Just Add Light and Stir

The full plate club!

2012-02-25T00:01:00.001-07:00

"The empty plate club," referring
to kids who successfully
clean their plates,
sounds so sad.

"Full plate" sounds much more
nurturing.

SandraDodd.com/eating/grapes
the image is a painting by Pierre Mignard in the 1640s

Wishes

2012-02-24T00:01:00.016-07:00

Jenny Cyphers wrote:

I wish things for our family had been different earlier than later, but it is what it is. Unschooling really helped make us better people. I can't even imagine, or rather I can, how different things would be with our relationships with our kids if they'd been in school all these years.

Kids absorb the good and the bad. Unschooling really focuses on the good, and that's, well, GOOD!

SandraDodd.com/ifonly
photo by Sandra Dodd

Bully-proofing?

2012-02-23T00:01:00.005-07:00

QUESTION:

I worry that if our child does not go to school that he will be vulnerable to bullying when interacting with school kids at activity clubs like soccer or scouts.

RESPONSE:

School kids are vulnerable to bullying both at activity clubs and at school. The idea that practice with being bullied helps people to avoid bullying doesn't seem true. Do abused women stand up to abusers better than women who have not been abused?

With my kids, their tolerance for nonsense from other children was very low, and because they never had to be in a class or club, but it was always their option to leave, it made a huge difference. They knew they could stay if they wanted, or go home if they would rather.

Much of bullying happens because humans need a hierarchy to interact. They don't behave well in "equal" groups of equally inexperienced people their own age. First, they need to learn from older and more experienced people. And if they have no leaders or experts in the group, then bullying and gangs can develop, because people seem to have a need to know their "rank" in a group.

I think bullying is a natural side effect of people feeling powerless, and of not being in the regular world where people do have different ages and different levels of experience in a situation.

SandraDodd.com/musicroom
photo by Sandra Dodd

Pattern blocks and deep thoughts

2012-02-22T00:01:00.014-07:00

Of things to do that encourage conversation:

I have discovered the motherlode of two-for-ones, of tools for inspiring and sustaining conversation. I suppose you have some of these things, or might want to put them on your wish list. My favorite is pattern blocks. There are some hardwood blocks stained in a few bright colors, available for $25 at educational supply stores and upscale toyshops. They are mesmerizing. We bought a second set after a while so we could fill the table with one big mandala pattern after another. And over those blocks my children have told their secret dreams, and we have discussed art and math, manufacturing, stain and paint, we have laughed and been silent.

While the blocks were still out our children have dazzled visiting adults with their dexterity and artistic sense, then they’ve wandered off and the visitors have talked to me, while making patterns with blocks, about things that might have been hard to discuss if we were sitting facing one another. They’ve discussed their fears and love lives and embarrassments, and made some really great patterns.

SandraDodd.com/truck
scan of blocks by Sandra Dodd; they're bigger in real life

Who they are, where they are

2012-02-21T00:01:00.009-07:00

My children are different from most of their schooled friends. They are more like their fellow unschoolers. They are comfortable with people of many different ages, they are kindhearted, and tolerant. Because they haven’t been shamed and molded by school life and expectations and “peer pressure,” they’re more willing to appear different without adding value to that appearance. Some schooled kids conform to become invisible, and some rebel to become visible, but my children are who they are, where they are, now. They’re not embarrassed about their interests or hobbies, they’re not afraid to wear used clothes, or to play with younger children, or to hang around with adults. Because they are respected, they are respectful.

SandraDodd.com/thoughts
photo by Ravi Bharadwaj, of Marty and Zoya *

Seeing growth

2012-02-20T00:01:00.004-07:00

"As with most kinds of growth, it's difficult to see the changes on a daily or short-term basis. It's when you look back over a longer period that you really see, and are amazed by, the amount of growth that has happened."

—Frank Maier

SandraDodd.com/growth
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a tree at Hampton Court

Learning about natural learning

2012-02-19T00:01:00.002-07:00

Let [babies] hear you speak, and find opportunities for them to hear others speak. Although there are justifications and theories about what babies like and respond to (high voices and sing-songy voices seem to appeal to babies), don't revert to a whole babytalk language with them. Some is fine, but talk to them about real things, too. Tell them what you're doing with them, and what they're seeing, when they're out and about. Don't quiz them, just talk. It's fine if they can't understand you for months and months. They'll be learning your tone and your moods and the speech patterns of the language even before they have vocabulary. You will be building a relationship that is not based on the meaning of the words, but on the sharing of the time and attention. You're paying attention to what the baby sees and touches and hears. The baby is paying attention to you.

If you can keep that up for eighteen years, you've got unschooling!

SandraDodd.com/babies
photo by Sandra Dodd, up into a little tree I sat under, in a gully;
not in New Mexico

How much time do you have?

2012-02-18T00:01:00.004-07:00

Sometimes people say to me, "You're patient with your own children but pushy with unschooling parents." I don't go door to door asking people if they know about unschooling, and whether they'd like to know more. If they come where I already am, though, I might press. And when I do, it's because of the possibility that they will run out of time.

My kids have their whole lives to memorize 7x8 if they want to.

The mother of a twelve year old has VERY little time if she wants to help her child recover from school and spend a few unschooling years with him before he's grown and gone. She doesn't have time to ease into it gradually. If she stalls, he'll be fifteen or sixteen and it just won't happen.

If the mother of a five year old is trying to decide how much reading instruction and math drill to continue with before she switches to unschooling, I would rather press her to decide toward "none," because "some" is damaging to the child's potential to learn it joyfully and discover it on his own. And "lots" will only hurt that much more. "None" can still be turned to "some" if the parent can't get unschooling. But if she doesn't even try unschooling, she misses forever the opportunity to see that child learn to read gradually and naturally. It will be gone forever.
Forever.

That's why I don't say, "Gosh, I'm sure whatever you're doing is fine, and if you want to unschool you can come to it gradually at your own pace. No hurry."

SandraDodd.com/schoolinmyhead
photo by Sandra Dodd

Mindfulness in Unschooling

2012-02-17T00:01:00.002-07:00

Once upon a time on the unschooling discussion list, someone seemed unhappy with the way I used "mindful." For years, some of the regular writers here tried to find a good word for what we were trying to convey—a kind of mothering that involved making infinitesimal decisions all the time, day and night, and basing those decisions on our evolving beliefs about living respectfully with our children, and giving THEM room to make their own decisions of the moment.

We finally settled on "mindful," in the sense of being fully in the moment. Though "mindfulness" is used as a term in western Buddhism, the word they chose when they were translating from Japanese, Chinese, Hindu, Vietnamese and whatever all hodgepodge of ideas were eventually described in English, "mindfulness," is an English word over 800 years old. It's a simple English compound, and has to do with the state of one's mind while performing an action. It creates a state of "if/then" in one. And IF a parent intends to be a good unschooling parent, a generous freedom-nurturing parent, a parent providing a peaceful nest, a parent wanting to be her child's partner, then the best way she can live in that goal and come ever closer to her ideals is to make all her decisions in that light. The more mindful she is of where she intends to go, the easier her decisions are.

SandraDodd.com/mindfulness
photo by Sandra Dodd

What it takes

2012-02-16T00:01:00.001-07:00

One doesn't need to be rich to unschool, but it takes dedication and focus, creativity and resourcefulness.

SandraDodd.com/unschoolingcost
photo by Sandra Dodd

You don't need to break your bad habits

2012-02-15T00:01:00.002-07:00

Leave the old habit to wither. Don't try to break it. Move to making better choices so that what you used to do and used to think will be left in the "choices I don't consider anymore" category.

SandraDodd.com/change
photo by Sandra Dodd

Open the world up

2012-02-14T00:01:00.002-07:00

Joyce Fetteroll:

Unschooling is a whole way of life not a method. That might sound like a quibble but it gets to the heart of why unschooling is different than other ways of homeschooling.

Homeschooling has a particular destination that the parents want to get the kids to. The destination depends on the method and the parents. (A typical destination is preparation for college.)

Unschooling is about helping kids be who they are and to grow into who they'll become. The destination is wherever the kids end up. It isn't predetermined by the parents. Our job is to support who they are and open the world up to them so they have opportunities to expand their interests.

JoyfullyRejoycing.com/unschooling/noonerightwaytounschool
photo by Joyce Fetteroll
of a lizard on a rock
in New Mexico
in January

The way we live, the way we think

2012-02-13T00:01:00.001-07:00

Lyle Perry wrote:

I know how scary it is to think about letting go of what's 'normal', and I know it seems impossible to think about your kids learning on their own, but it's all very possible. More than possible. It's waiting to happen. It's happened for us, and we were as 'normal' as anyone else.

Unschooling has had an incredibly positive impact on our lives, and not only in an educational aspect, but in everything we do. It's changed the way we live, the way we think, and the way we look at the world in general.

SandraDodd.com/lists/lyle
photo by Sandra Dodd

Saying Yes to Infants

2012-02-12T00:01:00.001-07:00

If an infant can't even ask a question, why would a parent say "no"? But some of the first words many babies hear are "No!" and "Don't" and "Stop." Even without the words themselves, if a baby reaches out and the parent pushes his hand back or ignores him, that is a big "no." If a baby cries and the parent ignores him, or puts him down roughly, or leaves the room and closes the door, that is not even nearly in the realm of "yes."

When one of the partners is in pain, the partnership isn't doing very well. And it's not a fifty-fifty partnership; nor is anything in the whole world. In the case of a mother who can walk and talk, access water and maybe drive a car, she can't expect a newborn baby to do half the work. If she gives him everything she can, he will give back as much as he has, not just then, but for years to come if she doesn't screw it up.

SandraDodd.com/babies/infants
photo by Sandra Dodd

Peace

2012-02-11T00:01:00.007-07:00

Create and maintain a peaceful environment for your child, and share in it.

SandraDodd.com
photo by Sandra Dodd

Why thought matters

2012-02-10T00:01:00.007-07:00

Pam Sorooshian:

Lots of people go through their whole lives never feeling like they had choices in many many areas of their lives in which they really did. Just like it is useful for unschoolers to drop school language (not use the terms teaching or lessons or curriculum to refer to the natural learning that happens in their families) it is useful to drop the use of "have to's" and replace it with an awareness of choices and options.

How we think - the language we use to think - about what we're doing, matters.

SandraDodd.com/haveto
photo by Sandra Dodd

Being a witness

2012-02-09T00:01:00.002-07:00

Kim: What have you loved most about unschooling your 3 children?

Sandra: I loved being there when they were happy, and when they were sad.

I loved being a witness to so much of their joy and learning, and being a part of their lives in a whole, real way.

Feather and Nest interview
photo by Sandra Dodd

How can you tell?

2012-02-08T00:01:00.007-07:00

How can unschooling parents tell if their kids are learning?

They can tell because they're there with them every day. How did you know when your child could ride a bike? How did you know when they could swim? That's how you know when a child can read or count by fives or spell. They do it!

When they discuss current events with an understanding of geography and history, you know they've picked up that information, gradually and from all kinds of sources. It won't be in the same order kids at school or using a curriculum might learn it, but one reason that schooled kids can fail to learn something is that they have nothing to hook the new fact to. With natural learning, all learning is hooked into something the learner already knows.

SandraDodd.com/interviews/successful
photo by Sandra Dodd

Possibilities and Joys

2012-02-07T00:19:00.000-07:00

To a mom finding it difficult to be present with her child, and to get him to leave when it was time to go:

Nobody's still and at kid-speed all the time. But if you can figure out how to do it sometimes, then you can choose to do it, or choose to go faster, but to bring him along in a happy way.

Instead of saying "Come on, let's go!" maybe you could have picked him up and twirled him around and said something sweet and by the time he knows it he's fifty yards from there, but happy to be with his happy mom.

SandraDodd.com/parentingpeacefully
photo by Sandra Dodd

Stop the cycle now (if applicable)

2012-02-06T00:01:00.015-07:00

It's not a quote, but it's a summary/paraphrase by Brie Jontry of part of a talk I gave in 2010. I was really amused by it. There's nothing I didn't mean, though I don't think I phrased it quite this succinctly that night. ☺

STOP the cycle of shitty parenting NOW.

Give your child(ren) the childhood you would have wanted.

Be the dad you wish you'd had.

SandraDodd.com/issues/dads (a new page inspired by that "quote")
photo by Sandra Dodd

Slowing down

2012-02-05T00:01:00.026-07:00

When I had one baby Kirby, I tried to consciously slow myself down and go at his speed when we went on walks, or when he examined something he had never seen. It wasn't easy. I kept working at it and was more patient when Marty and Holly came along.

It was good practice for unschooling; I didn't know it at the time, though.

SandraDodd.com/rentalk
photo by Sandra Dodd

Love, love, love

2012-02-04T00:01:00.005-07:00

Pam Sorooshian wrote this:

Parents do all kinds of things in the name of love….not all good for their children.

Love is not enough.

But there is a kind of love that is absolutely necessary for successful unschooling, and that is love of learning.

Unschoolers value learning. We look for it everywhere. We crave it.

But, love it gently. Don’t try to force it – not a good idea for learning OR love!

SandraDodd.com/pamsorooshian
photo by Sandra Dodd

Threes

2012-02-03T00:01:00.002-07:00

I had a Shakespeare professor who said "Three trees make a row," to confirm a pattern when a student noticed that something had appeared three times. to confirm a pattern when a student noticed that something had appeared three times. I remember thinking, but not saying, "Not if they're making a triangle." But it wasn't a math class, and I understood his point.

There's something strong and fun about three. Two parents and a baby. A tripod for a camera or a telescope. A three-legged stool (a tripod to sit on). Three versions of a song. A book or movie trilogy. Counting by threes with its elegant stops at 33, 66, and 99.
photo by Sandra Dodd
Some other images in this blog with three of something:
Moments in days
Museum of everything
Destinations
Happy and glad
Calm and quiet
Leeway and freedom

Without TV...

2012-02-02T00:01:00.007-07:00

Joyce Fetteroll, a few years ago, when her daughter was in her mid-teens:

"My daughter and I have done a great deal of interacting as a direct result of TV. It's tied into her other interests in story telling. Without TV she wouldn't have the huge collection of comics she's written. Without TV we wouldn't have discovered manga. Without TV we wouldn't being going to Anime conventions together (I even dress up)."

SandraDodd.com/joyce/logic
photo by Sandra Dodd

Sparkly, bubbly, warm and effusive

2012-02-01T00:01:00.001-07:00

Unschooling should be rich, flowing and mindful living where learning abounds. Too many people see "living" as nothing more than the absence of death. Let's encourage sparkly, bubbly, warm and effusive lives.

SandraDodd.com/sparkly
photo by Sandra Dodd