Of Broken Bones and Broken Brains

This blog post has existed as a title only for about a month. (And I'm adding it's original title was "Of Broken Arms and Broken Brains." My son suggested the title change. Good call! Loved the alliteration! so there you are.) I thought it fitting to actually write it today, as the same son busted his collar bone yesterday.

The following quote - my inspiration for this post - came from an article on the "benefits of roughhousing." Larry Cohen, quoted below, is a licensed psychologist. You can read the article in it's entirety here.

[When it comes to the issue of roughhousing and safety, Cohen said he prefers supervision and knowledge, rather than too many rules. It's an approach that really set in when Cohen's daughter was younger and climbing around at a playground, and he kept telling her to be careful, over and over. "My friend said 'You know Larry, she's gonna recover more easily from a broken arm than from being timid and fearful her whole life,'" Cohen recalled. "Yes, there's a risk that a child could get hurt, but a loss of an adventurous spirit, a loss of excitement, a loss of confidence is worse than a broken arm."]

So, now my son HAS a busted bone, I can speak to this with some authority.

Just kidding.

What I wanted to say, even before the broken bone, was that the sentiment above rang so true to me, and I find it to be a compelling reason to homeschool. When we homeschool, we DO face the "dangers" of "doing it wrong" - of neglecting the education of our children in one way or another. I suppose when I write WE face those dangers, I really mean our children do. THEY will live the consequences of their educations.

Like well meaning parents hovering near their children on a jungle-gym, we may be tempted to stand over their shoulders as they learn too. Certainly, we don't want them to fail. Failing to obtain the knowledge and skill necessary in life is, after all, far more painful and damaging than most physical injuries will be. So we stress, and "supervise," or outsource entirely to a stressful, ultra supervised environment so our kids will be "safe."

But when we homeschool, we CAN (if we chose to) begin to let our children LIVE the consequences of their educations NOW. We can nurture their adventurous spirits by committing to be more spontaneous and responsive to what THEY want to do and learn about. We can preserve their excitement by feeling our own as we discover things together. And we can allow their confidence to build, both as our children meet with success in directing their educations, AND as they meet with failures. (Yes, even failure can teach them how to manage time better, what they need to work harder on to meet their goals, or, if nothing else, that they CAN cope with failure and disappointment and move on - that failing isn't defining.)

So the next time we are tempted to step in, take over just a little, and "save" our kids from themselves, let's ask, "Broken arm or broken brain?" And make the choice to step back and nurture adventure, excitement, and confidence by allowing our kids to run some risk in their educations. We may be amazed at what their confidence and risk-taking produces!