The most delightful person

"I want to be the most delightful person in the world for my child." —Zanna Rickard

Comment from Australia ALLive session in Melbourne, March 23, 2014
photo by Sandra Dodd

Give it your all.

In an unschooling chat on March 12, Pam Sorooshian wrote: I often think this way, "I've thought about this a lot and made my decision. Now I owe it to myself and my family to really truly embrace that decision and give it my all and not be wishy-washy about it."

Special Guest, Pam Sorooshian
photo by Sandra Dodd

Happier, easier

"There's a common parenting myth that making our kids' lives easier, being sweet and kind and gentle with them, makes them greedy and unfit for adult life. It is not true. Kids learn from experience. When they experience a lot of kindness, they learn the value of kindness in very real, concrete ways. When we make their lives easier, we make it easier for them to learn more and more richly. And they're happier. And that makes parenting easier, because we're not dealing with kids who are stressed out and frustrated."

—Meredith Novak

New writing by Meredith, a little like SandraDodd.com/spoiled
photo by Sandra Dodd
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The past, the future, and the right now

I love history, and I like to think about the future, but it's important to bring yourself back, very often to the very now.

Schuyler Waynforth wrote: "It helps a lot to try for better moments not days. Don't judge a day by one upset, judge it as a bad moment and move forward. A little bit better each moment. A little bit more aware."

SandraDodd.com/moment
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Helping create safety

Confident kids who communicate well with parents and wouldn't be tempted to sneak out or to lie wouldn't be in danger of meeting someone who says he'll marry her if she meets him at the train station. That doesn't happen randomly.

SandraDodd.com/quotes
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Playful experimentation

Children learn from playing. They experiment with tools, materials, textures, movements, sounds. They imitate the older people around the. They imitate animals, and fictional characters. They try on voices, faces, postures and ideas. Parents should encourage and facilitate their playful experimentation.

Learning Styles and living big, on the Always Learning discussion
photo by Sarah Dickinson

Do more.

If you don't feel like you're doing enough, do more. Karen James remembered me writing that, and a few years later she repeated it to another mom, with a nice addition: "Do more. Have fun. In my experience, it's truly contagious!"

SandraDodd.com/howto/precisely
photo by Sandra Dodd

You don't need to know.

Response to a question about how a mother can discover her child's passion or strengths:

You don't need to know your child's strengths and passions. It doesn't matter. Sounds goofy, but it's true.

What you should look for is helping her right in the moment.

SandraDodd.com/being
photo by Sandra Dodd, of an Easy-Bake Oven, in a thrift store
Thinking the new lightbulbs won't work, but most unschoolers have REAL ovens, unless they're in The Netherlands, perhaps, where (I've learned) ovens are rare.

Mix it up

Combine some things that have never been put together before.

SandraDodd.com/strewing
photo by Sandra Dodd

Learn about learning

Focus on your kids. Learn about learning.

SandraDodd.com/learning
photo by Sandra Dodd

Soft and Sweet

Be soft and sweet, or else your children won't have a soft and sweet mother. Keep your house happy and calm, or else your children won't have a happy and calm environment.

SandraDodd.com/being
photo by Holly Dodd

Credit

Every little thing a parent does goes into the plus column or the minus column. Each parent is gaining credit or losing credit. Everything counts—words, tone, patience, generosity, interest, kindnesses and thoughts. It takes more to build your credit back up than it does to waste it, so be careful.

You might like to read about respect,
though the quote was from a facebook discussion in 2013
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a kinetic sculpture a person can affect,
at ¡Explora! ("Ballnasium," by George Rhoads)

Magical robbery?

There is a kind of magic thinking that says television can rob people of their imagination, but that if parents sacrifice televisions, children will be more intelligent.
. . . .

[A]mong unschoolers there are many who once prohibited or measured out TV time, and who changed their stance. Learning became a higher priority than control, and joy replaced fear in their lives. I can't quote all the accounts I have collected, but I invite you to read them.

SandraDodd.com/tv
Photo by Sandra Dodd, at Legoland Windsor, of the kind of plane kids can see on TV!

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The quote is a re-run on this blog, because it's four minutes to midnight and I forgot to make a post today! I blame a nap, the lyrics game on facebook, and daylight savings time!

Be that kind of person

Be the kind of person you want your child to be.

Nurture your own curiosity and joy.

Find gratitude and abundance.

Explore. Make connections, on your own.

Sandra Dodd, on Unschooling, for the Do Life Right Teleconference 2012
photo by Holly Dodd
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Violence?

There are no "violent video games." Kids are sitting on a couch in their parents' home pushing buttons on a remote control. That's not hurting them or anyone else. (Or young adults are home sitting and pushing buttons, instead of being out drinking or vandalizing something.)

In every single case of real-life violence anyone can think of, wouldn't it have been better if the perpetrator had been home on the couch than out causing trouble? 🙂

SandraDodd.com/violence
photo by Sandra Dodd

Advantage

"Having parents who nurture optimism, hopefulness, and contentment gives children an extraordinary advantage in life."

—Rippy Dusseldorp

Rippy's quote in context
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Decision time

Decision time isn't about what you will do next year or for the rest of your child's life. Decision time is about what you will do in the next five seconds. I recommend getting up and doing something sweet for another person, wordlessly and gently. Never send the bill; make it a gift you forget all about. Do that again later in the day. Don't tell us, don't tell them, just do it.

SandraDodd.com/change
photo by Sandra Dodd
(I posted part of that quote in April 2011, also with a lawn photo.)
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Hooks to hang Hamlet on

Sometimes it's even easier if the humor comes first and the "real" information later. Someone who has seen Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, the Simpsons episode about Hamlet, and the Reduced Shakespeare Company's little Hamlet will have many hooks to hang the real Hamlet on, if and when they see it.

SandraDodd.com/connections/jokes
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Tons of yes

Some advice on going gradually:

Just like getting lots of gifts instead of one big one, if you say "sure," "okay," "yes" to lots of requests for watching a movie late or having cake for breakfast or them playing another half hour on the swings and you can just read a book in the car nearby, then they get TONS of yes, and permission, and approval. If you throw your hands up and say "Whatever," that's a disturbing moment of mom seeming not to care instead of mom seeming the provider of an assortment of joyous approvals.

SandraDodd.com/freedom/to
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Waking or sleeping

When the kids were babies they would go to sleep with us, nursing, or in dad's lap, and we'd put them in bed. That evolved into them going to sleep where they wanted to, or in a carseat, or a backpack (hiking/frame-pack) or beside us on the couch or on a blanket on the floor where one of us was doing something, and we'd put them in bed.

Getting up used to be "get up by noon," when they got old enough to want to stay up late on the computer or watching movies or playing games. Then it became "Sleep as long as you want to, but at noon others are free to make noise." We still try to keep it quiet until noon or until everyone's awake, whichever comes first.
. . . .
When Marty worked at a grocery store, he woke himself up at 5:30 to get there at 6:00. He had a very timed and regular routine for himself. The first few weeks I got up too to make sure he'd be up, but he worked there full time for over a year and was only late once.

The lack of a "regular schedule" has never kept our kids from getting where they needed or wanted to be on time without trouble. When Kirby was very young, eight or so, he used to wake up at 6:25 a.m. to record Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles at 6:30. He would pause for the commercials so they wouldn't be on the tape, and then when the show was over he would go back to bed. He has them all on tape, marked in his little-kid writing.

The account above is from 2007, and is similar to some things here: SandraDodd.com/sleep
photo by Sandra Dodd, of stained-glass light falling on a young friend's lovey.