Improving thought

Kathy Ward had eight children, and was active in discussions years back. At first she rejected video games, but changed her mind. This is part of something longer:

Everyone agreed that [Tetris] was a great game for developing and improving mathematical thinking. The puzzles require some thinking about patterns and ability to recognize and recall geometric designs. Even the little kids enjoy it. I don't know why a parent would love to see a child spend an hour at a time figuring out puzzles like this in a workbook or on paper but be dismayed that the same child was doing this on a computer or a video game system. In fact, the whole thing is more challenging on the game system because it moves and changes, it's more interactive than geometric puzzles on a piece of paper.

When I told the older children that I was interested in putting their ideas about video games on this webpage...

—Kathy Ward
who continues that writing into other games, and benefits including problem solving, spatial reasoning, maps, graphic arts, physics of motion, vocabulary of auto mechanics, morality, military history, comparative cultures, and geography.

SandraDodd.com/kathyward/videogames
photo by Sarah Peshek

Ideas, terminology, and attitudes

If someone really does want to unschool, it's going to take looking at her own ideas, terminology, and attitudes really closely, to weed out that "what will screw it up" set.

SandraDodd.com/screwitup

The original quote is here:
Archive: "...on TV & junk food"
photo by Cátia Maciel

Right for your child

Rather than look at labels that try to pigeonhole people into being this sort of parent or that sort of parent, be the parent that is right for your child in each moment.

—Laurie Wolfrum

SandraDodd.com/parents
photo by Sandra Dodd

Freeing and joyful

When people come here and their messages are like parroted little recordings of things their teachers said, that their grandparents and in-laws say, that they read in an anti-TV book, it seems they need to peel off all the layers of recitation and people-pleasing and try to feel what they feel and decide what's freeing and joyful instead of what will shush their internal voices.

That's not easy.

SandraDodd.com/voices
photo by Denaire Nixon

Surrounded by words

My children learned to read without being taught. If my children were the only children in the history of the world who learned without being taught, it would still be a fact that some children have learned to read without lessons—that a child can learn to read without lessons.

But my children are not the only ones. There are many. There were many even before schools existed, though it was harder without being surrounded by talking video games and movies with subtitles and printed boxes all over the kitchen, and signs on every street and building and shelf.


Always Learning post, Sandra Dodd, 2010
photo by Denaire Nixon

Portable, cheap, long-lasting

The really good thing about happiness is that it’s portable. It’s cheap. It doesn’t need a safety deposit box or an inheritance. You can give the same amount to all your kids, and they don’t have to wait until they’re 18 to claim and use it! Think about that. They can have it right now, and start using it, without taking yours away from you.

Do kids need to have their own room to store their happiness in? No. Do kids need to wait nine weeks to get a report card that says they’re doing well in happiness? No. Will working really hard now store up happiness they can use later? That’s the going theory, the one we were raised on, but I no longer believe it.

The quote is from SandraDodd.com/president

More on happiness: SandraDodd.com/happy

photo by Cátia Maciel

Completely engaged

Stephanie E. wrote:

It came to me the other day that Jason is more engaged then if he were doing puzzles in a book or being read to. When he plays a video game, it is a whole-body experience. I can see his mind working—he is completely engaged. He is constantly strategizing, thinking about the next step, figuring out how to solve the next level, experimenting with options. He is also very active—jumping up and down, yelling, running in to show me his latest accomplishment.

—Stephanie E.

GameCube and Little Boys
photo by Karen James