[email protected]

MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS!

It's official. The Live and Learn Unschooling Conference location for 2005
has been changed to St. Louis, Missouri.

It's very centrally located, and St. Louis is a gorgeous city with lots to
do and see. I hope many of you will make a vacation out of this and spend some
extra time in the Midwest.

St. Louis is five hours from Chicago, Kansas City, Nashville, and
Memphis----LOTS to see! St. Louis itself is home to the Cardinals, Budweiser Brewery,
The Bowling Hall of Fame, Grant's Farm, a lovely free zoo, a children's
museum, a great science museum, Laclede's Landing, Riverboat gambling, and of
course, the beautiful Arch (with its Lewis & Clark Museum underneath). It's a
short drive to Hannibal, MO, childhood home of Mark Twain, and Cahokia Mounds, a
Mississippian settlement that disappeared (and totally peaceful---I love to
walk around and drink up the quiet energy).

The conference will be October 6th-9th. I was petitioned by a large group of
attendees to extend the conference to five days, but we compromised with
four---so we'll be starting on Thursday this year. We have some exciting new
speakers as well as our popular standards, Sandra and Anne. <g>

The website should be up before the end of the year. I'll point you in that
direction as soon as it's up and operational.

The hotel contract should be signed by the end of this week: I'll get that
out to you the day it happens, so that you can make your reservations as soon
as possible. If I were to give it out now, y'all would bombard them, and they
might not have us in the system yet---so please be patient! <g> But we got a
super room rate with several huge ballrooms, a great lay-out, and an indoor
pool! There's an hotel restaurant and several within walking distance or a
VERY short drive.

I have lots of great volunteers already, but if you have a talent you'd like
to share, please let me know.

I'm looking forward to hosting the conference again---and VERY much looking
forward to seeing you all in October!

~Kelly
Conference Coordinator, 2005 Live and Learn Unschooling Conference


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Cheyenne Cain

Hello out there.

This past fall 2 of my dd's closest formerly homeschooled enrolled in the lab school at the univerisity here in town. Ever since she has been increasingly interested in going. Now she has stated her firm desire to go.

Now I am torn between
-being an unschooling mother who wants to encourage her child in what ever endeavors
dd wants to pursue. It would take a fair amount of preparing for her to take the test and what nots of trying to get in to a school.
-and wanting to protect her from the public school system.


Has anyone ever had their children do this? Anyone got any advice? Love to hear from you

Cheyenne


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J. Stauffer

<<Has anyone ever had their children do this? Anyone got any advice? Love to hear from you>>

I have 5 children and all of them have tried the ps system at one time or another. It has never lasted more than a few months. My three youngest wanted to try elementary school this year. I spent most of my energy up at the school, reminding the administration that children have civil rights too, fighting battles on a perimeter around the kids so they could enjoy themselves.

Even with me making sure they were not forced to say the pledge or pray, making sure homework was optional, etc., my son has decided this will be his last week there and the glitter is wearing off for the girls as well.

What the kids learned is that I trust them to make those decisions, to know what is best for them, and that I will support them no matter where they lead.

Julie S.

----- Original Message -----
From: Cheyenne Cain
To: [email protected]
Sent: Monday, December 13, 2004 7:01 PM
Subject: [unschoolingbasics] Need Some Advice


Hello out there.

This past fall 2 of my dd's closest formerly homeschooled enrolled in the lab school at the univerisity here in town. Ever since she has been increasingly interested in going. Now she has stated her firm desire to go.

Now I am torn between
-being an unschooling mother who wants to encourage her child in what ever endeavors
dd wants to pursue. It would take a fair amount of preparing for her to take the test and what nots of trying to get in to a school.
-and wanting to protect her from the public school system.


Has anyone ever had their children do this? Anyone got any advice? Love to hear from you

Cheyenne


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Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com

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scrapgal

--- In [email protected], Cheyenne Cain
<cherokeecain@y...> wrote:
> Hello out there.
>
> This past fall 2 of my dd's closest formerly homeschooled enrolled
in the lab school at the univerisity here in town. Ever since she
has been increasingly interested in going. Now she has stated her
firm desire to go.
>

Last year, I felt there was no way that I could homeschool my kids.
We had had 2 years school-free and were loving it. My xh and I
separated and I felt I had to get a job and the kids would have to
go to school. I told myself over and over that grades and homework
didn't matter. That this was a temporary situation until I could
find a way to let the kids come home again. I was only using school
as a babysitter.

Unfortunately, *I* fell into the "do your homework, what are your
grades" trap. By mid-year, Emily, my oldest was pulling her hair
out. Even with violin lessons (which she was enjoying) she could
find no good reason to continue going to school. She felt stifled,
unchallenged, and frustrated with the system (plus she was not
making any friends other than the girl who lived around the
corner). I took a deep breath and told her she could come back to
homeschooling since she was old enough to stay home by herself.
After that the other 2 wanted to leave school as well. I didn't
think that could work so I made bargains with them so they would
stay in school (For Keon it was getting to eat that nasty cafeteria
food for both breakfast and lunch! - GAG!) By the time summer came
along again, my xh and I were living together again and we were
buying a house. We tried the summer also as a trial to see if the
kids could indeed stay home without killing each other. Well, it
wasn't a healthy situation for Emily who was having to play
surrogate mother to Keon. So I quit my part time (low paying) job
and became a Pampered Chef consultant (another part time low paying
job, but I love it and it works around what the kids want to do
instead of the other way around!) and we have been so much happier
ever since.

I really think that going back into school was a good thing for the
kids because it showed them that they weren't missing out on
anything. However, looking back I see that year as totally wasted
for them in so many ways. It took us several months for the kids to
relax back into free exploration in the house. Mary Elayne still
asks permission to eat when she is hungry. Something that I have
never asked of them.

Michelle