Estimated reading time: 2 minutes, 8 seconds
I tried something interesting today. My daughter (who is 3) was being stubborn about bedtime, but my head was filling up with thoughts of what I would start doing after she sleeps (apparently my mind has a biological clock set to get an adrenaline rush at her usual bedtime).
So I tried this: while feeding her, I started telling her all the thoughts i had in my mind. I told her about my 2-hour hangout yesterday and how I wished Pete and Andrea and all of the gang would come to Egypt someday. Then i started telling her about the #ccourses research team that Laura Gogia initiated (forum discussion over here), and I told her about some of the cMOOCs I have participated in. She looked into my eyes through it all, nodding and saying “yes” (seems she now understands when I am talking in English, because she was saying “yes” in English). I then told her about a thought I had about representations of mental illness in novels, and another thought I had about LMS discourse.
Sure, she doesn’t know what a MOOC or LMS or mental illness is. She has no idea who Pete is (though she did once actually talk to him on google hangout or some such thing, ha, I just remembered this now).
And so now that I have done this (the blogposts aren’t written out yet but are more developed in my mind – I even told her I was going to wrote this post you are reading now…. I think it’s a great idea! It keeps me thinking about what i want to think about without ignoring my daughter while doing it. Sure, it is self-centered (ha!) but it also lets her start to know from a young age that her mother has a career and interests, and when she is old enough to understand, it’ll be a good thing that i have started sharing (as a kid I always enjoyed medical conversations at our dinner table and am v medically literate because of them). I also think it’s good for her language development. And it seemed to really please and engage her.
This is really funny, pedagogically, though, because I almost never talk that much all in one go in class. Then again, I blog. And I just blogged out loud. Blogging is a written slew of thoughts, that sound like speech (the way I write, most of the time), so 🙂 It actually made total sense to speak it first.
Wonder if anyone else does what I have just done?
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My Mom would talk about her interests and sometimes it felt like she was day dreaming. Or lecturing when she was upset. Maybe we work too hard at creating a separation between ourselves and our children to protect their “individuality”? We belong to them and we should be useful don’t you think?
That’s an interesting way of looking at it. I guess we do 🙂 I think in my case it was just treating her like a close friend rather than a child, which I know I used to like when I was younger (to be talked to as an adult). On the other hand, I probably wouldn’t talk any of this out loud to anyone because who’d want to listen to it anyway?
There’s an intimate connection between Mother and Child that is more meaningful because it isn’t public–still interesting though. The snake charmer with his child is probably having one of those conversations too. “Guess who me and Snake saw today at the market? All she could talk about was self-improvement this and and strange diets that. The girl needs some serious interests!”
Did you name your Daughter after Hoda Sha’arawi?
ha! No, but that would have been a good idea. My boss’s mom was a close friend of Hoda Shaarawi’s and a feminist activist as well.
I just love the name Hoda, have loved it forever 🙂 and almost every Hoda I know, is someone I love
Just a guess from some reading I’m doing. Funny, in English it sounds awkward and not a female name. I’m told Arabic is a language suited to poetry and English is appropriate for science. Interesting combination.
Educating Girls has started. Neat course for you to fit into all your spare time:-)
Oh, will look that course up! Use up some of the parenting time? Oops
If you enroll your Daughter in the course she can blog about it for you to read:-) The home page is:> https://learn.canvas.net/courses/411 http://teacherswithoutborders.org/ < is also looking for volunteers…Will let you know how the course is going and have ordered a copy of Teachers as Cultural Workers by Paulo Freire so I can start a new carer. Giving advice to reluctant medical people is proving to be a waste of my time.
Oh, I googled the course as soon as I read your earlier comment and am already enrolled. Not sure yet whether i will engage but i’m there 🙂
You can audit the course and I’ll make inflammatory comments using your name:-) I need some teacher training to volunteer for teachers without borders. Any thoughts on where to go? Polite thoughts I mean. Between You, Clarissa and Lisa Lane I must be able to assemble a curriculum.
Lol re: inflammatory comments 😉
Unsure what u mean about Teachers w/o borders (i know they’re doing the edu girls MOOC, but confused about ur question) – happy to help once i understand! 🙂
Teachers Without Borders has volunteer mentors which is something I’ve volunteered for in a few online courses. Plus I’ve done back channel “training and supports” for older teachers who were terrified of switching to online delivery at the college where I worked. There never was any training for my work with apprentices either so all my working with people has been made up on the spot.
How are teachers trained? what classes do they take? are the questions I have. I’m not necessarily looking for formal training, more like guidance on communication styles that draw people out to exceed their own expectations. Or something like that. Easy eh? Have read “Becoming a Reflective Teacher” and thought it excellent.
Does that help?