Hope and mystery

A new year comes with hope and mystery.

Hope and mystery, with good humor and curiosity, warmed in your heart and kept safe, might become wonder.

Relax into wonder
photo by Sandra Dodd, of ice on a chain, and a cat, near the gas meter, in my side yard.
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Ponder the wonder

Joyce Fetteroll wrote:

Get interested in things yourself. Not interested in your child getting educated, but in learning for yourself. Pursue an interest you've always wanted to but never had time for. Be curious about life around you. Look things up to satisfy your own curiosity. Or just ponder the wonder of it all. Ask questions you don't know the answers to. "Why are there beautiful colors beneath the green in leaves?" "Why did they build the bridge here rather than over there?" "Why is there suddenly more traffic on my road than there used to be?"
SandraDodd.com/curiosity
photo by Colleen Prieto

The world is a wonder

Jihong Tang wrote:

Relevancy is very important in learning. I knew wax's melting point by heart but freaked out when it melted so fast while I was doing project with my [four-year-old son]. I never played with wax before. I knew physics on paper very well but played with pulleys in real life just recently. I knew areodynamics from school but had real appreciation of it through flying kite with my son.

Unschooling my children sparkles my curiosity and burning desire to learn. The world is a wonder!

—Jihong Tang, 2010

SandraDodd.com/learning (the quote isn't there, but the ideas are)
photo by Megan Valnes

Wonder

Be ready to find beauty and newness in unexpected places.
See with a child's eyes.



SandraDodd.com/wonder

Curiosity, wonder, fascination, and enthusiasm

Pam Sorooshian wrote:

Take them to the grocery store.

...While you're there, look at the weirdest thing in the produce department. Bright orange cactus? BUY one. Go home and get online and try to figure out what to do with it. Or just slice it open to see what is inside.

Or buy a coconut—shake it to see if it has liquid inside. Let the kid pound on it with a hammer until it cracks open. While they're doing that, do a quick google on coconuts so you have some background knowledge. Don't "teach" them—but if something seems cool, just say it as an interesting, cool thing to know, "Wow, coconuts are SEEDS! And, oh my gosh, they sometimes float in the ocean for years before washing up on some island and sprouting into a coconut tree."

How about a pineapple—bought one fresh, lately? Talked about Hawaii? Just say, "Aloha," while handing the kids a slice. Or, maybe you'll get really into the whole idea of Hawaii and you'll see connections everywhere—Hawaiian shirts at the thrift store, flowers to me leis, someone playing a ukelele, a video of a volcano exploding (maybe that will inspire you to want to make your own volcano with baking soda and vinegar).

I'm not saying to prepare a lesson on cactus or coconuts or pineapples. I'm saying that if you're not already an interesting person with interesting information to share with your children, then you'll have to make an effort to be more interesting. The way to do that is to develop your own sense of curiosity, wonder, fascination, and enthusiasm.

—Pam Sorooshian

Building an Unschooling Nest
photo by Sandra Dodd

Be more, do more

Pam Sorooshian wrote: I'm not saying to prepare a lesson on cactus or coconuts or pineapples. I'm saying that if you're not already an interesting person with interesting information to share with your children, then you'll have to make an effort to be more interesting. The way to do that is to develop your own sense of curiosity, wonder, fascination, and enthusiasm.

It might have to seem a little artificial, for a while, if it isn't natural to a parent to just "be" this way.

—Pam Sorooshian

SandraDodd.com/wonder
photo by Cathy Koetsier

Wonderful

Find wonder. Let the world be full of wonder. Wonderful.

SandraDodd.com/leiden
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Learning like a kid

One indication that unschooling is working, or has succeeded, is that the adults see the world with child-like eyes. It might just be occasional, at first, but as time passes, wonder should return.

SandraDodd.com/wonder
photo by Janine
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Laugh, think, smile

In a group chat on "wonder and awe," Marta wrote, to me:

Do you know what I have done lately whenever I'm feeling a bit down? I listen to one of your talks! It makes me laugh, it makes me think, it makes me smile, it makes me feel awe and it makes me go right back to my daughter and my husband and touch them and kiss them.

I love your voice, I love your laughter. It calms me, what can I say?

—Marta Venturini Machado
2012

The quote is from Wonder and Awe
and there are things to hear at SandraDodd.com/listen.
photo by Amber Ivey

Play, Wonder, Smile...

"Play. A lot. Wonder. A lot. Listen. Observe. Smile. A lot."

—Karen James

SandraDodd.com/karenjames/deschooling
photo by Leon McNeill
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Curiosity and enthusiasm

"Develop your own sense of curiosity, wonder, fascination, and enthusiasm." —Pam Sorooshian

SandraDodd.com/wonder
photo by Sandra Dodd

Lamplight and color

I like facebook because I can see photos of my grandkids, of more distant relatives, of friends who live near and far, some of whom I've met in person and others I've known for twenty years or more without being in the same physical place.

This week, Karen James (probably with the help of her family) painted a couple of these walls different colors. I know this because she shared it on facebook.

Before the new colors came, though, I had snagged an image of lamps, thinking of the interactions of those various lights on Karen's art projects, her snacks, views of her husband and son, and her cat. I thought of how each light had a purpose, and a history.

Now, to all of that, add the thought of new colors. What is commonplace this year—seeing others' homes at a distance in color, grandparents seeing grandchildren asleep in their own beds without leaving our own—is new, on Earth. Appreciation and wonder are appropriate reactions to these marvels. Try not to take wonders for granted.

SandraDodd.com/wonder
photos by Karen James

Becoming lighter

"Once I turned my head around and realized the wonder in me and curiosity that I felt for learning with my children a huge weight lifted off of me."

—Phoebe Wyllyamz

SandraDodd.com/wonder
photo by Sandra Dodd

Learn to love

A new unschooler wrote:
"I hate when people say that adhd isn't real."

Any unschooling parent who hates anything is at a disadvantage.

If an unschooling parent REALLY hates something, or five things, or ten, the spaces around those dark places will be harder to fill with wonder, joy and curiosity to learn.

SandraDodd.com/wonder

SandraDodd.com/joy

Hoping to begin unschooling while clinging to hatred isn't healthy physically, socially or philosophically.

SandraDodd.com/negativity
photo by Marty Dodd

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P.S. You don't need to learn to love everything, but learning to move toward neutrality from "hatred" (even using the term "I hate") WILL make a difference in parenting and unschooling.

Wonder and discovery

No matter how your children learn, take a few more opportunities to share wonder and discovery with them. It will enrich you all.

SandraDodd.com/unschool/allkinds
photo by Sylvia Woodman

I'm positive!

"Being able to find the wonder in small things contributes to being more positive."

—Marta Venturini

SandraDodd.com/chats/wonder
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Share wonder

No matter how your children learn, take a few more opportunities to share wonder and discovery with them. It will enrich you all.

All Kinds of Homeschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Good job! (Is it?)

EVERY DAY you should wonder whether you're doing a good job. And you should do what it takes for you not to wonder about that.

I don't know where I wrote it, but Sylvia Woodman quoted me, in 2011.
I will match it with... Thoughts about doing better
photo by Gail Higgins

Playful and full of wonder

Being with our children in direct and mindful ways made us kinder, gentler and more accepting. We were more playful and full of wonder, as we saw the world through their eyes.

SandraDodd.com/betterpartner
photo by Sandra Dodd

Children see it

A mom named Nancy, in western Canada, wrote:

Again and again my kids can catch me when I am falling, and help me see the wonder of the small things.I feel so blessed to have this time with them.

—Nancy in BC

SandraDodd.com/wonder
photo by Nicole Ní Néill.