Surprising thoughts

Surprises help with learning, and so a humorous situation is more likely to be memorable than a humdrum one.

SandraDodd.com/humor
photo by Sandra Dodd
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A better direction

Is the cup half empty, half full, defective or overflowing?

One mindful step in a better direction can be joyous. You don't need to reach a destination to have joy.

The Big Book of Unschooling
page 318 (or 275, if it's yellow)
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Avoid thwarting

Put your frustrated energy into a burst of mixing it up.

Unschooling can prove itself if it's not thwarted.

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That was part of some advice I gave in 2003 to a mom whose husband "wasn't onboard," as people say.

"Unschooling can prove itself if it's not thwarted" wasn't suggesting her husband was thwarting it, but that passivity and a lack of sharing it with a spouse thwarts it.

I like the sound of the word "thwart."

Don't thwart unschooling by using it to divide the family. Move toward it methodically and thoughtfully. Read a little, try a little, wait a while, watch. Note and share the results with your spouse. It can take a while to come to shared confidence, but don't fail to see it as a family-improving project.

SandraDodd.com/reluctance
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Clarity magnified

Online discussions of natural learning and parenting give people a serious opportunity to practice communicating clearly and carefully. For some people, an unschooling discussion will be their first "real writing"—the first time they've written real things for real people, rather than practice things for teachers. Those who stick with it or who have a native talent for it will find themselves getting direct and immediate feedback from other parents who have taken the ideas or examples or stories and used them to change their own real children's lives, and that is bigtime.

The Big Book of Unschooling, page 235
photo by Sandra Dodd
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What is "fair"?

In an attempt to "be fair," parents can be very UNfair. Children don't all need the same things for the same amount of time. Measuring with rulers and timers and charts is often shortchanging one child or another. What they could use more than that is the opportunity to decide when they're finished for their own reasons.


SandraDodd.com/sharing
photo by Sandra Dodd of a naturally-occuring basket of Nerf guns

"Science"

When one person says "I like science" and another says "I don't like science," I remember school science textbooks that had geology, astronomy, chemistry, botany, biology, agriculture and physics all in one book. . . . .There are many fun things to do and explore that could be called "science," but why not just call them skate boards or miniature golf or basketball or piano or water play or rescuing wounded birds or making goop or collecting rocks or swimming or drawing pictures of clouds or taking photos in different kinds of light or growing corn or training a dog or looking through binoculars or waiting for a chrysalis to open or making a sundial or making a web page or flying a kite or chasing fireflies or building a campfire or finding out which planet that is by the moon on the horizon, or wondering why snowballs take so much snow to make, or how a 4-wheel-drive truck works.

from page 82 (or 90) of The Big Book of Unschooling
and some more science clues, tricks and connections are at SandraDodd.com/science
photo by Marty Dodd
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A simple gesture

Taking food to someone who is reading or playing a game or watching a movie and just putting it where he or she can reach it without any instructions, warnings or reminders is a great gift. It is a simple gesture, and a profound service.

SandraDodd.com/eating/monkeyplatter
photo by Sandra Dodd