Why Are We Learning This?

This idea was prompted by a post I came across while looking through an anti-ABA linkspam given to me by someone on Reddit. Since then, however, I've been unable to find the post that inspired it again. In any case, this was a principle that was important to me before, but this post reminded me of it and convinced me to act on it.

When we are teaching children, we should try to make sure that what we are teaching them will actually be beneficial to them.

Now, this isn't to say that we must only teach stuff with a clear practical benefit. After all, you can also gain benefits from having a broader perspective on the world, learning to express yourself in a deep and meaningful way, learning that being persistent and trying hard can pay off, or even the joy of learning something simply because it's interesting.

Or, you can learn that adults will put you through pointless drudgery and make you miserable for something that ultimately has no real benefit to your life. Like doing long division by hand, because guess what, teachers, turns out I actually do always have a calculator with me! (And yet, teachers are still arguing that children need to do long division by hand, even in this time of smartphones, because of some vague, unproven and undefined benefits to their understanding of math.)

So, one of the areas I listed in my personal curriculum goal database for my child is the intended benefit of that particular goal to my child.

Some things have a clear, obvious and significant benefit that is only achievable by that goal. For example, being able to read fluently in English has a lot of benefits that are hard to replace with any alternatives - many books aren't available as audiobooks and text-to-speech has flaws.

Other things have less clear benefits that could be obtained in many ways. For example, being able to kick a ball is important for playing soccer, but playing soccer isn't really essential to life. Exercise has health benefits, but many exercises don't require any ball-handling skills. So, if my child really struggles with kicking a ball, that's not really a big deal.

If my child enjoys kicking a ball around, well, then, I'll gladly encourage them to build their ball-handling skills as long as they're having fun with it. But if I try to show my kid how to kick a ball and they get frustrated and upset and say that they're sick of playing with a ball, well, then, I'll drop it. Because basic ball-handling skills aren't worth them going through the stress of being forced to do something they don't enjoy. After all, if they don't like kicking a ball, they won't put themselves in situations where kicking a ball would be a useful skill anyway. And a skill you only use before you're old enough that people stop forcing you into recreational activities is pretty useless. Granted, ball-handling skills can build overall dexterity, but so can many other things, and hopefully at least one of those will be something my child enjoys.

And even with the most valuable skill, like reading, there comes a point where learning it might not be worth the cost. Torey Hayden, special education teacher and author, described one such child in one of her books - a seven year old girl who'd been put in her class after failing grade 1. She and her twin sister had suffered physical abuse in their original family and were currently living in a very loving foster home. Whereas her sister was thriving, she'd experienced a serious brain injury that seemed to have caused lasting visual processing impairment, resulting in pretty much total inability to tell letters apart.

Torey Hayden tried to teach her to read. But regular drilling with letters seemed to have only one effect - making this girl miserable. So, finally, Torey Hayden gave up and stopped working on literacy goals with this child, and her whole demeanor changed. It seemed pretty clear to both Torey Hayden and myself as I read the story that this child was better off without reading instruction, at least for now. (Unfortunately, Torey Hayden got in trouble with her superiors about this decision. Luckily, that's far less of a concern for homeschooling, but I will still have to worry about proving to the Saskatchewan government that I'm actually educating my child.)

And if there's one thing disability rights advocates have taught me, it's that it's possible to live a good life while lacking a lot of "essential" skills. So, if it comes down to struggling at the cost of mental health or learning to live without a skill that would be very useful, even the most essential skills are ultimately optional. I simply have a higher threshold for when I'll call off teaching them a really useful skill as opposed to a skill that's not so useful.