The easy way

When someone wrote "I may be taking the easy way out by just waiting until my son is older...," I responded (in part):

TAKE THE EASY WAY!!!

Make people’s lives easy. Don’t think there’s virtue in allowing difficulties to continue.

Make his life easier, if you can do it in some simple way.

The world will provide obstacles and difficulties enough. Let it be your duty and joy to provide a haven.

SandraDodd.com/peace
photo by Abby Davis
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All the good things follow

“Start with love and respect and all the good things follow—it is not magic, and it is a lot of hard work, especially at the beginning.”

—Marina DeLuca-Howard

Recently quoted by Pam Laricchia here,
and obtained from Quotes for Unschoolers on my site
photo by Sukayna
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Sorting, sort of

Things will get better as you weed out negativity and focus on what’s good and positive.


The quote is from a private e-mail. This page is a match:
SandraDodd.com/deschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a card from the singing game "Encore"

Bounce, spring and fly

Keep your ideas bouncing in unpredictable directions! Let them spring and fly.

Rum Tum Tugger hooks up
photo by Lydia Koltai
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Efficiency

It seems that once unschooling is going that it covers everything, and there are no wasted moments, or wasted thoughts.

but you don't have to take my word for it:
Shockingly efficient
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Invisible weeds

Weeding out terminology we would prefer not to mean improves thinking.

A hundred times or more people have said "just semantics" and "stupid" about me saying "don't say teach," which I've been doing for years. Every time someone says "taught" or "teach" they can slip back into the whole school thing and be seeing the world through school-colored glasses. If they do what it takes, mentally and emotionally, to recast their reports and then their thoughts in terms of who *learned* something, then they can start to see the world in terms of learning.

SandraDodd.com/control
is where the quote came from
but the "Mindful of words" page
might be good to see.
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Humming along

Debbie Regan wrote, to someone afraid a child was "falling behind":

"While schooly people are focussing on that fictional finish line, the real world is still humming along. People are walking around and past the fretting throng, living interesting lives, doing cool things, being productive, enjoying life."

—Debbie Regan

SandraDodd.com/behind
photo by Talia Bartoe

Interwoven

In weaving, one thread touches all the others. At first, learning is in one place, play is in another, and work is in a third. Unschoolers can gradually become people whose lives are made of learning and togetherness. When play has value, and parents see learning in everything, the fiber and substance of the family's life change.

What is woven into your life is part of your being.

SandraDodd.com/substance
photo by Nancy Machaj

Toys in every room

Colleen Prieto wrote this, at the end of a longer, spookier story:

My son has toys in every room of our house, and his dad and I provide lots of bins and shelves and baskets to make straightening up for visits from friends and grandparents easy for whoever wants to help with the pre-visit clean-up. Because to us, a neat and orderly house with lovely, Perfect rooms and a minimum of Stuff isn't worth trading a relationship with a Child Who Will Be An Adult Before You Know It. — No way.

—Colleen Prieto

SandraDodd.com/deprivation
photo by Sandra Dodd, at Collen Prieto's house
(There was a Lego Viking ship behind me, on a shelf.)
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Touching, playing, knowing

"How do you know they're learning?"

The people who ask that question are looking at the world through school-colored glasses. Those same parents knew when their children could use a spoon. They knew when the child could drink out of a cup. They knew when walking and talking and bike riding had been learned.

SandraDodd.com/playing
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Unmeasured and whole

If you are not required by law to test your child, don't choose it.

Because a test score is never ignored, tests affect the relationship between parent and child, and many unschoolers want to preserve their child’s journey to adulthood unmeasured, uncompared, and whole. It might seem crazy from the outside, but the disadvantage of testing is real.

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The second paragraph above is from SandraDodd.com/thoughts.
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Not blindly

I don't care if people disagree with me. I wouldn't want anyone to agree with me blindly, nor disagree blindly.

SandraDodd.com/detox
photo by Sandra Dodd

Right where you are

If every conscious decision is taken with the intention of getting closer to the way one wants to be, then in a "getting warm / getting cold" way, it's not nearly as distant as one might have thought. You never even have to leave your regular house, car, family. It's right where you are, only the thoughts are different.

SandraDodd.com/factors
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Sweet and grounding

"There's little so sweet and grounding to me as being loved for who I am and appreciated for all I choose to spend my time doing. If we want our children to really know what that feels like too, we should stop standing on the sidelines, and start joining in. It's a simple gift we can all give to our children that will have the potential to last a lifetime." —Karen James

A simple gift
photo by Karen James, too

Something to give your children

Children need choices and options.

SandraDodd.com/freerein
photo by Cathy Koetsier

"Worthwhile" means...

Once someone wrote in an unschooling discussion: "I just have one concern. I want my children to finish what they start." I responded: If you start a book and decide you don't like it, will you finish it? If you start eating a dozen donuts, and after you're not in the mood for donuts anymore, will you finish the dozen? If you start an evening out with a guy and he irritates or frightens you, will you stay for five more hours to finish what you started? If you put a DVD in and it turns out to be Kevin Costner and you don't like Kevin Costner, will you finish it anyway? The only things that should be finished are those things that seem worthwhile to do.

Finish What you Start
photo by Chrissy Florence
"Worth"—worthy
"while"—time
The American Heritage Dictionary says it's an adjective meaning "Sufficiently valuable or important to be worth one's time, effort, or interest."

Pretty cool.

Kids really can (and do!!) learn *so* much in the absence of school and teachers. They learn so very well when they are allowed the time to explore and examine, question and Google, ponder and wonder—and they learn even better when they have the support of parents and other such people as they go after and capture the skills and knowledge that they desire. Pretty cool.

—Colleen Prieto

SandraDodd.com/knowledge
photo by Sandra Dodd

Living with the truth

Response to someone who wanted reassurance that unschooling would create success:

I can't guarantee anything for anyone else, nor for my own family. I know what does damage, and I know what might help.
. . . .
Every second of every day things happen or don't happen and there are consequences.

I would say if you don't want to gamble, don't unschool, but the truth is that everything else is a gamble too.


SandraDodd.com/guarantee
photo by Sandra Dodd, left over from playing a board game online—
click to enlarge it for candid desk details
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Schoolhouse Rock times three

Noon, October 21, 1994:

When we got home I set the kids up with their food and put on the Schoolhouse Rock multiplication videotape. I was eating my burrito in the kitchen, reading a couple of pamphlets a friend had sent on "Michigan's Little Bavaria," and the biggest Christmas store in the world. I overheard Marty and his friend discussing infinity during a song about multiplying by nine. In a discussion like this, if they seem to know what they're talking about and they're happy with the outcome then I will stay out of it. If they ask me to mediate or confirm, I will. If I were actually at the table with them I might've led the conversation a little further, but since they were watching something with music, it would've been more distracting than helpful. If there had been more chicken strips in those lunches, they would have watched more Schoolhouse Rock. Just as the parts of speech section started, they were down to the French fries and, one by one, they wandered off to do other things, except for Holly who fell asleep on the couch.

Friday, May 29, 2015:

Kirby and Destiny passed by a rummage sale and bought Schoolhouse Rock on DVD. Nice find!

Saturday, May 30, 2015:

Keith and I were watching Saturday Night Live, which started off with a "I'm Just a Bill," from Schoolhouse Rock (live action against cartoonish background), and switched cleverly to being about executive orders. It was a repeat from November, 2014. I'll link it below.

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The last two things happened Friday and Saturday. On Sunday, when looking for something for Just Add Light, I came across a 21-year-old article called "Pink Crayons," and a Schoolhouse Rock story popped up, coincidentally, so three in a row! Connections!

SandraDodd.com/pinkcrayons

Saturday Night Live's "I'm Just a Bill"
(with commentary and the video, which I hope will play even outside the U.S.)

2020 note: The article above is still there, but if it's not accessible, here are the original cartoon and SNL's version.
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For years...

They trusted me because I had spent years being trustworthy.

SandraDodd.com/sharing
photo by Sandra Dodd
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