photo by Cátia Maciel
Saturday, April 6, 2024
Whole life and whole person
photo by Cátia Maciel
Sunday, February 11, 2024
Pathways and connections
photo by Ester Siroky
Saturday, January 27, 2024
Connections coming and going
Football has been a big connector lately. Hayden loves claw machines and on our trip won (bought) a KC Chiefs window hangie thingamabobber. He thought we should send it to the "unschoolers who sing the Kansas City Song" (Ken & Amy Briggs). When we were at Burger King the other day, the kids' prizes were NFL related. He first found KC Chiefs and reiterated his connection to the team, which led to a talk of the Briggs' actually living in NY -- "NY has TWO teams!!" As he browsed the other teams, he happened upon Cleveland Browns -- "Oh! Now I get the joke on Family Guy!! Cleveland's last name is Brown, I thought it was because of his skin color, well it is! Both!" I didn't realize how many football jokes have been on that series, but Hayden knew of a few others and it is just now that they're connecting and beginning to make sense.
I never knew how multi-layered most movies and television shows are, until I lived the freedom of no censorship with my kids. I'm excited to watch Shrek again with Hayden... we've not seen it in over a year and I know his sense of humor has drastically changed, he's more aware of innuendo, it will most likely be a whole new movie for him. I will miss his *younger* perspective as much as I look forward to this *older* one.
also consider SandraDodd.com/again, about watching things again
Hayden playing in a fountain,
photo by Gail Higgins, I think,
or maybe by Diana Jenner
Thursday, November 30, 2023
Happy, fun dishes
Finding ways not to be grumpy about dishes is a good model and practice field for other choices in life.
We get our dishes from thrift stores, mostly. If one of them bugs me, it can go back to the thrift store.
Sometimes when a mom is really frustrated with doing the dishes, it can help to get rid of dishes with bad memories and connections, or put them in storage for a while. Happy, fun dishes with pleasant associations are easier to wash.
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Friday, October 13, 2023
A living example
Nurture your own curiosity and joy.
Find gratitude and abundance in your life.
Explore. Make connections, on your own.
Share those with your children when they're interesting.
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Thursday, October 12, 2023
Open
When I reject something from my life, it closes doors, in my head, and in my soul. I can't make connections there anymore. I have eliminated it from active play. It's not good for unschoolers.
Open and unfold, enlarge and expand.
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Sunday, September 24, 2023
The value of input
I value input, information and learning. I've seen immeasurable learning in my kids and others from things they have seen in movies, on TV, in online videos, heard on the radio, read in magazines, picked up in conversations with others, heard in public presentations or from tour guides or from books. To eliminate some part of that input out of fear would have made my children's world smaller.
photo by Karen James
Tuesday, July 18, 2023
Facilitation
What a child notices on her own, or discovers, or figures out, will connect to other things in her that the parent wouldn't have predicted, or known about. That's good!
Connections are personal, and each web of knowledge is of and within that person.
To make it easier for a child to learn—to facilitate her learning—the parent can provide opportunities, materials, tools, and time. Answer questions. Maybe make suggestions, or play with the child, but don't take over, if you can manage to hang back.
You can learn about learning by watching your child learn.
photo by Roya Dedeaux
Sunday, July 9, 2023
Quiet trust
"Learning flows when needs are met, connections are strong, and kids can absolutely trust their parents, and know their parents are there for them."
photo by Cátia Maciel
Sunday, May 7, 2023
Peace and use
Don't think of your brain. Think of your mind and of your awareness. A little tiny brain can hold a LOT of information. A big fat one can fail to do so. It's not size, it's peace and use.Shan Burton responded:
OH! This just resonated through my mind and awareness.What a concise, clear way of expressing it. It feels to me like this is the difference between unschooling learning and school learning. School learning is focused (and not so well, maybe) on pouring things into brains.
Unschooling is about learning, and engagement, and connections, and awareness of things that can get deeper and deeper, throughout life. It works that way for kids and for adults.
Peace and use. I feel like bit is going to be connecting to lots of other things in my mind and awareness for some time to come...
—Shan Burton,
most of that
photo by Denaire Nixon
Friday, May 5, 2023
History in the snow
When you think of history, think of engineering, toys, clothes, dishes, food... Think of buildings and of transportation, of bedding, and of books.
Then you can look at the same things as art, or as science, of "antiques," or collections.
The categories aren't as important as the curiosity, appreciation and connections.
photo by Denaire Nixon
Wednesday, April 26, 2023
Each person's learning
"Every person's learning about the world will be piecemeal - so it might as well be serendipitous and interest based."—Cally Brown
(original, on facebook)
photo by Rosie Moon
Thursday, March 9, 2023
Compassion for passions
What are your passions? HOW did you learn to do those things? In a classroom?
Two of my passions as a child were dogs and horses. Dogs and horses are NOT taught in any grade, middle, or high school *I* know of. But I wanted to learn everything I could about them. My parents gave me dogs and horses. They bought me books and paid for me to take riding lessons and dog obedience classes. They paid for dog and horse shows and equipment. My passion threw me into reading every book I could find (there were no videos back then—nor "Animal Planet").
By twelve I could identify every breed of dog and horse that I had ever seen or read about and tell you how it was developed, where, why, and by whom. I spent every weekend and every afternoon at a dog show/horse show/event/trial or just hanging around the stable or kennel. I asked thousands of questions and "got my hands dirty." Many of my friends were adults with the same passions. Training, breeding, grooming, showing, husbandry—all of these things I learned because I was consumed by them!
But, of course, dogs and horses are NOT school subjects—and are completely unimportant in the school world. What if I had waited for a teacher to come along and say, "Today we are learning all about dog and horses"? Not only would I have waited all my life, the teacher would only have given me a "taste" of the subject!
OH! And you *can't* make a living with dogs and horses—right?
Stage one is often referred to as DEschooling. It's the period of time we need to give ourselves in order to "step away from the box" of school and school-think. Ask yourself why and how you learned your passion: whether it was music, cooking, flying, gardening, or long-distance running. Or even more "academic-like" passions, like Shakespeare, chemistry, World War II, or a foreign language. When you are comfortable with how learning happens by indulging in passions and making connections in your learning, you are quickly heading towards stage two.
SandraDodd.com/kellylovejoy/stages
photo by Cathy Koetsier
Tuesday, February 28, 2023
Trivia
Is that worth knowing? Maybe not, but I think it's interesting.
Where I live, in the U.S., horses don't have names on them, except at Disneyland, pretty much. The "King Arthur Carrousel" in Disneyland was made in Canada, over 100 years ago—before Disneyland. I don't know whether the Canadian builders used two "r"s in the name, or if Walt Disney liked the alternative spelling. If you think any of this is interesting, you can read more here, about the one at Disneyland.
I took the photo above, at a fair in England. Lol is a nickname for Laurence, there (and old guys are named Laurence, not so many young kids), so that horse was named after someone who was called "Lol" instead of "Larry," and not named after laughing out loud.
How many small facts and connections can one person hold? I don't think there's a limit.
It's easier to learn a thing if you already know something else kind of like it. Connections!
photo by Sandra Dodd
Thursday, January 26, 2023
Something new
Learning comes from connecting something new to what you've already thought or known.
photo by Marty Dodd, of a salt-encrusted coke bottle in Utah
Thursday, January 12, 2023
"Wrong place"
Live loosely, for learning to flow.
Inflexibility makes fewer connections. Stiffness opens fewer conversations.
photo by Sandra Dodd
Thursday, January 5, 2023
How and why
SandraDodd.com/connections
photo by Julie D
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Saturday, December 24, 2022
Rejoice
Don't be afraid of happy connections and rearrangements. Rejoice!
Robbie Prieto's nativity scene, once upon a time;
photo by Colleen Prieto, his mom
Saturday, December 10, 2022
Bridges and reflections
In this photo, the arches are reflecting and making a round shape. That's always fun. There is also roundness in the tree to the right, and in its reflection in the water. The bank of the river has a rounded edge, and is covered with rounded pebbles.
Others, seeing that, might be thinking of what birds live around there, or other wildlife. If it's someone familiar with the area, they will know where the road goes, maybe who owns the land, and who used to own it before that.
Kids, seeing it, might wonder first "Could we get IN that water?" Wild swimmers (people who like to swim in naturally occurring waters) probably had that thought before any other.
Any scene is many things. The knowledge and perspective of each viewer is different. People spot different things and make their own connections.
photo by Ester Siroky
Saturday, December 3, 2022
How Learning Works
Unschoolers do not preplan a curriculum and we don't have predetermined lesson plans. What we have instead is an extremely rich environment for learning in which, for example, the globe sits on the living room coffee table and is regularly handled and part of our everyday life (not pulled out for a specific lesson). Learning is valued and constant. Connections are looked for everywhere and the whole family is involved and loves to explore ideas and gain new information and knowledge. Learning happens inside the learner's own head and is not always apparent to outside observers, but the proof, for me, is in the pudding. My kids think learning is what life is for. And I agree with them.
photo by Sandra Dodd