Ani wrote:So anybody homeschooling with the objective of teaching their kids to be autodidacts, in general but in languages specifically, have suggestions on how to encourage sticking to one language instead of spinning and dabbling all over the place like a demented hummingbird?
I realize I'm doing the thing where people who don't have kids come in and talk about how to raise children, but I gradually became an autodidact of my own accord and thought I might share how.
There are two books that I read many, many times as a kid that contributed to this mindset. The first is
The Swiss Family Robinson, where a family in a precarious position not only survives but thrives thanks to the bottomless knowledge of all. The second is
Cheaper by the Dozen, and to some extent its sequel
Belles on their Toes, which I only read after I was well into teaching myself things. In that book, the father of 12 children is an efficiency expert (in real life, he and his wife invented the field of industrial engineering) and takes it upon himself to greatly enhance the children's public school education by taking every opportunity to teach and to make learning fun. Both of these books had sections where people learn several languages, of course.
So I guess I learned by example: I knew that it was possible to learn many things if I put my mind to it, and so I gradually got more and more used to looking at how I was spending my time. If I couldn't justify it as contributing to my knowledge or personal development in some way, I felt guilty and started to learn more things. This sort of thinking started when I was about 17 - I graded papers for the Spanish class and often had nothing to do. Instead of playing on my phone, I taught myself Morse Code and how to write left-handed. By the way, I'd never call these "useless talents" as some people do, they're just skills I might not need very much. At the very least it opens me up to a new way of using my brain or body.
Avoiding wasting time on devices is a whole huge topic that I won't really get into, but I will say that if the devices are inconvenient then they'll get used less and less. When you have a very limited data plan and battery life, you're not going to spend a whole lot of time on your phone.
In college I met people that were very smart and that challenged my way of thinking, as well as encouraged me to learn more on my own. I met people that had skills I didn't have, and instead of thinking "I don't know that" I thought "I haven't learned that. Maybe I will someday." That's why I learned guitar and Python.
Sure, I liked it when people asked me for help learning something, but I also really liked the feeling of being amazed by how smart someone was. It was very cool to be one of the least smart people in the room. If you can foster that appreciation in your child as well as the sense of excitement at learning something new, they'll go far.