Step away from school

I've been a teacher. From that point of view the world IS most definitely revolving around years and semesters, school districts, standardized test schedules, federal title monies, school bus contracts, cafeteria funding, library cuts, parking-lot pavement... all kinds of stuff that has nothing much to do with kids, their hearts, spirits and ideas. Shuck it away. Don't live there.

SandraDodd.com/interview
photo by Sandra Dodd of a carousel at a carnival in Leiden
This post is a repeat from four years ago, Don't live there.
Turn away, and live in the rest of the big world.

Wondering, questioning, answering

During a drought, what is lacking? The recommended answer: rain Marty's answer: a boat ride

SandraDodd.com/betteranswers
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Giving up, gaining strength

De Smith wrote:

At one point in my early struggles to grasp the concept, I "threw in the towel", thinking that it wasn't "working", and decided I was going back to traditional parenting! Within a day, I knew I could never be that parent, again—if I ever had totally been that parent. I found that once you learned how to respect someone, you couldn't ignore that and treat them with less value, with less honor just because you decided so. For a day or so, that had me desperate and flailing. Eventually, I found it strengthening—it backed up the ideas I so loved and wanted for my family.

—De Smith

SandraDodd.com/unexpected
photo by Sandra Dodd

Once you start looking...

Once you start looking for connections and welcoming them, it creates a kind of flow that builds and grows.

SandraDodd.com/connections/example
photo by Chrissy Florence
__

Being together

When a child lives with his parents, it's good if the parents appreciate and nurture what it is "to live," and if they can see the value of the "with."

Read about the New Wheelbarrow or perhaps more Togetherness
photo by Jo Isaac

Happier. Sparklier.

An ever-improving understanding of unschooling will, incrementally and gradually, create a life in which the parent is HAPPY to have done better, been more interested and interesting. Where "more" is the goal. Happier. Sparklier.


SandraDodd.com/gratitude
photo by Eva Witsel
__

Commitment to optimism

Pam Sorooshian, in 2012 (pared down from the original):

Unschooling is a profoundly optimistic decision, and it involves a huge commitment to living a very optimistic life.

I think it is possible that THE most significant thing unschooling does is nurture optimism.

—Pam Sorooshian

SandraDodd.com/commitment
photo and quote reduction by Sandra Dodd
__

Emotional well-being

Emotional health and emotional well-being are as important, if not more so, as physical health.

—Jenny Cyphers

Moving Toward Less Control, Concerning Food
photo by Janine Davies
__

Open, windows; open, doors

Be open to seeing what you see, out the window. Be open to finding what you find, out the door.

SandraDodd.com/learning
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Being and providing

Being the sort of parent you wish you had had, and providing an environment you would like to have had as a child, is probably the easiest and most direct way to move toward being a good unschooler.

photo by Janine
words by Sandra, in a fleeting context
__

Relax the constraints

"When you only allow a limited amount of TV, then the marginal utility of a little more tv is high and every other option looks like a poor one, comparatively. Watching more TV becomes the focus of the person's thinking, since the marginal utility is so high. Relax the constraints and, after a period of adjustment and experimentation to determine accurate marginal utilities, the focus on TV will disappear and it will become just another option."

—Pam Sorooshian
from "Economics of Restricting TV Watching of Children"

This applies to anything—not just TV/video.

photo by Janine Davies
__

Nurturing bonds

Lots of people, when they first hear of homeschooling or unschooling say (almost before they take a breath) "I couldn't be with my child all the time." School (and even daycare) can break the bond between parent and child.There are, and have been in the past, various culturally approved bonds-breaking practices, so one thing we're doing with unschooling is purposefully nurturing bonds, and these relationships. Lots of parents discover that *if* they can relax into that relationship building, that they can't believe they weren't with their children 24/7 before, and they make up for lost time, and it gets easier and easier.

SandraDodd.com/obstacles
photo by Claire Horsley

Old and new

Right between the past and the future, here we are. What's new today is getting old tomorrow. Be glad to be there as the future reveals itself. You'll be able to say "I remember when that was new..."

SandraDodd.com/t/history
photo by Sandra Dodd, of part of The London Eye

Do things and go places

Say “yes” a lot. Do things and go places and explore the world together with your family — whether the world, to you, means your backyard, your neighborhood, your town, your state/country, or a giant chunk of the globe.

—Colleen Prieto

From Colleen's writings at the bottom of: SandraDodd.com/video/doright
photo by Claire Horsley

Happiness

Unschooled kids should learn what they want to learn, and have fun doing it. If happiness isn’t even a goal, life is of little value.

SandraDodd.com/happy
auto-bot photo of the Dusseldorp family

Where are you headed?

When you come to an intersection, how do you decide which way to go? It helps, before operating a motor vehicle with all its attendant expenses and inherent dangers, to know where you want to go. When you DO have a destination, then each intersection has some wrong ways, and some better and worse ways. It's the same with unschooling. If that's where you're headed, there are some wrong ways you can avoid simply by being mindful of your intent.

Mindfulness in Unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd

The power to give kids choices

If children have freedom to choose, it's because the parents GIVE them that freedom, because they have the power to give it to them.

For a parent to absolutely decide that he will never "insist" is going way too far, I think. Not only could it be, in some cases, illegal and neglectful, if the parent isn't even clear on what her duties and responsibilities are as a parent, maybe she isn't thinking clearly about other things, either.

Part of something long about If-then contracts
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Keep learning in mind

If learning is always in mind, learning always happens.

SandraDodd.com/learning
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Your child as a person

"Just a reminder: your kids are whole people. They're having experiences even when you're not there. They learn with you and without you."

—Holly Dodd

(I told Holly, "Say something I can quote in Just Add Light.")

SandraDodd.com/holly
photo by Julie D, of Holly and Adam
__

Lasting happiness

"Fun is serious. Fun is important, especially for kids. Don't underrate fun. People who are not happy as children seldom find easy or lasting happiness as adults."

—Deb Lewis

SandraDodd.com/t/cartoons
photo by Susan Burke
__