Principles sustain; rules constrain

Ben Lovejoy wrote:

Question the rules, and question the principles as well. But once you and your family have chosen the principles important to the family, you'll find that no one will want to change or break or get around them like they will rules.

Principles sustain a life; rules will constrain that very same life.

—Ben Lovejoy

SandraDodd.com/benrules
photo by Sandra Dodd
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When is the test?

[As a kid in school...]
I asked fewer questions when I heard "that won't be on the test" for the dozenth time.

Then when I was teaching, too many kids asked me "Will this be on the test?"

That's when I came up with the test being the rest of their lives, and whether they'll get jokes, or be interesting people, and with "Everything counts."


Everything Counts (other posts going there)

image by Bill Watterson
If you're on facebook, you can click that image to see the original discussion. Other unschooling moms had thoughts on it, too.

Where the learning is

Even if you obtain the coolest tools or toys unschoolers could recommend, natural learning isn't in the toys, it's in the relationship between the adult and child—in the freedom and peace and time to explore and to think.

JoyfullyRejoycing.com/how-unschooling-works
(The quote isn't there, but similar ideas are!)
photo by Janine Davies

A calmer, kinder mother

Below are my comments (Sandra's). They didn't go to the author, because I wasn't in on the discussion where this was first posted. They're for people who come by here ["here" being the page linked at the bottom].

"Am I going to hate, and have to fight, Harry Potter the way I have Pokemon?"

HATE? "Have to"? "Fight"? Eewwww... There is more violence in that question than in all of Pokemon's "battles." And seriously... fighting Harry Potter!? He can kick Voldemort's ass. If only the mom had spent all that energy looking at Harry Potter, or Pokemon, WITH her daughter, instead of being resentful and jealous and spiteful, their relationship might soar.

SandraDodd.com/addiction
photo by Rippy Dusseldorp

Learning comes from play

"Real learning comes from play. And it stays longer and means more."

—Kelly/mina

SandraDodd.com/game/ccg
photo by Julie D

Playing, and happiness

Lyle Perry wrote:

Playing is fun. Playing makes a person happy. Why on earth would anyone want to move from something that makes them happy?

Play has been given a bad rap in our society. It's looked upon as a waste of time. It's not productive enough. And anything that isn't productive (in society's eyes) is a waste of life.

It's all bunk. What is more important in life than "producing" happiness?

—Lyle Perry

SandraDodd.com/lyleperry
photo by Sandra Dodd

Imagine supporting and accepting

Jenny Cyphers wrote:

I really can't imagine villifying anything in their lives that they might find very exciting. Well, I can imagine it, so I guess that's why I don't do it.

—Jenny Cyphers

SandraDodd.com/negativity
photo by Susanna Waters
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