Ren Allen

"I realize this is in the future, and
we talked about how she would have to prepare to be able to do the
work at the 9th grade level if she decided to return to school. I
don't think she understands what this would entail."

First of all, IF she chooses school, she does not need to worry about
"being at grade level". Especially not right now.
If she's concerned about it at that time, THEN I might help her
navigate getting prepared.

It doesn't sound like she's had much of a chance to actually enjoy a
bubbly, interesting, rich unschooling life though. It sounds like
she's been given down time, but not really very many choices at all.

Maybe I'm not getting the full picture, but leaving her and attending
to family matters isn't exactly going to entice her to try new things. yk?

I don't sit around and wait for my kids to suddenly come up with
ideas. That's not what unschooling is about. What kind of hobbies do
YOU have? What kind of interests and learning are YOU pursuing? Do you
invite her into your passions, share your ideas, take her to places
that excite you?
One of the best ways for children to learn about the world around
them, is through the adults in their lives. If they don't have
passionate, interesting adults that are at least CURIOUS and want to
try new things, then I don't think unschooling will work very well.

Maybe that's a bit cut and dry, because adults can re-learn how to be
curious and passionate, but if kids don't have a model for this,
school might be a better place.

Life happens sometimes. We don't always have amazing things
happening...sometimes people are dying, sometimes friends need
support, sometimes we move and get stressed, but learning is still
happening.
Yes, it's easier when you've started out this way, I agree. That
doesn't mean throw in the towel and go back to school, it means make
life MORE interesting!! She doesn't need a class, or a homeschool
group activity (unless she really wants that), she needs an adult that
excitedly pursues their own learning and helps her be involved in the
adult world as much as she is willing and able.

Sometimes the damage that schooling does, creates human beings that
don't know what their passions are. If she's still in that place, then
all the down time was great, but she's obviously ready for more.

What does she love? Even kids that don't realize they have passions,
have them!! Does she like certain movies? Rent and watch them with her.
Does she love the beach or hiking trails or amusement parks? Take her
to them and have a ball.
What colors does she like? Paint her room in her favorite color and
bring home cool objects she might like.
What are her favorite foods? Cook them all, take her to her favorite
restaurants.
What kind of books or comics or magazines does she like? Seek them out.
Music? Clothing? Time periods? Costumes?

Any ONE of those things can lead to everything in the whole wide
world. It just sounds like you both need a dose of passion right now!
Treat your town and region as though you are outsiders....seek out
every cool place and fun thing you can find. Leave once the fun ends.
Try to make every day a big vacation and see if learning starts to
happen. I guarantee it will.

Ren

jlh44music

> First of all, IF she chooses school, she does not need to worry
about "being at grade level". Especially not right now. If she's
concerned about it at that time, THEN I might help her navigate
getting prepared.>>>

I didn't mean she has to prepare NOW, I know that IF she decides in
the future, she will have to do some prep work.

> It doesn't sound like she's had much of a chance to actually enjoy a
bubbly, interesting, rich unschooling life though. It sounds like
she's been given down time, but not really very many choices at all.
> Maybe I'm not getting the full picture, but leaving her and
attending to family matters isn't exactly going to entice her to try
new things. yk?>

I know you're on Anne's list (shine), me too. There IS more to the
picture. She's highly sensitive, I learned that from Anne's group.
I DID give her choices in the beginning (and during the past 4 months
from time to time, we HAVE done some things, we go camping etc), I
DON'T leave her all day on her own, but SHE wanted to do NOTHING, so
I interpreted this as needing to deschool. We do watch movies and
do things together, but also she's going through the pre-hormonal
stuff, and vascilates in her mood and willingness to do things not of
her choosing sometimes (i.e. my suggestions, including her in
activities I'M passionate about). She DOES do some things with me,
but she needs lots of time to prepare mentally for change. She's
cautious by nature, anxious, a worrier, not eager to jump into new
things. She decided she wanted to quit karate this summer (she's a
purple belt), we discussed it at length.

I'm a musician. She wants to explore guitar, but she says she
doesn't want lessons, she doesn't want my help. She hates being the
center of attention, she needs lots of time to observe before jumping
in to new situations. We were volunteering a couple of months ago
helping a man who fosters kittens, socializing them, but had to stop
for a while because they had an epidemic of distemper (we have a cat,
cats over age 1 are generally immune, but he didn't want to risk it.
We haven't been back yet.)

> Yes, it's easier when you've started out this way, I agree. That
doesn't mean throw in the towel and go back to school, it means make
life MORE interesting!! She doesn't need a class, or a homeschool
group activity (unless she really wants that), she needs an adult that
excitedly pursues their own learning and helps her be involved in the
adult world as much as she is willing and able.>>>>>>

I'm not throwing in the towel, but she seems to not want to
particularily be with me, she said something earlier about wanting to
be away from me MORE, so she can miss me. I said, do you think
you'd like to be back in school (and I meant it as an honest
question, NOT a guilt laden statement!) or involved in something
where you go off to do something with other people or homeschoolers
etc that she's interested in, she said, NO, she doesn't want to be in
school, and as for getting involved in something else, we agreed to
start taking a look at what's out there. I AM pursing my own
passions, she sees me reading, crocheting, playing the piano, etc,
but she's not interested in any of them (and I don't expect her to if
she's not).

> Sometimes the damage that schooling does, creates human beings that
don't know what their passions are. If she's still in that place, then
all the down time was great, but she's obviously ready for more.>>>

This is what I think too.

> What does she love? Even kids that don't realize they have passions,
have them!! Does she like certain movies? Rent and watch them with
her. Does she love the beach or hiking trails or amusement parks?
Take her to them and have a ball. What colors does she like? Paint
her room in her favorite color and bring home cool objects she might
like. What are her favorite foods? Cook them all, take her to her
favorite restaurants. What kind of books or comics or magazines does
she like? Seek them out. Music? Clothing? Time periods? Costumes?>>>

Money is tight since I quit working. We can get by, but I was
hoping to have more new piano students (there are very few teachers
in town, but I've been out of the loop, so people went elsewhere, I
also told the school music teachers I was accepting new students,
they're all friends of mine as I've always volunteered to accompany
their choral groups as needed, and parents often ask the school music
teacher at the beginning of the school year if they know a piano
teacher, but NOTHING) but only have one new one, and she's a
homeschooler. We just built a house, she selected the color for her
new room and all the cool stuff to jazz it up. She HATES to read.
I've bought her some CDs of her favorite music, we've listened
together, I sit with her when she's on the computer, she tells me
about all the cool stuff she's doing (I'm amazed at what she's doing
with it!). She HAS been absorbed with the game. We started making
a list before the end of the school year when we knew we would be
homeschooling, of things we like or want to do someday. We've looked
at it from time to time, but no bites.

I'm not worried about "learning" per se, I'm more worried that she
doesn't want my participation in her life. I read on this list and
the others about all the unschooly stuff and lives that people do and
live, sucking it in, but when I try to "live" it, she is shutting me
out. We've talked about getting to bed earlier, SHE decided she
needs to get to sleep earlier than midnight or beyond, and wants my
help because she can't "turn it off" by herself, but then sleep til
noon, and if I gently wake her earlier than when SHE wakes up on her
own,(turning off the fan, she likes the white noise, then leaving the
room) she wakes up cranky. Maybe we need some time to change the
routine, SHE wants to but isn't always pleased when I actually do
it. It takes her a long time to get going and wake up, which is
fine. But also to go off and do things (IF there are any outings
planned that she might be interested in for example, since she
mentioned she wants to maybe be away from me more...), several of
them start before noon, and she'd have to REALLY want to go and get
up, and so far, the one's we've considered, she decided she didn't
want to bother.

So, I don't know at this point what to do. (Plus it's that time of
the month, one week early, VERY unexpected, so I'm sure part of this
apathy is from that, and perimenopause.....). And the stress of
this past year has been catching up with us (last July 2004, we sold
our house, moved in with my dad and were having a house built behind
him, which was delayed; the day after we sold our house, my BIL
dropped dead, he was living with my MIL who has Alzheimers, we had to
deal with his death, (100 miles away), find an assisted living
facility and get on their waiting list, find someone to stay with her
during the week, go to the Cape every weekend to be with her (until
Oct 2004), then clean out her house (BIL and MIL stuff, she was a
shopaholic), do repairs to the house, it's STILL on the market, we
moved her to a nursing home 2 weeks ago, cleaned out her apt, and
dealing with Danielle's issues in school all of last year at the same
time, plus working in a very stressful situation). It's been a long
year and I think I'm overwhelmed, it's catching up with me. So, yes,
I don't feel as much passion as maybe I should.

But I won't give up.
Jann

Pamela Sorooshian

> So, I don't know at this point what to do.

Does she have any friends? Of any age? Perhaps what she really needs
is to just be able to spend time with someone else. I mean, she SAID
that, right? Maybe just take her words at face value - don't read too
much into them.

Also, my daughters all liked to spend some time with other families,
when they were her age. And they've each had at least one other adult
woman in their lives - a mother of a friend, for example - whom they
looked up to a lot.

-pam

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

Ren Allen

"I know you're on Anne's list (shine), me too. There IS more to the
picture. She's highly sensitive, I learned that from Anne's group.
I DID give her choices in the beginning (and during the past 4 months
from time to time, we HAVE done some things, we go camping etc), I
DON'T leave her all day on her own, but SHE wanted to do NOTHING, so
I interpreted this as needing to deschool."

AH....thanks for giving a much clearer picture of the issues
surrounding her restlessness.
I don't read on Anne's list very often, so it's hard to remember
people and stories.

I'm thinking after reading your very descriptive post, that it's a
combination of a need to heal further and just her age. I know many
kids that get sort of restless right around 12-14ish. Not sure what
they want to do, but needing more stimulation.
She's a sensitive soul, but would she like a bigger circle of friends.
I know having a larger social group REALLY helped Trevor out during
his restless phase. There's a very strong urge for a lot of children
around that time to seek out a similar aged peer group.
My children's best friends ranged from 9-40, so it wasn't just teens
or anything, but they all had similar interests and had a ball together.
We've just moved, so trying to develop new friendships (Brandie and
her kids are great!!) but it's hard right now.

It might just be a restless "I don't know what I want" phase. It
sounds like a lot of the issues you're all dealing with are LIFE. It
happens. School doesn't fix it though, often it just complicates
things. If she had been unschooled all along and wanted to try school
I'd have a different answer....:) but it sounds like she's still
trying to find herself.

Hang in there...listening deeply and just being there for her is
probably the best thing you can do.

Ren

jlh44music

> AH....thanks for giving a much clearer picture of the issues
surrounding her restlessness. I don't read on Anne's list very often,
so it's hard to remember people and stories.>>>

And there are so many, I have a hard time keeping track sometimes!

> I'm thinking after reading your very descriptive post, that it's a
combination of a need to heal further and just her age. I know many
kids that get sort of restless right around 12-14ish. Not sure what
they want to do, but needing more stimulation. She's a sensitive
soul, but would she like a bigger circle of friends.>>>

I think because she's always had a hard time joining in, needs to
watch from the sidelines for a while as I said, she doesn't have a
lot of friends. There aren't many kids in our neighborhood, and the
one girl I mentioned from another town is an OK kid, but some of her
behaviors are starting to concern me. Also, if she calls and
Danielle doesn't want to talk to her (she'll see it on the caller ID
and give me "a look" that says this!) I tell her, "you don't have to
pick it up, that's what caller ID and answering machines are for".
She's also told me sometimes she just doesn't like talking to her
(because it's usually the friend doing all the talking, mostly silly
stuff, which I remember having conversations about "nothing much" at
that age, but Danielle can only take so much of that). I'm going to
contact our local homeschool group to see if there are any teen
groups (other than the occ "book discussion" group that comes over
the email chain, she's not interested in that as she really doesn't
enjoy reading for pleasure) or people we could try to meet (or at
least the moms first) as I don't know many people yet, we're too new
and there haven't been many big events to meet others at yet (and
most have been all little kids, which didn't help as it made her feel
like it's only little kids who are homeschooling/unschooling, which
of course we talked about!). She enjoys people of all ages, and
being an only child, has had a lot of contact with adults, and holds
her own quite well. I envision her having friends of all ages, but
right now I think she needs more connection with kids around her age.

She's playing World of Warcraft (online game) a lot and has "friends"
she's connected with there (she says she wishes sometimes they could
all meet). She doesn't do well in a LARGE group of people, but it
would be nice if she had a few friends she enjoyed doing different
things with from time to time. I've tried getting her to connect
with others via email etc, but she's not into writing long missives
(like us!).

> We've just moved, so trying to develop new friendships (Brandie and
her kids are great!!) but it's hard right now.>>>

It must be hard to find new friends after moving. I hope things
improve! We just moved 1000 feet or so (sold our house next to my
dad's and built a house behind him!). There are new houses on the
new street, but very few kids (toddlers and older teens, they've met
but not connected).

> It might just be a restless "I don't know what I want" phase. It
sounds like a lot of the issues you're all dealing with are LIFE. It
happens. School doesn't fix it though, often it just complicates
things.>>>

Oh, I AGREE! I think it would do more damamge, but I understand her
missing certain parts, she said "school wasn't all bad", she's
remembering the positive things, which are all social connections,
the few that she did have, and just seeing the kids in the halls
etc. But she's also forgotten how stressed and anxious it all made
her to rush between classes (and this year they shortened the time
even more) etc.

>>>>......but it sounds like she's still trying to find herself.>>>

Yes, I think she's just beginning.

Oh, and also last night she shared that she thinks she may be showing
signs of getting her first period (showed me in the toilet, just a
very small amount of brown, which is a BIG change for her, she was
always so "hush hush" about it, embarrased, which I respected).
She's really nervous about it (we've been talking about it for
months, and I even took her to her pedi and she talked to her (for
reassurance) about what to expect, which helped), but she said "maybe
THAT'S part of why I feel "isolated", it's hormonal!". I also said
maybe that's why I got my period a week early (I'm like CLOCKWORK
usually! And should be spreading them out at age 50, not closer
together), we've talked about women who work or live together often
getting in sync with their periods.

So, perhaps all of this is right now is because of this change.
(She wants to be 12 again BTW!)

> Hang in there...listening deeply and just being there for her is
probably the best thing you can do.>>>>

Thanks Ren.
Jann

jlh44music

> Does she have any friends? Of any age? Perhaps what she really needs
is to just be able to spend time with someone else. I mean, she SAID
that, right? Maybe just take her words at face value - don't read too
much into them.>>>

The one friend she has connection with right now lives 2 towns away
(about 15-20 mins) and they talk on the phone every day. Mostly it's
the friend talking about silly stuff (Danielle likes to have the
speaker phone on so she can play her game while her friend babbles - I
remember having conversations about not much at that age too). She's
a pretty good kid, but I'm starting to see some behaviors I'm not too
trhilled about. There are no kids in the neighborhood she's connected
with (see my response to Ren's last post!), and there were 2 girls she
became friendly with last year in school, who she invited to her
birthday party, we've talked about getting together with them (they see
each other quite often, nice girls, one is legally blind and is a
riot! the other, even though she's a "cheerleader" (nothing wrong with
cheerleaders! it's a joke between them, because it's not something
Danielle would do!) they connected (and I also found out she has an
older sister who's autistic, so she's learned a lot about tolerance
from that). Meeting them at her party, I can see why the 3 of them
connected.

I'm also going to contact our local homeschool group to see if I can
start to make some connections there. Even though I grew up in this
town, we know very few people (a lot of "yuppies" have moved in,
younger people with young kids). Many of my friends have kids in
college (I had my daughter later in life).

OK, now I sound like I'm whining!

> Also, my daughters all liked to spend some time with other families,
when they were her age. And they've each had at least one other adult
woman in their lives - a mother of a friend, for example - whom they
looked up to a lot.>>>>>

I would welcome this and hope this will happen. Actually, she has my
aunt, it's her "surrogate" grandmother and she has a wonderful
relationship with her. I lost my mother 11 yrs ago, D was only 2, and
my MIL has Alzheimers and was never really a grandmother to her. She
would like to get out more I think, but she also likes to be home.
And when she reaches her limit of being at someone's house (her fun
meter gets full!) she's ready to come home (she gets over stimulated).
So it's hard to balance.

I like to think I can provide some of that for her friend (2 towns
away) as she lives with her dad (who got custody 5-6 years ago, the mom
was diagnosed with schizophrenia and only sees her once a week for 2
hrs), but it seems Danielle is moving away from her a bit (at least for
the moment, and we've talked about how this happens, I shared stories
about different friends I had at different times growing up, some I've
kept in touch with, others it was just a period of time where we
connected, went to each other's houses for several months, then it
tapered off).

Oh, (see my response to Ren's last post), I think she's showing signs
of getting her first period, I wrote about it there (and may be a part
of this, this week!).
Jann

Ren Allen

"He really kept a low profile for a very long time---just so
uncomfortable with
himself."

Which is SO hard to believe when you meet Cameron today!!
I never saw him at the first conference...he literally hid from everyone.
Two years ago, I saw him occasionally...he would smile and mumble
hello quietly, looking away quickly.
This year he was Mr. sociable. He drew "hug buttons" on everyone,
hugged everyone, had wonderful conversations about everything, smiled
sweetly, looked everyone in the eye.....was THE MOST incredible,
sweet, intelligent, unique and FUN teen ever.:)
We all love Cameron. Heck, everyone did.

It's hard to believe the change over the last few years...but it's
such a beautiful example of the healing that unschooling can procure.

Ren

katherand2003

Boy do I remember this age. My mother is very gregarious and didn't
know WHAT to make of me. The poor woman. What I put her through.
Teenagers who've been schooled or in authoritative backgrounds for
years find the going especially rough. {Waving}

I'm going some hormonal shifts myself. I have a barely there sense of
loss and foreboding that colors whatever happens in my daily round.
Nothing wrong with those feelings but I have been messing things up
because I don't know to how to handle them.

Barbara's posts on "holding the space" rather than rushing in with
solutions have given me another perspective and I am seeing others
deal rather than put myself in when I don't need to be there.

Your daughter is beginning to deschool. I hear 2 things. She wants
time away from you and you want to support her and are ready for
involvement. Here's your daughter --new horizons, unschooling,
starting periods. She's starting to realize more about making
decisions (not a school thought per se) and hasn't seen the
collaborative nature that decision making CAN have while still
maintaining a sense of autonomy you don't find in school. For all
practical purposes, the home has seemed to exist in order to support
the school system. Home still seems that way during deschooling,
hence-- as supportive as you are (a truly wonderful thing) --she wants
time alone from you to go on leg of HER journey and she will invite
you to join at points along the way because you will hopefully give
her space she needs. Otherwise, she'll feel you don't think she can
be trusted with autonomy; that growing up is too scary and maybe she
shouldn't want to grow up. But she will need your guidance and you
want to wear new ears so you can hear what she's asking for.

You mentioned some new behaviors from your daughter that disturb you.
How is that playing into it?

How to suddenly swish school out of the scenario seems a bit
overwhelming. It's always been there, seemingly a support system.
The ways we are dependent on that system are truly insidious. You
and your daughter have had a goodly dose of it. It takes a lot of
processing to feel like you said... free.

Your aptly named deschooling dilemma post seems like the adage oft
repeated around here: "It isn't the unschooling, it's ____________
(fill in the blank). In my book, there ain't nuthin' like hormones to
make unschooling a difficult transition. :) It's hard to be
comfortable with others in transition without also being in transition
yourself, and it sounds like you have been going through several.

Here's to you!
Kathe


--- In [email protected], "jlh44music"
<jlh44music@y...> wrote:
>

> The one friend she has connection with right now lives 2 towns away
> (about 15-20 mins) and they talk on the phone every day. Mostly it's
> the friend talking about silly stuff (Danielle likes to have the
> speaker phone on so she can play her game while her friend babbles - I
> remember having conversations about not much at that age too). She's
> a pretty good kid, but I'm starting to see some behaviors I'm not too
> trhilled about. There are no kids in the neighborhood she's connected
> with (see my response to Ren's last post!), and there were 2 girls she
> became friendly with last year in school, who she invited to her
> birthday party, we've talked about getting together with them (they see
> each other quite often, nice girls, one is legally blind and is a
> riot! the other, even though she's a "cheerleader" (nothing wrong with
> cheerleaders! it's a joke between them, because it's not something
> Danielle would do!) they connected (and I also found out she has an
> older sister who's autistic, so she's learned a lot about tolerance
> from that). Meeting them at her party, I can see why the 3 of them
> connected.
>
> I'm also going to contact our local homeschool group to see if I can
> start to make some connections there. Even though I grew up in this
> town, we know very few people (a lot of "yuppies" have moved in,
> younger people with young kids). Many of my friends have kids in
> college (I had my daughter later in life).
>
> OK, now I sound like I'm whining!

<<<snip>>>

> Oh, (see my response to Ren's last post), I think she's showing signs
> of getting her first period, I wrote about it there (and may be a part
> of this, this week!).
> Jann

katherand2003

Oops. Answering this question myself. I misread and thought Jann was
saying something about her daughter that was new and disturbing
behavior. I read further.... very very behind in my email AS usual.
Jann was talking about her daughter's friend having disturbing
behavior. Sorry about the mixup and hope I didn't get others off
track too. I didn't know what I was talking about. :/

Kathe





--- In [email protected], "katherand2003"
<katherand2003@y...> wrote:
>
> You mentioned some new behaviors from your daughter that disturb you.
How is that playing into it?

jlh44music

> Oops. Answering this question myself. I misread and thought Jann
was saying something about her daughter that was new and disturbing
behavior. I read further.... very very behind in my email AS usual.
Jann was talking about her daughter's friend having disturbing
behavior. Sorry about the mixup and hope I didn't get others off
track too. I didn't know what I was talking about. :/

No problem Kathe! I went back and read what I wrote too and figured
that's what happened. She's still talking to her friend most every
day, but hasn't asked to go to her house on the weekends since the
day she was there all day when dh and I had to go to MIL's house to
do repairs about a month ago, and she wasn't feeling well (anxiety
at the beginning of what caused me to post, and ended up, in part,
being pre-period) and wanted to be with me, and couldn't because we
were 100 miles away (I'm not even going to TRY to fix that long
mixed up quasi sentence!). Plus she was there for Halloween, went
out with her friend and a couple of HER friends, who are a little
wild, so I'm guessing (tho she hasn't talked about it yet) that
she's not comfortable being with them all again (these girls tend to
live at her friend's house all weekend, I think it's too much for
Danielle). We're going to do something FUN this weekend (I've had
a hectic week, a lot of things planned, appts, MIL stuff, car
repairs, etc etc), maybe a movie.

She's still feeling lost, but she's decided to really try hard to
get to bed earlier (and get up earlier). She likes to sleep until
she's "done" (noon or after a bit) but she says lately she feels
even more tired, and thinks she'll do better shifting her awake
time. I've told her "I" can't continue to go to bed at 2, 3 or 4
AM, so we're working it out. Plus we're starting to get out more
to meet others, she wants to try around once a week (not everyday in
other words) for now. We met some homeschoolers yesterday, and
after her usual initial period of getting a feel for the group, all
of a sudden I saw her in the other room doing the chicken dance!
It's a start.
Jann