The trail starts to open up

In the middle of something a little longer, about becoming an unschooling parent, Pam Sorooshian wrote:

Overly self-centered people can't do it because it requires a lot of empathy. People with too many personal problems that they haven't addressed in their own lives probably can't do it because they are too distracted by those. People who are too negative or cynical can't do it because they tend to crush interest and joy, not build it up. People who lack curiosity and a certain amount of gusto for life can't really do it.

On the other hand, we grow into it. Turns out that we parents learn, too.

So—when we are making moves, taking steps, in the direction of unschooling, turns out the trail starts to open up in front of us and we get more and more sure-footed as we travel the unschooling path.

Pam Sorooshian, on SandraDodd.com/lazy/parents
photo by Sandra Dodd
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The Full Plate Club

The food section of my website is called "The Full Plate Club." Its intro says:

"The empty plate club," referring to kids who successfully clean their plates, sounds so sad.

"Full plate" sounds much more nurturing.

On questions of whether a cup is half full or half empty, consider a plate. If a child has a feeling of abundance he will stop eating when he's had enough and be healthier and happier than if anyone presses him to take one more bite.


SandraDodd.com/food
photo by Sandra Dodd

Being with your child

If watching TV is his thing and complaining about TV is your thing, you spoiled a chance to have a shared thing.

SandraDodd.com/t/sharing
photo by Holly Dodd

Free tools

You need to do MANY things, as an unschooling parent. Free tools are being added to these collections just about every day:
Joyfully Rejoycing (Joyce's site)

SandraDodd.com/

LivingJoyfully.ca (Pam Laricchia's site)

Read a little, try a little, wait a while, watch.

Don't overcomplicate, don't oversimplify.


Paraphrased from a post on Always Learning; this site will work:
SandraDodd.com/howto/precisely
photo by Sandra Dodd

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2020 note:

In cleaning up old posts with more solid images and links, I replaced Always Learning, in the list above, with Pam Laricchia's site. Always Learning still exists, and at a better hosting site, but people aren't using e-mail as much as they once did. The Always Learning archives are open here if you want to read, and if you want to join and try to stir the discussion up, I would not mind!

A head start

Making this moment better than worse (getting warm, rather than getting cold) gives me a head start on the next moment, and being positive becomes habitual.

Getting Warm
photo by Sandra Dodd

Choosing and power

Deb Lewis wrote:

Once you’re really listening to your kids and not your sense of injustice, you’ll find that answering them and interacting with them is intellectually rewarding and stimulating and fun. It’s not something you *have* to do. It’s something you *get* to do for a very little while. You can’t change this need your kids have right now. You can only change how you see it, how you think about it and meet it. And that’s good because that’s entirely in your power to do.

—Deb Lewis

Deb was writing in a discussion,
but it was a good lead-in to this page:
SandraDodd.com/gettingit
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a railyard we visited
because my son Marty wanted to go there
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Special Offer

Pam Sorooshian wrote:

The only way to make it "just right" is to offer and not coerce. If you don't "offer" stuff/ideas/experiences, then the kids aren't going to even know what's out there. If you push too much on them, they can feel pressured and that their learning is being taken over by you.

It isn't all that tricky, though, when you live with a kid and pay attention and care deeply—to keep that child in mind and provide him/her with a pretty steady stream of options/possibilities/ideas/ stuff, etc. Invite and offer a lot—it is your job to create a stimulating and interesting environment around her.

SandraDodd.com/nest
photo by Sandra Dodd
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