Confronting the Educational Dilemma

As we negotiate our way through the process of teaching the kids about government and history, it becomes clearer to me what a farce education can seem at times. I remember hating history and how it had no meaning or value to me. For the record, now that I'm older (much older), I love the subject, but when I was younger you couldn't have paid me to show any interest, and I see a bit of that in not only our kids, but in all kids. It just becomes a case of memorizing facts and regurgitating them for the benefit of the us adults. What does it really mean to a seven-year-old?

At the very least, we're finding our way, but only because as homeschoolers we have some flexibility in molding the lessons and optimizing our approach, though optimizing it is a stretch. I guess in the end, history is best learned with some context, and without that context, it just becomes a process of learning a bunch of facts... you guessed it, out of context. I don't have an answer, and I realize this is just the way it's done and the way it's gotta be, but it's a shame, in a way, that the subject has to be such a chore to learn. I struggle with this and am still searching for the holy grail of the interesting and fun approach to learning history. Something interactive that will grab their imagination would be best, so if you're reading this and have any thoughts, I'd welcome your advice. Until then, we're taking the public school approach and memorizing and regurgitating.

It works as far as placating the state, but we'd like to find something that bestow the kids with more meaning and maybe even, if I may be so bold, inspire them. Maybe a trip, or something interactive. I'm scouring the web for something fun and interesting, and from what little research I've done, feel optimistic that there is something out there.

In meantime, we'll continue to have fun with math and reading. Learning can be fun, as we all know, you just have to have the right attitude, and I'm not here to knock conventional schooling, but it's difficult to argue with the fact that it doesn't instill us with the best of attitudes about learning.

Thanks for reading.