Schuyler

From someone who doesn't have end product children/almost adults I can say
that this unschooling life has given my two, my 9 and 6 year old, some of
the most amazing abilities. Linnaea just asked me for some pomegranate
seeds, but she couldn't remember what they were. So, she asked me for the
fruit seeds, y'know, the ones the woman ate when she shouldn't and she only
had 6. And I didn't get it for a few minutes, but she took me patiently to
the fridge and we looked until it clicked, the lovely fruit seeds, the many
fruit seeds, the 6 that Persephone ate and shouldn't have, so she had to
swap between Hades and Mt. Olympus and we have seasons.

Yesterday Simon wanted to go out to walk the dog. He wanted to go out to
walk the dog because he has been playing Pokemon Fire Red lately and he had
some plans for catching Pokemon down by a pond that I walk past when I walk
the dog. He was pretty sure there would be some Lotads down that way, and he
needed to add them to his pokemon collection. Simon doesn't go on walks
easily. But, because he wanted to, because it was his choice, he went on
this walk well. Actually, he didn't. Linnaea irritated him before we left,
so he didn't go when Linnaea and David left. He and I stayed while he worked
through whatever he needed to work through and we left about 5 minutes
behind them. On the walk we saw a Fallow deer, which became a Stantler, and
an old horse, a Rapidash, and lots of birds, Pidgeots and Taillows and
Wingulls and Spearows, and then there were the things that were there in his
and Linnaea's shared imaginings. Linnaea found a Nidoran that loved her soon
after the capture. And there was a Rattatta site in the hay bales.

Last night Linnaea composed songs. She had me transcribe her words as she
sang them. She found a bunch of our instruments and assigned them to David
and me (Simon played electric guitar briefly, but bowed out early) and she
wrote out the notation, her own notation, for each instrument so that we
would know what to play and when. And we sang and played the two songs she
wrote.

Late at night, after David has gone to bed, they cook these amazing
creations. Linnaea made bread rolls the other night of flour and water and
coke and knew to add baking soda as a rising agent. We baked them and they
weren't bad at all. Simon has been making egg in the hole concoctions.
Things with cheese and home beaten applesauce and a pinch of salt and a
smidgen of pepper and they are tasty and playful in a way that I have never
been with cooking.

I don't know who they would be without unschooling. But the friends they
have who are in school or who are schooled are harder and sadder and need
far more support being who they want to be than either of my two radically
unschooled beings do. And I don't know who or what they will be when they
are grown up/almost adults, but I can't believe that they will be anything
but exactly who they are, and I hope that they can carry with them the power
and happiness that they possess right now.

Schuyler
www.waynforth.blogspot.com
>
> Thanks. I'll share this with them. They really have been poster
> children for another way of being.
>
> Marty went to a school dance last night.
>
> Kirby's about to start training on a job that said you have to have a
> high school diploma or a GED; he has neither. He's the only one who
> passed all the "tests" (informal) and interviews to do the World of
> Warcraft customer support. The rest of them who applied when he did
> will be doing support for other companies than Blizzard.
>
> Holly was participating in a weekly discussion of medieval virtues,
> and though she would only say two or three things in a two hour
> session, her comments were better than most of those others present.
> When the young (22 year old) wife of one of the participants wanted
> to start coming, I was talking about it with one of my best regulars
> and said "I'd like to say she's too young or new to the group, but
> Holly's there." He said "Yeah, but Holly's like 30." (She's 15. He
> knows. He meant to say she's as mature in that type of discussion as
> if she were 30, which is too flattering, but still... she does
> understand the subject matter better than the 22 year old graduate
> student does sometimes.) But now Holly has a Wednesday night
> babysitting job, so she's unable to come to the discussions, which is
> fine because she was going to quit when Lost starts back up in a
> couple of weeks.
>
> These kids are just not "at their spot" on the conveyor belt.
> They're "ahead" some and "behind" some and "beyond" some and
> "oblivious" some (to traditions concerning school dances, for
> instance <g>).
>
> But in every case, they have had the information they've requested or
> that came up naturally in the course of their wanting to know things,
> or coming across a new activity or topic, or choosing to pursue
> something or other.
>
> I didn't invite Holly to that philosophy discussion. We meet in a
> restaurant that's walking distance, and one night she was hungry and
> wanted to go eat and then go home. She stayed. She came back. She
> was curious about what we were doing, and she likes some of the
> people there. Marty goes now too. Marty's friend Brett started
> going. He first planned to come for the first hour and then go to
> our house for Kirby's D&D game. As it turned out, he goes to the D&D
> game late.
>
> Had I suggested to any of these kids that they should attend a
> philosophy discussion that I run, or MADE them go, their being there
> wouldn't be nearly the same.
>
> I've rambled away from the original question, but I'm still in the
> realm of the quality and value of information that is shared when
> the listener is interested or needs to know, and when the listener
> is free to stay or go, free to change the subject or to ask about
> something altogether different.
>
> It's cool to say that all my kids have jobs. Except for campus work-
> study jobs (filing cards for the bursar, and working in the
> cafeteria) I didn't have a job until I was 20 years old. Kirby has
> worked since he was 14, and Marty since he was 15. Holly's 15 and
> got a very good babysitting job, regular through May. (Whether it
> will continue after that isn't important to her.) People are happy
> with their work and their presence. We didn't "make" them get jobs
> or even suggest it, in any of those cases. (I did let Holly know
> about the babysitting job, but I didn't say "Look for a babysitting
> job.")
>
> Now I'm ramblng, but there are some more ideas for the collection.
>
> Sandra
>
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