See your child

Seeing a child where he is, and as he is, leads to love.

Seeing a child in comparison to an ideal, imaginary child can lead to heartbreak all the way around.

SandraDodd.com/look
photo by Tara Joe Farrell

Learn and be an example

Colleen Prieto wrote:

Realize your unschooling life and someone else’s unschooling life won’t look exactly just the same, and that’s because your kids and their kids, your partner and their partner, your house and their house, your interests and their interests… they’re not the same either. But still read, talk, and think about what you are doing, and listen to what others are doing. Learn from the example of people who have been there/done that, and be an example for those who will come after you on the unschooling path.

—Colleen Prieto

From Colleen's writings at the bottom here: SandraDodd.com/video/doright
photo by Sandra Dodd

Joyous but careful

How we use words with our children affects their future and our present, so be joyous but careful with your parenting word-power!

SandraDodd.com/words/
photo by Megan Valnes

Seeing what learning is

When a newcomer was very confused, Meredith Novak wrote:

The basis of unschooling comes from seeing learning as a substantial human drive and seeing that learning depends absolutely on the perceptions of the learner. The second part is what makes everything tricky - you can't control what someone else learns. At best you can work on seeing the world from another person's perspective and try to create an environment which helps that person learn.

It can help a lot to think about how people learn via their hobbies. In a way, that's what real life unschooling looks like: people learning through hobbies. It usually involves a lot of playing around - and the playing around parts are just as important to learning as the parts where you need to go look something up, or network with another hobbyist, or take a class or workshop to improve a skill.

One of the common parenting/educational myths is that it's possible to imbue children with "good habits" by making them do certain things over and over. It Seems like it Should work... but when you look at adults there's no evidence it does. The results are pretty random. It's not a strategy that helps people learn about the world.

—Meredith Meredith
July 2012

SandraDodd.com/meredithnovak
photo by Carolyn Vandenbusch Neves

Overflow is good

Having a happy home comes from the creation and maintenance of happy conditions! Produce as much as you can. You'll fill yourself up and it will overflow, and your family might even have enough to share with friends and strangers!

SandraDodd.com/cup
photo by Janine Davies

Brain food

Pam Sorooshian wrote:

Human brains are voracious and will feed on whatever is available. Unschoolers should be offering interesting experiences, ideas, stimulation, music, logic, conversation, images, movement, discovery, beauty, etc. Brain food in abundance. It requires effort. It requires attention to qualitative and quantitative aspects of learning. Depth and breadth—creating a lifestyle in which kids are offered the opportunity to learn a lot about some things and a little about a lot of things.

—Pam Sorooshian

SandraDodd.com/learning
Thanks to Marta Venturini Machado for finding and sharing that quote.
photo by Meghan Pawlowski

Like nothing else

If a parent can learn how to "facilitate learning"—to help a child get what he needs or wants—rather than to direct or try to own it, all of unschooling goes better. And if a child learns to read without "reading instruction," that can open the world up like nothing else can.

SandraDodd.com/r/deeper
photo by Alicia Gonzalez-Lopez

Being mindful

Try to be a good unschooling parent, a generous freedom-nurturing parent, a parent providing a peaceful nest, a parent wanting to be each child's partner. Try to make your decisions in that light.

SandraDodd.com/mindfulness
The text above paraphrases something I wrote there.
photo by Brigita Usman (click to enlarge)

Variable, thoughtful lunch

Some days lunch is medicinal—one child is sickly and could use soup or juice. One is off to a sports event, and carbohydrates are a good idea. One is sad, and would like comfort food. One is bored, and her sandwich could use a face.

Be as loose as a dancer, as variable as an actor, as thoughtful as a chessplayer, when you decide what to make for lunch sometimes!

SandraDodd.com/eating/peace
photo by Hinano

The words are from Little meals make big memories

Clarity and Focus

Clarity and focus make things easier.

Muddly confusion make things harder.

SandraDodd.com/clarity
photo by Janine Davies

Living lightly

John Quincy Adams is credited with having said, “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”

The sentence above came from a post by an unschooling dad, Sean Heritage. In the post he's talking about his unusual approach to his job as a Commander in the U.S. Navy. Some of his ideas might have been inspired by his unschooling experiences, but Sean's ability to see in the way he does must surely be making unschooling easier at his house.

In your family, in your unschooling, in each dyad/partnership within your family, if you inspire dreaming, learning, doing and becoming, you'll be leading in an exceptional way.

Sean Heritage is retired now; the post originally appeared in 2015.
His writing from which I pulled the quote: Unicorns and Fairies

Being your Child's Partner is probably the best match on my site.
photo by Megan Valnes

Meeting needs

After physiological needs, Maslow says people need to feel safe and secure. Next comes the set of belonging, affection, and positive regard.

The application to unschooling is that if the child isn't hungry, tired, afraid or feeling unloved, there should be no problem with curiosity and the desire to experience other things.

SandraDodd.com/maslow
photo by Roya Dedeaux

From Dictator to Partner

Kelly Lovejoy wrote, in "Wet Paint":

I could have easily have remained a dictator had I not found unschooling and mindful parenting. I like when folks do what I say! Cameron has always been very compliant, so being a benevolent dictator was easy. Duncan, on the other hand, questions everything! I needed to change how I approached parenting with him—and that’s helped in my dealings with Cameron too. Stepping back and realizing that obeying orders was not in my children’s best interest was huge to me.

It’s helped me to change my language a bit. Rather than say, "Don’t touch the bench: the paint is wet," I'll now say, ”That paint may be wet. You might want to be careful if you touch it.” That gives them information to think through instead of an order to follow or disregard. They might ask how I know it’s wet. Or did I see a painter leave? Is there a sign? How can we tell when it’s dry? What does 'tacky' mean?

And they might go ahead and touch it. But that gives them the information they need. And that’s OK. One more brick in your tower.

—Kelly Lovejoy

SandraDodd.com/kellylovejoy/wetpaint
photo by Sandra Dodd

Already full

"I don't need to stuff him full of who I need him to be, because he's already full of who he is."

—Schuyler Waynforth
March 29, 2014
Gold Coast symposium

SandraDodd.com/understanding
photo by Sandra Dodd of a wonga pigeon at Schuyler's
(The quote is about her son, not about a pigeon.)

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

Learning for fun

The separation of learning and fun is the only thing that keeps learning from BEING fun.

Perhaps this will be seen as preaching to the choir, but I prefer to think of it as teaching a new song to an experienced, enthusiastic choir.

---

Learning is fun.

Playing with ideas is fun.

Living becomes learning
photo by Karen James

Stop, breathe, and change

Caren Knox wrote:

Trust is a vital foundation to building an unschooling home. If kids can't trust that what their parents are saying is true, their foundation is shaky, perilous. That affects their ability to learn, and harms the relationship they have with the world (and their parents).

Why bring a negative force into the home?

If you're used to sarcasm and other lying, it might take practice to learn to speak honestly. It can feel vulnerable and risky. It is worth it. You'll soon be able to feel if what you are about to say is true — really true — and you'll develop the ability to stop, breathe, and change what you're saying if needed.

—Caren Knox

Deposit the good stuff.
photo by Cathy Koetsier

Better, without regrets

Do your best to do your best.

You won't regret making more positive choices.

---

SandraDodd.com/better on my site
and
"Better" on Just Add Light and Stir
photo by Renee Cabatic

Partnership, joy and fun

Chris Ester wrote:

What bothers me most... (about a questionable definition of unschooling) is that it is all about the parent and their level of comfort. Focusing on what the parent can 'bear' at the possible expense of the child irks me....

Thank you Sandra, et al. for the clarity that you provide. The talk of partnership and joy and fun with clearly stated principles in mind is challenging to the status quo and stretches many of us, but it is certainly much more helpful.

—Chris Ester

Appropriating the word Unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd
(a tied game against Keith;
newer than the writing)

The panoply of wonder

Robyn Coburn, when Jayn was little:

Jayn certainly finds learning inescapable. Educational is an irrelevant label to her, neither endorsed nor discarded. Her first issue continues to be whether the item looks like fun or is simply beautiful enough to warrant a place in the panoply of wonder that already inhabits her imagination.

Truly I believe that her greatest cognitive leaps have come from the most frivolous seeming of her pursuits. Her most profound discoveries have come from her interactions with the least overtly educational of her tools&mddash;her play toys and her animated movies. It is not work masquerading as play to make it palatable; it truly is that all her most valuable work is play.

—Robyn Coburn

SandraDodd.com/robyn/label
photo by Robyn Coburn

One thing leads to something else

Mary Ellen (nellebelle) wrote, years ago:

Up to now, we have never had any video games in our house. It wasn't that I purposely avoided them, it was just something we'd never done and the girls had never asked for. I had a vague idea in my head that they were negative along the lines of TV and other electronic media. Generally, when video games make the news it is not positive. I had never before questioned these ideas. Lisa had mentioned playing a race car game at her friend's house. We decided to give the girls a Nintendo64 for Christmas. This morning I played Crusin World with Lisa. The game is full of famous landmarks. It is not totally realistic, but does match many real aspects of the countries you race through. While cruising Germany, I mentioned the autobahn. I don't know too much about it, except that people drive really fast there. This led us to consider mph vs. kph, which led to the metric vs. US system of measurement. I told Lisa that I had bought some stuff to help learn the metric system because I wanted to understand it better. She said, "We can learn it together".

It never ceases to amaze me how doing one thing can lead to learning about something else.

—Mary Ellen(nellebelle)

"Everything I really need to know I learned from video games and cheesy cartoons."
SandraDodd.com/t/cheesy

image respectfully lifted from
Launchbox Games Database

Learn and share

Karen James, to a worried mom with a young teen daughter:

Try not to worry. I know that's hard. I'm a worrier, myself. But when we worry about another person, it becomes a burden for them on top of what they are already experiencing. Just be with her, as fully as you can. If she's telling you she's bored, she's inviting you into her experience. Join her. Learn about her. Share yourself with her too. You'll likely learn a lot about her (and yourself) in the process, and I'm confident it will be enriching and rewarding for you both.

—Karen James

A gentle approach to boredom
SandraDodd.com/boredom/karen
photo by Sandra Dodd

Random words, or CHOSEN words?

In an unschooling discussion, once, someone commented just this:

Evidently this is a place to choose one's words extremely carefully.

I responded:

YES!!
Yes, it is.
This group is a place to choose one's words carefully.

One wonderful thing about that is that if one practices that here, and sees the value in it, maybe she will begin to choose her words more carefully when speaking to her children, or her partner. Her other friends and relatives probably wouldn't mind if she chose her words carefully when speaking to them.

And in other groups, too—a humor group, or Korean drama group, Viking crafts group, puppy-training group—wouldn't it be best to choose one's words carefully?

SandraDodd.com/mindfulofwords
photo by Sandra Dodd

Kids first, positively

In a social group, if a mom gets comfortable, she can spend years just chatting with those other moms without paying much attention to her own children other than keeping them fed, clothed and safe. If they're in school, that's not so bad.

If they're unschooled, though, the bulk of her time and energy should be with, on, about THEM, and the family, and the relationships. Unschooling should be better than school; if it's not, the kids would be better off in school.

Any unschooler who wants to do just the bare minimum of what she "has to do" to be considered (by whom!?) an unschooler is NOT unschooling well or right. It needs energy, activity, interactivity, flow, sparkle, joy.

People who come [to a discussion group] with ANY amount of Eeyore attitude, and those who defend that, are dragging people under and I don't want to condone that or provide a forum for anyone to drag potentially joyful people into a hole, justifying complaints, collecting negativity.

---

Please don't try to turn your unschooling into social groups. Don't look for "a tribe." Don't put your loyalty toward an unschooling group, or a conference. When that group becomes complacent, or negative, then you will, too.

Find a way to unschool confidently, even if all your other friends buy a curriculum or put their kids in school.

SandraDodd.com/positivity
photo by Annie Regan

(source, on facebook)

Demons (avoidance of)

If a family thinks that "having no junk food" in the house will ensure a child's health for eight or nine decades, they are incorrect in that belief. If the mother thinks that it will absolve her of any blame in future dietary choices, she is also incorrect.

Demonizing food creates a demon. Being calm creates more calm.

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Sandra Dodd

Other things flow

Being a child's partner rather than his adversary makes the balance of knowledge unimportant. Nowadays my children drive me around, help me out, read small print and get things off high shelves. For many years, I did those things for them.

SandraDodd.com/partners

SandraDodd.com/balance

Learning first, and partnership and being present close after, and all the other things flow in around it.


Part of a longer response to an odd question: The other things flow in around it.

See also "Snapshot" on this blog
photo by Karen James

Bright and shiny things

Schuyler Waynforth wrote:

Often if I'm stuck not being able to see the positive in something, I need to quit looking at it. I need to look at other things. I need to find something to move forward to instead of whirling and twirling around the angsty thing. Make the angry thing small and insignificant, turn away from it, look for bright and shiny things to distract you, look at tiny things that give you pleasure, look at large things that you didn't appreciate fully the first time around. Turning toward joy will definitely make it harder to feel stymied in the negative.

—Schuyler Waynforth

SandraDodd.com/distraction
photo by Vlad Gurdiga

Distraction can be a blessing

If someone is flipping out, distraction can be a blessing. If the problem is insurmountable, they will get right back to it. If the problem was that the problem itself was creating feedback and a small thing had turned into a roar, distraction can break the tension and let them breathe and relax, or even better—to laugh and to slump until some adrenaline can pass.

The reason I'm telling this sudden story is that in another topic Meredith wrote:

I've been listening to a podcast called The Hilarious World of Depression which is all interviews with comics who have various kinds of depression. In one episode (I don't recall which) they talk about distraction, and how it's actually a helpful strategy for a lot of people with anxiety, depression, and the like. That was nice to hear. There's a lot of pressure on people to journal and talk and ruminate and Not try to be distracted, but it turns out for some people distraction is a good thing.

SandraDodd.com/distraction
photo by Jo Isaac

Kindness, grace and generosity

Meredith wrote:

Expecting human relationships—of any kind—to be fair and equitable is a set-up for cynicism and disappointment in the human race. Human beings are marvelously varied in their needs and capabilities. It helps a whole lot to think in terms of needs and capabilities rather than rights or fairness or equality. What more can you do to support the people you love—including yourself? Kindness, grace, and generosity go a lot further toward creating warm relationships and a joyfully harmonious home than measuring out equality.

—Meredith Novak

SandraDodd.com/50/50
photo by Cátia Maciel

Finding depth and clarity

Pam Sorooshian wrote:

When we started unschooling, my mom kept saying that she was worried I would "lose myself" in it—that I wouldn't have time for myself. She was very very wrong. I found myself and very very deep meaning to life and a much more clear sense of what's important.

—Pam Sorooshian

SandraDodd.com/peace/mama
photo by Denaire Nixon

Dishes and clothes and food...

One time long ago Keith was cranky and told me that because of me he had to go to work every day, and make house payments.

I heard him, and I let him rant, and I said fairly calmly that I was pretty sure that if we hadn't gotten married he still would be living in a house and going to work. Even if he was single, and I named some friends of ours who were single, who had jobs, and paid rent or mortgages. 🙂

I think women do that too, thinking they wouldn't be doing dishes or laundry or cooking if they hadn't gotten married or had kids.

Avoiding the negative rants is a giant step in the right direction, for having a peaceful, contented life. Being glad to HAVE dishes and clothes and food and a pan and a fire, that's the way to be. 🙂

SandraDodd.com/50/50
photo by Cátia Maciel

Actually doing it

Reading about unschooling without doing it is like reading a cookbook without making any food, or reading woodworking project books without owning a saw.

Do it!

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Help for getting it
photo by Cara Jones

Learning, clearly

Sandra Dodd
16 February 2020

I'm cleaning up my computer desktop (a neverending task), and came across a note where I saved this:

"Getting mad about the difference between teach and learn is a waste of your life."

I've never been "mad" about the difference. 🙂 I've been thinking about it for longer than most people have been alive. I've read about it, I've written about it, I've helped others understand why it can matter, sometimes. It ALWAYS matters for those who want to unschool. Deschooling won't happen without stepping away from the idea of teaching, and without finding some occurrences of natural learning, picking them up and turning them over. Soon it will be easier to see and understand the kind of learning that happens lightly but deeply.

Someone must have been mad enough about my pointing out that there is a difference between teaching and learning (lots of differences; I could go on) to declare that my life was a waste.

I'm pretty sure my life has not been a waste. 🙂

What Teaching Never Can Be
Sandra Dodd, and others, on "Learning" vs. "Teaching"

The quote is here: SandraDodd.com/learningClearly
photo by Stacie Mahoe

Big world

Here is a peacock in India. Hema Bharadwaj took the photo:


This peacock lives wherever it wants to, in Albuquerque, and was photographed by Holly Dodd. Where it wants to live is wandering around the zoo. 🙂


Below is a picture I took of Holly and another zoo peacock in 2009.

click for more just-add-light-and-stir peacock images
What do you know about peacocks? What do you need to know? Does what you know touch geography? Art, biology, or animal behavior? History, mythology or fashion?

You probably don't "need" to know anything about peacocks, really, but I bet you already knew several things.


peacock images out on the net

Never heard of such a thing

Christine Macdonald wrote that she and her daughter had walked to the grocery store once to pick up milk they needed for a recipe:

I had brought a ten-dollar bill (no wallet) I told her we'd have about six dollars left and she could get whatever she wanted with it—she wanted a pomegranate or three artichokes (neither of which we had enough money left for) I told her we could come back later with my wallet and get them or get them now skip the milk and come back later for the milk to finish our cake. She said come back later for the artichokes. When we were at the checkout I said why don't you just get a candy bar or something for the walk home she said no thanks. A mom behind me in line was shocked at the idea of a kid not wanting candy if offered said she never heard of such a thing.

—Christine Macdonald

SandraDodd.com/eating/sweets
photo by Jihong Tang