The trail starts to open up

In the middle of something a little longer, about becoming an unschooling parent, Pam Sorooshian wrote:

Overly self-centered people can't do it because it requires a lot of empathy. People with too many personal problems that they haven't addressed in their own lives probably can't do it because they are too distracted by those. People who are too negative or cynical can't do it because they tend to crush interest and joy, not build it up. People who lack curiosity and a certain amount of gusto for life can't really do it.

On the other hand, we grow into it. Turns out that we parents learn, too.

So—when we are making moves, taking steps, in the direction of unschooling, turns out the trail starts to open up in front of us and we get more and more sure-footed as we travel the unschooling path.

Pam Sorooshian, on SandraDodd.com/lazy/parents
photo by Sandra Dodd
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The Full Plate Club

The food section of my website is called "The Full Plate Club." Its intro says:

"The empty plate club," referring to kids who successfully clean their plates, sounds so sad.

"Full plate" sounds much more nurturing.

On questions of whether a cup is half full or half empty, consider a plate. If a child has a feeling of abundance he will stop eating when he's had enough and be healthier and happier than if anyone presses him to take one more bite.


SandraDodd.com/food
photo by Sandra Dodd

Being with your child

If watching TV is his thing and complaining about TV is your thing, you spoiled a chance to have a shared thing.

SandraDodd.com/t/sharing
photo by Holly Dodd

Free tools

You need to do MANY things, as an unschooling parent. Free tools are being added to these collections just about every day:
Joyfully Rejoycing (Joyce's site)

SandraDodd.com/

LivingJoyfully.ca (Pam Laricchia's site)

Read a little, try a little, wait a while, watch.

Don't overcomplicate, don't oversimplify.


Paraphrased from a post on Always Learning; this site will work:
SandraDodd.com/howto/precisely
photo by Sandra Dodd

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2020 note:

In cleaning up old posts with more solid images and links, I replaced Always Learning, in the list above, with Pam Laricchia's site. Always Learning still exists, and at a better hosting site, but people aren't using e-mail as much as they once did. The Always Learning archives are open here if you want to read, and if you want to join and try to stir the discussion up, I would not mind!

A head start

Making this moment better than worse (getting warm, rather than getting cold) gives me a head start on the next moment, and being positive becomes habitual.

Getting Warm
photo by Sandra Dodd

Choosing and power

Deb Lewis wrote:

Once you’re really listening to your kids and not your sense of injustice, you’ll find that answering them and interacting with them is intellectually rewarding and stimulating and fun. It’s not something you *have* to do. It’s something you *get* to do for a very little while. You can’t change this need your kids have right now. You can only change how you see it, how you think about it and meet it. And that’s good because that’s entirely in your power to do.

—Deb Lewis

Deb was writing in a discussion,
but it was a good lead-in to this page:
SandraDodd.com/gettingit
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a railyard we visited
because my son Marty wanted to go there
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Special Offer

Pam Sorooshian wrote:

The only way to make it "just right" is to offer and not coerce. If you don't "offer" stuff/ideas/experiences, then the kids aren't going to even know what's out there. If you push too much on them, they can feel pressured and that their learning is being taken over by you.

It isn't all that tricky, though, when you live with a kid and pay attention and care deeply—to keep that child in mind and provide him/her with a pretty steady stream of options/possibilities/ideas/ stuff, etc. Invite and offer a lot—it is your job to create a stimulating and interesting environment around her.

SandraDodd.com/nest
photo by Sandra Dodd
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How Many Days of What?

I think there should be 180 great days a year—parents should feel enough pressure that they have as many shiny show-off days as there would be school days. And that leaves 185-186 days per year for "doing nothing."

I don't think anyone should count, but if they feel like they're in a frenzy of doing too much, then that's too much. And if the mom is feeling like maybe she should do more, then she should do more.

Enough "great" that the mom feels like she provided greatness. And enough happy that the kid felt like it was good, too.

The "180" number came from the number of school days required by the State of New Mexico. YMMV.
photo by Sandra Dodd
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The Solution

Joyce wrote:

If we're creating an atmosphere of power struggle, the kids will fight back to win. If we're creating an atmosphere of problem solving, the kids will feel part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

—Joyce Fetteroll

SandraDodd.com/chores/shift
photo by Sandra Dodd
(but I don't know whose car it was)
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Proof and Belief

I guess what makes me the most defensive is when people say, "I don't believe unschooling will work." Okay... based on WHAT? I want to say. Based on the fact that you went to school every day for twelve or sixteen years and "cooperated" and you want that to be the only possible way!? The fact that it has worked and DOES work (maybe not for everybody, but for a LOT of people) is right there for those who want to see it.

I might not BELIEVE a 747 could fly, but they do. Whether I can explain it or build one doesn't matter. They do fly.

I have friends with older kids than mine who do remarkable things their parents didn't teach them to do. They figured out how to do it.

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The foregoing was written in an online chat in 1996 (or late 1995) when my oldest child was nine. In the fifteen years since then, my own three have done many remarkable things they learned in all kinds of ways—from other kids, other adults, the internet, and on their own. The disbelief of others has had no effect on our family.

SandraDodd.com/confidence
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Step right up

The same life can be seen from many different angles.
The same situation can be seen while holding one's breath and being furious,
or while seeing the alternatives and finding ways to be grateful,
no matter how small,
because on one small bit of gratitude,
one can step up and see another one,
and another.

SandraDodd.com/gratitude
photo by Sandra Dodd;
quote saved and provided by Leah Rose,
edited in that format, which is good.

How to stop a power struggle

"Power struggles can disappear
when the person with the power
stops struggling."

Deb Lewis, 1/3/11



SandraDodd.com/deblewis
photo by Sandra Dodd

Natural Balance

If you limit it, they will want more.
If you "unlimit" it they will fill up and be done.

They can only make their own choices if they're allowed to make their own choices.
I don't think balance will come from limitations as well as some people wish it would.

I had a niece not allowed to eat sugar at all. NOTHING with sugar. A little hippie kid in the late 1960's, early 1970's.

She came to stay with us for a few days when she was six. We were keeping to her mom's rules about sugar.

We found her in the field, squatted over a 5-lb. bag of sugar, eating it with both hands like a monkey, as fast as she could before she'd get caught.

That wasn't balance.

Or maybe it was. It was the balance of all her deprivation.

My kids have come to their own balance with food, TV, activities, sleep, because they're allowed to make their own choices.

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The quote is from an online discussion in August, 2001, ten years ago. The story of the sugar was when I was 22 and in my first marriage, long before I had children with Keith.

A related link is SandraDodd.com/balance
photo by Sandra Dodd

Old and New

History is not all old. What happens now and in the future will be history to those not yet born, and even to us, if we live long enough.

SandraDodd.com/history
photo by Sandra Dodd

Growth or erosion

The faith your child has in you is growing or waning at every moment. You're either building your relationship or you're eroding it.

The photo is by Sandra Dodd, of coins on a computer; not important.
The quote is from a chat; not worth reading.

Living a Life of Learning

Unschooling is not the opposite of schooling. It is living a life of learning.


page 4 of The Big Book of Unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Unschooling Philosophy

In the paperwork I filled out for a conference organizer, I was asked to describe my unschooling philosophy, and wrote:

I see unschooling as the ideal application of the 1960's and 70's "Open Classroom" methods, unlimited by school's schedules and physical limitations, but based in the research about human learning and optimal conditions for children's mental health and growth. In a rich, peaceful environment, learning happens all the time.



SandraDodd.com/interview.html
photo by Sandra Dodd, of a bird's nest in England

Better?

"What will make the situation better?" That might be a good mantra for family changes. Anyone, no matter how young or frustrated, can think of each action in light of "Will it make the situation better?"


SandraDodd.com/unschooling
(quote from an outgoing e-mail)
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Stop and look

Instead of feeling like you need to struggle, just stop and look at your son and think, "Right now what can I do to make his life a little more interesting?" —Pam Sorooshian

photo by Sandra Dodd

Smile one sweet smile

Change a moment. Change one touch, one word, one reaction. If you try to change your entire self so that next year will be better, you might become overwhelmed and discouraged and distraught.

Change one thing. Smile one sweet smile. Say one kind thing.

If that felt good, do it again. Rest. Watch. Listen. You're a parent because of your child. Your child. You should be his parent, or her parent. Not a generic parent, or a hypothetical parent. Be your child's parent in each moment that you interact with her.

The Big Book of Unschooling, page 194
Becoming the Parent you Want to Be
photo by Sandra Dodd
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The value of values

It will help unschooling for a family to accept the value of learning and of living peacefully. One family might value industry over music; one might value art over organization. But if they value their relationships and the comfort and safety of others in their family, they can thrive. As unschooling grows, you will find your priorities.

SandraDodd.com/priorities
photo by Sandra Dodd

Better than fear

I think holding still and being afraid isn't nearly as good as swirling out and living a big life.

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From a private e-mail I sent, but here's a fairly-matching link: SandraDodd.com/fears
photo by Sandra Dodd

One year has passed

Today this blog is one year old, and a second year begins. Occasionally I have future posts prepared to launch but more often I build one each evening before I go to bed. I've missed a few days since September 2, 2010, but this is post #361. Pretty close. There are 720 subscribers as I write this, so that's about two a day.

Most difficult, thusfar, has been trying to make sure I don't use the same image or words twice. I've decided to give up on checking so closely. I'll try not to repeat, but if you see something come around again, that will indicate that I really like that picture or that quote, and that I'm getting old, or sleepy, or both.

Thank you for reading, for sharing these ideas further, and for your kind words and sweet thoughts.

Holly, my lovely assistant and frequent photo contributor, suggests that I mention that a year passes more slowly for children than for adults. This reminder might help some of you, somehow, in ways I can't guess.

SandraDodd.com/time
Photo by Sandra Dodd, of the books I use to mark which quotes I've used.
That doesn't work for website quotes.
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What would make things worse?

One easy way to decide how to be is to picture clearly what would make things worse, and then not do that.

photo by Sandra Dodd
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Criss-cross trails

Do the best you can to survive the bumps and unexpected turns of the trails through the unschooling world, which will necessarily cross back over and through themselves, which is how learning works–a little now, a little more later to connect to what you've learned since, and detours that end up being short cuts.

The quote is from page 3 of The Big Book of Unschooling.
photo by Sandra Dodd
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The more they get...

I often think back to the things I learned in La Leche League, from readings and other moms. If you nurse a child a long time does it make him dependent on the mom? Seems to be the opposite. If you hug a child every time he wants a hug, does it make him want a hug-a-day for life? You WISH!

The more they get, the less they need.
Photo of Kate Koetsier and her 10th Birthday cake by her mom, Cathy.
Quote from a very-early online chat for homeschoolers,
late 1995 or early 1996, SandraDodd.com/detox.

Goals

I wrote this in 1996, when my children were 9, 7 and 4.
As I'm posting it today, they are 25, 22 and 19.
So far so good.


Here are my goals for my children: I want them to learn something every day. I want them to greet the morning with joy. I want them to see strangers as potential friends. I want their lives to be adventures without a map, where there are innumerable destinations, and unlimited opportunities for “success.” I want their definition of success to include things they can see all around them, not just in Washington, not just at medical conventions, or the Olympics. I want them to wake up, look out the window, and be glad of the view. I want them to be content with their choices and their abilities. I want them to be realistic about goals and philosophical about failure. I want them to be happy.

SandraDodd.com/president
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Flowing and rich

Is it "child-led learning"?

This definition is probably the most common quick description, and one of the most harmful to the success of unschooling. It suggests that parents wait for children to decide what to learn. We have learning all the time; no waiting. Neither parents nor children need to "lead" learning, if the environment is flowing and rich.

SandraDodd.com/unschool/definition
photo by Sandra Dodd

Shelter

"Shelter doesn’t only mean a roof; it means a safe place of peace and healthfulness." —Deb Lewis

SandraDodd.com/peace/noisy
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Exploration

Unschooling is about learning, exploration, peace and love. it shouldn't be about pressure, shame and failure.

SandraDodd.com/flitting
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Bright, big and happy

If an idea piques your interest, keep reading and keep thinking. Think about your own childhood or those you've seen or contributed to. Think about arguments that seemed pointless in retrospect, and the damage done by them.

Picture and remember the difference between going to sleep content and crying yourself to sleep. Remember moments in your childhood when the world seemed bright and big and happy. Then the next time you have a decision to make with or for your child, lean a bit toward the happy contentment answer.

SandraDodd.com/unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Do a good job

If a family values love and relationships, unschooling can pay off in a jackpot of closeness and joy that could hardly be possible with school in the equation, and could never be bought back with a thousand hours of expensive therapy down the road. (Maybe factor in the time savings of not spending a thousand hours sitting and talking about what you could've done differently, in addition to the cost of it.)

SandraDodd.com/nest
photo by Sandra Dodd

Launching a child wildly (try not to)

With anything, if a family moves from rules (about food, freedoms, clocks, what to wear) to something new there's going to be the backlash, and thinking of catapults (or trebuchets, more technically, or of a rubber band airplane, or other crank-it-up projectile) the more pressure that's built up, the further that kid is going to launch if you let it go all at once.

SandraDodd.com/gradualchange
another nice photo of the Rio Grande by Holly Dodd
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Better Choices

Pam Sorooshian wrote:

My suggestion to you is to focus on making a "better" choice each time you can. I think that was the most helpful advice I got as a parent of younger kids—it was surprisingly practical and encouraging to simply consider at least two choices and pick the better one. The next time, try to think of the one you did choose and then one other—pick the better one. If you make a choice you're unhappy with, after the fact, think then about what would have been a better choice—have that one 'on hand' for next time.

Don't expect to be perfect, but expect yourself to be improving all the time.

—Pam Sorooshian

SandraDodd.com/betterchoice
photo by Sandra Dodd, of something Keith Dodd carved
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If/then and other happy logic

Joyce Fetteroll wrote:

Some people, such as those who are naturally drawn to rules, who live under limitations accept the rules and stick to them. They live in fear and the rules are like talismans that will keep the boogeyman away. What happens when they are faced with new situations that they don't have rules in place for? People often extrapolate from the nonsense and extend the rules. But rational thought would reveal shoddy foundations for decision making.

If the reasons behind rules make sense, then there isn't a reason to make a rule. But people who follow rules aren't learning how to make decisions. They are only learning to follow someone else's rules.

If the reasons behind rules are nonsense, then people memorize nonsense and use that as a foundation for decision making.

—Joyce Fetteroll

SandraDodd.com/joyce/logic
photo by Sandra Dodd
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A nicer person

Being gentle and honest and compassionate is as much for the doer as for the object. Being nice to the dog makes one a nicer person (regardless of the dog's opinion, I mean).

page 11, The Big Book of Unschooling
photo from the corner of Schuyler Waynforth's garden in Norfolk, by Sandra Dodd
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Peace RIGHT NOW

Here is how to make yourself a safer, more peaceful person, before you even finish reading this post:

Just let your breath out, and don't breath back in right away. Empty out.
You can't talk without any air in you.

That will seem like five seconds, if you're full of adrenaline. But it will be one second or less.
Then your body will naturally fill back up, whether you want it to or not.
And the breath you breathe in will be all new oxygen. Not that dirty used adrenaline cloud you had built up before that. It might not totally dissipate in one breath; it might take three.

Hold it in. Top it off. Hold it. Let it out slowly—all the way out. Huff out the rest. Hold it out. Breathe in slowly...

There are a lot of people in prison for life who wouldn't be if they had known they could let all their breath out, breath back in, hold it.

And there are parents who swat their kids, or yell at them, or tell them something the kid might remember for life, when they could have breathed out, huffed out the rest, breathed in a deep breath.

Deep breaths will probably help. You don't have to do it formally, and nobody even needs to know you're doing it.

Quotes and paraphrases lifted from SandraDodd.com/chats/breathing
photo by Sandra Dodd, of one part of Norwich Cathedral, from one angle, one moment

Use your childhood memories

Just as the adult a child will be already lives in him, so the child you were still lives in you as an adult. If you have memories of childhood, examine them objectively sometimes when you're considering how to be with your own children.
. . . .The list of things that marred your childhood can be your checklist of things to avoid or change or undo. The things that brought joy to you as a child can be things for you to do for and with your children, too, if you can.



from "Healing," on page 271 (or 313) of The Big Book of Unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Seeing Choices

We can't look at everything. Sometimes, choose the prettiest thing.



We can't examine every thought, so if you get overwhelmed, focus on a peaceful, hopeful thought.

We can't do everything, so when the choices come, try to choose beauty.

photo by Sandra Dodd, zoomed in from a whole different frame/view
shown here

Learn by playing

Children learn by playing. Parents can learn about unschooling by playing. Parents can learn about their children by playing, too. Don't try to control the play. Be the guest in your child's play sometimes. If you've forgotten how to play or he doesn't want you to play, just watch, then. See if you can help by providing more of whatever he might need: space, materials, a surface, boxes or bags or tools or a photo of what he's done so he won't feel so bad about taking it apart, maybe. Maybe he needs a light to keep playing outside at night, or maybe a darkened room in the house to play with something that glows.

SandraDodd.com/playing
photo by Sandra Dodd of flower fairies by a younger Holly Dodd

Full-time learning environment

Unschooling is a form of homeschooling; it's a way to homeschool. The method is to create and maintain a full-time learning environment in which learning happens at home and away, from as many sources as the family comes across.


from "Methods," page 109,The Big Book of Unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd

the simple truth

"I have seen, again and again, the simple truth that the more a parent plays with, listens to, and includes their child, the better their relationship."

—Claire Horsley

SandraDodd.com/being/with
photo by Holly Dodd
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Calm and Quiet

Please take time for reflection. Take time for your mind to be calm and quiet. Take time to be open to input, not busy creating output. Don't respond, think. Take the ideas and let them "be" in your mind and go spend lots of time with your children and consider and observe how the ideas might play out in your own home with your own kids.

—Pam Sorooshian

SandraDodd.com/lists/alwayslearning
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Unexpected discovery

My children have never asked, "Do we have to learn this?" They don't have to learn anything. So everything is equally fun for them. The joy of unexpected discovery is the substance of a typical unschooling day.

Typical Unschooling Day (Presidents)
photo by Holly Dodd
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Stand with your child

In a discussion about limitations and choices, Joanna Murphy wrote:

People want to look at these issues as though there are only two options: free rein or limit. Black or white thinking. There is a whole world of conversation and relationship with your children between the two extremes.And that's where unschooling lives—a child exploring their world in connection with a parent.


Are you going to be a parent who enlarges your child's world and helps them to find their own power and hone their decision making and critical thinking abilities, or will you be a parent who limits and closes down your child's world and imposes your own ideas of right and wrong?

Stand WITH your child to navigate these issues, not in their way. The more you let them make important decisions, the more they will think them through and strive to make good ones for themselves.

—Joanna Murphy

Joanna Murphy, from Building an Unschooling Nest
photo by Sandra Dodd
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(in French)

People

Treat your children as people first.

(a paraphrase of Dan Vilter, paraphrasing me,
and the whole story is at SandraDodd.com/tone)
photo by Sandra Dodd

Extra Thinking is Good!

Public school discourages kids from coming up with off-the-wall responses. No bank shots, please. Just go directly from the question to the first sufficient answer—nothing tricky or dramatic, and nothing that makes you think, or makes the teacher think. If your answer isn't what's in the teacher's manual your answer is wrong. If you did extra thinking you wasted your time.

When learning is valued for its own sake, all thinking is good.



SandraDodd.com/connections/cocktail
Photo by Sandra Dodd, of a dry-stone bridge made by Bruce Curtis, a home ed dad and a master drystone waller ("dyker" in Scottish parlance). Bruce made this particular bridge singlehandedly, to the specifications WWII engineers figured would hold an army tank. He didn't "have to." He wanted to. It's for golf carts and small automobiles. If you want to read more about drystone work click here, but remember it won't be on the test.
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Consideration—more or less

"Children don’t deserve less consideration just because they’re small. They deserve *more* patience and kindness and consideration because they are young and still learning."

—Deb Lewis

SandraDodd.com/deblewis
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Getting Better

Don't expect to be perfect, but expect yourself to be improving all the time.

—Pam Sorooshian

Make the Better Choice
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Crazy-thinking

I wrote this twelve years ago, but it's still true:

We keep a running commentary on one another’s lives, and so what I’m learning trickles down to them, and their questions make me think like crazy.

Crazy-thinking isn’t bad.

SandraDodd.com/input
photo by Holly Dodd, of the stop sign, which is its own right direction
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