Don't do what other people do, do what your kids need |
photo by Sarah S.
Don't do what other people do, do what your kids need |
When Kirby was seven and eight, I used to see others his age who were pulled out of school already knowing how to read and write and think wistfully that maybe that would make everything easier. In the longrun, it didn't. Those kids have issues about that reading and writing that Kirby doesn't have. Their handwriting is prettier, but their spelling isn't always better, and their ideas aren't always better. But Kirby has a poise and a confidence that I think school would have immediately begun to dismantle and scatter. So it did take him longer to read, but in the meantime he was learning like crazy, like fireworks. |
"Don't rush. This is a hard but crucial piece of advice. Rush to take him out of school but don't rush to replace it with anything. Bring your child home, don't bring school home. You don't even have to bring their terminology and judgments home. You can start from scratch, brush off the labels, and find your son where he is. Forget school. Move to life." |
![]() |
Even if you don't decide to unschool, keep an open mind about where and what your children could be learning, and where they might find the inspiration to become something like world-changing scientists. |
This photo of Holly Dodd and a braiding pattern on a pony was taken to illustrate a quote from Professor Christine Alvarado about... well just go and read it, please.
Some of the things that help people be confidently in the moment, feeling satisfied and content are:
At first it might be relief and not joy, but as relief is a step away from fear, more relief will be progress toward joy.
- Breathing
- Gratitude
- Happy thoughts
- Fondness
- Acceptance
Sometimes limitations are physical. Sometimes they have to do with resources, weather, health, fears and random happenstance. There are no guarantees, but appreciation and gratitude are better than any of their opposites. |
Life is lumpy. Let it be. I'm going to type it again (for my own therapy...skip over it, if you think you've already got it!). "Life is lumpy; let it be." Not every day is perfect. Not every moment is memorable. Perfection is never perfect. And you know what? That's okay! Fighting it only makes you miserable. You can choose to be miserable, of course. But that's your choice. Hard to feel victimised if you refuse to be the victim... —Faolmar |
No one can have perfect happiness, but *more* happiness is easy to come by. It doesn't cost any more than less happiness, but it's much healthier and better for the whole family and the neighbors and relatives.
![]() | Look at things others might not see. See their shapes, their backgrounds. Light changes. Wind comes. Things were once younger, smaller, newer. They will be older, different, gone. See what's around you. |
![]() |
[The Always Learning discussion] has helped me think more clearly and maturely. It has helped me change unhelpful patterns and most of all helped me step into the *JOY* of life, connection, partnership with my children and husband. I know how scary it is to feel examined, and I think some other readers interpret examination as meanness, like I once did. I think to do unschooling well, it is a fundamental element to have an examined life. To be mindful of our choices and understand our thought processes.
It's true; the subscription provider has changed. Feedburner is closing at the end of June, and another company offered to import five blogs for me, so if you want to add any of the others to your feed, they are
There are TWO ways to get to the blog from e-mail now—clicking the post's title, or "read more" at the bottom. A new option is to get a push notification on your phone, so for those who didn't like the e-mail's appearance on a phone, I hope this is way better. Changes do not thrill me, and I'm getting old. But Vlad Gurdiga is still young and enthusiastic. He helped with this move as he has helped with many other things involving my collections— moving thousands of photos from photobucket (which kept on changing and losing things and charging more money) to SandraDodd.com (which he moved from yahoo to another host company). Thank you Vlad, again. |
There are some people who haven’t been born yet who will, someday, read things Jo Isaac wrote, and other people here. It might be hard for them to find it, or it might not be. But good ideas, written well, can outlive the writers. |
I’m not trying to be scary. I’m trying to pick ideas up and turn them over and see if they work, how they work, how they might be tweaked to work better. |
![]() |
Some things are a pretty big deal. What's a big deal to one person might not be so memorable to another. Things that changed my life might not have affected my sister at all, and that's fine. Each life is unique, and we don't need to agree on what is or isn't monumental, and why. |
Relevancy is very important in learning. I knew wax's melting point by heart but freaked out when it melted so fast while I was doing project with my [four-year-old son]. I never played with wax before. I knew physics on paper very well but played with pulleys in real life just recently. I knew areodynamics from school but had real appreciation of it through flying kite with my son. Unschooling my children sparkles my curiosity and burning desire to learn. The world is a wonder! —Jihong Tang, 2010 |
![]() | "Children don’t deserve less consideration just because they’re small. They deserve *more* patience and kindness and consideration because they are young and still learning." —Deb Lewis |