Not in Buffalo: How many times can I say "no, gracias"?

When we spent any amount of time in central park in Antigua, Guatemala, I continuously needed to say "no, gracias" to the very numerous products and services being offered.  Americans are not used to being approached and often are either offended or nervous.  I felt bad saying no so often, of course.  Many of the items were total bargains, like necklaces or beautiful pieces of fabric for a dollar, but when you don't need something, you don't need it.

The experience made the family think, however.  We don't have commercial tv in the living room and no cable, so most ads we see are limited to online and billboards.  We have escaped the repetitious constant attempt to get us to want things we don't need.  Corporations get away with repeating messages with little effort or personal contact creating a sort of one-sided cultural dialogue.  In Antigua, where there are relatively few big box establishments and certainly not the large suburban type with big parking lots.  Small businesses and private individuals on the street rely on personal contact and expect some haggling over price.  This makes most Americans uncomfortable, but isn't it more authentic?  Isn't it more of a free market?

Anyone who wants to sell must have the guts to approach you and ask you to buy.  In return, of course, you should give an answer, even if it is almost always, "no, gracias".  There are also the businesses that can't exist in our corporate controlled environment.  We saw someone selling cigarettes one at a time, not much different than the odd person buying one off someone at a bus stop at home, but certainly, the regulations are set up to prevent an individual from carrying out such as a business in a more ongoing manner in the United States.

I am sure we haven't thought about the implications of all the differences, but clearly our trip has prompted more and more thinking about economics and marketing.  I think most Americans, and other relatively affluent Westerners, would benefit from embracing such travel experience rather than succumbing to fear.

Not in Buffalo: Skip the Book and Go to the Volcano

There have been a couple of other posts about our month in Antigua, Guatemala.  Here I would like to highlight our visit to an active volcano, Pacaya.  When we went there was no flowing lava only gas and heat.  There had been lava only about a year before, so we could see the black hardening lava and step into areas where we could feel the geothermal heat radiating from the magma still hot under the hardening top layer.  You could also see clearly the way it flowed from the crater to the pool of lava.  If this isn't the best way to cover volcanoes, geothermal heat, and even igneous rocks, I don't know the best way!

This seemed like our one opportunity.  First off, we were near it and it was active.  Secondly, this one was only a 2 kilometer hike after a 4 kilometer car ride up.  I, and others with health problems, could do the hike either by hiring a horse or by hiring a private guide for the day so that we could take as many breaks as necessary to make the hike.  Very little of it was treacherous, most of it was just a walk at an incline.  Still, if you are out of shape or have health issues, I recommend a private guide at the very least, if not the horse.  Obviously, this is more expensive, but for us it was the difference between being able to have the kids experience the volcano or not.  Here are some highlights:

The best part of melting marshmallows in hot spots in the hardening lava area and making smores:

Not in Buffalo: Getting Hands-on with Traditional Weaving

After our great experience last year with my friend in a different part of Guatemala, we decided to go to Antigua to explore more Mayan culture and, of course, some Spanish colonial history.

For a hands-on activity, the kids wanted to take a weaving class.  They took one last year, but wanted another.  This one was a little different because they made a smaller item, but followed the whole process start to finish helping the teachers place the threads on the looms before they got to take over the weaving.  The class was at a cool bar Tintos Y Arte .  We were tempted to have beer and wine while they did the class, but we were pretty full from breakfast.  Instead we watched the kids and took advantage of two hours of uninterrupted adult conversation.

The teachers were great and super patient with the kids.  I will let the photos tell you the rest:

Not in Buffalo: I think we've covered the Mayans!

After our great experience last year with my friend in a different part of Guatemala, we decided to go to Antigua to explore more Mayan culture and, of course, some Spanish colonial history.  After loads of church ruins and museums, we decided that we better hit some major Mayan ruins in case we are unable to come back to Guatemala.  Most people think of Tikal.  We thought about going there, but Copan is quite a significant site and closer to Antigua, not to mention being able to visit Honduras.

It was a great experience.  I will post many photos at the bottom of this post because I think it speaks louder than my descriptions.  First of all, there is nothing like being in a place like an Antigua for a month.  To me, this is the minimum amount of time needed to pretend to live in a place and get a real feel and familiarity for it as well as see the sites slow and steady without wearing out.  Secondly, it was fascinating traveling to Copan, only 5 hours away, but different.  The tipicas comidas were similar sorts of foods, beans, corn tortillas, queso, avocado, but they were prepared and tasted different than their Guatemalan counterparts.  Also, the weather was more humid, including an hour and a half of rain in the evening, something rarely seen in the dry season of the popular parts of Guatemala.  The border crossing experience was quite interesting too.  Despite the agreement between Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, and Nicaragua, you need to formally leave one country before entering another.  This is quite different than going to Canada from Buffalo, where you don't talk to any immigration officials until you are on the other side talking to a Canadian official.

We kept telling the kids how lucky they were to see all of it firsthand rather than simply reading about Mayans in a library book, or worse, a textbook.  Hopefully, they understand that most kids don't get to go to Copan or any other site.  For some it is money (outside of airfare, there are cheap ways to travel central america like a backpacker, also expensive luxury accommodations with many options in between) or time, but for others it is fear.  Regardless, nothing beats this most authentic way to cover the Mayans so well and to get a sense of native peoples generally.

Many things were interesting, but see for yourself:

Public Transportation Curriculum

When we are out and about late afternoon, it is difficult to fight the sinking feeling when I see the all too familiar yellow buses.  A little bit of the feeling is the resource intensiveness of the super security to go a short distance versus the relatively low economic resource levels of children in our city.  More of it, however, is the knowledge that those children, as well as those in the bubbles of their parents' vehicles, are missing the tremendous number of educational opportunities on the NFTA buses and metro rail.  Indeed, all cities with relatively significant public transportation systems have unique systems and environments for learning.

Some of it is what you expect, geography and timing, but much more of it is character and socialization.  Kids in cars have no real responsibility for their own transportation.  They can't because they can't drive.  Besides putting their seat belt on without being asked and not distracting mom and dad, there's nothing.  Students on yellow buses can make sure to be at the stop on time and behave, but nothing else.  My kids have to carry their own bus passes, get them out at the right time, not lose them, make sure they scan, pull for the stop at the right time, etc.  These are not tremendously difficult things to do, but they need to do the same things adults do in order to ride.  They get real responsibilities sooner.

There are many rewarding social encounters.  Often, someone sees us and alerts me to a good place to take kids or some event for them nearby that I hadn't heard about.  Sometimes they witness kind adults and teenagers giving up their front seats for elderly or disabled people.  This is something they are starting to do.  One time, my son chatted with a man who was impressed with a story he told and encouraged him to write a book.

There are also social encounters that just don't happen in other environments since there are so few other opportunities to be in close quarters with strangers.  Many are great learning opportunities.  We witnessed two men heckling a woman over her hat one day and the incident had many components including: how to behave in public, freedom of religious expression, the lack of correlation between religious beliefs and proper behavior sometimes, as well as the idea that sometimes even the truth need not be stated.  We discussed these things the best we could given their complexity and their current ages.  Another time, we met someone on the bus who clearly had a hard life and was facing several hardships.  The kids kept pointing out several ways she and I were similar.  When I talked to them later, I tried to make them understand that often the only difference between someone who is doing okay and someone facing hardships are a few wrong turns, some of which may be outside of their control.  I hope they are learning empathy and compassion.

The more of these encounters and experiences we have, the more I believe that the decline of public transportation is one of many reasons that individualism and materialism seem to be so high in our culture.  There is no longer a sense that we are all more similar than than we are different or that we are all in it together.  It is easier to see others as "other" or even less than human when you don't have to get close to them.  People can more easily be in bubbles: in cars driving from their homogenous town past those "other" kinds of people in those "other" neighborhoods.

Hopefully, I am countering some of this bubble culture with my kids.  Only time will tell if riding around on the bus is the answer to responsibility and character building.

Do you ever get tempted to send the kids to school?

I am embarrassed to say that every year (sometimes more often) I consider school for the kids.  It isn't because I think they are missing something.  We have been at homeschooling long enough that it is obvious that they are doing just as well academically as school kids.  They experience all kinds of things that are just not available when cooped up all day.  I have great answers for those that contradict me about not sending them to school.  Intellectually, it is very clear that homeschooling is best, at least for us.

However, my frustration level skyrockets at times when I spend the whole day begging for them to do chores or the few traditional school items that we require.  My kids are great out of the house and will do whatever is asked by instructors at activities or church or helping other parents when we visit.  But at home, it seems that they don't feel compelled to do what is expected.  This is, of course, a better situation than good behavior at home and poor behavior outside the home, but it is exhausting!  At times, I get to the point of threatening school.  I am sure many of you are mortified by such a threat, but it just seems that they often aren't grateful for the freedom.  We ask ourselves if we should send them for a while so they understand?  For a few weeks, months, maybe a year?  Would they be grateful after?  I went to good schools, but when you include transportation and homework, it was 35-40 hours a week with no control over my time.

Am I the only one who feels this way?  Is this even tougher with a school-at-home style?  We are unschoolers, but with the added extra structure that, once old enough, they have to write about what they do for learning.  Is this better or worse across ages or styles?  Is compliance just better from kids that have tried school?   These are all things we think about constantly.

Really Covering Citizenship - School Board Election Time

Tonight we attended a session with the candidates for the Buffalo Board of Education at the Merriweather branch library.  First of all, for those of you not from the state of New York, yes, school board elections are in May, not in November with the other elections.  It does encourage a lack of broad representation in the sense that those that make a special effort to turn out in May usually have some vested interest of some sort, for better or for worse.  Anyway, there were a couple of things that struck me about the evening.

The first was that I was covering citizenship much better compared to the parents (and teachers) of school students.  Out of about 30,000 students in the district, there were perhaps 10 from what I could see, presumably school kids, in the audience.  Where were the students?  Surely they have vested interest in what happens.  I can only guess that some kids, the trouble makers who were alluded to regarding suspensions, don't care and the "good students" are too busy doing homework, going to activities, and going to bed early.  Either way, it is clear to me that homeschooling, with its lack of homework, lack of suspensions and relative lack of need for a bed time permits more engagement in the political process.  It is sort of a microcosm of the way the corporatocracy has kept people too busy to participate and notice that our state and national elections are bought.  Between busy or disengaged students and disadvantaged parents who need to work multiple jobs to have a living wage, I am sad but not surprised.  I hope I was setting an example for my kids that I tried to ascertain which candidates are good.

The second thing that struck me was that all the candidates were mainstream in the sense that they stated what you would expect.  No one, even the more interesting candidates, was outraged about mandatory kindergarten, for example, which to me is a big attack on parents rights and freedoms to decide what is right for their children.  There was all the "working together" and "caring about the community" rhetoric of course.  It was much easier to see which candidates not to vote for.  Sergio Rodriguez boldly stated how much he as for mandatory kindergarten and even mandatory Pre-K in the typical more-school-is-better approach to learning.  Clearly, he has not read what I have read about child development and the ways children learn.  Several candidates, including Sam Davis who most directly seemed to address it, stated that they wanted to eliminate waste and get the money into the classrooms.  This shows the ignorance of the candidates.  It is an extremely small percentage of what is spent that isn't directly or indirectly mandated by state education law and related applicable laws and contracts developed under those laws.  It is not to say that all tax dollars are put to good use.  I would certainly overhaul the entire education system, but such things would have to occur at the state level.  Making a note of those who mentioned this also eliminated several possible candidates for me.  I was pleasantly surprised that so many stated fairly directly that they wanted the good programs to be spread across the district to neighborhood schools rather than concentrated in a few schools in an unfair manner.  Unfortunately, this didn't help differentiate the candidates too well even though Wendy Mistretta seemed to articulate this best of all that spoke on this.  I agree with them on the inherent unfairness obviously, but it wasn't a differentiating factor.  Only one candidate, Daniel Reynolds, spoke about child centered learning at all.  He didn't state it directly, but alluded to it by wanting to teach students via their interest in hip hop.  My fear is that between not explaining it well and acting somewhat strange in that he included singing and dancing during the session that he may not be taken seriously.  He also seemed to be one of the more interesting ones in terms of his own education.  However, despite this he was for mandatory kindergarten when I talked to him although at least was open minded enough to tell me he would do further research on his position after speaking to me.

Anyway, I haven't finalized my choices yet other than deciding who not to vote for.  Whoever gets elected, however, the proof of educational improvement to me will be in how many of the students attend next year's board candidate forums because it will show whether or not the teaching methods have instilled enthusiasm and priorities.

Mandating Kindergarten and the Continuing Wrong Direction of Education

This morning my fibromyalgia was bad and I woke up very bored and too stiff to do much, so I put on the news despite that fact that I am always on guard for a corporate/materialism agenda.  One of the stories was about the Board of Buffalo Schools requesting that the NY state legislature mandate kindergarten in a similar manner to Syracuse and New York City.  I was alarmed by the story as the tone is such that the Board expects that starting academics earlier will achieve better educational outcomes.  No one seems opposed or is even questioning it.  There is no discussion of what is actually better for children or what helps them learn.  Are they developmentally ready for serious academics at age 5?  Does the emotional trauma of taking children away from parents on a full-time basis at such a young age detract from their ability to learn?  Does the existing type of schooling even work well enough to necessitate more of it?  With the increasing amount of data available in the information age, should there be less traditional instruction and more focus on critical thinking and data retrieval?  Why is more and more schooling needed to achieve adulthood?  The conventional wisdom seems to be Pre-K (age 4) through graduate school (age 24 or 26) on a full-time basis to be considered "competitive" for jobs.  Shouldn't the structure of the economy and labor market be remedied rather than piling on more schooling to be "competitive"?  Why isn't the willingness to work hard enough to achieve reasonable employment success anymore?  This sounds like the corporate powerhouses making demands and the well-meaning yet very misguided educational industrial complex excitedly taking on the task.  It seems unfair to me that 5 year-olds must be the sacrificial lambs when the adults can't solve the economics and politics to make opportunities more fair.

With all these sorts of increasing instruction efforts there is only talk about better "outcomes" or being more "competitive" whether it is mandatory kindergarten, extending the school day, or extending the school year.  Has anyone looked at the data?  Many of the countries with which we "compete" don't have the educational systems we think they have.  For example in Scandinavian countries, while early schooling has been expanded, serious academics are mainly postponed to age 7.  In the U.S., we are pushing it down to kindergarten and even pre-K.  We also assume homework is good for kids, but according to Alfie Kohn in the The Homework Myth, many studies have debunked homework for both academics and responsibility enforcement.  If you read his book you will see how politics have emphasized homework despite the data.

My main hope can be that homeschoolers in Buffalo will not be burdened with reporting for an extra year because of this, but it seems to me that without an exception made for homeschoolers it will be the case.  Unfortunately, New York is already one of the most burdensome states on homeschoolers requiring quarterly reports, plans, and even standardized tests at some grade levels.  This is incredibly unfair since the homeschool children I know in Buffalo are performing as well or better than those who attend Buffalo public schools.  If the school board and the state legislature actually cares about educational outcomes, they would make an exception for homeschool families from this extra reporting rather than penalize them for their superior performance.  If you live in Buffalo contact your state representation and your school board members and tell them that they are not be doing what is in the best interest of children by going forward with this.

Expanding our Horizons in Guatemala Meets Escaping Buffalo in January

Several months ago, at the age of 34, I got my very first passport.  I was always nervous to travel abroad.  I am sure part of it was the propaganda about traveling to certain places.  However, most of the time I think I was intimidated by new languages, international paperwork, and flying. I had a terrible time with Spanish in college and only received some sort of a B (don't remember the exact grade) due to a student teacher who was afraid to look bad.  I hate flying, not because I am afraid as much as I feel sick, both air sick (either I come down with a sinus infection from the pressure or actually vomit on the plane) and it aggravates my fibromyalgia.  Until now, I never felt like I missed out and I certainly traveled otherwise, hitting more than half the states (by car) before I turned 20.  Still, I was nervous.  I have a cousin who has lived in London for quite a while and have never gone despite the fact that I am sort of in love with Britain from its wonderfully made television mystery shows.  In the case of Britain, it isn't a language issue, but a long flight and time change issue.  Anyway, with our kids in the training choirs at church and the regular church choirs traveling to England this August, it hit me that I needed to get comfortable with foreign travel in the near future.

Then a friend of mine who lived in Guatemala for over a year, raved about it to me and wanted to go back, so we decided to go together for the month of January.  It would be a great homeschool trip for her son and my kids as well as a break for my fibromyalgia in the cold.  Of course, if she had only been on vacation there, I never would have been brave enough to go, but since she actually lived there, on her own with her son, I was much more comfortable.  I wanted the kids to be immersed in Spanish as well as see a different culture and experience life very different than the U.S.  The nice thing about Panajachel Guatemala is that there is still a very strong Mayan culture including traditional food and dress.  It is one of the few places left in the world where so much native culture remains.  The climate is also ideal with lows of about 48F and highs of about 72F all year, so it is never cold or hot.

For homeschool, it was a super experience.  First off, the architecture was interesting with buildings open to the outside, sometimes in the middle of the building, since they don't require heating or cooling.

There are churches much older than our church too.

Don't forget the day trip to Antigua where we saw many sites with old ruins including the Church and Convent at Capuchins.

There was the natural wonder of Lake Atitlan with its surrounding volcanoes.

The science of hot springs due to the nearby volcanoes.

The nature preserve was quite exotic complete with banana trees.

We learned about coffee on a tour of the farm and processing.

Forget conventional art class.  The kids took a Mayan weaving class.

They visited a handmade pottery factory.

They visited the Galeria owned by Nan Cuz where they viewed lots of Guatemalan art.

They tried on authentic Mayan clothing from the village of San Antonio.

While we didn't plan on doing a whole lot of math, they kids studied Guatemalan currency and used it buy things including watching Mom attempt to bargain.  Social studies was the strongest area covered mainly because the kids visited the homes of two local families and ate a traditional meal at one of them.  We also experienced the ancient by visiting Mayan ruins.

Modern differences were the most interesting.  On the one hand, there was litter and less than perfect plumbing, but on the other hand there was the tremendous wisdom in simplicity such as the efficiency of tuk tuks on roads without too many cars (no traffic lights), hopping in the back of a pickup truck for longer distances, shopping in a pharmacy with no prescription needed, using ATMs where you can lock yourself in without the fear of someone else with a bank card being able to get in, and eating in restaurants where the owner's chickens roam about the premises.

Physical Education wasn't left out either as we did a horseback ride throughout the village of San Pedro (which I don't recommend for someone with fibromyalgia as due to lack of balance and sensory issues it was very uncomfortable and afterwards I had to rest quite a bit on the couch for several days - but it was fine for the kids).

The kids also went kayaking, but I didn't get pictures.

Obviously, many people in Guatemala don't have as much as we (or most Americans) do, so we had the kids volunteer two mornings doing an art project with preschoolers at Mayan Families.  They really felt great about helping the little ones. 

When Defiance Turns into an Experiment

For the longest time I have been strict about sunscreen and sun hats.  I have always said they were necessary from nine to five between March and September and ten to four the rest of the year with adjusting to nine to three during standard time.  It is just a rule I have used to be prudent about the sun.  The kids, however, were getting sick of it and challenged me on it.  So we sat down and researched possible rules of thumb for sunscreen usage.  A common one that seemed to come up was to wear it when one's shadow is shorter than oneself.  But even with this, my times didn't seem to be too far off - until we tested it.

We began by watching a video online about the angle of the sun.  Then we decided to measure our shadows beginning within a week of the summer solstice and once a month, thereafter.  After the June one, we looked up the solar noon so we could extrapolate the end time rather than have to measure shadows in both the morning and afternoon.  Here is what we came up with for sunscreen/hat usage:

Month (3rd week)	Start	Stop
June	9:45	4:45
July	10:10	4:35
August	10:40	4:00
September	11:20	3:00
October	never shorter	never shorter

In Buffalo, there is a big variance in how much sun we get during the different times of year.  As you can see, I wasn't too far off for June.

We continued in July.

August, however, was more like the times I had been using for winter.  This is when the kids started to get excited.  By September, it was less than four hours.

And finally, here is October, when their shadows never even got close to shorter:

Do you see the satisfaction at Mom being wrong?  Hopefully, this is the beginning of questioning all kinds of rules and seeking out the truth in more areas.  Of course, we are (painfully at times) aware that it often means questioning us too.