The Education of My Daughter

There is something about looking down at that small round face, with its button nose right in the middle, and orange-slice shape of a smile, and glittering bright eager eyes that absorb everything and invite every stranger within a fifty-foot radius to come over and say hi, and big pink cheeks that need a torrent of kisses, that makes me think of the future in a much bigger and broader way than I ever have before. This past week, traipsing over Vermont's rocks and streams and ferns and ponds, sometimes in the rain, my handsome husband carrying the little bean of our lives, I was awash in thoughts of her future, and how I could best contribute. Starting with the button nose and thinking outward from there, I concluded, while feeding her breadcrumbs on a summit of Mt. Mansfield, with its immense eastward vista over the Green Mountains, and later, sitting on horseback and watching a spotted fawn run behind its mama, that there were six basic categories I wanted her to master by age 18 or 19.

1. Literature and Art

2. Mind and Body Are One Focus

3. Languages and Travel

4. Outdoor Adventurer

5. Mathematics

6. Music and Dance

If she could pursue all six of these simultaneously starting at age 5 or 6, I think she'd have a high capacity for self-knowledge, happiness, and the ability to tenaciously pursue her own dreams and ideas while learning from, listening to, teaching and collaborating with others.

Thinking about it more deeply, I realized that I have specific philosophies about how to approach each category, as well.

Literature and Art, for instance, are not things you can really master in breadth without extensive graduate education. But if you take the time to go really deep with a few artists and writers, you can learn to analyze, understand and relate to other people's expression, and make your own art, too. Maybe even teach it. So I thought that one writer or artist could be the focus each year.

From there, I expanded on the approach to my basic six categories, including an advanced flow from the initial idea that would probably not happen until she was in her teens.

1. Literature and Art
GOAL: To be able to analyze and relate to artists, and to create own art. Depth not breadth.
SAMPLE YEAR/LESSONS: Issa > Haiku and Impact > Japanese culture > Illustrate hiaku > Write haiku > Teach haiku
ADVANCED FLOW: Write, produce and star in own play

2. Mind and Body Are One Focus
GOAL: To build skills in the defensive arts, and nurture a discipline of focus
SAMPLE YEAR/LESSONS: Gun range + advanced archery = daily target practice
ADVANCED FLOW: Brazilian jujitsu

3. Languages and Travel
GOAL: Fluency in 2 languages by age 18, travel experience with language connection, deep understanding of what it's like to be somewhere with no language connection
SAMPLE YEAR/LESSONS: Travel to France & Polynesia; meet other Francophiles in Boston; watch French films
ADVANCED FLOW: Learn and teach variants of chosen languages

4. Outdoor Adventurer
GOAL: Building confident independence and applied knowledge of biology and geology
SAMPLE YEAR/LESSONS: Climb a mountain every week for a year; apply one different context to mountain per climb (such as plants, animals, rocks, supplies, trails and off trail, gear, speed, orienteering, etc.)
ADVANCED FLOW: Be able to teach, debate, and motivate for sustainability

5. Mathematics
GOAL: Develop mastery of complex math and how to apply it
SAMPLE YEAR/LESSONS: Model different economic indicators & results--trade stock over multiple years
ADVANCED FLOW: Answer this question: How can you apply math to succeed in business?

6. Music and Dance
GOAL: Know rhythm, know beat, in her bones, and be able to compose
SAMPLE YEAR/LESSONS: Learn keyboard
ADVANCED FLOW: She's #1 in a breakdancing competition

7. All the while: Unstructured Play Time

So, I sound like a public school parent from hell, right? There are a few things missing from this list (like basic history, for instance) that kind of jump out at me, that she will need to learn at school. And she'll live near a good public school, so, that's good. But to be able to apply her knowledge and make it work for her as an adult (and an adult in a time when certain kinds of information, like basic history, are very easy to obtain, and certain skills, like flexibility, analysis and the ability to motivate, are very valuable), I think she needs a complex education. The way that this framework is valuable is that everything else that she does, like say, soccer, is taking away from one of these categories. Maybe that's OK, but it's just something to recognize. I don't know how to make it work yet, but I have a little time. She just started to crawl last night.