Homeschooling in Rural Northern Vermont

An Oral History Project by Jack Powell and Nina la Porta

 

(The audio recording of our October 31, 2007 interview, accompanied by an unedited transcription, can be found at the bottom of the page)
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The farmhouse that Carol had decorated and turned into their family home was old. It had that warm feeling of a structure which has been lived in and loved, and which has seen many happy moments. When we asked Carol if she knew the history of the house, she responded with a wonderfully detailed (if not rather unexpected) tale of the house’s geriatric and rather eccentric previous inhabitant:

“The lady who lived here for probably forty plus years was, according to her neighbors, a very strange, secretive lady who had several husbands (legally or not). Her lights were always out, nobody ever saw her light on—as an old lady—but… One of her husbands had the garage down in Wolcott, and one of them had a junkyard—old farm equipment—, and we still pull out bales of wire, tires, and axils, and all kinds of lovely stuff like that every time we dig. And she, she was so persnickety, I guess… She was pretty neglected by her family. And she died, here. And her nephew had to settle the estate. And he said yeah, she didn’t want anybody to take care of her or interfere very much, so… The house was old, and it was packed full of stuff, so they took everything that they could sell and left the rest for us to clean out. And so we actually had to use a dumpster.”

This account certainly did not explain the house’s feeling of warmth and comfort, and we could only assume, therefore, that the ambiance was brought fairly recently to the house entirely by Carol and her family. Yet really, that wasn’t so surprising or hard to believe—these people whom we had just become acquainted seemed exceptionally caring and generous and creative.

Carol, a calm and motherly woman in her thirties, with strawberry-blond hair and a pleasant smile, had greeted us at the back door (which was hand-painted red with white polka dots), wearing an apron, and carrying some component of the sandwiches that she was in the middle of making. It was the evening of October 31—Halloween— and she and her two young sons (Liam, 12, and Matthias, 6) were busy preparing for the usual Halloween festivity of trick-or-treating. She stepped aside, letting us into her small and cozy kitchen, and motioned for us to sit down at the table. She excused herself, explaining that she had to finish the boys’ sandwiches, and that it would only take a minute.  We took the time to unpack the computer and recording equipment which we were going to need for the interview, and set it up in an as unassuming a way as possible. We guessed, from our own feelings of nervousness and anticipation, that Carol would be made relatively uncomfortable by the presence of a microphone resting in front of her. We couldn’t, however, avoid that necessity, and so therefore attempted as best we could to make the set-up seem casual. We then proceeded to wait.

~

After she finished making the sandwiches, Carol took off her apron and came over to the table. She sat down between us, and, making an effort to remain calm, began the recorded interview. These are the stories of her experiences as a homeschooling mother in rural, northern Vermont. They are stories of challenges, changes, rhythms, family dynamics, personal beliefs, lessons, and joys. They reflect her strong personal sense of self, and her and her husband’s dedicated commitment to their children. While in this interview Carol only speaks from her own experience and doesn’t make any broad generalizations about homeschooling families in general, we believe that her stories can provide important windows into the (oftentimes under-acknowledge and under-recorded) reality of homeschooling, and can help to make it visible, understandable, and accessible to others.

....

CAROL: ON HER HISTORY AND HER FAMILY'S HOMESCHOOLING EXPERIENCE

(adapted from the original transcription)

Also included are several short excerpts from our informal interview with Carol’s twelve-year-old son, Liam.

Note: C= Carol, N= Nina, J= Jack, L=Liam

INDEX:

Part I: The Place-- Farmhouse, Moving There, Maps on the Ceiling

Part II: Carol's History-- Carol's Family History, Carol's Sister's Education, On Photographing Carol

Part III: How They Started to Homeschool-- The Local Waldorf School

Part IV: The Homeschooling Process-- Homeschooling Manuals and Mentors, Liam's Unschooling, Computers, Teaching Basic Living Skills, Liam's Class Experience, Learning From Elders/ Respect, Concerns & Solutions, On Homeschooling

Part V: Family Dynamics-- Liam, Mother's Role & Work, Father's Support, Father's Role in the Children's Education

Part VI: Homeschooling in Rural Vermont-- Homeschooing in a Rural Vermont, Respect for Homeschoolers in the Area, The -- Elementary School, Homeschooling and the State, On Vermont

Part VII: Liam's View-- Conversations with Liam, age 12

PART I: THE PLACE

SETTING: FARMHOUSE

J: We mentioned about how this was an old farmhouse.

C: I’m pretty sure…it was a farmhouse. The lady who lived here for probably forty plus years was, according to her neighbors, a very strange, secretive lady, who had several husbands (legally or not). Her lights were always out, nobody ever saw her light on—as an old lady—but, one of her husbands had the garage down in Wolcott, and one of them had a junkyard—old farm equipment—, and we still pull out bales of wire, tires, and axils, and all kinds of lovely stuff like that (every time we dig). And she, she was so persnickety, I guess… She was pretty neglected by her family. And she died, here. And her nephew had to settle the estate. And he said yeah, she didn’t want anybody to take care of her or interfere very much, so… The house was old, and it was packed full of stuff, so they took everything that they could sell and left the rest for us to clean out, and so we actually had to use a dumpster.

 

MOVING THERE

C: [We moved here] the year before Matthias was born, so he’s six now, so seven years ago… My mother lives up the road… And, we all moved to Vermont, to take up a job up by Lake Willoughby. We’ve worked with handicapped people quite a lot, and the place that we worked at up at Lake Willoughby—Do you really want to know any more?—They dealt with traumatic brain injury—TBI—, and that’s a very intense caretaker position. They’re very extreme in dealing with life. Everything-- their anger— is a lot of times very strong. It comes through all the time. Maybe because they know what they aren’t anymore…So, that was a new direction for us, and it didn’t work. Liam was five, going on to kindergarten, so we finally said “We don’t want to do this anymore”, and we move out and came here. We didn’t consider buying—we had used up all our saving to move around a couple times before we got here. But this house was for sale, and it was a mile away from the Waldorf School, which we really wanted to send Liam to, and three miles away from my mom in the other direction. So we did. We went through the process of getting, a VHFA (or something like that)—Vermont Housing and Financing whosy-whats-it kinda loan…And we did. We got it, and we qualified because… Its mostly because of low income…But also good credit or something like that. We had to have [those] two extremes. And we managed to do it, so…So, we got this house.

 

MAPS ON THE CEILING

 

J: What is this map system up here all about? I have to know.

C: Well, when we moved into the house, the ceiling fell down in the kitchen. And so Trevor went to work, and I ripped all the tiles off, and then we were living with beams. Not this one, but the ones that are holding the floor up. So then we lived with floor boards, and dust and stuff. And then Trevor put in this—whatever material that it is—[Liam interjects: “Soundboard”] Soundboard--, to start a ceiling.  And it looks—looked—like we were living inside a cardboard box. And, I like to paint things, and I do a lot of painting of art and the house, but my arm is getting messed up from doing all of it. So, I started painting it, but it hurt my arm too much. And the soundboard just is a sponge, and it kept soaking it up, soaking it up and still looking disgusting. So, Trevor said “Well, we should glue this on” or “We should glue that on” or the other, and then I finally figured out what I wanted to glue on, and that was the maps…But the cool thing is that we can look up and see where we are. We, we have to start putting “where we are” dots on, which was Liam’s latest idea. And we—you know those little, touristic maps…? We’re starting to actually save them to put up.  ‘Cause they’re kind of cool. We have all kinds of maps…We get National Geographic—we’ve gotten it for years, since Liam was pretty young, so— I think I might still have some of those maps in a storage box somewhere. And this one is of Maine. Of the area Pemaquin— Pemaquid area in Maine where we go once a year to touch water.

 

PART II: CAROL’S HISTORY

CAROL’S FAMILY HISTORY

C: My dad was in the army…And my mom was German. They met when he went to Germany. And none of us have stopped moving since. Well… when my parents got divorced, (and after lots of fun custody stuff), my brother went with my dad, and my sister and I went with my mom. And my mom never stopped moving around— she moved quit a lot, and I did too. I mean… part of it was to do with working with the handicapped people that we did. We worked in a Camp Hill system, which is the same philosophy as the Waldorf School… So, I worked in a camp hill in South Africa…And in Pennsylvania, where I met Trevor…There’s a number of, of anthroposophical places there. Beaver Run is the boarding school for handicapped children. My mom actually did the four year training course there. It’s quite a place to be, and it totally replaces the need to go to college, because you have the natural course that you take there and you review your practicum at the same time. So it’s a very intense 24 hour, seven days a week. I was a staff child there…

 

CAROL’S SISTER’S EDUCATION

N: So, had you thought homeschooling before that?... How did you arrive upon that decision, to go from the Waldorf school to the homeschooling?

C: Well, I was never homeschooled. My sister kinda went through the whole gamut of schooling. She was a very difficult child, just because she was herself. And she didn’t want to put up with teachers looking down at her, she didn’t wanna do what her mom said, she didn’t wanna, didn’t wanna, didn’t wanna. So… She went to the public school, [and] she did a few years of Waldorf school and then she was pulled out, and they moved, and my mom got married. So everything changed for her a lot—at about twelve—and it was very hard for her. So, it wasn’t like she was a bad kid, but she’d had enough. She started rebelling, and kicking butt, and um, she went to the public school, and then I think she might have gone to another public school (I’m not sure, but…).  She went to a boarding school and got kicked out and she tried homeschooling but my mom couldn’t do anything with her. And by the time high school came around, she tried high school— she moved out… She moved into my apartment, and supposedly was going to school, but she wasn’t. And then she had some kinda special last ditch effort by the public school system, you know, to keep the kids--
to come to a completion [and] say “Yes, now I can be a grown-up, and finish my education”. And she dropped out of that too. So… With all that behind me… And I think I counted up…eleven different schools that I went to…They also went from public to private.

 

ON PHOTOGRAPHING CAROL

C: You can take a picture of anything accept me. We have this, this soul issue about it… Right?… not really, but it’s a good excuse.

PART III: HOW THEY STARTED HOMESCHOOLING

THE LOCAL WALDORF SCHOOL

C: [Then the Waldorf School] closed. Liam went to Kindergarten and first grade, and second grade it closed halfway through the year. And, the plan was always from the start of the end, that they would relocate and re-populate… It was a small, very personable private school, so everybody knew too much… And everybody kind of was picking on each other, and starting to lay blame, and it was just kind of traumatic. So, some of the people are with the new school now. I didn’t want to pay enough attention to know if those were the “badies” or the “goodies” or whatever… But its forty-five minutes away now to the new school. It’s a completely new set-up, with a new name and everything…

The only choice that we had after the Waldorf school closed was the public school, so, we decided to join the crowd—half the crowd went to home school, and a third, or whatever, went to public school, and the rest moved (sometimes literally) to be closer to a different Waldorf school. We couldn’t do those things, so we just kept him home. We taught him to read and write, ‘cause he was just learning that in school—in the Waldorf school they start late—So…

PART IV: THE HOMESCHOOLING PROCESS

HOMESCHOOLING MANUALS & MENTORS

N: Did you read books or anything that was really inspiring for you? Any of the works by famous homeschooling mentors…?

C: Ah… no, not really. No. Because we were busy. And those books are hard to get through. Every once and a while somebody will say “You should read this” and “You should check out this author” and we have. And we have several books that we refer to just to get a clue sometimes, but we’re not really following anybody else’s ideas. And, it seems to be okay so far. We’re trying to just keep trying to be real. Liam is going on thirteen and its making us be more real again, then we were just having a kid.

 

LIAM’S UNSCHOOLING

N: Is he “unschooling”… “homeschooling”?
                               
C: Well, he will tell you very proudly that he’s unschooling. And I would have to confess that yeah, that’s pretty much it…But we did sit him down and go over how to write, and, you know, I look at everybody’s writing…‘cause I love to write, and I want him to be able to write so that people can read it….I think Trevor and I both would say [that once] you have your basic skills, then the rest of it would be to make sure that he knows how to get what he wants when he knows what he wants. And that would mean he knows how to write, and he knows how to do basic math, if not more. And he knows how to read. And then he can—he’s already on the computer when we go to the library…I have no fears that he will get left behind because I don’t give him a computer to play with all day.

 

COMPUTERS

C: I get sucked into the computer if I—I used to instant message with my friend in France, and my other one in Pennsylvania, and when I lived in Colorado all by myself, everybody else was on the east coast or in Europe. It was really nice to hop onto the computer. But when I actually want to find something on the computer, I can spend hours, and I find all kinds of things except what I wanted… And, I’m grumpy… And, I’ve wasted all this time, that I didn’t do the laundry or cook a meal or whatever it is that I had wanted to get done...And Liam is the same. He gets very grumpy after he gets on the computer at the library.
HOMESCHOOLING IN A RURAL SETTING
N: So, what’s it like homeschooling in this area? Do you feel sort of out of the loop?

C: We kind of worried about being out in the rural setting… I think sometimes Liam might feel that way too. But, that’s kind of a part where we decide, and our kids have to live with it. But actually, its to your advantage to be out in the middle of nowhere. Because if you’re in town, you’re—it’s like being in school. There’s the cliques and the gangs, and, you know, my friend’s son disappears for hours at a time (they live in Hyde Park— you know, that’s kind of like a rural village. It’s not a town or a city) and she doesn’t know what he’s doing. And he can go to the library and spend hours on the computer, which he does do…

If [Liam] says, as he gets older and is more interested in making social connections with his peers, he says “I need to do that”, then we’ll make it happen. But right now he’s still happy exploring the woods and going swimming in the river and chasing the chickens and picking them up and weighing them. Riding his bike, and, you know, he reads like a maniac so…. He gets seven to eight books every week from the library. And yeah, basic living happens…

 

TEACHING BASIC LIVING SKILLS

C: Every day I make him do stuff for me. He says “well you coulda done it”- so, well I want you to be able to do it too. It’s amazing how much effort… And he doesn’t see it yet but one day he’ll see it and hide his face and go, “ how come you spent so much time and effort to get me to do something that took you two minutes to do?”

And I always think back to a very wise friend of mine who said: [that] she doesn’t want her kids to not know what to do if she should disappear.
Not that she would ever run away, but what if she got hit by a car? She wants her kids to be able to come home, cook a meal, wash their cloths, make their bed, go to bed… you know, brush their teeth, take their shower, get up, make breakfast, and do whatever it needs doing. And, and, I figured “that sounds pretty good”. You know? Image how many kids are out there who home and they haven’t a clue yet. I mean you can buy a book through, like…I don’t know, one of those magazines, that says “Survival Guide for the Young Adult”, “How to Wash Your Laundry”, “How to Make Macaroni and Cheese”, or whatever it is.

Some people think that they want their children to have everything. So they have humongous wardrobes, all the toys, and each child have their TV and computer, and microwaved food, etcetera, etcetera. They go from that environment to the school environment, where they’re told what to do every minute of the day. You don’t have time to make any real connections—to iron out a misunderstanding…

 

LIAM’S CLASS EXPERIENCE

C: [Liam] does [Tai Kwan Do] twice a week with his dad. His dad joined later so he’s a belt-and-a-half behind. He did that very on purpose, so that Liam would be ahead. And they’ve done that every week, (I think Trevor takes a month off a year and doesn’t go for several weeks once a year, just to have a break). But other wise they go twice a week, every week—and…. That doesn’t have homework with it really, but that’s his kind of class experience at this time.

                                He did go to French for a while and he did a homeschooling “once a week” kind of group for a while. But right now the Tai Kwan Do is the “go out, interact with other people, and deal”, you know. And learn from someone else besides your parents. 

 

LEARNING FROM ELDERS/ RESPECT

C: He’s got great teachers; he’s got two teachers who really teach about courtesy, respect, and uh….  It’s almost a little old fashioned, but part of that is because it’s an Eastern martial arts, and part of it is that they strongly believe that children have a place, and—not that they don’t have all the rights that are excepted as rights—but they, the grownups, have a right of respect. So that really helped a lot when Liam (I think he was eleven… I’m not sure, maybe he was ten still when he joined) and he thought that respect was not necessary. So it was a very timely beginning.

And he goes to his grandparents once a week, stays over night and spends a day working with them. They have a garden and chickens, and his grandfather works with handicapped people— mentally handicapped—as apposed to the TBI that we talked about before. And sometimes Liam will go there, work with his grandpa and socialize if he wants…My friend and I talked about it and she was saying “yeah it could be a good opportunity for him to see real work. You know if he stayed with his grandpa and did the work along the side of his grandpa.”…He’s too young for that, but he knows all the handicapped people who live there, and he respects them even though their different.And that’s what I wanted him to get out of going there, so… that’s what his grandpa gives him sometimes.

 

CONCERNS & SOLUTIONS

C: But we were really worried to be homeschooling. We were very concerned that our inefficiencies, or  unknowing influences could be very damaging.  And we were worried about you know “what about high school?”, “what about ‘social adjustment’?” Learning processes… And what about if he wanted to go to college? You know… We came slowly to the conclusion that, well, first of all, if, if we don’t do everything right we’re not going to be, you know, legally in trouble. We’ll still have our kids, and we’ll do whatever it takes to make up for anything that we haven’t done properly, in a legal way.  In a social way it seems to be very much a balancing act anymore—how much social contact you really want your kids to have. How much time do you really want your kid to be away from home? What’s wrong with social contact with your siblings and with your parents? Or what’s so great about being disciplined by a teacher all day long… Told to go this way or that way. You know, why do we have to have a huge group of quote-unquote “friends” that you get five minutes a day with, and then everybody hops on their different busses and gets harassed all the way home. So “why keep worrying about that?” was kind of where we got to, and that kind of has lessened… And we feel pretty good about what we’re doing. We don’t feel like we’re going to handicap our kids. Liam, if he wants to go play with a group of kids when he’s sees them in Hyde Park tonight— he’ll go over and, play with them. And if Mathias wants to be shy for the next couple of years, then he can be shy and nobody’s going to label him, which they would be doing if he was in school right now. Nobody’s gunna push him into doing stuff that he might be uncomfortable with, and I think we’ve all been in a place where we’ve been pushed to do something that we couldn’t get out of because we were kids. And that’s something that he doesn’t have to put up with yet.

 

ON HOMESCHOOLING

C: I think it’s a good thing to do. I mean, the whole “being real” thing keeps getting shown to us— homeschooling, having kids.

PART V: FAMILY DYNAMICS

LIAM

J: I gotta tell you, he behaves really good for a thirteen-year-old.

C: [Liam behaves really well for a thirteen-year-old], and he does in private, and he does in public. And being with your kid all the time, you see your kid so much, that you know every little detail. It’s just like having a partner for a long time. You know he’s gonna roll over and he’s gonna say this. Or he’s gonna leave the toilet seat up, or whatever it is that annoys you. You know teeny tiny little things. So if we just sweep those away, which we have to do on a regular basis like “Hey, he’s doing really good”. So…and that’s what we use to judge if we’re doing okay. That’s the only thing that counts. Because you can see kids come through school, and they’re not literate. They can’t read or write, so why send them to school?

 

MOTHERS’ ROLES & WORK

C: I’m home all day. I used to work three days a week and now I work one day a week. And I work with a physically handicapped mom who was also homeschooling for a while. And her kids were out of control, and she couldn’t get them back in control. She has a whole bunch more issues to deal with than just having rambunctious kids. So she has put them in to the school and is maybe still sad about it a little bit, but it’s benefited everybody to have a schedule. And my kids might suffer from too much scheduling or, “no we can’t do that cause now where cooking supper”, or whatever…Where as her kids were kind of, “ruling the roost”. So, it was good for them to have some discipline… But I couldn’t go and help her do everything that she needs to have done, and then come home and do everything that I needed to do. Just cause it’s wearing out my arm tendons and bits…So, after a while, we can’t do anything if we keep over working. So that’s what makes it work. I guess I could get a job where I didn’t have to physically do stuff. But then I would have to put the kids in school. And when we had Liam, we decided that we weren’t going to be a two-full-time-working household, and therefore we’ve chosen to have lower income, but have our kids.

 [Being a stay-at-home mom is] more than a full time job because, at five o’clock, I don’t go home and kick back and relax. I get to deal with the “witching hour”—what we call that hour right before supper when everything goes wrong. When everybody gets on everybody else’s nerves, and pushes their buttons. And you keep on going until eight-thirty, when Mathias goes to bed.…But [people] keep telling me that I’ll miss these years when they’re grown ups. But, sometimes it’s hard to believe.

 

FATHER’S SUPPORT

J: Trevor supports you with all, with all this?

C: He does. Or we wouldn’t be able to do it; I wouldn’t be able to, to have the kids if we weren’t a team on it. We just, we do what we have to do. And that includes, you know, all the practical details of feeding, and clothing, and then, anything extra that we can add… we do. Trevor goes to Tai Kwan Do twice a week with Liam and he’s tired when he gets home, but he’s still goes to Tai Kwan Do. And he goes…

FATHER’S ROLE IN THE CHILDREN’S EDUCATION
                             

C: Trevor is very good at teaching math. And I’m hopeless at math, and I went to thirteen years of school and I still and hopeless at math.

PART VI: HOMESCHOOLING IN RURAL VT

HOMESCHOOLING IN A RURAL SETTING

N: So, what’s it like homeschooling in this area? Do you feel sort of out of the loop?

C: We kind of worried about being out in the rural setting… I think sometimes Liam might feel that way too. But, that’s kind of a part where we decide, and our kids have to live with it. But actually, its to your advantage to be out in the middle of nowhere. Because if you’re in town, you’re—it’s like being in school. There’s the cliques and the gangs, and, you know, my friend’s son disappears for hours at a time (they live in Hyde Park— you know, that’s kind of like a rural village. It’s not a town or a city) and she doesn’t know what he’s doing. And he can go to the library and spend hours on the computer, which he does do…

If [Liam] says, as he gets older and is more interested in making social connections with his peers, he says “I need to do that”, then we’ll make it happen. But right now he’s still happy exploring the woods and going swimming in the river and chasing the chickens and picking them up and weighing them. Riding his bike, and, you know, he reads like a maniac so…. He gets seven to eight books every week from the library. And yeah, basic living happens…

RESPECT FOR HOMESCHOOLERS IN THE AREA

N: Do you think homeschoolers are respected in this area? What’s your experience of…

                                C: I’ve never run into any kind of um… social judgment, on that.

THE -- ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

C: I wanted to see how the -- Elementary School felt about a homeschooler coming in for some classes. I called before school started and I thought it was the secretary… and I said what I was interested in and wondered if I could have the name and phone number of the teacher he would have if he did this. And, it ended up that it was the principal of the school. And she hadn’t told me that she was the principal. She said “Well first of all, you have to have a meeting with me”. And I said “Well, who are you?” “Well, I’m the principal. And you would have—you would not be allowed to just talk to the teacher. You would have to have a meeting with the principal—which is me—and then we would decide”. And I said “Oh, okay. I didn’t know there’d be a problem to meet the teacher. I would think that most parents would want to do that. But maybe that’s ‘cause I went to Waldorf school”. And so she said—then she turned the conversation around and started questioning me about why I thought public school wasn’t good enough, and very forcefully telling me that I should, you know, get it—just sign him up for it, and try it out, and it would be fine. And “why didn’t I?” and I just, kind of, very quickly ended the conversation, and said “Thank you very much”, and didn’t call back. ‘Cause she didn’t sound like she would be very helpful in that process. And I think legally a homeschooler has the right to participate in the classes that they might be interested in.

 

HOMESCHOOLING AND THE STATE   

  
N: How is it legally for—you were saying earlier about problems with homeschooling. What are the rules? What does the state want?

C: The state wants a curriculum. And it wants proof that you followed it. And you can give them proof by giving them a portfolio. Or you can have a number of licensed education specialists look at your child and write down what they think that your child has met and/or surpassed the outlined curriculum that you handed in. Or your child’s doctor can do that. And um, we’ve never asked a doctor, but we’ve had the licensed education specialist, who basically said “What do you want?” But as far as participating in the public school system, you’re legally allowed to. And I think you have to register as a homeschooler. And then you would have to have a good working relationship with the people in the school. And that’s where it can be difficult. And insisting upon your rights is all well and fine, but it can actually be quite difficult to do. You know, ask any black person who’s insisting on their rights and at face value they’re getting them, but in reality there’s so much under the surface that’s almost impossible to do. Which I have seen.

 

ON VERMONT

C: I kind-of feel like Vermont is a pretty good place to be sometimes. [L: yeah]. I think it’s pretty good that we landed in Vermont. When Liam was little we were in Colorado. It would have been a lot harder to live the lifestyle we wanted to. That we are…

PART VII: LIAM’S VIEW

CONVERSATIONS WITH LIAM

On Working With His Hands:

J: I was noticing all the art stuff around, and I saw you building the, uh, the plane last week. And I was just wondering if you like doing lots of those things a lot—working with your hands, and—

L: Yeah
                               
On Circus Smirkus:
                                               
L: The springboard looked fun. One guy jumps off and then lands on the board, and then the other guy flies of the end. Does tricks, and then comes down… It’s like a see-saw. It’s like they’re jumping up and down on it.

                                On Exploring the Woods:

L: We have a river down the hill there, which is farther down than it is along, actually. Really steep. And I explore. Good half a mile-circle radius around here. Oh, half circle, I guess, ‘cause I haven’t explored any across the river yet.

                                On Being Unschooled

                                N: Your mom said that if we asked you, you would say very proudly that you’re unschooled. That’s true?

                                L: Yeah. I would.

J: What’s your favorite thing about being unschooled?

L: Uh… I get to stay home and play all day? Well, not really, uh… Pretty much. Except for when I stop and people teach me stuff.

                                C: We do, sometimes, force some learning down your throat.

                                On Reading

                                N: Your mom said that you read a lot.

                                L: Yeah

                                N: What are you reading right now? Anything in particular? A lot of stuff, probably.

                                L: A lot of stuff…So I’m sucking them all up.

                                L: Like this big literary black hole.

 

ON PHOTOGRAPHING LIAM

C: Liam is at the stage, when he can’t figure out what to do if someone points a camera…

                               L: No I can’t. They just have to take a picture when I’m not noticing.

THE AUDIO RECORDING and TRANSCRIPT: October 31, 2007

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Interview with Carol Wednesday, October 31, 2007 TRANSCRIPTION [Liam, Matthias] J: Today-- Wednesday October 31, 2007—Nina la Porta and John Powell have arrived in Wolcott, VT to interview Carol and her family about their homeschooling experience, as part of the Sterling College Black River Voices Oral History Project. J: Here-on-out, everything is being recorded. N: Okay, so… J: It’s freaking me out. Yeah, it’s creeping me out a lot… N: (laugh) Okay, so… I don’t know… should we start with…? J: Well, as, when I first came in here, we talked about, um… N: Yeah, I don’t know what you guys talked about last time. J: We mentioned about how this was a, uh, an old, uh, farmhouse. C: Um-hum, I’m pretty sure. It was a farmhouse. J: So, um, what—do you know anymore history about the house here, or review the history that you do know? C: Well the lady who lived here for probably forty plus years N: Um-hum 0:01:01 C: She was, according to her neighbors, a very strange, secretive, um, lady, who had several husbands (legally or not) um, her lights were always out, nobody ever saw her light on—um, as an old lady—but, um, one of her husbands had the garage down in Wolcott, and, um, one of them had a junkyard, um—old farm equipment—and we still pull out bales of wire, tires, and axils, and all kinds of lovely stuff like that (every time we dig). And, um, she, she was so persnickety, I guess, that she was pretty neglected by her family. And she died, here. N: Um-hum 0:01:51 C: And her nephew had to settle the estate. And he, uh, he said yeah, she didn’t want anybody to take care of her or… N: Um-hum C: …interfere very much, so… The house was old, and it was packed full of stuff, so they took everything that they could sell and left the rest for us to clean out, and so we actually had to use a dumpster. N: When did you move here? C: Uh, the year before Matthias was born, so he’s six now, so, N: Um-hum 0:02:22 C: …seven years ago. J: Do you have anything to do with the prior owners—like, did you hear about this house--- C: Well, my mother lives up the road… And, uh, we all moved to Vermont, um, to um, take up a job up by Lake [Willoby] N & J: Uh-huh C: Because we’ve worked with handicapped people quite a lot, and um, the place that we worked at up at Lake Willoby, (I keep putting that in) that’s where it is. (Laughter) 0:02:59 C: Do you really want to know any more? But, they dealt with, um traumatic brain injury—TBI— N: Huh C: And that’s a very intense, uh, caretaker position. They’re very, um, extreme… N: Um-hum C: …in dealing with life. Everything, their anger, is a lot of times very strong. It comes through all the time. Maybe because they know what they aren’t anymore… N: Um-hum, yeah. 0:03:30 C: So, that was a new direction for us, and it didn’t work. Liam was five, going on to kindergarten, so we finally said “We don’t want to do this anymore”, and we move out and came here, uh…. N: Um-hum C: Uh, we didn’t consider buying—we had used up all our saving to move around a couple times before we got here. But this house was for sale, and it was a mile away from the Waldorf school, which we really wanted to send Liam to. 0:04:04 And three miles away from my mom in the other direction. So we did. We went through the process of getting, uh, it’s a [VHFA] (or something like that)—Vermont Housing and Financing whosy-whats-it kinda loan… N: Uh-huh C: And we did. We got it, and we qualified because, its mostly because of low income… N: Um-hum 0:04:34 C: But also good credit or something like that. We had to have, like, these two extremes N: Right C: And we managed to do it, so… N: Um-hum C: So, we got this house. N: So, then what happened with the Waldorf School? C: It closed. Liam went to Kindergarten and first grade, second grade it closed halfway through the year. N: Wow 0:04:51 C: And, the plan was always from the start of the end, that they would relocate, and re-populate, um, [more] the teachers and the support group. It was, uh, a small, very personable private school, so everybody knew too much… N: Yeah C: And everybody kind of was picking on each other, and starting to lay blame, and it was just kind of traumatic and um, so some of the people are with the new school now and I didn’t want to pay enough attention to know if those were the “badies” or the “goodies” or whatever… But its forty-five minutes away now to the new, the new school. It’s a completely new set-up, with a new name and everything. N: So, had you thought homeschooling before that, or was the homeschooling a new i-- how did you arrive upon that decision, to go from the Waldorf school to the homeschooling? 0:05:56 C: Well, I was never homeschooled. My sister kinda went-- [Turns to Jack] I talked to you about that—She went through the whole gamut of schooling. She was a very difficult child, um, just because she was herself, and she didn’t want to put up with teachers looking down at her, she didn’t wanna do what her mom said, she didn’t wanna, didn’t wanna, didn’t wanna, so… She um, she went to the public school, she went, um—she did a few years of Waldorf school and then she was pulled out, and they moved and my mom got married. So everything changed for her a lot—at about twelve—and it was very hard for her. So, it wasn’t like she was a bad kid, but she’d had enough, and she started rebelling, and kicking butt, and um, she went to um, the public school, and then I think she might have gone to another public school (I’m not sure, but…), she went to a boarding school and got kicked out and she tried homeschooling but my mom couldn’t do anything with her… [Laughter]…and uh, and by the time high school came around, she tried high school, she moved out… She moved into my apartment, and supposedly was going to school but she wasn’t. And then she had some kinda special last ditch effort by the public school system, you know, to keep the kids to come to a completion to say “Yes, now I can be a grown-up, and finish my education”. And she dropped out of that too. So… With all that behind me and [yes?], I think I counted up thirteen schools that I went to, or no—well, wait a minute—I went to thirteen years of school and there were eleven different schools that I went to. 0:08:13 N: Wow. C: And they also went from public to private. And um… there was, um…. The only choice the only choice that we had after the Waldorf school closed was the public school, so, we decided to join the crowd—half the crowd went to home school, and a third, or whatever, went to public school, and the rest moved (sometimes literally) to be closer to a different Waldorf school. We couldn’t do those things, so we just kept him home, so… We taught him to read and write, and ‘cause he was just learning that in, in school— N: Um-hum. 0:08:59 C: In the Waldorf school they start late… So… N: Did you have any influencing—kind of—Did you read books or anything that was really inspiring for you? C: You mean like homeschooling manuals? N: Yeah. Or, like, any of the works by famous homeschooling mentors… C: Ah… no, not really. No. Because we were busy. [Laughter]. And those books are hard to get through. Every once and a while somebody will say “You should read this” and “You should check out this author” and we have. And we have several books that we refer to just to get a clue sometimes, but we’re not really following anybody else’s ideas. And, it seems to be okay. N: So…. 0:9:55 C: So far. We’re trying to just keep trying to be real. Liam is going on thirteen and its making us be more real again, then we were just having a kid. J: I gotta tell you, he behaves really good for a thirteen-year-old. C: He really does, and, and, and he does in private, and he does in public. And being with your kid all the time, you see your kid so much, that you know every little detail. It’s just like having a partner for a long time. You know he’s gonna roll over and he’s gonna say this. Or he’s gonna leave the toilet seat up, or whatever it is that annoys you. You know teeny tiny little things. So if we just sweep those away, which we have to do on a regular basis like “Hey, he’s doing really good”. N: Yeah! It seems like it. C: Um-hum. So…and that’s what we use to judge if we’re doing okay. N: Um-hum C: That’s the only thing that counts. Because you can see kids come through school, and they’re not literate. N: Yeah. C: Um-hum, they can’t read or write, so why send them to school? N: So… Do you—have you been—do you have any sort of philosophies that, like—how you’re tying to go about it, or are you just—is he “unschooling”, “homeschooling”--? C: Well, he will tell you very proudly that he’s unschooling. And I would have to confess that yeah, that’s pretty much it. N: Um-hum C: But, um, we did sit him down and go over how to write, and, you know, I look at everybody’s writing, and I looked at yours [points to Nina], and I looked at yours [points to Jack]. I- I look at, at everybody’s writing ‘cause I love to write, and um, and I want him to be able to write so that people can read it. Um, my sister hardly can write, and she’s not really interested in it. But, I think Trevor and I both would say, you know, if you have your basic skills, um, and then the rest of it would be to make sure that uh, he knows how to get what he wants-- 0:12:20 N: Yeah C: --when he knows what he wants. And that would mean he knows how to write, and he knows how to do basic math, if not more. And um, he knows how to read. And then he can—he’s already on the computer when we go to the library. N: Um-hum. C: I have no fears that he will get left behind because I don’t give him a computer to play with all day. [Chuckles]. And uh— J: [whispering] Good choice… C: I get sucked into the computer if I, uh—I used to instant message with my friend in France, and my other one in Pennsylvania, and when I lived in Colorado all by myself, everybody else was on the east coast or in Europe, it was really nice to hop onto the computer. But, uh, when, when I actually want to find something on the computer, I can spend hours, and I find all kinds of things, except what I wanted… And, I’m grumpy… And, I’ve wasted all this time, that I didn’t do the laundry or cook a meal or whatever it is that I had wanted to get done. 0:13:31 N: Um-hum C: And Liam is the same. He gets very grumpy after he gets on the computer at the library. N: Yeah, the computer can definitely do that to you. [Laughter] J: We spent about, about a good hour-and-a-half trying to set this thing up so that we wouldn’t, we wouldn’t be fumbling with it once we got here… C: Well good [Laughter] C: We’d be here for hours, right? J: Yeah [Laughter] 0:13:57 C: That’s funny… Oh, its, its, uh, “hurry up and wait”. You know, these conveniences take a long time to make them actually happen. N: Yeah… So, what’s it like homeschooling in this area? Do you feel like—are there—you said you didn’t really do anything with other home—do you feel sort of out of the loop? Or has it helped? I mean— C: Well— N: Just like this— C: We kind of worried about being out in the rural setting, um, I remember you said when you were out in the middle of nowhere J & N: Um-hum C: As homeschoolers, I think sometimes Liam might feel that way too. But, that’s kind of a part where we decide, and our kids have to live with it. But actually, its to your advantage to be out in the middle of nowhere. Um, because if you’re in town, you’re—it’s like being in school. There’s the cliques and the gangs, and the um, you know, my friend’s son disappears for hours at a time, and they live in Hyde Park. You know, that’s kind of like a rural village. It’s not a town or a city… And, um, she doesn’t know what he’s doing. And he can go to the library and spend hours on the computer, which he does do. 0:15:22 N: Um-hum C: If he says, as he gets older and is more interested in making social connections with his peers. He says “I need to do that” then we’ll make it happen. N: Yeah C: But, right now he’s still happy exploring the woods and going swimming in the river and chasing the chickens and picking them up and weighing them. N: Mmm hmm C: Riding his bike, and um, you know, he reads like, like a maniac so…. He gets 7 to 8 books every week from the library. And um… and yeah, basic living happens. N: Mmm Hmm C: Every day you know, I make him do stuff for me. He says “well you coulda done it”- so well I want you to be able to do it too. J: I remember that growing up, I would always fight every single chore. 0:16:19 C: It’s amazing how much effort, and, and he doesn’t see it yet but one day he’ll see it and hide his face and go, “ how come you spent so much time and effort to get me to do something that took you two minutes to do?”- and I always think back to a very um… wise friend of mine who said: she was abandoned by her mother, and her father had to work, (and I think she had two siblings).. anyways… she doesn’t want her kids to not know what to do if she should disappear. 0:16:54 N: Mmm Hmm C: Not that she would ever run away, but what if she got hit by a car? She wants her kids to be able to come home, cook a meal, wash their cloths, make their bed, go to bed… you know brush their teeth, take their shower, get up, make breakfast, and do whatever it needs doing. N: Mmm Hmm C: And, and, I figured “that sounds pretty good”. You know? Image how many kids are out there who home and they haven’t a clue yet. I mean you can buy a book through, like…I don’t know, one of those magazines, that says “ Survival Guide for the Young Adult”. N: Yeah, like those – C: “How to Wash Your Laundry”, “How to Make Macaroni and Cheese”, or whatever it is. 0:17:41 N: Like going to College, people are like….. The beginning years of college are like… are sort of supposed to be like a time that young adults can get grounded and stuff like that. But if you’re… if you learned that all along as your growing up then you don’t have to have that huge, huge transition time, which is really hard for people. And when you’re homeschooling you do it gradually. When you’re home you see how people in the—adults and regular people are living, and it’s easier. 0:18:19 J: Yeah, I grew up in—doing a lot of… Yeah, my parents were always on my case about making me do the firewood, or, bring up the firewood, or, make sure I cleaned out the cat litter. Just little things, and, or, even do really obnoxious things like making them, them food—make them food… And they would force us to make them food. And uh… C: He still holds resentment.... [chuckling] J: Oh, I do, I do. [laughter] J: They’d have—they’d have, like, their trays, and we’d have to bring them their tray of food. C: Mmm hmmm J: Bring them water, and he, like, he would yell for us to get him water, while he sat on the chair, like, twenty feet away from the sink. And we would have to come in from outside, or come in from the other side of the house, and get him a cup of water… He was just like—[gestures strangling someone] I can’t say that, so… [laughter] C: Well, I guess, um… That’s… Some people think that um, they want their children to have everything. And, so they have humongous wardrobes, all the toys, and each child have their TV and computer, and microwaved food, etcetera, etcetera. They go from that environment to the school environment, where they’re told what to do every minute of the day. To sneak in—[to Nina] did you say you ever went to school? 0:20:00 N: I did go to school for—well I went to a Waldorf preschool till that closed, and then I went to—I wanted to go to school, so, I went to public school for seventh and eighth grade to see what it was like. C: So you do know that— N: Yeah. C: --you don’t have time to make any real connections— N: I know C: to iron out, iron out a misunderstanding-- N: There was no, there was no, there was no thinking time. There’s no processing time—that was my—and then I went to a year of private school in ninth grade, a really intense prep school, and… The classes were great and stuff, but they didn’t give us any processing time, to just sit down and think about what you’re learning, and about how you feel, and what you want to do, and where you’re going. If you don’t know where you’re going it’s pointless to go anywhere. But, that’s how I felt, like, “Why am I doing all this stuff if I don’t even know, you know, where I am. So, I think, homeschooling can give you the opportunity to have that extra time to think, you know? 0:21:12 C: Mmm hmm. I think that um, it does definitely one of the benefits, is that you are really experiencing what’s going on. N: Mmm hmm C: You know, Liam knows what it means when his mom is having a temper tantrum. And he knows what it means when Halloween afternoon comes around and the ritual starts of making a costume. N: mmm hmmm C: And he recycled this year’s costume. But it needed adjustments, and Mathias decided he wanted a costume. And we just click along like clockwork. And Liam is guiding Mathias. “And, we’re making the costumes, don’t ask questions. Don’t say no. Do whatever she says, and when we’re done, we’ll have great costumes. So, if she says put up your arms, you’d better put up your arms.” [laughter] But the thing is, that he’s, he’s right in with it, and he thinks I’m doing it at him, or to him, but we do it together. And he’s got all the pieces, and he, he does all the parts that he knows how to do, and he trusts that I’m going to kick in and do my part. N: Mmm hmm C: So, that experience has happened every year since he was five. And he knows what’s gonna happen. And he, he trusts it, and he counts on it, and that’s awesome. N: Yeah 0:22:48 C: That is so awesome, I never have said “If you don’t behave yourself, I’m not going to make you a costume” or “you can’t go trick-or-treating” or anything like that…And so he knows that he’s gonna go trick-or-treating, and he’s gonna have a costume. N: Mmm hmmm C: And um, and that’s, much better than, you know, getting home and—if the bus comes by (it already went by), but it comes by here around four-thirty in the afternoon, and that’s the bus that he would have to take. J: So he would have been on the bus for an hour-and-a-half. C: Yeah, and it comes in the morning at six-thirty. So, um… J: That’s what I did. C: I did even worse, and one year when I—when we lived in one town and went to school in another town. It was quite exciting. We had to go on the public bus, and catch the school bus once we were in the school bus range, and do the reverse on the way home. We got home at five. I’m pretty sure it was five. And we got up at five… I don’t know how we did it. But… 0:23:56 N: So, what’s the daily rhythm, sort of like here? Do you—is—everyday’s probably different, right? Does it seem like there’s a pattern that— C: Well, actually everyday is pretty the same. N: Oh really? C: And, that—you were asking about philosophy, and as far as I could take it, having not really set down a manifesto— N: Right C: -- or anything like that… Um, we, we really like the idea, the ideas that the Waldorf schools use. Um, so we really believe in a holistic, um, approach, which means, you know, basically in my head it means your mind, your heart, your body, and your spirit. And um, so if we’re going to do something, then we would really do it. We grew meat birds this year, and we didn’t hide that you actually have to butcher the meat birds. You can’t get away from the fact that you have to do that. Liam hides, but Mathias is right there, and he knows, and he, he understands what’s happening—he’s six. He’s, he’s not like into it like “Oooo, it’s gross!”, but he, he holds the bird and says “Thank you, Bird” and “You’re okay”, and he gently hands it to his dad, and his dad does the necessary chopping. And, and, it’s a very respectful thing. And then, much plucking later, and cleaning… Then we wrap it up and put it—sit it in the fridge for a day, ‘cause it has to relax, and they know all of that stuff. They know which bits look like what. And then we cook it—well, we take it out of the freezer, cook it, and that’s our meat bird. And we raised it. And remember when it was a little tiny fluff-ball? So they saw the whole thing, and so they know the whole story. And um, then we read books about chickens, and Liam finds the huge, tea-table books, or whatever they’re called, with a-hundred-and-fifty different breeds, and he, uh, he fantasizes and dreams about the perfect chicken breed with his grandmother—who is the one who got us on to doing chickens. And uh, they talk about what kind of eggs they’re gonna get—which breed. And what the best breed would be, and “oh god, if we only had a-hundred-and-fifty extra dollars, we would be getting those birds, and some of these birds, and they’d each have their catalogs, and Mathias is a chicken for five months… And playing pretend chicken. And um… and that’s a very practical example. But that’s what we kind 0:26:59 of try to do—just keep it real. And keep it—so that when they’re done, when they move out, they know how do or know how to get what they want. N: Mmm humm C: Yeah so…. J: So… how—or what else happens in a regular day, or a regular week, like… I know last week I call up and, uh, Liam was going to [Tai Kwan Do]. C: Well, he does that twice a week with his dad. Um, his dad joined later so he’s a belt-and-a-half behind [laughter}. He did that very un purpose, so that Liam would be ahead. And um, they’ve done that every week, (I think Trevor takes a month off a year and uh doesn’t go for several weeks once a year, just to have a break). But other wise they go twice a week, every week—and…. That doesn’t have homework with it really, but… umm… that’s his umm…that’s his kind of class experience at this time. N: Mmm Hmm C: He did go to French for a while and he did kind of uh, a homeschooling once a week kind of group for a while. But right now the Tai Kwan Do is the go out, interact with other people, and deal, you know, and learn from someone else besides your parents. 0:28:36 He’s got great teachers, he’s got two teachers…um, (Saranam?), who, and they, they really teach about courtesy, um, respect, and uh…. It’s almost a little old fashioned, but part of that is because it’s an Eastern Martial Arts and part of it is, that they strongly believe that children have a place, and… not that they don’t have all the rights that are excepted as rights, but they… the grownups have a right of respect. So that really helped a lot when Liam, I think he was eleven… I’m not sure, maybe he was ten still when he joined and he thought that respect was… not necessary. [Laughter] So it was a very timely beginning. N: Mmm Hmm. C: And um… he goes to his grandparents once a week, stays over night and spends a day working with them. They have a garden, and chickens, and his grandfather works with handicapped people, um… mentally handicapped… as apposed to the TBI that we talked about before. And sometimes Liam will go there, work with his grandpa and socialize if he wants… [Papers Crinkle] J: Garth? C: Yes, Garth. And um, he uh… and that, and… My friend and I talked about it and she was saying “yeah it could be a good opportunity for him to see real work. You know if he stayed with his grandpa and did the work along the side of his grandpa.” [Paper crackles] 0:30:27 N: Mmm hmm. C: He’s too young for that and the people that live there, the family that started the place Heart Beat, um, have a daughter who was in his class until it closed. And… that’s up where he went for one of his group, once a week classes. So he wants to play, but he knows all the handicapped people who live there, and he respects them even though their different. N: Mmm Hmm C: And that’s what I wanted him to get out of going their, so… that’s what his grandpa gives him sometimes. N: Yeah… Do you think homeschoolers are respected in this area? I mean, how, what’s your experience of… C: I’ve never, I’ve never run into any kind of um… social um… judgment on that. I um…wanted to see how the Wolcott Elementary School felt about a homeschooler coming in for some classes. And… I called before school started and I thought it was the secretary… and I said what I was interested in and wondered if I could have the name and phone number of the teacher he would have if he did this. And, it ended up that it was the principal of the school, and she hadn’t told me that she was the principal. She said “Well first of all, you have to have a meeting with me”. And I said “Well, who are you?” “Well, I’m the principal. And you would have—you would not be allowed to just talk to the teacher. [Aside: That’s the UPS. They always come at this time]. Um, “you would have to have a meeting with the principal—which is me—and then we would 0:32:18 decide”. And I said “Oh, okay. I didn’t know there’d be a problem to meet the teacher. I would think that most parents would want to do that. But maybe that’s ‘cause I went to Waldorf school”. And um, so she said—then she turned the conversation around and started questioning me about why I thought public school wasn’t good enough. And very forcefully telling me that I should, you know, get it—just sign him up for it, and try it out, and it would be fine. And “why didn’t I?” and I just, kind of, very quickly ended the conversation, and said “Thank you very much”, and didn’t call back. N: Yeah C: ‘Cause she didn’t, um, sound like she would be very helpful in that process. And I think legally a homeschooler has the right to participate in the classes that they might be interested in. J: I think that’s a strong point— 0:33:25 C: So, in Vermont J: I mean, we—we pay taxes towards the public school the same as anyone else. N: So what are the—how is it legally for—you were saying earlier about problems with homeschooling. Or like, what are the rules? What does the state want? C: The state wants a curriculum. N: Okay C: And it wants proof that you followed it. And you can give them proof by giving them a portfolio. Or you can have a number of licensed education specialists look at your child and write down what they think that your child has met and/or surpassed the outlined curriculum that you handed in. Or your child’s doctor can do that. And um, we um, we’ve never asked a doctor, but we’ve had the licensed education specialist, who basically said “What do you want?” [Liam walks up to the door] 0:34:35 J: You don’t have to creep around… We’re uh, no—we’re good. [Laughter] C: Join us if you’d like. He’s gonna scope it out first. [Chuckles]. J: Okay C: But um, the um, the—as far as participating in the public school system, you’re legally allowed to. And I think you have to register as a homeschooler. N: Okay C: And um, then you would have to have a good working relationship with the people in the school. And that’s where it can be difficult, and insisting upon your rights is all well and fine, but it can actually be quite difficult to do. You know, ask any black person who’s insisting on their rights and at face value they’re getting them, but in reality there’s so much under the surface that’s almost impossible to do. Which I have seen. 0:35:43 J: So, before we go any further, I want to-- N: What time is it? J: It’s five eighteen. –Stop this and make sure that it’s working… So far we have thirty six minutes. N: Okay, so we have— C: So you need a certain amount of minutes— N: Well… C: --to work with? J: We just want to make sure we have enough to work with. N: What should—I mean—are-- should we—I don’t know what your schedules like, if you need to… C: They’re going to go trick-or-treating— L: As soon as it’s dark C: --and I’m going to stay home. N: Okay M: So, we’re not really on a schedule today. N: Should we just continue?

0:36:18 J: Well, I have a couple questions here. Number one: what is this map system up here all about? I have to know. C: Well, we moved into the house—are you recording?—When we moved into the house, the ceiling fell down in the kitchen [Laughter] L: I remember, it was raining tiles. C: And so Trevor went to work, and I ripped all the tiles off, and then we were living with beams. Not this one, but the ones that are holding the floor up. J: Mmm hmm C: And, they went that way. So this beam is supporting the original beams. So then we lived with floor boards, and um, dust and stuff. And then Trevor put in this—whatever material that it is— L: Soundboard. C: Soundboard. --to start a ceiling. And it looks—looked—like we were living inside a cardboard box. [Laughter]. And, I, um, I like to paint things, and I do a lot of painting of art and the house, but my arm is getting messed up from doing all of it. So, I started painting it, but it hurt my arm too much. And the soundboard just is a sponge, and it kept soaking it up, soaking it up and still looking disgusting. So, Trevor said “Well, we should glue this on” or “We should glue that on” or the other, and then I finally figured out what I wanted to glue on, and that was the maps. So… L: [pointing] That was the first one. J: Which one? L: USA C: The big USA one. And, of course, I put it one crooked. But, they’re starting to 0:38:02 straighten out as they go along because it is easier. But the cool thing is that we can look up and see— L: Where we are. C: Where we are. We, we have to start putting “where we are” dots on, which was Liam’s latest idea. L: Yeah, we’d just find a really big Vermont map, so I thought “Okay, we find where we are and put a dot there, pointing to where we are. J: Do you have any Vermont maps up here? C: Yeah, we have a couple. And we—you know those little, touristic maps… We’re starting to actually save them to put up. Um, ‘cause they’re kind of cool. We have all kinds of maps. 0:38:38 N: Do you get National Geographic, or do you go through old ones to find all the maps? C: We do. We get National Geographic—we’ve gotten it for years. Since Liam was pretty young, so… I think I might still have some of those maps in a storage box somewhere. N: It looks like that one right—that Africa one might be— C: That is definitely a National Geographic—And this one is of the Caribbean islands. L: Caribbean. Or Caribbean. C: Caribbean. I think… Isn’t that how you say it? N: It’s correct either way. I looked that up actually. L: I like Caribbean. N: It’s Caribbean or Caribbean…. I like that little one up there. C: Uh huh. That was like how to find a flea market or something…. Saudi Arabia… N: So cool. C: And this one is of Maine. Of the area [Pemequin]— L: [Pemequid]. C: Pemequid area in Maine where go once a year to touch water. J: Is that in, uh, the—the Penobscot Bay? No, it’s in John’s Bay. C: Well, you know more than I do. Well, we stayed on the, the—what is it called? Which, which—Dara—Dara, Dara, Dara-something. L: If it’s a “Dara” it’s Daramscotia, but… C: I think it’s more complicated than that. Some really cool lake that we stayed on this past year. J: Okay. So um, Liam, I see all these… 0:40:31 N: If he’s gonna talk, maybe he has to sit next to the microphone. But anyways… J: Oh C: [To Liam] You don’t want to be recorded? L: No C: Okay. N: No??? [Laughs] C: He wants to ask you a recorded question. Come on. I signed it. I signed it and its okay. N: You can—do you want a chair? It might be easier if you sit down. J: Well I was gonna ask you um… I was noticing all the art stuff around, and I saw you building the, uh, the plane last week. And I was just wondering if you like doing lots of those things a lot—working with your hands, and— L: Yeah J: You do. L: Yes, yeah. J: Okay [Laughter] 0:41:10 N: Do you guys do a lot of stuff? L: Yeah. N: Have you ever been to the Bread and Puppet Theater? I just went this morning. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it. L: I think I’ve gone once, I don’t really remember it too clearly, but… N: It was an amazing place. C: [To Liam] Remember that play we saw at, um, [HiJinx?] festival at People’s Academy? L: Oh yeah C: That was a Bread and Puppet-lead high school group. 0:41:38 N: They have— L: Oh yeah, I remember— C: That’s what we—that’s what we saw. N: They have this amazing museum at their—where they’re based, and it’s a old barn, um… Huge barn. And, it’s just filled with all of their old, retired puppets and different puppets from around the world that they’ve collected over the years… And artwork that the peo—that the man who started it—he’s an artist as well—and he does these amazing pieces of art, and just really random stuff, but it all fits together perfectly. And it was just so inspiring. C: Yeah, we should go there. N: Yeah…Today was their last day that they’re open. C: For the season… N: Yeah. For the season. But they’re… I—it was really inspiring. Just, the creative energy in there. C: We went to the Circus Smirkus it summer and— L: That was fun. C: Liam is—was, anyways—pretty determined to join them next year for some other circus training. L: Oh yeah, I remember that. C: You remember? Are you still interested? [Chuckles]. L: Yeah C: Okay, we can start saving then. [Laughs] J: So, Circus Smirkus—that’s right where our school is. C: Yeah N: Well— J: It’s right on our campus actually. N: Well, it depends—The, the camp? C: No, this was the beginning of the tour. 0:43:07 N: That’s in a different spot… There’s yeah, I don’t know—Their home-base is somewhere else. C: Really. N: In one of these nearby towns, right? Where, where you saw… I don’t know where— L: Where we saw was inbetween Newport and Hardwick on Route 14. N: And then their summer camp is at our school. So, I was here this summer, and they were there at the same time, and— C: It must have been fun to watch. N: Yeah. Yeah, it was. And there’s huge tents—they have two big real circus tents, and yeah, it was fun. We went—every other Tuesday they had a performance that everybody could go and watch, and we’d go… Of the, not of the students, but of the coaches. Just for everybody to see what they were working on. I was really fun. C: They’re, they’re very exhibitionist. L: They are. C: With people. Yeah, they have to be. They did some pretty stunning work. L: They did. 0:44:16 C: Liam’s very graceful, so he could probably do some of that. L: Maybe. The springboard looked fun. One guy jumps off and then lands on the board, and then the other guy flies of the end. C: Does tricks. L: Does tricks, and then comes down [inaudible]. It’s like a see-saw. It’s like they’re jumping up and down on it. C: Huh J: So, um, I guess my, uh, other question for you was, um, do you spend a lot of time in the woods around the area, or goin’ swimming, or… 0:44:52 L: Yeah. Yeah, I do. We have a river down the hill there, which is farther down than it is along, actually. Really steep. And I explore. Good half a mile-circle radius around here. J: I loved doing that. I did that a lot. L: Oh, half circle, I guess, ‘cause I haven’t explored any across the river yet. N: Your mom said that if we asked you, you would say very proudly that you’re unschooled. L: Yeah. N: That’s true? L: I would. [Chuckling] N: [Laughing] Was I not supposed to say that? 0:45:26 J: What’s your, uh, favorite thing about being unschooled? L: Uh… I get to stay home and play all day? [Laughter] N: Yep L: Well, not really, uh… Pretty much. Except for when I stop and people teach me stuff. C: We do, sometimes, force some learning down your throat. [Laughter] N: Your mom said that you read a lot. L: Yeah N: What are you reading right now? Anything in particular? A lot of stuff, probably. L: A lot of stuff C: There’s quite a few, um, fantasy series for, um, juvenile readers. L: So I’m sucking them all up. [Laughter] L: Like this big literary black hole. J: “Big literary black hole”. That’s a great, great saying. [Laughter] L: [inaudible—too quiet] 0:46:26 J: So… I guess another big question is, um, how does, uh, Trevor feel about all this, like, as far as… C: Well J: Trevor is very good at teaching math. Um, and I’m hopeless at math, and I went to thirteen years of school [chuckles] and I still and hopeless at math. But, uh, um, we uh, we were really worried to be homeschooling. We were very concerned that our inefficiencies, or um, unknowing influences could be very damaging. And we were, um, worried about, um, you know, uh, “what about high school?”, “what about, um, ‘social adjustment’?” Learning processes… And what about, what about if he wanted to go to college? You know… L: Then we’ll make it happen. C: Yeah, and we um— L: If I don’t want to go, why should I go? C: We came slowly to the conclusion that, well, first of all, if, if we don’t do everything right, um, we’re not going to be, you know, legally in trouble. We’ll still have our kids, and we’ll do whatever it takes to make up for anything that we haven’t done properly, in a legal way. Um, and, we uh—in a social way it seems to be a very, very much a balancing act anymore—how much social contact you really want your kids to have. Um, how much, um, how much time do you really want your kid to be away from home? What’s wrong with social contact with your siblings and with your parents? Or what’s uh, what’s so great about being disciplined by a teacher all day long… Told to go this way or that way. 0:48:35 L: “Ra-ra-ra-ra-ra” C: You know, why, why do we have to have a, a huge group of [quote-unquote] “friends” that you get five minutes a day with, and then everybody hops on their different busses and gets harassed all the way home. So why, why keep worrying about that? Was kind of where we got to and that kind of has lessened and, and we feel pretty good about what we’re doing. Um… we don’t feel like, umm… we’re going to handicap our kids. Liam, if he wants to go play with a group of kids when he’s sees them in Hyde Park tonight; he’ll go over and, play with them. L: Yeah! C: And um…if, if Mathias wants to be shy for the next couple of years, then he can be shy and nobody’s going to label him, um, which they would be doing if he was in school right now. [N: Mmm Hmm] Umm, nobody’s gunna push him into doing stuff that he might be uncomfortable with, and I think we’ve all been in a place where we’ve been push to do something that we couldn’t get out of because we where kids. And that’s something that, um… he doesn’t have to put up with yet. N: Mmm Hmm J: Trevor supports you with all, with all this? C: He does. Or we wouldn’t be able to do it; I wouldn’t be able to, to have the kids if I wasn’t, if we weren’t a team on it. Um… We just, kinda just, we do what we have to do. And that includes, you know, all the practical details of feeding, and clothing, and then, and then anything extra that we can add… we do. Trevor goes to Tai Kwan Do twice a week with… L: Me. C: Liam and he’s tired when he gets home, but he’s still goes to Tai Kwan Do. And he goes… N: So, are you home all day or, what’s the sce… 0:50:46 C: I am, I’m home all day. I used to work three days a week and now I work one day a week. And Um, I work with a physically handicapped mom who was also homeschooling for a while. And um, her kids were out of control, and she couldn’t get them back in control. She has a whole bunch more issues to deal with than just having rambunctious kids. So she has put them in to the school and is maybe still sad about it a little bit, but it’s benefited everybody to have a schedule. N: Yup. C: And my kids might suffer from too much scheduling or, no we can’t do that cause now where cooking supper, or whatever. N: Mmm Hmm C: Where as her kids were kind of, “ruling the roost”. So, it was good for them to have some discipline… But I could only work… [Laughter in background, Liam said a joke] I couldn’t go and help her do everything that she needs to have done, and then come home and do everything that I needed to do. Um, just cause it’s wearing out my arm tendons and bits. N: Mmm Hmm C: So, after a while, we can’t do anything if we keep over working. So that’s what… makes it work. I guess I could get a job where I didn’t have to physically do stuff. But then I would have to put the kids in school. L: Yeah. C: And We’ve, we, when we had Liam, we decided that we weren’t going to be a two full time working household, and there for we’ve chosen to have lower income but have our kids. N: Yeah. My mom always says, “Being a stay at home mom is a full time job”. [Laughter] 0:52:45 C: It’s more than that, it’s more than a full time job because, at five o’clock, I don’t go home and kick back and relax. I get to deal with the witching hour. What we call that hour right before supper when everything goes wrong. L: When I run out of energy! C: When everybody gets on everybody else’s nerves, and pushes their buttons, and… you keep on going until eight-thirty, when Mathias goes to bed. Do I usually bellow? L: No. C: Kay. Mathias usually bellows? L: Yeah. C: Trevor? [L: yeah] No he doesn’t. [Laughter] J: My dad was always the one that stayed home… [C: yeah?] and my mom went out, she still, she still works and my dad stays home. C: Wow. Well that’s – cool, totally opposite. Trevor always said that I was more than welcomed to switch roles with him. [Laughter] N: Yeah, my dad works and my mom’s home, and this is the first time it’s just my sister and I. But she, my sister, and my mom and I do everything together. And now I’m not home, and my mom and I are really close so, and I have no idea how, it is for my mom except I have… for a while I wasn’t calling as much as I should probably, and my sister would email me and say, “Nina, you have to call mom, all I hear about is: When’s Nina gonna call, I miss Nina, why isn’t she calling, I wonder what she’s doing now.” [Laughter] “What’s Nina”… and, when you’re, when your with people all day, and especially when your with family members all day, you really get close. C: Yeah, yeah but they keep telling me that I’ll miss these years when they’re grown ups. But, sometimes it’s hard to believe. L: Don’t worry I’ll call regularly. [Laughter] N: I got on a schedule now, now I call my mom every few days, and I really like calling. I can’t wait for thanksgiving, to be able to go home and… C: Where’s home for you? 0:55:01 N: In Cornwall Bridge Connecticut. Which is a rural area, kind of like this and… yeah… L: Do you explore the woods? N: Yeah, I, the problem where we live is we have a serious tick and limes disease problem, and, so… you can explore the woods in the winter time, but if you explore them in the summer, chances are you’ll get really sick. Umm, which I got twice and it was really debilitating, um… C: It takes a long time to get better from that too. N: Yes. I… L: Don’t you build up an immunity system? N: Hmm… the problem is, is that it wrecks your immune system when you get it and I got it when I was seven, and they didn’t know what it was then, and I got chronic fatigue from it, and really low immune system and stuff. So like, I’m still sort of getting over it… so… that’s the problem with the woods where I live. C: Hmm… We haven’t seen any ticks this year have we? L: No. C: I kind-of feel like Vermont is a pretty good place to be sometimes. [L: yeah] I think I grew up in a lot of different places you know… I think it’s pretty good that we landed in Vermont. When Liam was little we where in Cali… in Colorado, It would have been a lot harder to live the lifestyle we wanted to. That we are… N: Did you grow up, did you grow up here or in one spot. C: No, I didn’t. My dad was in the army… N: Ok. C: And, we um, my mom was, was German, they met when he went to Germany. And um, none of us have stopped moving since, well… When my parents got divorced, and after lots of fun custody stuff, um... my brother went with my dad, and my sister and I went with my mom. And my mom never stopped moving around, she moved quit a lot, and I did too, I mean… Part of it was to do with working with the handicapped people that we did. We, worked um, in a camp hill system, which is the same philosophy as the Walldorf School… So, I uh, worked in a camp hill in South Africa… 0:57:32 N: Wow. C: And in Pennsylvania, where I met Trevor. N: Was that the school, Beaver Run School, or… C: Beaver Run um, Beaver Run… N: Isn’t there a school… C: There’s a number of, of anthraposophical places there. Beaver Run is the boarding school for handicapped children. My mom actually did the four year training course there. N: That was what I was gonna do before I came to Sterling. You know, I uh, I didn’t know about Sterling when I was gonna do it, I still might, I’d like to. C: It’s a quit, quit a place to be, and it totally replaces, it totally replaces the need to go to college, because you have the natural course that you take there and you review your practicum at the same time. So it’s a very intense 24 hour, seven days a week. I was a staff child there… J: He’s jump’n crocodiles. [Referring to Liam’s picture] C: Is that an old one? L: Nah it’s a, it’s a new one. N: Can we take a picture of this a little later? L: Sure. N: We brought our camera, his camera. L: You should see the wall upstairs. C: You would have to ask poppas permission, because that’s his space and poppa likes to keep a little bit private. So don’t push him into it. Especially when he wakes up grumpy. Is he watching? L: Yea he’s watching. C: Ok, now we know. N: With your permission maybe we could take a photograph of you, and your brother and your costumes. Or at least you, I know your brother’s shy. Before you go trick-or-treating. L: He’s way too shy, yeah. That’s, that’s fine. N: We thought we could get a picture of your maps, maybe take a picture. L: You have to ask her, those aren’t mine. C: You can take a picture of anything accept me. [Laughter] N: Ok C: We have this, this soul issue about it… Right?… not really, but it’s a good excuse. [Laughter] N: Yeah. Ok. C: But anyway, if you have any other questions. N: I’m trying to think, is there anything that we wanna. J: Well… C: You can get back to me as well… N: Yeah, maybe… C: It wouldn’t be on tape but… N: Ok, yeah. That would be… C: I’d like to… N: Yeah. Thanks so much this has been really great. L: Fun. N: It makes me wanna go and… [Carol cuts in: Have babies!?!] [Laughter] N: That wasn’t what I was gonna say… C: That’s why I said it. J: That’s right where I was headed with it… N: Although I do want to home school my children. 1:00:16 C: I think it’s, it’s a good thing to do. I mean, the whole being real thing keeps getting shown to us, um, homeschooling, having kids. Do you want more light? You don’t have a flash right? J: I do have a flash. N: Sometimes it helps not to have the light on. It depends. We could experiment. C: We uh, we, we go to the Stowe Dump a lot… N: I haven’t been there. C: And um… Trevor works in Stowe so, sometimes he goes every day. N: Oh huh. C: And he comes home with the wildest treasures, and one of them was one of those lights that you use for, for taking real magazine quality photographs. L: Does it take well with the flash on? [Asking Jack] J: Yeah it does. Want a picture of you and your planes? You can grab your plane if you want. L: Yeah. I’ll get the A-10. J: You want the A-10; it’s more of a rugged plane? L: It’s got a more distinct shape, so you can actually see what it is. [Random conversation, undecipherable] C: Liam is at the stage, when he can’t figure out what to do if someone points a camera… 1:01:37 L: No I can’t. They just have to take a picture when I’m not noticing.

~Special thanks to Carol and Liam for sharing their stories and making this project possible. ~