Showing posts sorted by date for query /clock. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by date for query /clock. Sort by relevance Show all posts

Monday, March 4, 2024

Helping them share


The problem I see with measured turns is that the quality of game play is compromised. If someone sees the clock and that's when they have to stop, they won't play as thoughtfully. They're less likely to look around at the art or appreciate the music. If they're starting to read, they're less likely to take a moment to look at the text and see if they can tell what it says.

The benefits of game play will not come to full fruition if kids' time is measured that way, and they're not learning to share.

If they only have an hour, they will take ALL of that hour, just as kids whose TV time is limited will.

It they can play as long as they want to, they might play for five or ten minutes and be done.

SandraDodd.com/sharing
photo by Sarah S.

Tuesday, November 16, 2021

Connect and assist

An expression of boredom is a request for connection, for input, for assistance with the world.
Bored No More
photo by Sandra Dodd, but Holly put the clock in the tree years ago

Tuesday, January 15, 2019

The clock isn't hungry

Perhaps "eating by the clock" has roots in European manor houses filled with servants, where the lady of the house got to choose the times of meals (within the narrow window of what was considered right and proper). In more modern times, eating by the clock has to do with factory lunch breaks and with school bells.

Don't be the clock's mother. Don't watch the clock to see if it's time to eat. Watch your child. Or watch the clock to see if it's time to offer another snack, but don't let the clock say "not yet" or "Must EAT!"

It isn't good parenting or self control for an adult who has reproduced to be looking to a mechanical device to make decisions for her. Clocks are great for meeting people at a certain time, but they were never intended to be an oracle by which mothers would decide whether to pay attention to a child or not. Your child knows whether he's hungry. You don't. The clock doesn't either, never did, and never will.

from page 163 of The Big Book of Unschooling (page 182 of newer editions)
photo by Sandra Dodd

Thursday, October 18, 2018

Restful


If you get to sleep for a long time, be glad. If your sleep is interrupted, try to be like a cat, and just accept it. Measuring sleep and being angry about the clock will lead to neither peace nor rest.

Children will wake you up. Breathe in love and remain restful.

SandraDodd.com/peace/
photo by Janine Davies

Tuesday, June 26, 2018

What is not a clock?

I do love clocks and calendars and the history of time measurement, but it is good to remember that we are not clocks, and our children are not clocks.


The clock is not hungry
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a sundial in Chichester

Tuesday, June 5, 2018

Live here and now


[Historically...]

Nobody kept their kids home for 18 or 20 years just discussing life with them, hanging out, playing games.

We probably wouldn't be either, if it weren't that we're biding time until the clock runs out on compulsory education.

So even as we unschool now (and I'm not talking about people with toddlers who aspire to become unschoolers over the years), it's in reaction to the culture around us, it's finding a way to live in an alternative fashion within this culture.

People can't actually leave the planet and can't actually go back in time. The only place we can live is the here and now.

SandraDodd.com/reality
photo by Ester Siroky
__

P.S. A few people have left the planet for a while, but they don't get very far, and no unschooling family has yet done so.

Sunday, February 18, 2018

Myths and alarm clocks

A myth and boogie-man:

"If children are allowed sleep as late as they want, they'll never be able to get up and go to work."
I have three children (at this writing 16, 19 and 21), all of whom have had jobs, none of whom has failed to learn to use an alarm clock and good judgment, none of whom has ever been let go from a job, all of whom have been free to sleep or get up for 16 years or more (depending). If there were no other refutation of the myth above than this, it would be sufficient.

It's also worth noting that none of those jobs have been "regular hours." Shifts have started as early as 6:30 a.m. and ended as late as 3:00 a.m. Good thing they were well prepared by years of irregular sleep!

SandraDodd.com/myths
That was written ten years ago, so my "children" this month are are 26, 28 and 31.
They have had even MORE jobs with odd hours, and sometimes "normal" hours.
photo by Janine Davies

Monday, December 4, 2017

Coincidence and confluence

I don't believe in magic, but I find joy in wonderful coincidences and confluences. I like looking at a digital clock right at 11:11, for its pattern and symmetry. When planets line up I'm happy, even though I believe it to have no effect whatsoever on humans on earth outside the happiness they might have if they know about it.



The quote is from Magic Window,
which was written about my kids about this time ten years ago,
when they were 16, 18 and 21.

photo by Chrissy Florence

Friday, July 7, 2017

The clock is not hungry


Little children know nothing of the clock or "tomorrow" or "later."

It will help for parents to learn to live in the moment rather than by the clock, too. The clock is not sleepy. The clock is not hungry. Look at what your real, immediate child needs in the moment, and find ways to adjust your thinking so that it is not always too much for you. SOMEtimes maybe you can't. But if you never can feel the obligation or justification to take a breath and do what he wants instead of what you want, then school might be better for them than any sort of homeschooling—especially than unschooling, which is all about living in the immediate now.

SandraDodd.com/clock
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Saturday, March 25, 2017

Living with food

You don't know what your children need. They won't know either, if they're never allowed to live in such a way that they will learn to pay more attention to their bodies than to a book or a menu, a calendar, a clock, or to their parents' fears and prejudices.



SandraDodd.com/food
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Stance and viewpoint

If there is a method to unschooling it's certainly not a simple one. It involves changing one's stance and viewpoint on just about everything concerning children and learning. That's not "a method." That's a life change.


SandraDodd.com/unschool/definition
photo of "the rock house" (small, at 10 o'clock), from Sandia Tram,
by Sandra Dodd

Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Without measure

Sometimes people measure too much.

Try not to go by the clock or the numbers or the calendar so much as you go by the emotional and personal and physical needs of your child. It will pay you back. It will be a good deal.
SandraDodd, "Unschooling—How to Screw it Up"
photo by Jasmine Baykus

Saturday, March 26, 2016

Resting

If you get to sleep for a long time, be glad. If your sleep is interrupted, try to be like a cat, and just accept it. Measuring sleep and being angry about the clock will lead to neither peace nor rest.
Children will wake you up. Breathe in love and remain restful.

SandraDodd.com/peace/
photo by Ve Lacerda

Friday, September 11, 2015

Just discussing life, hanging out...


Nobody kept their kids home for 18 or 20 years just discussing life with them, hanging out, playing games.

We probably wouldn't be either, if it weren't that we're biding time until the clock runs out on compulsory education.

SandraDodd.com/context
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Monday, June 22, 2015

Pleasantly surprised


I was asked:

Did your kids have rules like bedtimes, no candy before dinner ... that sort of thing?

I wrote:

We didn't have those rules, but our kids went to bed every night and didn't eat candy before dinner. It seems crazy to people who believe that the only options are rules or chaos, but our children slept when they were sleepy, and ate when they were hungry (or when something smelled really good, or others were eating), and I was pleasantly surprised to learn that they were able to know what their bodies needed. I grew up by the clock, up at 6:30, eat quickly, bus stop, school, wait until lunch, eat, wait until dinner, go to bed. I had no idea that sleep and food could be separated from a schedule like that, but they can be.

Not so crazy after all
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Friday, May 8, 2015

Variable speeds

Time is fast, time is slow. A moment can seem like an hour, or a day can pass in a blink. Joy can make time flow smoothly. Make the best of most of your moments.wall clock with chain to look like giant pocket watch
SandraDodd.com/time
photo by Sandra Dodd

Sunday, March 16, 2014

Years or an hour

medieval market cross structure with 18th century clock up top, Chichester"Gauge how much to do and when by your child’s reactions. Let her say no thanks. Let her choose. Let her interest set the pace. If it takes years, let it take years. If it lasts an hour, let it last an hour."
—Joyce Fetteroll
Five Steps to Unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd

Monday, January 13, 2014

The clock isn't hungry.

Perhaps "eating by the clock" has roots in European manor houses filled with servants, where the lady of the house got to choose the times of meals (within the narrow window of what was considered right and proper). In more modern times, eating by the clock has to do with factory lunch breaks and with school bells.

Don't be the clock's mother. Don't watch the clock to see if it's time to eat. Watch your child. Or watch the clock to see if it's time to offer another snack, but don't let the clock say "not yet" or "Must EAT!"

It isn't good parenting or self control for an adult who has reproduced to be looking to a mechanical device to make decisions for her. Clocks are great for meeting people at a certain time, but they were never intended to be an oracle by which mothers would decide whether to pay attention to a child or not. Your child knows whether he's hungry. You don't. The clock doesn't either, never did, and never will.

from page 163 of The Big Book of Unschooling (page 182 of newer editions)
photo by Sandra Dodd

Saturday, May 26, 2012

About food...

You don't know what your children need. They won't know either, if they're never allowed to live in such a way that they will learn to pay more attention to their bodies than to a book or a menu, a calendar, a clock, or to their parents' fears and prejudices.



SandraDodd.com/food
photo by Sandra Dodd
__

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Sharing

About kids sharing a computer:

The problem I see with measured turns is that the quality of game play is compromised. If someone sees the clock and that's when they have to stop, they won't play as thoughtfully. They're less likely to look around at the art or appreciate the music. If they're starting to read, they're less likely to take a moment to look at the text and see if they can tell what it says.

The benefits of game play will not come to full fruition if kids' time is measured that way, and they're not learning to share.

If they only have an hour, they will take ALL of that hour, just as kids whose TV time is limited will.

It they can play as long as they want to, they might play for five or ten minutes and be done. I've seen it in Holly, I saw it for half an hour in Marty.

Yes, Kirby wanted it more. He was older and it was his game system and he could play better. And so in exchange for me keeping the other kids away while Kirby was playing as long as he wanted to, he let them play as long as they wanted to, which was never as long as he did.

from "Helping Kids Share," SandraDodd.com/sharing
photo by Will Geusz, of his pets sharing