Now that O is talking nonstop and asking lots of questions, we're having a lot more opportunities to "unschool." Before she was talking, we told her about everything around us, etc. but now we really know what she is interested in, and that is so much fun. Her two favorite questions to ask are "What is it? or What's that is it?" and "What does that mean?" She is NOT satisfied with a simple answer. The girl wants DETAILS! Here are a couple of examples that I'd like to document just so I can remember to tell O about them one day :)
She asked Elliott what a light switch was. She wasn't satisfied that it was just a light switch, so he went into great detail telling her all about electricity. He took her outside and showed her the power lines and told her all about voltage and where the electricity comes from (he works for an electric company, so he was thrilled with her interest in this subject). I'm sure most of this was way over her head since she's just 26 months old, but she was really listening and paying attention to him. Since then she's talked about electricity quite a bit. This morning she told me about daddy showing her the power lines, and she said "daddy buys electricity at his office." She definitely has an understanding of not wasting electricity, which is something that she hears often when we make sure all of the lights are off when we aren't using them. When we were at her grandparents house this past weekend, she worriedly told me that they'd left a light on upstairs :)
O has also been interested in her veins in her wrists lately. Elliott also went into great detail explaining what her veins are and what they are used for. He must have also told her about bones, because she's been talking about her bones, too. This new questioning stage of her language development is SO much fun!
Oh, one more unschooling story...O LOVES for us to tell her her birth story, and we probably tell it at least 4 times a day. I realized last week that although O knows that she was born at X:08 pm (although she usually just says Xpm when asked) on a Sunday, she did not know her actual birthday. Oops! I told her that her birthday is July XX, and she has proudly been sharing that information with everyone she sees ever since then. She also adds in that July XX is her Guh-guh and her cousin, Emily's, birthday, too. Although she's a little confused about her cousin Emily, since she has two Auntie Emily's :) I've also told her that she was born in 20XX (I made sure to tell her this since I am always amazed by how many children in elementary and even middle school who don't know the year in which they were born!) O won't say 20XX, but she will fill in the X if I say 2000... She loves it when I ask her questions like this (She gets a sweet little proud grin on her face), so I'm trying to think of more. Let me know if you have any ideas :) Thanks!
edited to delete personal info at Elliott's request :)
