Thursday, July 7, 2011

Sleeping when they're tired


We were active in La Leche League, and Keith and I both fell in love with being parents, and with the ideas we were learning there. We were active in a group that had many late-night parties and meetings, and campouts, so our kids were used to sleeping in different places, and falling asleep in our laps, or in a frame backpack either indoors or in the mountains under the stars. That helped us know without a doubt that children will sleep when they’re tired, and that it’s more important for them to be with their parents doing interesting things than to be home in bed simply because it’s 8:00 or 9:00.

From page 340 of The Big Book of Unschooling (page 381 of 2019 edition)
photo by Sandra Dodd

3 comments:

  1. so beautifully put. this brings to mind that book "go the fuck to sleep" i find it so offensive and disrespectful to kids, some may say i'm being too sensitive. but i actually saw it in the store last night and showed it to my kids. they didn't think it was funny either, they were really surprised by it. anyway, i love this!!

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  2. Thanks. I needed this this morning. We just had a disagreement last night regarding going to bed and I need to find a better solution. (For the record though, I don't make them go to sleep, or even to bed, just upstairs and they are fighting that at the moment so we need to do some reevaluation.)

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  3. Disagreements and fighting don't create a peaceful sleep environment, though, so maybe the better solution should look at peace first. There are lots of ideas at http://sandradodd.com/sleep

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