Parents' Goals

Generally speaking, parents want the best for their children. But defining "the best" is not always easy, nor is it consistent across parents or communities. So let me share what some of our goals for this experiment are.

Long-Term Goals / Vision

• We want our son to learn to learn, to know how to think, to take initiative, to communicate effectively, and to retain curiosity throughout his life.
• We want our son to be a concerned and active citizen, to be economically independent, and most importantly, to be happy.
• We want our son to discover within himself the power to create anything he can dream, whether that's a lunar colony, a new paradigm in global trade, or a popular lamp shade, using basic business, scientific, and project management processes.
• We want our family to remain close, create amazing memories, experience life together, and enjoy one another's company.

Throughout this blog you will likely see me reference the scientific method. I have many hypotheses going into this experiment and they may be proved or disproved as we go. I'll be sharing the journey and the results.

Short-Term Goals / Objectives

These long-term goals or values are what we would expect and desire for him (given variances in what he desires for himself) whether he emerged from public, private, or no school. This year, our grand experiment will work on smaller parts of this whole.

• Set weekly, monthly, quarterly goals for projects; learn to plan projects, pace tasks, and evaluate success.
• Learn CCSS 3rd Grade math curriculum. (Because he's already ahead in this, and is gifted in math, I am also hoping to accelerate him to 4th grade math, maybe on to 5th. He loves it so... we'll see.)
• Apply CCSS objectives for language arts, including writing, reading, comprehension, speaking and related skills. This doesn't mean he has to follow a curriculum, it means I have to track what he does and map it to the CCSS, 
• Learn the social science subjects that all California 3rd graders learn... early native Californian peoples, local tribes, local geography and geology, natural history, as well as areas of citizenship, American government, etc. He will get a lot of this from his Cub Scout program and the history will integrate nicely with the language arts.
• Work on important organizational and concentration strategies, metacognition strategies, and other skills that help in life, learning, and potentially in school if he decides to go back.
• Apply and demonstrate newly learned skills in crafty and creative ways.
• Have fun. Lots of free time for "hack schooling!"

Learner's Goals / Desires

My son has his own goals and desires, and the challenge for me will be to facilitate these goals while analyzing and evaluating how they correspond with the above short-term goals. Some or all of these goals may evolve over the course of the year as his interests change, he discovers new

• Create Minecraft tutorial and gameplay videos; set up his own YouTube channel to publish and share the videos.
• Do lots of science, technology, engineering, arts, and math (STEAM). Experiment a lot. Keep lots of science journals. Build robots and things.
• Play lots of chess and Pokemon. Maybe do a tournament.
• Play at the park a lot. Make new friends. 
• Go to museums and community events that aren't boring.
• Spend more time with my mom.