Alice Roddy

I’m moving to Linden, VA to live with one of my sons and his family and I expect to homeschool my granddaughter, now 4, so I’m learning all that I can.
As soon as I joined this list I read the archives for 10/1 and found that a couple of you apparently live near my soon-to-be home. Joanne, Elissa Jill, hello.

Among my reasons for homeschooling is one that may surprise you: socialization. When my 3 children where in high school back in the 80s I came to the realization that they had no real idea of what life would be like after high school. They had no friends or relatives in college, beginning their careers, or setting up independent living. Their ideas were pretty much what they gleaned from TV. In their attempt to separate their identities from their father and me, they turned to their peers, who were just as ignorant as they. ‘Little House on the Prairie’ was on TV then and I thought that children who attended one room school houses probably made friends of all ages. My grandmother was born in 1872, the eldest of 6 children, and was 16 when the youngest was born. All the families around her were probably the same. Humans are not born in schools and I don’t think they are meant to grow up all same age, like fish. So when I hear of networks of homeschooling families I think,
“Aha! Perhaps we can create something like an extended family for the children.”

Since another aim is to keep her interest in learning alive, I pretty rapidly realized that I don’t want to school at home. Seeing how she likes to play, I’m pretty sure she will want to play school with workbooks and she’ll want a folder of things to show her dad when he gets home, but that can stop anytime it stops being fun.

At this point I’m thinking of homeschooling as being like teaching a 16 yr-old to drive. You can figure kids have probably been watching whoever was driving for some time. Put them behind the wheel and let them show and tell you what they know, and then fill in the gaps of anything they failed to observe so that they’ll be safe on the road. I remember the scene in the movie ‘Starman’ where the alien drives for the first time, assuring the heroine that he has been studying her driving. She is appalled when he high speeds thru an intersection and asks, “Don’t you know what traffic lights are for?” He responds, “Yes. Red means stop, green means go and yellow means go very fast.”

One thing that does bother me about unschooling is that the term is negative and doesn’t express what we are for. I have another son who I expect will send his kids to public school. He and his wife are excellent parents. I feel that talking about unschooling to them could seem like a slap in the face. Some of you seem to share this concern because I read some posts in the archives about people having a hard time talking with friends without seeming to put them down. I’m struggling to come up with a positive term to describe briefly what I think I’m going to be doing with my granddaughter. So far I’ve come up with 'eclectic home learning'. Are any of you bothered by 'unschooling' being negative rather than affirmative? If so, how do you handle it?


Alice Roddy

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Michelle Leifur Reid

On 10/9/06, Alice Roddy <amar0514412000@...> wrote:
> "Yes. Red means stop, green means go and yellow means go very fast."

Ah a kindred soulmate - one who uses movie analogies :-) (One of my
favorite movie quotes BTW)

>
> One thing that does bother me about unschooling is that the term is negative and doesn't express what we are for.

Yes; many people who do not understand unschooling equate unschooling
to "not doing anything." We just let our kids play and watch tv and
surf the internet all the want (and some of us do LOL!) But to the
un-unschooled mind they equate this to not learning. They hold no
value in learning that does not look schoolish. I tend to not mention
that we unschool to most people outside the homeschooling community.
I've learned to speak a "schooly language" to non-friends who I have
conversations with (like the retired school teacher who is now a
co-worker at a bookstore) For instance I might say that Emily (age
14) is studying Japanese culture and language. Which is "schoolese"
for "She's reading manga, watching anime, creating AMV's, and has a
self-study guide for Japanese language" I won't mention that that is
about the only thing that she is interested in. :) Or I might
mention that Mary Elayne is studying Romania and Bulgaria at the
moment (she's reading everything she can on vampires). Trying to get
the "un-unschooled mind" to comprehend the value in "obsession" is a
difficult thing. Even with my own mother I have had to ask her to
trust me that I will do no ill-harm to my children and am doing the
best with the (vast) information that I have. It's hard for her to
see her grandchildren "not learning"

What surprises me is reading all that I have and listening to all that
I have from various sources about how people really feel about
education and children and parenting and then to see how it is *not*
carried out. I listen to the weekly radio broadcast of "This I
Believe" which is done through NPR and it just seems like that program
is filled with some people who would be great unschoolers. It's
inspiring until you read more from these people and find that while
they idealize these beliefs they rarely act on those beliefs.

Good luck in your venture and welcome to the group!

Michelle

Donna Brown

You have both hit a nerve with me! I have been homeschooling more
years than I can remember and I may may still be one of those last
people Michelle mentioned at the end of her reply. Just when these
great kids are both tolerable and preparing to take whatever the
next step in their lives, I begin to panic! Have I prepared them
enough? What have we missed? It is a knee jerk reaction, but it is
fierce! You would think after having done this twice it would be a
cakewalk, but I swear I feel it coming on again with a new
victim!!! Poor 16 yo. I am going to need a swift kick so I am
counting on this group to bring me back to reality!
I have just moved too. So I have no one to do the reality check.
You guys are the new lifeline.

Donna
--- In [email protected], "Michelle Leifur Reid"
<pamperedmichelle@...> wrote:
>
> On 10/9/06, Alice Roddy <amar0514412000@...> wrote:
> > "Yes. Red means stop, green means go and yellow means go very
fast."
>
> Ah a kindred soulmate - one who uses movie analogies :-) (One of
my
> favorite movie quotes BTW)
>
> >
> > One thing that does bother me about unschooling is that the
term is negative and doesn't express what we are for.
>
> Yes; many people who do not understand unschooling equate
unschooling
> to "not doing anything." We just let our kids play and watch tv
and
> surf the internet all the want (and some of us do LOL!) But to the
> un-unschooled mind they equate this to not learning. They hold no
> value in learning that does not look schoolish. I tend to not
mention
> that we unschool to most people outside the homeschooling
community.
> I've learned to speak a "schooly language" to non-friends who I
have
> conversations with (like the retired school teacher who is now a
> co-worker at a bookstore) For instance I might say that Emily (age
> 14) is studying Japanese culture and language. Which
is "schoolese"
> for "She's reading manga, watching anime, creating AMV's, and has a
> self-study guide for Japanese language" I won't mention that that
is
> about the only thing that she is interested in. :) Or I might
> mention that Mary Elayne is studying Romania and Bulgaria at the
> moment (she's reading everything she can on vampires). Trying to
get
> the "un-unschooled mind" to comprehend the value in "obsession" is
a
> difficult thing. Even with my own mother I have had to ask her to
> trust me that I will do no ill-harm to my children and am doing the
> best with the (vast) information that I have. It's hard for her to
> see her grandchildren "not learning"
>
> What surprises me is reading all that I have and listening to all
that
> I have from various sources about how people really feel about
> education and children and parenting and then to see how it is
*not*
> carried out. I listen to the weekly radio broadcast of "This I
> Believe" which is done through NPR and it just seems like that
program
> is filled with some people who would be great unschoolers. It's
> inspiring until you read more from these people and find that while
> they idealize these beliefs they rarely act on those beliefs.
>
> Good luck in your venture and welcome to the group!
>
> Michelle
>

Deb

With family and friends in general converse we typically
use 'homeschooling' and then fill in any details they might be
interested in. For the first several years (we chose this path when
DS was an infant), we just said "we plan to homeschool" and left it
there...no big questions then since he was a babe at the time. As he
got closer to 'school age', we started using 'homeschool'
and 'unschool' semi interchangeably - we 'homeschool' in a legal
sense and 'unschool' in a lifestyle sense. Now, my parents pick out
articles about homeschooling AND unschooling (they read an article
last spring about an unschooling family and said 'hey, this sounds
like what you're doing - it's called unschooling and sounds pretty
cool"... big grin on my end of the phone conversation). We might
also use terms like 'life learning' as well to indicate the scope of
it - not just 'school' stuff but encompassing all of life (food, TV,
sleep, etc). And, technically, "un"schooling is accurate - it
is 'not' school in any way, shape, or form - maybe think in terms
of 'un'encumbered, 'un'fettered, and all those positive 'un' things -
even the 'un'Cola bwah-ha-ha ;-)

--Deb