sense, yes.
I mean, look how tiny I am and I'm so much better at finding
the perfect carrot than you. I think you are the perfect
(53:40):
size. No, thank you.
Yeah. Wow, I feel rejuvenated.
In fact, I feel like a pretty cool dude right now.
Yeah, party on surfing. Sorry, surfing runny.
Bye bye, Mr. Bunny. Oh, that was such an interesting
(54:05):
appearance. I am so fascinated.
I had no idea that that pesky little cousin of his was such a
surfer and he he held that back till the very last minute.
I know if it's almost as though if he hadn't been asked he
wouldn't have thought of it, butgood thing he was asked because
(54:27):
that added a whole new dimension.
We said we were going to. We said we were going to check
up on him at the end of last episode and see how his
strategies were. Mr. Bunny doesn't always
remember what he says from week to week.
All right. Well, on that note, I hope all
(54:48):
of you are navigating the wild ways of teaching your children
out in the home school of life. And I hope that whether no
matter how many children you have at home, whether you've got
1 little Bunny or whether you'vegot many.
Bunnies A. Whole Burrow full of bunnies.
(55:08):
What it was a bunch of bunnies called.
It's called like a. Not a brood.
Is it a brood? I don't think so.
Maybe it is. We'll find out and we'll find
out. Here.
Next week on the Power Hour. Ted Lee, thank you all.
I will pass that along. You can do it, Mr. Bunny.
I agree. I think Mr. Bunny can do it.
(55:29):
You know, he'll be safe. His mom and dad will make sure
that he isn't in trouble and make sure that he could swim.
Yes. And if his little cousin is
going with them, then I think he'll be OK.
I bet he comes back all tanned and rested and.
Surfed out. Hey, if Teddy and Teddy can do
it, Mr. Bunny can do it. Too.
This is this is right. This is inspiration.
(55:52):
All right, friends, we are goingto leave it there.
We'll see you next week on Let'ssee, it's the 1st of July.
For our third part in the series, we're going to be
talking about handling sibling dynamics.
Yeah. Laid the table, you've got the
Montessori. It's all going to work
perfectly. Maybe not.
Let's find out next week what wecan do to help.
All right, love ya.
Hey there friends, I'm Aubrey Harkis.
Today's episode is a replay fromthe Child of the Redwoods live
show that I host with my husbandand Montessori homeschooling
partnering crime David Harkis. You can watch the full episode
on the Child of the Redwoods YouTube channel.
Here's the clip. You can absolutely have
(00:24):
peaceful, beautiful, productive homeschool days even if you're
teaching more than one child in a different plane of
development. Trying to teach a toddler and a
preschooler and maybe an elementary kid in there in the
mix can be really, really tough and unfortunately, can sometimes
lead to homeschool burnout. It's a real thing.
(00:46):
We're going to talk about it today.
We're going to give you tips andsome strategies for what to do
when you start to feel that exhaustion creeping in and if
you're not feeling it yet, hopefully how to stave it off or
to recognize the signs of it when you start to feel that
overwhelm creeping in. This is something I think that
(01:08):
every homeschooler who has more than one child at home at the
same time has felt. So this is, you know that you're
not alone. That's right.
So how do you go about teaching children at different levels,
often different ages, but not necessarily but without burning
(01:29):
out? I mean, it is a question we get
a lot, many homeschool families have multiple children.
They're some, some families of course, have an only child, but
we know that a lot of families have too.
We know when we were at the conference just a few days a
couple weeks ago in Texas, we met people with five, four or
five kids. Some of them.
(01:49):
Yeah, and they had a huge range.I would say it's the it's
probably if you have only one child, then just like let this
one slide over your head. But I would say it's like the
norm for a lot of homeschool families to have more than one
child. I forget what the average
American household is now, but it.
Was 2 1/2 right? Something like that now.
(02:10):
So if you do have an only child,just, you know, maybe come back
in 20 minutes for Mr. Bunny. But if you don't have an only
child, you're probably. Just hang out and listen to a
lot of only children end up playing with other kids.
And if you're teaching more thanone child at a time, maybe you
have a homeschool Co-op. All of this applies to you too.
That's right anyway, so if you are ready to take some of that
(02:33):
stress off your plate, we have some techniques that can help.
Last week we started this serieson multi age children talking
about why Montessori is particularly good for families
that have more than one child ofdifferent ages.
Now again, it works for all families, whether you have a a
single child or you have a wholebunch of them.
(02:54):
It's really, really good either way.
But for those who do are are homeschooling multiple kids at
the same time, Montessori is really, you know, precisely made
for those circumstances. And go back and watch last
week's episode if you like some of those techniques.
This week, what we want to talk about is how do you do that
(03:15):
while keeping your sanity? Yes, exactly.
And we came up with four strategies that we want to share
with you today. And I know we have a pretty good
crowd out there. Welcome everybody who's joining
us live. If you have thoughts or
suggestions or comments on any of this, please pop those in the
comment in the in the comments. We love reading your chats.
(03:40):
OK, so let's start. I would also say even if you're
not watching live, we come back and get the comments later too,
so we will respond to you. Reach out anytime.
That's right. OK, so first, the first strategy
we came up with was respect eachchild's needs.
Now, this sounds kind of straightforward and obvious,
(04:01):
duh. But it's actually an important
mindset. I think what we, I think what we
often do when we try to homeschool, you know what we
have? We have two boys.
And it can be really tempting. And I think because this is what
we see in schools is to segregate the children apart.
(04:23):
Like you're going to work on your stuff here because you're
3, and you're going to work on your stuff here because you're 5
and you're going to work on yourstuff here because you're 7.
And that's not the way we would suggest you organize your home.
Like there are times for that and there are times not for
that. And the mindset really needs to
be, we're going to have family lessons, but we're going to
(04:45):
respect each child's needs through them.
So for example, if you have a little guy, you're going to want
to make sure you're leaving space in that activity for them
to feel included without the expectation that they're going
to learn a lot from it. Like they may actually learn a
lot, but you're not setting out to have make sure that the
(05:05):
three-year old is getting the same level of information and
understanding that the five or six year old is, but you're
going to include them both. Even though the three-year old
isn't going to get the same thing out of the same amount of
information from the lesson as the six year old, you include
them both. It's not going to hurt this 3
year old event. It's going to help them.
(05:27):
Conversely, you also want to make sure that you're giving
your big kids, the six year old in this example, time to go work
in private. You don't, you don't want to
force them to work together all the time.
And this is reflective of the developmental stages.
You want to give your 3 year oldtime to feel part of it.
I mean, all of us who've got kids, you know, a Big Brother,
(05:49):
little brother situation or whatever you might have, the
little brother always wants to be doing what the Big Brother is
doing or the big sibling, right?They just want to be part of
their world in a real way. Yeah, our kids, we used to tag
team actually, if you remember, like it usually started with the
little one would want to do whatthe older one was doing, but
then you'd finally get the little 1 settled in something
(06:11):
and the older would abandoned their work and then just want to
come over and play with whateverwas going on over here that
looked more interesting. That's right.
And that's so this is where respecting the child's needs
comes to life, right? The three-year old needs to be
with the five year old or 6 yearold or or the other child and
following along. They don't want to feel left
out. And we're going to, we want to
(06:33):
resist the temptation to say no,no, no, this is too advanced for
you or you'll find this boring, or this is inappropriate for you
and to say, yeah, let's, let's all learn together.
And you we've, I've used this analogy many times.
A child is like a cup. Actually humans are kind of like
cups. They'll hold as much as they can
and you can continue pouring information into them like water
(06:55):
into a cup and it'll just overflow and it's not going to
make a mess. It doesn't cause a problem.
They're going to hold what they can.
Your 3 year old will get from the lesson what the what the
three-year old can get. The six year old will get more.
You don't harm the three-year old.
Now the six year old. This again goes to respecting
each child's needs. The six year old is going to
want in a 7 and 8 especially is going to want to have time to go
(07:18):
off, maybe sit quietly, maybe read, do their own work.
Hey. He's always in my stuff.
Get away from me, you know, go back and watch Mr. Bunny from
last week for some examples of that, right?
Respect that too, right? The three-year old can't always
be with the six or seven-year old.
The six and seven-year old needstime to go off and explore
(07:39):
because developmentally, that's also where they're at.
They're in a journey into the mind, it's the journey to
abstraction and they need time to practice abstract thinking
internally. And so respecting them means
also giving them time to go off and learn.
So the way you might actually see this in practices, you give
a common lesson, let's say a lesson about a scientific
(08:02):
lesson. Let's say I know this coming
month we are doing smile and conservation.
We're going to do an experiment with egg shells.
We're going to put them in different kinds of acids or, or
base, like we're going to put itin water and lemon juice and
vinegar, I think, right. So you have various types of
liquids at least I'll say, and you're going to see what
(08:25):
happens. An older child is going to
really be able to make keen observations and keep a chart.
The younger child is not, but the younger child can still
participate in that activity. And we would encourage all the
children to participate, even ifthey're older teenagers, to
participate in the activity itself, and then to let each
(08:45):
child's need particular needs tobe expressed in the reflection.
Part yeah, I'm going to give another example, this one from
the theme that we're currently doing this month, which is pets.
A lot of our families are doing the pets poll and you actually
created like a little lab sheet for that.
And it's a classic elementary school activity where you graph
(09:08):
your favorite pet. You can pull people.
Fish. Dog, what kind of pets is your
favorite, right? It's very, very common to see
this in first grade or second grade especially.
I'll ask a neighbor, ask somebody, right?
And then you put a check mark. And you can make a little bar
graph of the favorite pets. So classic, but actually like a
really great activity because itcan easily be scaled up or
(09:31):
scaled down. And for those little ones, like
it's important to allow them to participate.
Even if they don't understand the concept of graphing, they
can still understand the conceptof people making an affirmed,
opinionated choice. Yeah.
And also the practice of asking somebody a question and then
(09:54):
receiving their answer. I mean, there are just
innumerable valuable lessons fora little 1.
So often people will look at ourcurriculum and they'll say,
like, oh, I think this is too advanced for my toddler.
And I will say Montessori is very advanced.
It's a really, it's a high levelcurriculum is how I like to
(10:16):
describe it to families. Like you're going to look at
this and and you're going to saylike I've got a 2 year old who's
mostly like throwing their fish crackers across the room.
What are they going to get out of this graphing activity?
Actually, a whole lot. A whole lot.
But not the same thing as the seven-year old.
Not as much. And that, yes, totally different
things for different ages of children, but it's an example of
(10:38):
the way that one of our lessons can just easily be scaled up for
the older child to maybe be interpreting this graph in
different ways. Like you can make a bar graph,
pie chart or a line graph. And older kids will be more
ready and receptive for that, especially like your 8 year old.
(10:58):
But for your 6 year old, for your five year old, they might
be more interested in a physicalrepresentation of graphing using
Legos, or I think it was using your goldfish to graft with and
your youngest, like you've got your toddler, they're still
learning all those great lessons.
(11:19):
You're just paring down the choices.
Maybe you're proposing to pull people for whether they like a
cat better or a fish better, youknow, and just see those
results. It's enough, you know, to to not
have to have the whole scope. But this is like on that lesson
giving level. But I'd also like to talk about
kind of on that macro level of thinking of your home school
(11:42):
rhythm and your routine. And in Montessori, we have a
concept called the prepared environment.
That's right. And this when we talk about like
teaching children at different levels by respecting their
needs, you're going to need to make sure that your environment
is reflective of your children'scurrent needs.
(12:02):
And so that means that if you'vegot a little one who's really
into pretend play, you need to make sure that that need is
representative. Yeah, the exactly you've.
Got. The exactly whatever you pull
your I, you know, I promise you pull your toddler and your older
preschool aged child. Say you're you're four or five
(12:24):
year old into a Montessori homeschool room that's outfitted
specifically with primary and lower elementary materials for
your older kids. Your toddler is just going to
throw the blocks across the roomand it's going to be a big mess,
right. So we want to make sure that if
we've got a baby on our hip, that there are things in the
(12:45):
environment for the baby. And we see this in public spaces
all the time. Dave and I are always constantly
looking, you know, public libraries or in libraries
actually do a pretty good job. They do better than they used
to, but we actually. Museums are not.
The often museums are ahead. Yeah, they do struggle, but a
(13:07):
way, a good way to think about this would be to think about
adult spaces where people often have to bring their children or
do bring their children. So I'm thinking like coffee
shops, libraries, museums, churches, like places that where
we generally think of as like places for adults who already
(13:31):
know how to behave well to go inand engage in public.
But I'll tell you, I've been in coffee shops that are very adult
oriented. There's no like there's no place
for children in them. It seems that there was one
coffee shop I went into with a homeschool friend.
The whole place was just set up for laptops for people to do
their work. And it was dead quiet in there.
(13:53):
There was no talking. It was absolutely silent.
And we went in there with our kids and we were like, we're the
only people talking. And of course, our kids are
like, you know, they're eating their croissants and getting
crumbs around. And the adults around us are
like, frowning and like, I'm on a work call or, you know, I'm
doing my doing my work. What are you bothering me?
(14:16):
And I'm like, this is a public space, and children should be
welcome everywhere. Maria Montessori firmly believed
in this. And she just decried it
constantly in every one of her lectures.
She was like, the world is designed for adults.
And no. And have people forgotten that
children, I don't know how many children there are in the world,
(14:36):
but it's like an enormous amountof the population of people on
Earth, right? So like, why are we creating
these adult only spaces or children only spaces?
So another example is you go into the library with your kids,
say you're an adult and you actually are also interested in
(14:57):
reading some fiction or non fiction for yourself.
There is a clear children's areaand a clear adults area.
And we just firmly separate the 2.
So when you think about an adultgoing into a space that's only
designed for adults, this is very, very anxious because
there's nothing for the kids to do there.
(15:18):
So Dave and I play this game allthe time.
We're out in public spaces and we're like, where's the basket
full of toys for babies? Or, you know, like, where are
the children's books here? I'm in.
I'm in these adult books. And it's just like you, you're
welcome to carry on this missionof Montessori to evaluate the
environments that are in your public areas.
(15:40):
And so an emphasis that you might think about thinking in
the same vein is, is your space set up?
Is there a space for your baby to engage with?
Is there a place for your toddler to freely play without
being reprimanded all the time for not using the materials
appropriately? Is there a space for your older
(16:02):
child? As David has mentioned, older
children need private spaces andthis generally starts around age
4. For 4 1/2 or so, there's kind of
a transition happening there. If anyone who has a four year
and a half year old is watching now, you know, 4 1/2 is it's a
big transition period. That is when children do start
(16:23):
to need some space away from a little 1A.
A three-year old will generally,you know, engage more.
Your older child really needs that preserved space.
Sometimes your 3 year old does too as well.
But I noticed it much more just becomes more important with the
older children. And so is there a space in this
(16:43):
room or this area where you are with your kids and your home
where your children can fully betheir full selves, working on
their skills that they need to develop and need to work on that
is fully appropriate for them. That's special, right?
And so a lot of families will have like the one shelf for the
specifically with toddler toys, one shelf that's very
(17:07):
specifically for primary age toys.
They think their family kind of works it that way.
I remember, I know a lot of our families will actually put a
baby gate up. And usually we think about the
baby gate as or a playpen or whatever is like to contain the
toddler, right? Put the baby in the playpen.
But actually what our families have been doing is putting the
(17:28):
older child in the playpen or the older child within the baby
dated area and the baby on the outside so that they can freely
explore the rest of the environment.
And yet there's still a preserved space for an older
child. So.
I'm going to bring these two ideas together with the
respecting each child's need. The concept would be we would
(17:52):
encourage you to give common lessons and then have prepared
your environment to allow the children after that common
lesson to go off and explore in whatever way is right.
So for the older child, maybe it's going off to a private area
to do the work, to read, to journal, to draw to whatever, to
do the math lesson for the younger child.
(18:14):
Play with Legos is very common. For the younger child, maybe
more of the tactile, get the play 6 silks out, maybe just
actually do something completelydifferent.
Movement. Which actually goes to the next
tip, which is be realistic with yourself.
All right, you're going to set the table.
You're going to give the common lesson that for example, let's
say the one on the pet, you say we're going to do this lesson on
(18:37):
pets and pet popularity. And then we're going to you're
going to go off an interview andyou've set the table and your
two or three-year old or 4 year old just doesn't want to do like
even though you've scaled it down, you've made it simpler.
They're just not it. They want to go and get the
little. They want to get their little
toy stuffy dog and make them talk or play around with them
(19:01):
like, oh, Pat, yeah, I love my dog, right?
Be realistic with yourself. You can set the table, but you
can't make the meat. Or as the old saying goes, you
can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink,
right? You can't force learning.
Now you can force compliance to somebody.
You can make people sit. You can make them complete work.
(19:23):
You can do all kinds of things. Schools are very good at that by
using the various forms of punishment and incentives, but
to actually force somebody to learn has to come from within.
The spark has to start within for it to actually take.
Especially if you're trying to do something much more advanced
than a root skill. Like if you want somebody to
(19:45):
learn how to sew, you could probably force them to do that
because it's a mechanical skill that they can repeat.
You want them to think abstractly and design a new
outfit that has to come from within.
And so you cannot force learning.
You, the parent, the teacher parent.
(20:07):
You have to accept that at the end of the day, the child is
responsible for the learning. Be realistic.
You can set the table. You can give the common lesson.
You cannot force them to do it with joy, with an outcome that
you want. They will find ways to defy.
(20:28):
All parents know this. It's not your fault.
It's not your fault, It's just how learning works.
So on being realistic with yourself, I love that you talk
about setting the table and we would in Montessori, we would
often call this like you preparethe environment and you prepare
(20:51):
your lesson. You like you prep your lesson,
you print out your materials, you read through, you know, we
have all of our lessons are scripted.
So like, what does that mean? You read through the script.
You familiarize yourself with the last.
That is your responsibility. Exactly.
Yeah, all of those things, preparing the environment,
choosing what toys are in the room or what materials are out
(21:15):
or or not. Picking interesting things.
All of those are your responsibility.
But on this note of like being realistic, I want to be really
clear that most Montessori parents will fail if they
believe that they are 100% responsible for what the
learning outcomes are going to be.
(21:37):
And so Davis''s words are reallyright on the money here.
You cannot control what your child learns.
You can't control, you can control what you teach, you
know, you can say, hey, I'm going to teach you, I'm going to
teach you about pets this month and you're welcome to do these
activities or, or just watch me do them.
You know, which a lot of our kids in our program do anyway.
(22:00):
That's great for them. Observing is 100% participating
in a lesson, even if they're notthe ones doing the writing,
watching it counts. All right, you can control that,
but you cannot control how quickly they progress in skills
and you can't control what they take out of a lesson, you know?
(22:20):
So what your toddler takes out of that pets poll popularity
contest might be the grace and courtesy, right?
Or it might be the value of making a choice in decision
making, or it might be the differences noting the
differences between those two kinds of pets.
You don't know, you don't know what learning outcomes are going
(22:43):
to happen. And when we taught in a
traditional school, I remember being required to state the
objective at the beginning of every single lesson.
And you know, we, we sort of do that, you know, here in our
constellation themes as well, for example, Oh, I just opened
it up to the pet popularity poll.
(23:03):
How fun is that? We've categorized this, even
though we've talked about it could be practical life, it
could be all these other things.We've categorized it under math
and we've said your child is learning how to collect data,
count with telemarks, organize information visually using
graphs like these are all possible outcomes.
(23:26):
Yeah, the lesson was designed byus instructional designers to
reinforce these concepts, right?If you do this do the activity
as described, then these outcomes are possible.
Right, But whose job is it to actually have these learning
outcomes? It's the child.
(23:46):
It's your child. I mean, you can make them do the
tally marks whether they'll remember it or care about it or
apply it like that might not even in some cases be within
their complete control because there's planes of development
they may. That's where sometimes parents
get in trouble too, is they expect things from children
because they'll read a book or they'll go, they'll see a source
(24:09):
online or they'll see a video like oh, all 5 year olds are
supposed to be doing X and then your child isn't doing X and
you're like, Oh no, I must be failing.
That's just not how learning works.
If you're preparing the environment, if you're supplying
the child with rich, good, focused activities that are
creative and inviting, then you are doing the part that's
(24:31):
important, like the part that the child has to learn and is
essential for success in all life, is self, is self
regulation and determination. They have to learn to want the
out. They have to learn to want the
outcome themselves. And when we teach children,
that's a big part of what it's about is helping a child learn
(24:51):
that we want children to developthis fire inside it, this
intrinsic motivation that then propels them to the rest of
their life so that they are successful and happy and
independent and creative and allthe things that we value as
humans, That's what we're tryingto do.
And so these lessons, you can set the table you must, but you
(25:14):
have to be realistic that it's up to them to eat.
Yeah. And this being realistic about
these, the wildness of possible learning outcomes that could
happen and the the progression of skills that's on a timetable
that you can't control is going to help prevent that burnout
(25:34):
that you might feel. You're much more likely to feel
burned out when you have very specific learning out yourself.
To an impossible. Stand Exactly.
And so part of the strategy is, yes, you're going to respect
your children's needs. That is going to help you
prevent burnout because you're going to be honing in on your
child's developmental levels. And the other piece here that
(25:55):
we're talking about is taking the pressure off by being very
clear about what your responsibility is with each of
your children or all of your children, and what
responsibility is not. And we talk about this all the
time inside our courses, in our Foundations of Montessori
courses. But you are welcome to learn
(26:17):
more about it. Child of the Redwoods.
Over to our website, childoftheredwoods.com.
Our complete and unlimited plansinclude the full scope and
sequence and all the foundational foundations of
Montessori information. You need to kind of start to
understand the philosophy that makes this happen.
OK, so we talked about you want to invite everyone in, but then
(26:37):
give them a place to learn. You want to be realistic that
you can do all of all of that and you won't necessarily at the
moment see the outcome. Doesn't mean that they're not
learning. You as the parent are the 1st
and best teacher in your child'slife always.
The third tip though, feeds ontothat it's you need to know where
(26:57):
your child is at in terms of their level, right?
So, for example, a little guy needs a lot of, not a lot
actually, I'm going to take thatback.
A little guy needs no talking, just demonstration.
You need to know where your child is at in the developmental
plane and in the level curriculum to know how to
(27:19):
present the lesson best for them.
An older child, they need conversation, they need moral
quandaries to work through. They want to challenge and
think. You need to know where your
child is at through the developmental stages and where
they fit on the scope and sequence.
So we have our, our scope and sequences available.
(27:43):
We put them on these cards and then you use a different, you
use the cards to essentially deal lessons each week for your
your kids to work on. They cover all the foundational
lessons and they are all integrated back into
Constellation. So by doing Constellation,
you're also doing the foundational lessons.
And if you know where your childis at in this level curriculum,
(28:04):
we've leveled the scope and sequence one to six.
You will be more prepared to give the child where they what
they need. You'll be able to more correctly
respect what the child is needing at that moment.
You'll also be able to tell whenthe lesson is just not hitting.
You're being realistic with yourself and you're like,
(28:25):
something's not working and being able to recognize like
this is just too advanced and actually the child is getting
out of the lesson. What the child can your child is
getting from this lesson on the shell experimentation or the pet
popularity poll, what they can get, It may not be what you
expected, but actually your expectations may not align with
(28:47):
what's realistic for a child of that age.
And this is where you would lookat the level curriculum and your
understanding of the planes of development and say, you know,
for a three-year old, that's actually right on the money.
And for if I was seeing that from a 7 year old, then I might
interrogate that a little further.
Is it just not hitting the mark?Is there something else that I
(29:09):
should think through? Again, this is where
understanding the the foundations of Montessori come
to play. But knowing that level is a key
to helping you set those realistic expectations.
Correct. And in our curriculum, we have
levels. We have two actually two ways
that you can kind of determine your child's level.
One is inside our thematic curriculum where we have our
(29:31):
everyone can play section and wehave it broken into toddlers
primary and elementary. And you know, we we say our
curriculum is for ages roughly 2to 9, OK.
Because there's definitely stuffthat works for all of those age
groups inside every single theme, if not every single
(29:52):
lesson within everything. And you would be surprised at
how some of the older children reinterpret some of the more
basic lessons that you would think of as introductory for a
toddler. Like a practical life lesson
that seems right on the money for a three-year old.
You could put it in a nine year old's hands.
It can be very fascinating. Super interesting, yeah.
And incredibly beneficial for children to revisit these
(30:15):
concepts. So we take that approach and so
this is a very easy way that youcan look and say, OK, well,
what, what level is my child at?We'll give you a little bit of a
guide here generally for a toddler, try these things.
And a lot of our parents will look at these and they'll say,
my, I have a primary child. But actually they're they are
(30:37):
more capable, like they are moreadvanced in this particular
subject area and we can start doing some of those elementary
lessons. And that's why we don't and
that's why we don't say ages or grades, right, say toddler
primary and elementary because they're a bit looser.
And it really goes to this, respecting each child's needs
and then getting much more macrowith micro with.
(30:58):
That and I was going to say on the converse, we also have some
older children who are special needs and who interact much more
in a way that is more sensory, like a toddler would interact
with something due to their developmental nature and their
just the way they are perceivingtheir world.
And there is absolutely nothing wrong with your children having
(31:22):
different skill levels in different subject areas.
In fact, Montessori prides itself on this concept of
individualized differentiated instruction.
All right, so we are already having, we're going to give you
a high level curriculum that works for a variety of age
(31:44):
groups with every single theme. And we're gonna guide you
through like if you've got a toddler, you're kind of looking
in this direction. If you've got an elementary kid,
you're like, you're gonna extendit in this particular way.
And of course, you as the homeschooling guide have the
power to take your child up, up a level or down a level.
(32:07):
And you should be doing this with every lesson you give.
And this is one of the, the one of the things that we dislike
the most about traditional curriculum is it tends to be
very prescriptive about age, la age groups.
And in Montessori, we are not prescriptive about age.
Instead, we are encouraging you to constantly modify for your
(32:31):
individual child's needs. And the second way is.
That goes with this. So in the constellation we have
3 ranges and then in the foundations curriculum we get
more specific and we have 6 levels.
And so for example, here's a level 2 reading car.
This is fluency is the key. So these would be lessons we
(32:53):
have reading short phrases, reading beginning of your books,
reading beginner sentences. You would go look up the steps
to do those different lessons and the objectives that go with
it in the material. But those are the kinds of
things that level 2 child would work on.
A level three child, as an example, is we're going to work
on. In this case, this is a spelling
card. This is also from reading.
(33:15):
So spelling silent E words, bossy R words, tricky R words,
etcetera, etcetera. There's a number of lessons.
Doesn't matter really what age your child is.
We're not saying this is for four and this is for five.
We're saying this is a predecessor skill.
It's a level 2 skill. This is a Level 3 card.
These are skill. This, the skills represented by
(33:37):
these various lessons aren't come after this.
You'd want to be comfortable. In fact, you'd want to be at the
B level, which means building. So your child is really
comfortable. Can apply this in these ideas
and creative ways before progressing to this because it
will help and it doesn't matter if your child is 3, your child
(33:59):
is five, your child is five, your child is 6.
It doesn't matter you're following the child through the
different levels. So going to tie this in as we're
thinking like these three thingsso far that we've mentioned in a
sequence you're going to again first respect the child's
individual needs. Give a common lesson, but
prepare your environment and leteach child's specific
(34:23):
developmental needs and intellectual needs and creative
needs come to life. Private space maybe for the
older child to go. For your older child to go and
read and study. A more open, tactile, sensorial
space for your younger child to play around with.
After you've presented a common lesson, you're going to be
realistic. Just because you presented this
gangbusters lesson that's super fun and everybody else in the
(34:46):
community seems to be having a great time with it and the kids
just aren't getting it, that's not on you.
If you've prepared the environment and you've presented
the lesson, it's up to the child.
They have ownership. In fact, they have chief
ownership over the learning. Yeah, your child always has
ownership over their learning. That's right.
Third, you're going to then lookat that situation and you're
(35:08):
going to say where are my children level wise?
Where are they are their predecessor skills that we might
need to introduce. So maybe the pet poll is going
back to that one. Maybe they're not.
Maybe my 7 or 8 year old is not able to do the graphing.
And I thought that they were supposed to.
Well, that's where you would come into the level curriculum
(35:29):
and know like, oh, you know what?
There's some actual predecessor skills in the math curriculum.
I think graphic would be a math.So what are those skills?
OK, that's a level 50. I see there's some level 4
skills in math that just aren't there yet.
That could be why they're not doing the graphing work.
There could be other reasons, but that is a way that you would
(35:52):
start to troubleshoot it. So knowing your child's level
can then help you approach that situation.
And then let's go to the last one, which I think we too often
underestimate the importance of,and that is self-care, right?
You've done all that you can. You've created the right
environment. You are being realistic with
(36:14):
yourself, or you're trying to beat all times.
You are studying and thinking and noting and still you go to
bed and you feel like a failure.It happens.
Burnout is real. It is and it happens.
Teaching is hard. Parenting is very hard.
What do you get when you put those two things together?
(36:37):
The impossible sandwich, right? I mean, it's just really,
really, really hard. You've got to have a community
and you've got to have friends and you've got to have practices
that will keep you going. When you feel that nagging doubt
that we all feel, every one of us will feel.
That yes, in our community, I will say that our members do a
(36:58):
really great job of sharing their self-care strategies and
also that there is, there are some tried and true general
strategies that work for almost universally for everyone.
You know, And you already mentioned one of them, which is
like peer support and the the social support of others.
(37:18):
It doesn't have to be someone inthe same age group as you.
It could be multi generational rights type of support, but
having a social connection, justbeing with another person is
extremely powerful. I remember reading in, I
remember reading or learning a while back, the power of the
(37:40):
hug, like the social hug is so strong and powerful.
It's it's basically universal. I mean, I'm I'm going to say
there are definitely exceptions to every single rule.
You know, there are someone, some people who just cannot be
touched, right? But for most of us, like a a
32nd long hug actually does havea significant impact on our
(38:04):
mental well-being. Another one is exposure to
nature. And so I mean, children are
really great. I will say it, giving 32nd hugs,
they'll give you like 32nd and then some, you know, like the
never ending hug. You know, it's still like every
time I get one of those for my kids and like, don't, don't
(38:26):
break the hug, respect the need for connection, even though I'm
like in the like, my hands are in the middle of those.
Right. But yeah, it does have a
physiological effect. Is that social and nature as
well? Like it's, it's very common.
Like almost everybody knows about the forest bathing effect
(38:47):
or the plants in a hospital roomor even the window where a
patient can see a tree outside. They just do better physically,
they're more likely to recover. And so people can, you can get
in that self-care through naturein the ways that work for you.
And I will say, some of our members do this by really
(39:09):
getting into nature. We have some members who are
just constantly out hiking with their kids, constantly doing
forest playgroup type of stuff. And they find it very
restorative. And others are not really so
much about the hiking, like there's bugs and ticks out there
and like some people, it's just not for everybody, right?
But maybe those people have a plant at home that they take
(39:32):
care of or? Maybe pets that is a part of
with their family or. Yeah, I mean.
Garden. Pets are nature as well.
You're right. Yeah, sure.
Absolutely. Yeah.
A. Trinity Garden maybe?
A garden, or maybe a little garden outside.
Botanical Garden in their city that they go to from time to
time. Or just an herb on the
(39:54):
windowsill. I mean, there are lots of ways
that we can use these bigger concepts of caring for our
mental and emotional well-being in ways that work for us.
And I think often parents, especially, like new parents,
new to this kind of feeling of overwhelming failure, tend to
(40:14):
feel isolated and like, you know, like.
I'm trying everything. Nothing is working.
And I think it's important to recognize that self-care
strategies are very individualized.
You know, like we all benefit from reflecting on our
experiences. Some of us do that reflection
(40:36):
and find it more beneficial to write it down in a journal
style. Some of us hate journaling,
don't want anything to do with it and find it better just to
tell another person, you know, their journal.
Like feelings is someone that you trust and, and love or to
say it in a prayer or, you know,like they're just many, many
ways. But it's very, very important
(40:59):
that you find what works for youand that you not just think, I'm
supposed to be doing this, you know, to take care of self-care
and recognizing that if you're engaging with something that's
supposed to be self-care, but it's actually not serving you,
that you just let it. Go and.
Find the thing that works for you, OK?
(41:20):
Our members in our community, they are into a variety of
things that nourish them. Right now, what's nourishing me
is pottery. I'm finding it very, very good
for my mental well-being. I'm also a journaler.
I like to write things down. But we have members who are into
crochet and knitting. I know we've got some big
(41:41):
knitters in our community, a famous crochet or in our
community. We've got members who who
express their creativity throughclay or through creative arts.
We've got parents in there who really are into pretend play
with their kids, which is great.Also, parents who don't want
anything to do with pretend playwith their kids, and they need
(42:03):
to have that quiet space. Oh, I know a parent who swears
by bath time. Yeah.
And every single night like thisis the bottom line got lots of
kids in the house don't want to experience burnout and she
preserves like this is the 30 minute bath that always happens
regardless of whatever else is happening.
(42:25):
Unfortunately has a a partner who can help take care of the
kids during this time so she cantake that self that bath
self-care for herself. It is just like an unquestioned
this is this is what's going to happen every day and it is the
thing that saves her sanity. So there's something out there
for everybody. You don't have to do all the
things, but you do have to do something.
(42:48):
You have to do something to refill and replenish yourself.
And it doesn't have to be it doesn't have to look like
traditional me time, you know, in parents speak, it can look
like whatever it looks like. That's realistic for you at
this. Point time for you to
decompress. And I want to under score
finding your people, whether youare more of a lurker in a
(43:09):
community or a really active participant, having a community
that you can be associated with gives us that sense of
belonging. And I think we often put it in
terms of won't my kids miss out on social activities if I
(43:29):
homeschool? And I think the equally
important question or maybe the underlying question is won't I
miss out? And the answer to both is you
will if you don't try. But if you make a little bit of
an effort, there's a lot of folks out there.
Your kids will have a robust social life just like they would
if they went to public school orprivate school.
(43:50):
And you had to find plenty of like minded, supportive moms and
dads and mentors out there who will guide you along the way.
On that note, we have a comment from Ted Lee Ever After, the
producer of our favorite bear themed teddy bear themed YouTube
channel. I think.
(44:11):
Yep, says your community. Your community is gold.
I'm constantly running into posewhere I fully relate in this
exchange of ideas and solidaritymake all the difference in our
homeschooling journey. Aw.
That's wonderful to hear, I I feel the same way.
Yeah, it's really gratifying to see that interaction.
(44:31):
And when you see community members connecting and solving
problems with each other as a teacher, like that is kind of
the goal, right? Like you, you want to see your
students, in this case our members, making real
connections. Like, it's gratifying on its
(44:52):
own. And the same way that is for,
you know, all educators. So I love hearing that.
Thank you so much for sharing and being with us today.
OK, Now if you like these tips, remember we talked about thank
you wrong way. I just want to.
So we talked about respecting each child's particular needs.
(45:14):
We talked about setting realistic expectations for
yourself. We talked about knowing your
child's level and we talked about practicing self-care, and
you can master all of these techniques.
We've created a program, a set of programs over the years that
can teach you and enable you to bring all this to life at home
(45:35):
using the Montessori approach. You can find out all about it
over on our website, childredwoods.com.
We have several. We have two really big plans
that we would prefer that you think about if you're wanting
the full experience. One is the complete curriculum,
which will teach you the philosophy of Montessori.
It's going to give you the full foundational curriculum and
(45:55):
access to the themes. And if you want to go to the
next level, we have our unlimited plan, which includes
live coaching and a bunch of other awesome benefits.
New benefits come out every month.
And in addition to that, like I said, you get that live
coaching. Live coaching for primary and
for the lower elementary classesstarts in September.
(46:16):
Actually, the orientation is in August.
So if you're interested in learning how to really bring
primary and lower elementary to life in your home school, join
us. Join at the unlimited level,
take a full, it's a full year program of coaching.
You get everything that's included.
Yep. And you can just really bring
your home schooling to the next level, just like our friend
(46:38):
Tedley. Yeah.
Yes, all right. Beautiful.
OK, well. Cowabunga dudes.
Cowabunga dudes. Cowabunga dudes.
That's right. Oh, that's surfing Bunny.
Surfing Bunny. Surfing Bunny.
(47:00):
Wipe out. Wipe out.
Well, Mr. Bunny, well, you're really on fire.
I sure am on fire. I'm on fire with my excitement
for. The.
Beach, I'm so excited. I wrote a song.
Are you ready for my song? Yes.
Say Cowabunga surfing party. Cowabunga surfing party.
(47:23):
Cowabunga surfing party. Yay.
Isn't that good? I'm going to sing that the whole
time that I have to drive to thebeach with my family.
Yeah, you know what? It's a 12 hour drive and I'm
sure we're all going to enjoy mesinging Cowabunga surfing party
for 12 hours. Yay.
Wow, that's a long time. No, now it takes a long time.
(47:47):
Do you have any idea how small rabbit cars are?
Because we're only about half a mile to the beach.
Oh, wait. Right, aren't we?
Maybe I should look at that map again.
You have to go through Idaho first, right?
Oh, you're going to go this way to the beach?
(48:08):
Well, I'll double check that. Oh boy, I'm so excited.
You know what I love the most about going to the beach?
What I love? Building sandcastles.
I love that too. And then I love tearing down my
sand castles. Yep, that's awesome fun.
And then I love building them again.
Yes, I do love it all. There's one thing I really
(48:29):
wanted to try, but I have to be honest, I'm a little nervous.
And that is I, I'm, I'm scared of surfing.
I want to learn to surf. Oh, and I'm scared.
I'm a lot scared. I thought you were already a
surfing Bunny. No, I'm just.
I'm just hoping that if I sing my surfing Bunny song, it'll
it'll give me the confidence to do it.
(48:51):
I've been I've been going all over asking for help and
everything. I I asked the shark for advice,
but I just don't trust him, you know?
He's a great white liar. Yeah.
And the shellfish, they weren't helpful at all.
Oh, no, Sir. No.
They were too crabby. The shellfish.
(49:12):
Weren't crabbed, but not all of them.
Some were a little shrimpy. I just didn't hold it too hard
to you. And then I'm just like, ocean,
ocean, help me learn to serve. You know what Olivet do is wave.
Well, it sounds like. You're I've never learned to
(49:33):
serve. You're on the right track, Mr.
Bunny. You're asking people for support
and advice, and that's a great first step to take.
Yeah. Well, do you think, do you think
I could learn to surf? I I mean I learned to sing a
surfing song. Yes, I do think you can learn to
surf. Well, how would I do that?
(49:54):
Well, I mean, you've already asked advice and you made-up a
surfing song, so you're buildingup your confidence and that's
always a good way to start. And it seems like, well, I've
been kind of wondering about what your actual plan is.
I know you're going to sing yoursurfing song, you're going to go
to the beach, and then what? Like, do you know what happens
then? Do you have a plan for getting
(50:15):
into the ocean? Well, no, I don't actually.
I'm just going to say I don't. Well, I was just going to walk
into the ocean and then, you know.
OK, so I I do have some advice. When you're learning something
new, it's often a really good idea to have a lesson.
And so if you want to learn to surf, maybe while you're at the
(50:39):
beach, you could find an experienced surfer or maybe you
can ask someone if they would bewilling to give you a lesson
because a lot of people that arevery experienced and good at
things love giving lessons to other people.
Even to little bunnies. Yes, especially little bunnies.
Wow, yeah. So I would say a good plan is if
(51:01):
you don't do it before and you get to the beach, find somebody
who has experience and then ask them if they will just show you
like show you how it works. And I bet that I bet you'll find
somebody who's willing to and then you can have your lesson
and then practice what that person taught you.
(51:21):
Okay, and then what if I fall off my surfboard?
Oh, you probably will, Mr. Bunny.
Yeah, you should expect to fall.That hurt.
I'll be hurt. Well, and I don't, I don't think
so. I mean, sometimes when we try
new things, we do fall down and get hurt.
But I don't think you'll get very hurt.
You know, the the ocean is very forgiving and.
(51:44):
Not if you lend it in money. It never.
You know you're not going to fall very far from your
surfboard. You probably actually won't be
standing on the surfboard right away when you're in the ocean.
When I've noticed beginning surfers, they usually begin kind
of holding the board and swimming along it on their
(52:05):
bellies and just learning how topaddle on the board.
And that'll keep you very close to the water.
And then when you feel like you,you are confident with your
surfboard and you're really ready, then you learn to stand
up on it. OK, yeah.
So it's all in little steps. Yes.
All right. Wow, I'm going to try it.
(52:27):
No, I am going to do it because you know what it it's what I
want. I want to try it and I should do
things I want to try. Yes, now I have a very important
question for you actually, before you go.
Well, I want to know if that pesky little cousin is coming
with you on this trip. No, boy is he ever.
(52:51):
Now here's the worst part of it.He is an extremely talented
surfer. What?
Yes. You're kidding.
No, but I thought he was youngerthan you.
I mean, he is, and that's why it's so annoying.
Oh, they do. A cousin of mine.
I'm not going to teach him my song.
Mr. Bunny, you already have an experienced surfer to teach you
(53:17):
a lesson. You'd.
Have to ask him and he's. Less you just have to ask him.
It doesn't matter how old you are, you can be experienced and
very good at things even if you're very young.
Well, I guess that makes sense, yes.
I mean, look how tiny I am and I'm so much better at finding
the perfect carrot than you. I think you are the perfect
(53:40):
size. No, thank you.
Yeah. Wow, I feel rejuvenated.
In fact, I feel like a pretty cool dude right now.
Yeah, party on surfing. Sorry, surfing runny.
Bye bye, Mr. Bunny. Oh, that was such an interesting
(54:05):
appearance. I am so fascinated.
I had no idea that that pesky little cousin of his was such a
surfer and he he held that back till the very last minute.
I know if it's almost as though if he hadn't been asked he
wouldn't have thought of it, butgood thing he was asked because
(54:27):
that added a whole new dimension.
We said we were going to. We said we were going to check
up on him at the end of last episode and see how his
strategies were. Mr. Bunny doesn't always
remember what he says from week to week.
All right. Well, on that note, I hope all
(54:48):
of you are navigating the wild ways of teaching your children
out in the home school of life. And I hope that whether no
matter how many children you have at home, whether you've got
1 little Bunny or whether you'vegot many.
Bunnies A. Whole Burrow full of bunnies.
(55:08):
What it was a bunch of bunnies called.
It's called like a. Not a brood.
Is it a brood? I don't think so.
Maybe it is. We'll find out and we'll find
out. Here.
Next week on the Power Hour. Ted Lee, thank you all.
I will pass that along. You can do it, Mr. Bunny.
I agree. I think Mr. Bunny can do it.
(55:29):
You know, he'll be safe. His mom and dad will make sure
that he isn't in trouble and make sure that he could swim.
Yes. And if his little cousin is
going with them, then I think he'll be OK.
I bet he comes back all tanned and rested and.
Surfed out. Hey, if Teddy and Teddy can do
it, Mr. Bunny can do it. Too.
This is this is right. This is inspiration.
(55:52):
All right, friends, we are goingto leave it there.
We'll see you next week on Let'ssee, it's the 1st of July.
For our third part in the series, we're going to be
talking about handling sibling dynamics.
Yeah. Laid the table, you've got the
Montessori. It's all going to work
perfectly. Maybe not.
Let's find out next week what wecan do to help.
All right, love ya.
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