Learning

Once I was a homeschooler. 

Always, I've been a learner, 

but all of us are, whether we realize it or not. 

I'm a bit addicted to it, wanting to have something to listen to while I'm working, and something to read when I'm not working. 

Anyway, this fall I've had the privilege of hanging out with a nephew once a week, and it gives me a chance to give in to all the things I would be doing if I were homeschooling again.

This week he played with some of the toys I'd found in the basement and cleaned up. 

We romped in the back yard with the dog, 

and my nephew learned to play a game with the dog that involved hiding treats. 

We used items from recyling. 

I found some brown wrapping paper that had been used as packing material, and we taped it to cover a table for us to do some art. 

My nephew drew places where gnomes might live. 

I drew some wildly colored flowers patterned after some art I'd seen in celebration of Diwali.

We are not busy all the time. 

Sometimes we just sat and watched things, and often those are the best learning times. 

We were hanging out near the driveway when we noticed a grasshopper moving across the driveway. 

The conversation turned to how its back legs were long and bent the opposite way our legs bend, so that it could jump better. 

And then we moved on to ladybugs and how different they are than grasshoppers.

My nephew wondered about the wings of a ladybug. 

We found a video of a ladybug opening it's back shell parts to allow transluscent black wings to unfold and fly it wherever it needed to go. 

Then those wings needed to be refolded to fit under the red and black shell again. The ladybug used its back feet to help tuck those wings in properly.

It was fascinating!

When we went back up to the porch, we began seeing ladybugs. We counted dots and found they were different. But why so many ladybugs on the porch?

Were they migrating?

I pulled out my phone again and together we discovered that ladybugs really don't migrate, at least not long distances. They find a place nearby where they are less likely to freeze, and they hibernate. Near a building that is heated is a very good spot. Then they gather there and keep each other warm near that building.

That would explain why the ladybugs were on the front porch, but not on the driveway.

My nephew started catching them and wanted to collect some, so we went back to recycling to find a jar with a lid. We poked some holes for air flow and then he delighted in seeing how many he could capture. His intention was to show his parents and then to release them again.

At one point, I told him this was science. 

We were learning about nature, 

and asking questions, 

observing, 

looking for answers.

It's not just science, though.

It's life. It's faith. It is how we learn to know ourselves, each other, God.

It is wondering.

It is asking good questions

searching for true answers

which lead us to even better questions.

Today my nephew has not been here, but there are still questions to understand.

These are the some that have come up today for me about

Vaccine mandates

I heard a clip this morning where someone stated that many countries do not mandate vaccines, even for their school age children. They gave the example of England, among others. I was skeptical, so I checked the internet for countries without vaccine mandates. I found a site that had a color coded map, with colors for contries that do mandate vaccines, countries that mandate vaccines for children in school, countries that recommend vaccines, and countries who either do not mandate or their status is unknown. 

Click here for the link.

There are a lot of countries that do not mandate vaccines, even for children in school.

So now I have more questions. 

If there is not a rule to rebel against, how does that change the health status of the majority of people? What are the positive and negative aspects of having a mandate...or of not having a mandate? 

When I was parenting, did it work better to set hard and fast rules, or to discuss issues and then trust the kids to make decisions? 

Is parenting a terrible analogy? 

What analogy could be better?

But the bigger question in this particular issue is even before the vaccine was a question, there was still the more basic question of how we learn to understand each other. I don't have a color coded map that can help with that question.

I have a sense that even this question is still not getting to the heart of the matter,

the place we can find truth,

but it is enough wondering for today.

Finally, something that brought me joy. We planted two maple trees the year after our fathers died. This is the one that Chuck chose. It is at it's peak right now.