Sandra Dodd

Here's the text of a presentation Dagny Kream made at a conference
earlier this year.
http://another-roadside-attraction.blogspot.com/2008/09/dagnys-speech-
from-ne-unschooling.html
"http://another-roadside-attraction.blogspot.com/2008/09/dagnys-
speech-from-ne-unschooling.html"
<http://another-roadside-attraction.blogspot.com/2008/09/dagnys-
speech-from-ne-unschooling.html>

<A HREF="http://another-roadside-attraction.blogspot.com/2008/09/
dagnys-speech-from-ne-unschooling.html">http://another-roadside-
attraction.blogspot.com/2008/09/dagnys-speech-from-ne-
unschooling.html</a>

(I hope one or two of those links stays whole through the e-mailing
process.)


This is a small part of it:

***************************************
I have had many conversations with unschoolers about people we know
saying, "I unschool, except for math" and how what we really hear is
"I unschool, but I don't trust my child to learn what he needs to
know, when he needs to know it". Unschooling, no matter how natural
or not it is to you, is a constant leap of faith. It always comes
back to whether or not you’re going to trust yourself, your children,
and your family as a whole, to hold hands and jump. Unschooling is
about constantly adapting to the understanding that although the
obvious, easy, mainstream answer is to say no, you're going to learn
to say yes, to say yes to deciding to trust your children’s ability
to decide on their own what they need, and when they need it, and how
they are going to get it. The ability to let go of a well-trained
reaction to just say no doesn't come easy. You can jump of the first
cliff, but it's parenthood, and there're going to be ten dozen more
even scarier jumps than your first. If unschooling were a tree
divided into parts trust would be the trunk. It holds everything
else, all of your other ideals and wants and opinions of unschooling,
up. It is sturdy and un-swaying and most of all necessary. After all,
without a trunk there is no tree.

John Holt said, "To trust children we must first learn to trust
ourselves...and most of us were taught as children that we could not
be trusted." You need to start reversing this curse; trust yourself
and show your children that they can be trusted!

You might have noticed by now that unschooling is not the easy way
out. It just Can Not truly be done halfway or with except-fors like
math or bedtimes or diet. I have many sane, nice friends who I call
"except-fors". The big difference between my family as unschoolers,
and their family as "unschoolers except for", is that none of them
have anything like the relationship I have with my parents.

I wish I could express to you how much I want these parents to
realize that they could all change that one small thing, that whole
trusting thing, and there would be communication between these people
who feel they are from and in different worlds.

*************************************

I think people who have asked recently what they can do to influence
relatives who don't understand might find some great quotes from
that, or might could print it out and pass it on. I'll put it here,
too, for ease of printing out.
http://sandradodd.com/teens/dagny

There's a link to Rue's book on parenting, too, which would help
anyone here who's having any kind of difficulties understanding why
it would help to give children more freedom and how it would work.

One more thing. At Rue's blog, which you should get to with the
links above, but if not here:
http://another-roadside-attraction.blogspot.com/
has links to the boingboing discussion of John Holt, in case any of
you missed that. There are comments now, and I personally fear to
go. I have too much on my list of things I've forgotten to do lately
to get involved in that today, but some of you might have some time
and energy to spare.

Sandra