Warm, glowing traditions

A pretty thing, about New Mexico...



photo by Sandra Dodd

Be cool! Be brave.

photo by Karen James

Minor and temporary problems

SandraDodd.com has been moved to a new server, and minor problems are being dealt with. Unrelated to that, the site where many of my older photos are stored is having problems, and that affects my website and hundreds of older posts in this blog. Things will be back to normal, but it's not happening today!

Please don't forget me if things are glitchy and incomplete for a litle while. I will share some happy wintery photos for a few days, and I hope those of you with holidays to celebrate this week have many smiles and joys.



photo by Sandra Dodd, of an "adobe" gingerbread house
created by a happy committee of kids, teens and parents
at Kim Archuleta's house in 2007.

Sharing life

I expected unschooling to cause me to be closer to my kids, when they were young, than I might otherwise have been. As time went by, though, I found that I was being kinder to my husband and nicer to my pets.

Others have reported this effect, and their surprise. As unschooling principles became a deeper part of their lives, they discovered a gentler homelife, and an expectation of kindness.

Unforeseen Benefits of Unschooling
photo by Meredith Dew

Is learning fun?

Kathryn Baptista wrote, in a discussion about formerly-schooled kids who assert that learning is not fun:

Playing games is fun. Watching tv is fun. Reading can be fun (if it's something you like and you're doing it for...well...fun.) Playing with (and maybe even taking care of) the dog is fun, pretending to be a pirate, making things, using the computer, maybe cooking... Fun.

You get the idea. And most people who are here, even the beginners, will recognize that for any and all of these things that kids choose to do for fun during the day can be a source of remarkable learning.

—Kathryn Baptista
2006

CONNECTIONS: How Learning Works
photo by Lourdes Garcia

A place to rest and dream

I believe there is a sacredness in sacrifice.

People are embarrassed by the idea of "the sacred" in everyday life. They reject it, often, unless it's part of a specific, brief ceremony (grace before a meal; Friday night candles and formal meal; bowing to a family altar). The idea that making a bed for someone could be about love and preparation of a special place to rest and dream seems too mushy, I think.

From this page which was following on some discussion of sacrifice.
Two words were added to the top line, above,
but the topic was understood in context.
photo by Whitney DiFalco

Limited and limiting

It is very common for people to see school as the center of life, the universe and everything. That's the way the world looks when one sees it mostly in textbook photos, or through whatever classroom windows haven't been papered over or painted out, and from the windows of a schoolbus on the way home to finish homework before going to sleep early because it's a schoolnight. That world is limited and limiting.

the whole wide world and what schooling isn't
photo by Pushpa Ramachandran