Strewing might ring a bell

Once Colleen Prieto wrote:

Yesterday, a neighbor offered me something that looks sort of like a cross between a bell and a gong, a stand to hang it from, and a mallet. It was interesting and I figured we'd find some sort of use for it, so...

In the less than 24 hours it's been in the house, my 9 year old has:

• Experimented with the different sounds it can make (soft hits, hard hits, hit in different places)
  
• Used it to call us all to attention so he could announce important things (like "I'm hungry" 🙂)
  
• Told our elderly friend about it, and in turn checked out the links she sent to websites that have photos of gongs that are bigger than people, Tibetan singing bowls, etc.
  
• Added The King and I to our Netflix queue after my mother said she thinks they use gongs to summon dancing maidens in the movie
  
• Looked for other things in the house to bring into the living room to make it look "even more Avatar air temple and less ordinary living room" 🙂
  
• Put Avatar episodes on in the background and made up his own air-bending moves while they were on
  
• Wondered why a mallet is called a mallet and is not called a hammer
  
• Asked me to find the bell collection we used to have out, so he can play with the bells again

The fun (and learning, and connections) that can come from exploring one simple item can be amazing.

—Colleen Prieto

SandraDodd.com/strew/strew
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Trained like a cat

I had a friend when my kids were single-digit ages. After she hung out with our family a while, she decided she would unschool just like we did. Before long she explained to me her liberal total-unschooling policy on her son's reading. He was eight or nine. She told him he could read any book he wanted to, as long as he finished any book he started.

Quicker than training a cat not to get on the table, she trained him not to start any books at all.

SandraDodd.com/finishwhatyoustart
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Don't count, don't measure

Don't divide anything "fifty/fifty." Forget that concept. Give what you have. Do all you can do. Give/do 80% when you can, but only measure it vaguely, at a squint, and then forget about it. If you aim for half, there will be resentments. If you aim for 100%, small failures will seem larger than they need to be, so don't do that. You can succeed at "lots" without measuring.

If each of you gives as much as you can, your shared needs will be fulfilled more quickly, more easily, and more often.


That was advice sent to our friend Sadie, for her bridal shower. It works for roommates and other dyads, too. I quoted it here: SandraDodd.com/betterpartner
photo by Lisa Jonick

Adults, not children

Don't worry about them. Delete "socialization" from your vocabulary. Give your kids so much love and self-confidence that peer pressure will mean nothing to them. They will be pressure-proof.

You want to aim toward a happy, balanced, confident adult, not "a successful third grader." You're raising adults, not children. You're keeping them warm and alive and happy until they become adults, because they will, with or without you in the picture. We have the power to screw them up to the point of life-scarring, or to just give them some room and peace and security to grow well in. We can't very well make them be what they aren't.

SandraDodd.com/friend
photo by Sandra Dodd, of Kerrin Koetsier
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Courtesy and common sense

Don't bring your hot dog to the vegan friend's house. Don't bring stinky food to places where others can't get away. Don't bring great-smelling food to a hospital room where someone is on a restricted diet, or on an IV with no food allowed.
. . . .
"It depends" is a good first answer when someone asks whether something is or is not okay. There is no "rule" that says unschoolers can eat anything they want any time. But there should not be arbitrary restrictions, just really logical, sensible ones involving courtesy and common sense.

SandraDodd.com/foodrules
photo by Sandra Dodd

Advice for a newlywed

To have a more peaceful, loving relationship that has the potential to last for a lifetime, don't count and don't measure.

Don't divide anything "fifty/fifty." Forget that concept. Give what you have. Do all you can do. Give/do 80% when you can, but only measure it vaguely, at a squint, and then forget about it. If you aim for half, there will be resentments. If you aim for 100%, small failures will seem larger than they need to be, so don't do that. You can succeed at "lots" without measuring.

If each of you gives as much as you can, your shared needs will be fulfilled more quickly, more easily, and more often.

Be generous with your patience. Life is long. People change, and more than once.
I wrote that for a young friend getting married, and I quoted it here:
Becoming a Better Partner
photo by Vlad Gurdiga

Intense learning

I was just telling a young (22) friend the other day that my kids were always the most exhausted not after a day of physical activity, but after a day of intense learning. If they saw things they had never seen, got to do something they’d never done, met new people and played and talked, they slept like rocks. But those days might not have looked like something to write a transcript about.

Sometimes the most intense learning of all looks like play. And that is central to what makes unschooling work.



Chat with Sandra Dodd on Mommy Chats, 4/25/07
photo by Kinsey Norris

Get witnesses

One suggestion for moving toward more peaceful parenting:

Get witnesses.That's one reason people join support groups and confess to their friends what they're doing, because you've told somebody what your intention is. You've told them what your problem is and what your intention is and now you have witnesses and for some people that helps. Sometimes it needs to be an imaginary witness, sometimes it needs to be a real witness. But maybe, if it will help you, imagine that the friend that you most want to impress is there and would you do it if they were there.

SandraDodd.com/parentingpeacefully
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Secondary benefits

Look at all this impermanence—pixels showing a digital photo of the shadows of paper banners. Nothing very solid. Nothing that will last a century. But when you share an observation with a child, or with a friend, it is possible that you will be offering a missing piece, an inspiring opening, a near-magical life-changing clue.


What seems small to one person might be life changing to another.

---

The text above was written for the image, but here's an example:
SandraDodd.com/mylittlepony
photo by Sandra Dodd

Be open to learning

When something someone heard from a friend or read on a blog is stated adamantly as TRUTH, rational thought has been batted away. Some people have the fervor of conversion upon them, having heard that there is an easy way to SAVE their families from disease and death, to make their children smarter, and better behaved; to make themselves strong and beautiful into old age. It is partially fountain-of-youth stuff. It is partly an attractive excuse for controlling children (and spouses, sometimes).

The quote is from a page about food as a religion, but it's really about control
(being too easily influenced, and then trying to pass it on)
photo by Amy Milstein
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Eye to eye

When encountering another being, consider which of you might be a danger to the other.

If the other being is a friend or relative of yours, try not to be a scary or dangerous creature.

SandraDodd.com/peace/
photo by Karen James

Happy and interested

Deb Lewis wrote:

If your daughter doesn't want to leave something interesting to go to the table to eat, take food to her. Sit with her and eat together.

That's the same kind of sharing you could do at a table. Food eaten in front of the TV or computer with a happy mom who is interested in you is much better than food shared in grudging silence and anger.

Wouldn't you be grateful to a friend who brought you food if you were in the middle of something important? I'm always grateful when my husband brings home a pizza or Chinese food when I'm having a really busy day.

—Deb Lewis

SandraDodd.com/deblewis
photo by a realtor, of Janine's former garden
(they've moved)

Usually unusual

Even in New Mexico, it can be difficult to see a roadrunner. They don't live in groups and they don't make much noise. A person might live in Texas for a long time and not see a live armadillo. Don't worry if you miss seeing something cool, but be grateful for lucky sightings of mystery or beauty. Something normal near you might be exotic everywhere else.

More "more"
photo by Holly's friend Eliza

Windows, and grown children

The pandemic made me appreciate the views from windows. I loved seeing so many exotic window views shared on facebook.

My youngest has her own house now. For a few months, she had a housemate, who is pregnant. The baby's father died, during the pregnancy. Holly had known the friend years ago, and invited her in to rest and recover.

A few days ago, Holly let me know she had been 200 miles away, overnight, helping the roommate move to another town to be with her mom, in a new place. This view is from that new window.

I brought that story to let you know that someday those little children at your house will grow up, and you might find them being compassionate and generous in ways you will only learn about after the fact. They will see beauty, out windows in other places, and might send you a photo.

SandraDodd.com/generosity
photo by Holly Dodd

Learning to listen

"Listen to your body" isn't the best description. There are ways to pay attention to bodily clues that our culture and language came to ignore and deny.

In response to someone talking about her children self regulating, I wrote: "Self regulate" means to make a rule and then follow it yourself. They're not self regulating. They're making choices. It's different. It's better!

My friend Bela sent me the following story, which has a good description of mindful living: One zen student said, "My teacher is the best. He can go days without eating." The second said, "My teacher has so much self control, he can go days without sleep." The third said, "My teacher is so wise that he eats when he's hungry and sleeps when he's tired."

My kids did that!
photo by Beth Lamb

Seems like yesterday

If my kids watched TV for hours each day, I might not be a good person to listen to about this, but I'll say it again: Unlimited access to TV and to food in my house has produced kids who only watch TV when they want to, and who only eat what they want to eat which is NOT a bunch of candy.

Holly asked for broccoli Tuesday. I bought some and cooked it before I knew she had gone to her friend's for an overnighter (she got the invite and left while I was shopping). So yesterday she asked about it, I reheated it and brought it to her at the TV where she was playing a game, waiting for the Simpsons to come on. She finished that bowl of broccoli, salt and butter, and asked for more with less butter.

I cooked the rest of it, and she ate most of it.

When The Simpsons ended she was done with the TV.

This isn't theoretical broccoli or TV, it was yesterday.

[It was 2001, but I wrote it the day after it happened.
Holly was nine years old.]

True Tales of Kids Turning Down Sweets
photo by Sandra Dodd, totally unrelated to the text, from a display at the Victoria and Albert museum of art from defunct or dismantled churches
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Are we? Am I?

Anna Black wrote:

Now I think... Is my child happy, healthy, connected? Are we moving towards partnership? Are we having fun right now, at this moment? Am I treating my children as well or better as I would treat my husband or my friend? If yes, great. If not, change, make a different choice.

—Anna Black

Gratitude and choices
photo by Ester Siroky
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A progression

Sylvia Woodman wrote:

One of the great gifts of reading in unschooling groups was learning to change my perspective. To stop writing off entire days. To recognize bad moments for what they were—just moments. Moments pass MUCH quicker than entire days.

I learned the value of taking a breath and making a better choice. Wouldn't you know it, our days became better, sweeter, more fun-filled.

Did I continue to mess up? Sure, but it got to be less and less. I was growing and learning right alongside my kids. I was learning to be a better parent to my unique kids.

The things I learned rippled out across my life. I became a better daughter, partner, sister, friend. Unschooling helped me become a better human.

—Sylvia Woodman

SandraDodd.com/moment
photo by Janine Davies
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A squirrel at sunrise

Sometimes photos only take pictures of something that was and is no more. There was a squirrel standing beautifully on that snow, but he saw my camera move and was gone. Fortunately, the sun stayed.

I have photos of my children that remind me of an entire party, or of a trip, or of the visit of a friend. All I have is the flash of an image—that and many memories. It might be a picture of two of my kids, but I know the other one was there. It might be a birthday cake that reminds me of an entire party. Maybe ask your children sometimes for stories behind some of their photos or art, and share a bit about a favorite of your own.

photo by Sandra Dodd, Bryn Athyn

Make room in your heart

Be your child's friend.

Make room in your heart and your life and your house for your child and his interests.

SandraDodd.com/focus
photo by Julie D