Supporting your Child with Natalie Burns
Corinne Powell: I'm so happy to be here with you, Natalie.
Natalie Burns: I'm very excited for you to share with us.. I'm so excited to be here. Talking about learning and how that is impacted by the relationship that we have as moms with our children is so important and really valuable for everybody that I'm just really eager to unpack this with you more.
Corinne Powell: So can you share with us a little bit about what your journey's been bringing you to this place that you're at, helping others as they're teaching their children.
Natalie Burns: Yeah, so recently I started up a homeschool teaching business called Homeschool Teaching Simplified, and it is focused on how we approach our children with their learning process. And I wasn't always an advocate for homeschooling. I actually used to teach high school biology, senior biology, and even a bridge program to a local health sciences trade school, and I really enjoyed the classroom.
It was when my oldest got into kindergarten that I was thinking, oh, I could go and be teaching these other students and be challenging them and growing them, and then my own children are going to go off to somebody else when I really could be doing that. So that caused a shift in me to move to homeschool, and I found that it was way different teaching my own children than it was teaching other random children.
In fact, teaching only three of my own children was way harder than teaching 30 teenagers. So that was what my business was all about, to set to find out why this was and how all of us moms can connect more deeply with our children through that learning process, because how many times have we tried to help them with something, even if that's just after-school homework, and you feel that rub, you feel that pushback, and they are resistant and they are fighting and it is just causing all sorts of chaos, not only with the learning, but also with your relationship. So that was what sparked my entire business now.
Corinne Powell: I feel validated, because you're saying it was harder to teach your three children than a classroom of 30, and I remember the challenge when we were homeschooling, so now I'm like, oh, okay. Thank you.
Natalie Burns: Yeah, not just you.
Corinne Powell So you take us where you want.
Natalie Burns: Sure, so what I found was that key piece that made it so much harder was the fact that our children are really a mirror of us. So let's say you're teaching something around how to read, something super basic, but that is really quite complicated the first time you do it. So if our child starts to get frustrated and get upset, this isn't happening right away.
I mean, it is a difficult thing to learn something new for the first time. The way that that comes out for them is actually going to be an inherited way of dealing with a problem.
So what they're going to do is they're going to react the same way that you would normally react. So when they start to get upset, it is actually a huge trigger for you as the mom, because that's like really digging deep into yourself of how you feel. You understand exactly how they feel. Not only relate, but you feel it with them. And so then you're upset.
And when we need to be self-regulated so that they can learn to be self-regulated, they're actually triggering in us some of the deepest fears, some of the deepest hurts and pains that we've had with our own learning experiences. And it's really hard to overcome that for ourselves in that moment so that we can be there for our children.
So really when they are starting to have that resistance, fighting, pushback at any level, it really is a mirror for us to notice, ooh, why is this bothering me? I think I have something that I could deal with this issue as well. Versus in a classroom, the children there, they are also going to struggle, but they're going to struggle with it in a different way than you. So it's really easy to stay emotionally regulated and walk them through that process because it doesn't bother you at all.
It's all about them, it's their thing. So how can we at home find a way to walk our children through their own thing, just like we would in the classroom? Because really our children's stuff doesn't need to be our stuff.
Corinne Powell: Yep, I'm nodding my head here because I resonate with what you're saying. And it's interesting because I just, well, I say just. Eight months ago, I had my fourth baby.
And this week, two of my kids were expressing themselves. And I'm like, oh my goodness, you're taking me back to my labor. Because basically they had the fear and the physical discomfort. And I'm witnessing this thinking, wow, like this is profound. It's what you touched on there, you know? But like our children are a mirror of us in a plethora of ways.
And yes, if we are able to focus on working out what we need to within ourselves, healing the parts of ourselves, it's so much easier to relate to parent, to empathize, but not get stuck with our kids as they're in their dysregulation.
Natalie Burns: Totally. So it really helps us see where we are stuck so that we have the opportunity now to actually wade through that mud and get out to the other side because we don't need to live like that forever.
And if we don't take that time to actually work through that, even though it's challenging, like we all know as soon as you start to work on yourself in that deep rooted fear way, it is a challenge and you are going to need to feel it and work through it and allow it to move out through to the other side. But if you don't, if you say, oh, that sounds too hard, I don't have time for that right now, then what you're going to find is that these are just patterns that you're going to keep doing.
And you're going to actually continue to rub up against your children and it will damage your relationship in some sense or form of the amount. So what we tend to do then is just try to make things happen.
We try to get them to just do it because if we don't want to deal with the emotional side, we say, just get through it, like, hurry up, just do those worksheet speed drills or whatever.
So if your child is freaking out about a timed speed drill and you're just forcing them, just do it, just say, come on, let's go faster, let's get this over with, it's not going to actually allow them to learn because they no longer feel relaxed.
They no longer feel like you are understanding them, that you're a safe place for them to really lean into during those moments of fear or panic or uncertainty.
So instead of trying to make them learn the way we want them to or the way that we think they should or the way that we are comfortable learning, we really need to embrace more of an open mind of how to let them become responsible for their own learning.
And what it really comes down to for us, like what is our role in that? It's mostly about just getting out of the way. So this is where we get this really challenging aspect of leading them and yet getting out of the way.
Corinne Powell: Okay, so how do you suggest we do that? Yeah, that sounds challenging.
Natalie Burns: Yeah, so the word I love the best is like a facilitator.
So you're allowing something to happen. So you set up the environment where they have everything they need to do it for themselves. And yet you do not take on the responsibility of doing it for them or doing it to them because I don't know if you can relate, but there have been many times where I was helping my child with something and I realized, oh, I'm doing this for them right now. Yeah. And sometimes one child more than the others.
Yeah, like let's just get through this. So instead of trying to make it happen and do that learning for them, we really need to set up the pieces that they need to do that for themselves, where we are there to support them and encourage them from beside.
So think about linking arms side by side. We're not pulling them forward from the front. We're not pushing them from behind. We're coming alongside them and being there so that they can lean into us when they have a question. We don't need to give them the answer necessarily.
We can say, oh, I remember when your book talked about this last lesson. Let's go back into that last lesson and see if we can find where that is and allow them to scan the page themselves. Or, oh, this would be a really good question to ask this certain family member.
Do you want me to call them? And then you can ask them. So even though they're still getting the answer from that family member, you're setting them up to learn how to get there themselves.
Corinne Powell: Yeah, yeah. That's great. That walking side by side, linking arms, I feel like the strength of that, but I also can see how that means like we have to be actively doing the, well, I'm gonna say inner work, just because that's what I focus on, right? There's so much that it's, you know, I know we each have our niches.
And so I might say inner child work, inner child work, but there is so many types of inner work that are helpful. But there is a strength that comes out of us being proactive within ourselves as we're linking arms and walking with our kids. The intention, the dedication, like there's a choice in that. But then the result must be profound. Like we're giving our children so much by doing that.
Natalie Burns: Not only do they have the opportunity now to actually learn how they learn, you know, whether they're a visual learner, whether they're auditory, whether they need to move, whether they need to come back to an idea over and over and over again before it actually clicks, whether they need to understand the big picture application before they could even memorize something.
They need to know how they go about that thinking. And when we start to try to define that for them, it really hinders them from that opportunity for themselves.
So then they will never be able to have that ability to reflect and self-assess as they get older and understand how they can adapt to situations in the future. But also it damages ourselves because we just get overwhelmed.
Why would we try to put something on somebody else when we know it's not going to work for them because they are their own person? Just because they have a lot of similarities to us does not mean they are us or that they're going to think or be just like us.
So really that starts to make us feel stressed, overwhelmed, because we don't have control of them. And we start to allow those inner child, like those subconscious responses start to come forth and it hinders the way that we speak to them.
So we may start to become more tense or terse, short with them. There may be more unfavorable tones of voice like yelling at them. And those come out in those moments
because they are an indicator that we're trying to control somebody else. And this is not an area that we have control over because we cannot make learning happen for somebody else.
Corinne Powell: Yeah, that is, we need to highlight that and say that.
Right? Like, wow, like the energy that we're putting out to try to control the situation, to try to change somebody is not our responsibility. I know that's speaking to me and like that's right there.
There's so much in that.
Natalie Burns: I was trying to find why so many of us feel like that is the way that we tend to automatically go. And I think it's because of the definition of success.
So I was looking up in the dictionary, I'm like, what does success even mean? Because it comes down to an outcome-based mindset. So success is achieving something that you want to do or get. So we see these goalposts ahead. This is what I want.
And when I get there, then I am successful. So we want our children to have a successful education. We're thinking, well, they have to know their times tables. So then we need to get them there. And maybe your child is one of those where they cannot just memorize the times tables.
They need to understand that real-world application before they can memorize those details. And yet here we are giving them step one, step two, step three, when they need to know the big picture first. And so trying to make that happen in order to get to success is causing us the overwhelmed.
When really we actually need to redefine what success means when it comes to learning. Because there is no end goalpost. There is no end outcome for learning. So there's never going to be a successful endpoint.
And this is why we all call ourselves lifelong learners. We are going to be learning and open-minded and ready to change in light of new information all our whole lives, all the way up to the last day.
So instead of success being the outcome, then can we look at success as the process? As the process of putting one foot in front of the other in the direction that we want to be going. And so as long as we see that improvement, that is success.
Corinne Powell: Yes, that's good. It takes the pressure off too.
Natalie Burns: Yeah, so that's what I found to be the biggest source of overwhelm when it comes to trying to support our children with their learning. That feeling of trying to make learning happen because we think that we know what is right, what is good, what is the best way to go about this, when really that's judging how something needs to be.
And that when it comes to learning, there's not really a right or wrong judgment. It's a lot more gray than we ever gave it credit for. And the process of how that is woven through our lives and how our children go about making those connections is an open and flexible, super dynamic kind of roadmap to their educational goals.
Corinne Powell: Yeah. So do you have a story of like, I don't know if, well, I guess you can tell us through this. When you started homeschooling, is who you are and how you're relating to your children very different now than it was? Or had you already been focusing so much on this previous that there's a progression but not a drastic difference?
Natalie Burns: Well, both, because in terms of the teaching style, like open-ended questions, for example. So instead of, did you have fun at the zoo today? Which is a closed question, you get yes, no. You get kind of a definite response, no other conversation.
I was able to already bring in like, if you were the zookeeper, which area would you want to be in charge of? And then they would talk about this whole explanation and give their reasoning. So I had those kinds of teaching strategies in place already, but it was this overwhelmed piece that I had no idea about because it really was not the same in the classic, like traditional brick-and-mortar school setting.
Having our children struggle with the same things that we struggle with that we may not have dealt with yet is really, really challenging. And when we start to feel overwhelmed, that shuts down our ability to think and reason in that moment. And that's why it's easy to become short with them and to say, just hurry up and do it.
And then mom needs to time out and throwing our hands up in the air because we basically have shut off our cognitive thinking response and allowed that subconscious-like limbic survival mode saying, danger, danger, this is something that you are afraid of, get out of here and make this stop and try to get control of this situation.
So that aspect I had to experience firsthand. And that's where I really challenged myself, what is going on here? Why am I upset about my child throwing his hoodie up and not wanting to say the different variations of how you pronounce the letter A?
Like what's the problem here? I can teach all sorts of super complicated content and teaching my child phonics is driving me nuts. So that was a big realization that something is different about homeschooling.
Something is different about homework help. Something is different about anything that we are walking our own children through rather than other children in the community or their friends and other classroom children. Because how many times do we have situations where teenagers will connect with their friend's parent because that parent isn't triggered by the same stuff.
Corinne Powell: So I hear you saying, things have progressed and morphed over the years.
So then I guess I'm just curious, like is there anything in the day-to-day that you remember, wow, this used to be really challenging and now it's easy that you can just tell us about?
Natalie Burns: Yeah, like my son literally putting on his hoodie and like hunching over instead of doing his work and me not knowing what to do to get him to get going again. Not knowing what to say to encourage him because I just felt frustrated by it.
Or my daughter was the one who was really stressed by speed drills and timed math drills. And at first I said, well, you're just going to do it and you'll get used to it. Like we're gonna do this because that was the classroom approach. Everybody's doing it this way, sorry, get on board.
The bus is moving, let's go. Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, and then something clicked with this whole understanding of not being able to make learning happen for them. And I realized this is the beauty of homeschooling is that I can give them a personalized approach.
Who cares if she doesn't want to do those questions in one minute? Why don't we instead change it to just as fast as she can or let's just do this before we do the next thing.
Like it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. And I realized that I can compromise with them to allow them to choose their own adventure rather than thinking I had to lead them through this experience.
Corinne Powell: Yeah, wow. That's so refreshing because like you're saying that like you could do it differently with the speed drills and that across the board, like so many of us need to literally absorb and ingest that truth that like there's not just one way to do something and the way that was modeled to us may not be the best way.
Like we have to be willing, I say have to, if we're wanting to progress, change, be able to cultivate like that safety in our relationship with our kids, we have to be willing to consider, wait, am I doing this? Am I responding this way because this is what was modeled to me? And is that how I want to respond?
Is that, do I want to think this way because there are other ways to look at it. There are other perspectives. We can reconceptualize a situation. We can actually step back and see, are we just stuck?
Like, are we actually, you know, our brain's offline. Like we're not able to think about another solution. Just so refreshing that truth right there is so important.
And I know that it's not just like us allowing ourselves to give our kids that opportunity, but allowing ourselves to give our own self that opportunity like, okay, all right, maybe in this setting, speed drills had to be done.
And that meant you had to do it in one minute and see how many questions you could answer. And even that, I can feel like the stress of that, like, oh my gosh, no, like, you know, it's okay. I'm just going to do what I can with this.
But just this, this is how other people have done it, but is this the way I have to do it? I mean, what a freedom there is in that, you know? And I don't think it's just easy.
I know that even in some of the things that I've been willing to do, because I'm like, okay, I'll do something different. There are many times where I kind of get gripped by this fear of, oh no, like maybe this isn't the best way to do it because I'm not necessarily seeing a lot of other people do it that way, right? And I'm still basing a lot on, well, the general populace does it this way. Maybe that's because they know something that I forgot or didn't realize.
And then I take a step back again and remind myself, no, if this is the place I want to get to, and this is the way there, then I'm going to continue to allow myself to be right where I am, because I'm still, like, I'm going in the direction that I want to go. Parenting, raising our kids. What you're talking about is not how everybody's doing it.
So we have to be able to ground ourselves back in like there is a value to this and it's worth going about it the way that you're talking about. If we want that bond, that closeness, that connection with our kids. Yeah, I mean, how many times, this is huge.
Natalie Burns: You really nailed it in the homeschool world because how many times do we do something because we feel like we are expected to? Maybe expectations from somebody else, family, friends, Ministry of Education, even the expectations we place on ourselves for how this is supposed to look or how this is supposed to go.
And that really limits us from using our own intuition about what our children really need and what they need from us, what they need from themselves, what they need in order to actually grow. So we really do need to tap into those intuitive approaches and trust that we have the authority to make an assessment of what is the best way for our children to go about their own personal growth and development.
Because that's really what this comes down to. Learning can be about math. It could be about something like sports. It could be about their personal self. And really the most important thing that they could ever learn is how to think, how to know yourself and how to think and how to critically think about what information is coming in.
Because when we can teach them that they are responsible for their own learning, then they start to trust themselves so that they can think and know what they think and why they think, and then to communicate their own individual voice in the world.
They will never be able to flourish as an individual without that ability to think and communicate that thinking. Yeah. Yeah, so that's a big calling for us as moms to support that and also not get in the way of that.
Corinne Powell: Yes, yes, yes. Lead them, but not get in the way. When you said that, I was like visualizing the picture of it, right? Because usually, I don't know, I heard lead and I'm thinking, oh, you're in front, but not getting in the way. I liked that picture.
So I don't want to take you on a rabbit trail if you have other things like you wanted to share with us, but I'm just curious, before you started homeschooling your children, was homeschool something like in the back of your mind? What was your familiarity with it before you actually embarked on it?
Because you said you were a teacher yourself in biology, high school biology.
Natalie Burns: So I've been a certified teacher for over 11 years now, and I taught K to 12, the whole gamut mostly focused in sciences and biology. And that was really where I had decided I was going to set my roots. I was going to be a public school high school teacher, and I loved it. I never stopped loving it. It just changed when I saw my own child start to enter into that school system phase.
And I thought, ah, I don't know if that's really what I want to do. Because the year before, bouncing between getting childcare and then going to work was already tough enough. I was pregnant with our third, and I thought this is only going to get more challenging. And we wanted to change some of the way we did life. Like we wanted to move out to get more land and do more of a homesteading kind of thing.
And that wasn't going to be possible close by to my school district. So there were different factors that I was thinking, really, what is my life direction at this point? If I'm going to reevaluate, do I really get to decide when I'm 25, this is my life direction forever now, and this is how I'm going to make it happen and strong arm everything around me to come into alignment to what I want?
Or can I be open to, oh, now that I have children, now that my views on certain things have changed, can I readjust that? Can I redefine my vision? Can I actually make a change that's going to keep me moving forward rather than keeping me stuck in what I thought was best?
Can I be open to what's best coming for me?
Corinne Powell: Everybody listening, hear the power of that. We can create the life we want to have. We can create our lifestyle. We can do things differently than we're even currently doing them.
Wow, that is so exciting. I love hearing stories like the one you're sharing about your life because you're showing us all a different way. You're just reminding us that you're able to do, this is the one life we live.
We don't have to do it the way that someone else is saying. And you've decided, you figured out what your, I mean, I'm guessing, right, what your priorities, your values were, what your goals were, and how can I do this? How's it possible to do it and make a way?
Oh, love it, love it, love it.
Natalie Burns: Yeah, you take your strengths and then you see what is a new way that I can get creative with this. And yes, those fears are going to come up. And yes, you're going to need to wrestle deep within yourself about, oh, why am I feeling like I'm pushing back against this even in my own life with whatever situation for yourself? And is this something that I can change my belief system about? Is this really the truth of what it is?
Do I really need to be afraid of this? Or is it really true that maybe I'm not worthy of these wonderful things? Or maybe I just need to change the way I think about myself.
Corinne Powell: Yeah. Yes. Yeah.
Natalie Burns: Really we can shape our children in a more powerful way when we allow them to actually shape themselves.
So when we set up the environment that they need so that they can learn how they think and learn, they can start to become empowered within themselves to share whatever they want to with the world.
And they will feel confident to do those things because they know that you are there as like that safety net, but that they're taking their own steps forward.
Corinne Powell: Yes. Great. And where can my listeners find you and connect with you?
Natalie Burns: Yeah, well, I'm mainly on YouTube and Instagram at @homeschoolteachingsimplified. You can also join me for a free workshop that I have. It is at homeschoolteachingsimplified.com/free workshop.
And that is where I unpack actually a lot of these ideas. It's called Three Secrets to Revamp Your Homeschool Approach and Unlock Deeper Connection with Your Child. So it's all around how we can approach them to bring them to these higher levels of thinking while strengthening the connection that we need for that learning to occur.
Corinne Powell: Great. Okay. And I'll include all that in the show notes as well.
Natalie Burns: So thank you so much.
Corinne Powell: Thank you, Natalie, for being with us.
Natalie Burns: I really enjoyed this time. It was my pleasure.
I hope you all have a wonderful day.
Corinne Powell: If you enjoyed this conversation that Natalie and I had, I wanna highlight a few previous episodes that you might also enjoy. From season 1 episode 8 Homeschooling can rock; from season 5 episode 1 - Connect with your kiddos; and from season 5 episode 1 - Helping kiddos through the hard stuff.
Well, we've come to the end of another episode. What did you think about what you heard and what resonated with your heart? If you were touched by this episode, is there a friend that you can share it with? Remember between now and when we speak again, that who you are is good. And I am so glad that you're alive.
