Higher level considerations

Someone wrote:

I just really wish I could be confident that I'm making the right choices for my children.

I responded:

Nobody can be confident that she's making "the right choices."

The best you can do is to gain courage in your own judgment and in making good choices given what you knew and what was available to you at the time. There aren't single "right" answers to life situations. There are ranges of options, and better and worse answers.

It helps to always consider an option or two when you make any decision. It's not a choice if you didn't consider two or more paths and then choose the one that seemed best. Gradually as you do gain strength of conviction and the ease of experience, the choices will come more easily and be of higher level considerations.

SandraDodd.com/betterchoice
photo by Cátia Maciel

Seeing and living harmoniously

I don't really care as much about the definition of unschooling as I do about helping real individual families to unschool in a way that works, that can last, and not just be a temporary respite from school or curriculum, but that can be sustained and enlarging in and for their whole family. If learning stops where "parenting" starts, how will unschooling be "learning from life"? . . . .

It doesn't matter if no two families decide on a definition. But when I'm asked "How did you do that?" I'm going to be honest. It's not about academics. It's about having changed how I saw the world and children, and then living harmoniously with my children in a world I *know* to be filled with all the elements they need to thrive. I suppose someone could spend a lot of volunteer time telling people how to unschool without changing their attitude or parenting. I haven't seen that, though, because I don't know of any truly happy and successful unschoolers who have clung to traditional parenting. If it can work, no one who's doing it has come out and helped others do it that way too.


From a 2004 discussion on why unschooling isn't 'just' unschooling, or something
photo by Cátia Maciel

Peaceful, interesting and happy

Yesterday's post might've warned you not to look at the photo or click anything. Sorry about that. I had cut and pasted something that was NOT a link on my page, but e-mail turned it into one.

There are Wayback Machine saves of some (not much) of the information from that long-gone forum, and I'm quoting something someone saved that I wrote, below. The link will go to an archived page about a parent worried about "socialization." It was nice to see something someone else had formatted up and saved that I had written. I'm usually on the collecting side.

If they're happy then they are!. . . .
If this moment is good, it's easier for the next moment to be good. If you have three or four really good moments in a day, people can go to bed happier, sleep better, and wake up happy. In as many small ways as you can, create a peaceful and interesting nest for your children and they'll leave it as happy, interesting people someday.

Socialization (archived)
photo by Sandra Dodd,
of reflections and shadows in a simple moment

More peaceful

Someone on unschooling-[dot]-info (now defunct) was frustrated with advice that she be more gentle with her daughter and wrote:

You guys do it your way, let your kids run wild, let them curse, let them do every little thing they want to do.

arcarpenter/Amy responded:

That's really not how my house looks or feels—not wild, not out-of-control. There is something in-between the extremes of demanding obedience and having children feel and act out-of-control all the time. The something in-between is giving feedback about how a behavior is affecting me and others, while also being understanding that the behavior is coming from a valid need. The something in-between often takes more time and attention than either of the extremes, but it is worth it, because my children get a chance to problem-solve and to grow in their own emotional awareness now, when they're young, instead of trying to figure it all out on their own when they're older.

. . . .
The more we practice these principles, the more peaceful our house becomes. *That* is what our house looks like—not what you described above.

Peace,
Amy

What I left out was a story with examples of how unschooling was creating peace at their house. It's here: SandraDodd.com/peace/fighting
photo by Gail Higgins

Who thinks what?

[For unschooling to work...]
The parents need to be truly interested in their children as people, not just as symbols or irritants or mistakes or property. They need to care more what their children think than what other adults think, and that is very rare in the world.

I don't know where I wrote it, but Tiffani M. shared it on Facebook in 2012.
I'm glad she saved it.
photo by Elise Lauterbach

What do you know?

If we avoid thoughts that are negative or non-productive or illogical, we move toward a better, lighter place. People can work on thinking and on being.

How will you be, as a parent, and why? What's keeping you from being the way you want to be?

Inventory your own tools. What do you already know that can make you a more peaceful parent? What tricks and skills can you bring into your relationships with members of your family?

A Loud Peaceful Home
photo by Rosie Moon

Heat and light

If I have a big woodpile, I don't have a fire. Even if I have a fireplace and matches and bellows and kindling and firestarters and a fire extinguisher and the chimney was just cleaned and inspected and I have a paper saying "good to go," I don't have a fire. Would wrought-iron fire tools on a cool rack help? What about a stained-glass fireplace screen, so no sparks can get out on the floor? I could subscribe to magazines for fireplace owners. I could join a yahoo group and a facebook page to talk about fires. I could be receiving catalogs with all kinds of fancy flameproof rugs and indoor wood racks and really cool slings for carrying wood in, and Ooh! What about a beautiful mantle?

Still no fire.

Meanwhile, the neighbors might have built a real, operating fire, in a little hole they dug and lined with scrap bricks or rocks, with wood they found in a vacant lot, and kindled it with old receipts and fast-food wrappers they found blown into the alley. Their fire has heat, their fire has light, if they're sitting around it talking and laughing, they have the benefit of the fire.

Some people want to look like they're interested and that they intend to hone their skills, but they don't actually want to do it, if it's going to involve any real combustion or change in them.


A Story of NOT Changing
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a fire in our own back yard,
not in a hole, but quite make-shift, 2012