visitors

Well I got to think about some stuff that I hadn’t been thinking about recently.

Like the word kids – being a word also for baby goats (possibly not something that would bother me as I LOVE goats, one of my best friends when I was 12/13 was my goat Sassy). When we had a “focus group” of three they all rejected children – as being too young sounding, childish even… They rejected youth as being something tight fitting, being about your physical age, and lets just talk about the “Youth of Today” (so often negative). I don’t feel that I can use the word Rangatahi as I am as Pakeha as, and to me the word has a mana that one has to live up to. We want a word that includes me – a middle aged woman, and people of younger ages, that implies that we play. We are not being childish but we are playing because this is how we learn best. We want to be climbing rocks and jumping off because it’s fun. Does anyone know another word? from another language? as this has to be us just being human and our approach to learning.

I also saw the look on the adults faces as they looked around and wanted to be able to be there… that they could envisage lots of possible projects to get involved in, or even do their ‘work from home’ work there. One of my dislikes of homeschool groups is that they are great for some kids (not so much mine – is she neuro-diverse or is it environment) but what do I do? I want to play with the kids but I know that sometimes that ruins their play or I take it in a direction they are not so interested in, and I have adult power…. I don’t often want to talk to the adults I don’t know (neuro weirdness) as all we have in common is homeschooling and I don’t need to be reasured or esteemed for my child’s choice, I want to talk about real stuff (I blame my dad – neuro weird?) and do things (the ADHD) and I am just reminded of school the whole time – who’s in, who’s not etc. Some of the adults who turned up with out kids will be returning with projects. H and my 30 something year old cousin started playing with the projector seeing weird playful uses I hadn’t thought of. He will be back to play, model play, inspire others…

Thinking about the brochure nearly all the people asked about, but actually speed drawing and annotating wildly…

A little kid came to visit and I was just reminded about how much I like little kids and how much I can learn from them, especially when it comes to creative, imaginative freedom. How can I make our space so they can be accommodated yet not put away the knives, saws etc? I remembered a neuro-diverse kid I use to teach at a school (I was teaching a programme called bush-guides in the plant museum next to the school) who was so good with adults. He said something about confusing Miro and Matiai – totally upskilling me, but he didn’t do so well in the classroom, the kids, the ‘Teacher’ – he certainly didn’t want to do things he didn’t see the point of (I really liked him). Yet when he was with my 9 months old baby (who I was allowed to take to school – not all schools are bad) he was amazing. He was so good with her I could leave him hanging out with her while I was engaged with other students. Just like my child is now – she feels more competent socialising with younger kids, yet needs the intellectual stimulation of older people as that is where her thinking and interest in the world is.