Following different kinds of trails

I took this photo in a history museum called Archeon, in The Netherlands. They have sections portraying different historical periods, with full-size buildings, and with guides in costume, making things, playing instruments, cooking, training birds, and many other things. There are gardens growing. There are chickens.

When I decided to use the photo, I googled "Roman hopscotch" to see whether there was documentation for that, and found this quote: (source)

Hopscotch began in ancient Britain during the early Roman Empire. The original hopscotch courts were over 100 feet long and used for military training exercises. ... Roman children drew their own smaller courts in imitation of the soldiers, added a scoring system and "Hopscotch" spread throughout Europe.

This is a kind of history about which more is known as time passes, rather than less. More may yet be discovered. Whether the diagram in the photo is historical or not, maybe people at the museum know. Either way is fine.

Learn history lightly, because new things will be learned, a new focus will come, and if you live long enough, it will change again. Collect ideas and information so that connections will continue to form, your whole life long.

Many images of hopscotch layouts, and many lead to more info
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Truth and kindness

Some things I've said when others were critical or questioning, about unschooling:

"This is working for now. If it stops working, we'll do something else."

"Thanks. I'll think about that." (Or you could say "We thought about that," or "I think about that all the time.")

Mostly people want to know you heard what they said, and that you have thought about what they're suggesting. It doesn't hurt to say that you have, or that you will.

—Sandra Dodd

What Can I Say to Doubters and Critics?
photo by Julie D
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Understanding and experience

"There are many things one can trust as one begins unschooling. Draw on what you know about your child, your partner and yourself to nurture confidence. Trust in unschooling will deepen and grow as one gains understanding and experience."

—Karen James

Trust
photo by Gail Higgins
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The next interaction

Pam Sorooshian, on becoming the parent you want to be:

Stop thinking about changing "for good and not just for days or moments." That is just another thing to overwhelm you and you don't need that!

Just change the next interaction you have with the kids.

Stop reading email right now and do something "preventative"—'something that helps build your relationship with them.

Fix them a little tray of cheese and crackers and take it to them, wherever they are, unasked. Sit down on the floor and play with them. If nothing else, just go and give each of them a little hug and a kiss and say, "I was just thinking about how much I love you."

Okay—so that is one good, positive interaction.

Again—just change the next interaction you have with the kids. Focus on making the next interaction another one that builds up your relationship.

—Pam Sorooshian

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I appreciate that Pam Sorooshian has let me collect her writing and quote her for many years. There are others who have been similarly wise and generous. It is a gift I enjoy every time I come across their words. —Sandra

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Becoming the Parent you Want to Be
photo by Elaine Santana

Gratitude and joy

If you don't feel you will be happy, then you won't be. The largest part of happiness has to do with gratitude and joy. Either of those can be snuffed out by the recitation of ills.

Discussion of the Gratitude page from The Big Book of Unschooling
photo by Gail Higgins
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Bad ideas, but funny

Holly is smart and funny. She showed me a question (in art/meme form) asking "If you could delete one thing from Earth, what would it be?"

So one person wrote "The stupid people. All of them."

Holly doesn't know her, but said "That would make her the stupidest person on Earth."

If someone could remove everybody who is stupider than they were, they would, by default, become the dumbest person left, as she explained it.

It's like the opposite of "Idiocracy," where a guy became the smartest person.

Anyone who thought deleting all the stupid people was a good idea would happily delete her next. 🙂 So I said "ants." But I wasted my wish. I should've said "mosquitos."

I read this tonight, after getting a serious mosquito bite from being outside talking with Brie about the movie Idiocracy, and about Holly being smart and funny. All coincidence, because I hadn't remembered the post or conversation. Stupid mosquito. My ankle itches.

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August 12, 2017 on my facebook page, where I apologize, explain, and endure assurances that ants and mosquitos are important (other animals eat them), and agree with the idea that maybe humans are not necessary to the survival of Earth.
image by Scott Nickel (I don't know him.)

Joy and Eternity

The better we handle the trust given us by a child, the better people we are, and the better the child's young life, adulthood and old age will be. We're not just dealing with little children. We're dealing with the whole of life itself, which will outlast us all. We are dealing with joy and with eternity.

link to musical original,
and to another post celebrating small but profound changes
photo by Sandra Dodd (a grandchild in the arms of her Dodd-Dad)
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