Understanding is more important.

Respect and acceptance are more important than test scores and "performance." Understanding is more important than recitation.

page 72, The Big Book of Unschooling (79 in new edition)
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Christmas candy, still there

We have a can of candy that was under the Christmas tree this year. We didn't do stockings. We bought the candy kids liked in stockings, put it in this little one-gallon paint can (printed with Christmas candy art) and it was always under the tree from mid-December. I just opened it.

It has half of its original candy. Reese's and Hershey's miniatures. Everyone here likes that stuff, but it could last a long time more, because nobody here is "needing" that stuff. Not craving it. It's just candy.

SandraDodd.com/eating/sweets
photo by Sandra Dodd

Expectations

"I suspect that any time a parent new to unschooling starts thinking 'This isn't working' it is because they are holding on to an expectation.

"Expectations can get in the way of seeing what is really happening."

—Robyn Coburn

SandraDodd.com/expectations or Attentes
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a house key in The Netherlands
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Much more than half

I've given this advice to newlyweds, and to my oldest child the first time he had a roommate:

Don't aim for 50/50.

If 50% is right, then 49% is wrong, and 65% would be something get angry about.

If you both aim for more than half, you'll meet around the middle, around half the time. If you want the other person to stick around, "around" is the goal.

SandraDodd.com/peace/mama
photo by Sandra Dodd
P.S. Nearly six years later and three houses later, Kirby still lives with that roommate, who is engaged. He and his fianceé custom-ordered a new home, designed to accommodate Kirby comfortably.
Don't measure.

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2020 update: Thirteen years later, Kirby is married, with three children, in a house in Albuquerque. They all get along sweetly.

Time and Perspective

As our children get older, our perspective changes, but no matter how lofty the view, we can't see forever.

Deb Lewis wrote:
"In looking back I've not only had the pleasure of revisiting a lot of wonderful moments, but I've also had the surprise gift of perspective, which reveals overwhelming evidence of natural learning. What I always believed to be true is no longer a matter of trust or faith; it is fact.. . . ."He is surrounded by the things that interest humans in the twenty-first century. He is surrounded by the whole of human history. He is a citizen of the world in a time when access to information has never been easier. He is learning all the time."

SandraDodd.com/deblewis/years
photo by Bob Cogliser

Being a mother

"If you are choosing to be a mother, move beyond playing at it, and *be* it."

—Pam Laricchia

Are You Playing the Role of “Mother”? by Pam Laricchia
(see also, if you're having fun, SandraDodd.com/being)
photo by Colleen Prieto

Just for now

"The big thing is to remember that you don't need once-and-for-all solutions, just for-now solutions." —Meredith Novak

the original quote, on Always Learning
or those who aren't in that group might like SandraDodd.com/nest
photo by Colleen Prieto