Decisions: Routine Versus Novel


Part of why homeschooling is starting so slowly is the difference between “routine decisions” and “novel decisions”.

I have four pairs of shoes by the back door and solid reasons and habits for which I choose when I'm leaving the house. That's a routine decision.
 
Should I decide to take up vegetable gardening I would have novel decisions to make:

  • container, raised bed, or in ground?
  • start from seed or tiny plants (with hidden task learning jargon for "tiny baby plants")
  • which vegetables to grow to start with? 
  • how many vegetables to grow? 
  • where to buy them?
  • use start dates listed in the catalog or look up Texas-specific dates?
  • how often to water?
Those decisions impact each other and have consequences. If I put a lot of resources into a fancy stone border for an in-ground garden I don't have to buy a lot of dirt, but it'll be hard to expand if I want more room in a year. How often I'm willing to water probably impacts which vegetables I should grow, but I have no feel for how often that is until I start.
 
So I'm puttering at the parts that don't have permanent consequences to figure out more about what works for us while continuing to read about available options.
  
Another reason homeschooling is starting slowly is that school instilled a lot of bad habits in my kid. Any complication or surprise in her computer setup triggers her to respond like she's about to get in big trouble; for example her optical mouse not working on the glass table. Some decisions trigger her to act like she'll get in big trouble if the results are unexpected; decisions as minor as what to type in the search bar. So I infer that school grownups were not fostering an easy-going problem solving mindset whenever my kid's creativity or accommodations differed from the planned class activity.
 
A month after deciding to withdraw my teen from public school, my first goals are taking shape:

  • Use low-stakes, lightly guided tasks to get my kid used to NOT getting chided nor dismissed 
  • Build a routine within which to do those tasks 
  • Debug stuff calmly enough times that she eventually joins me in the debugging
  • Try not to traumatize her further.
Related to that last bullet point, I'm making her play Tetris every day we do any homeschooling. That sounds weird but there is real evidence that it reduces the long-term psychological impacts of highly stressful events.

 

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