learning about learning
Sandra Dodd
Someone threw this word-rock at me (well, officially at many anonymous people) on someone's facebook wall where some badmouthing was going on. I don't want to throw rocks there; it's someone's facebook wall. I do want to bring it here to put it on a shelf with other projectiles, though, and look at it.
"The cognitive dissonance between the principles of unschooling and the sheer number of people who come away from many RU sites/groups deeply hurt by the judging is pretty amazing, as is the seeming lack of concern that a philosophy that is so much about connection and acceptance is being used to negate the feelings and perspectives of so many people."
"Sheer number" is an archaic idiom. It's like "countless numbers" or "unfathomable depths." Dramatic hyperbole.
I never, ever have used the term RU for unschooling. I use "unschooling." When I use "radical unschooling," I pronounce all the consonants, or I write out every letter. So some of what that person is cranky about, or "knows" about unschooling didn't come from me.
I/we are accused of seeming to lack concern that "a philosophy that is so much about connection and acceptance is being used to negate the feelings and perspectives of so many people."
I would like to negate the feeling that person has that some "RU philosophy" is about "connection and acceptance."
Connections between ideas, yes. Acceptance of children as important people, yes. Not connection between all people and parents anywhere no matter what they think, do or say, and not acceptance of every idea anywhere no matter what it is.
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
"The cognitive dissonance between the principles of unschooling and the sheer number of people who come away from many RU sites/groups deeply hurt by the judging is pretty amazing, as is the seeming lack of concern that a philosophy that is so much about connection and acceptance is being used to negate the feelings and perspectives of so many people."
"Sheer number" is an archaic idiom. It's like "countless numbers" or "unfathomable depths." Dramatic hyperbole.
I never, ever have used the term RU for unschooling. I use "unschooling." When I use "radical unschooling," I pronounce all the consonants, or I write out every letter. So some of what that person is cranky about, or "knows" about unschooling didn't come from me.
I/we are accused of seeming to lack concern that "a philosophy that is so much about connection and acceptance is being used to negate the feelings and perspectives of so many people."
I would like to negate the feeling that person has that some "RU philosophy" is about "connection and acceptance."
Connections between ideas, yes. Acceptance of children as important people, yes. Not connection between all people and parents anywhere no matter what they think, do or say, and not acceptance of every idea anywhere no matter what it is.
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Mica
I like the way you brought the rock here to look at Sandra - I'm guessing
that the decision was like choosing to avoid a scene in someone else's
house?
I'd like to speak to an idea of defusing the weapon on the Facebook wall
with the key non-personal point that came from your looking at the rock
here.
"Connections between ideas, yes. Acceptance of children as important people,
yes. Not connection between all people and parents anywhere no matter what
they think, do or say, and not acceptance of every idea anywhere no matter
what it is."
Rock or water balloon?
Mica
that the decision was like choosing to avoid a scene in someone else's
house?
I'd like to speak to an idea of defusing the weapon on the Facebook wall
with the key non-personal point that came from your looking at the rock
here.
"Connections between ideas, yes. Acceptance of children as important people,
yes. Not connection between all people and parents anywhere no matter what
they think, do or say, and not acceptance of every idea anywhere no matter
what it is."
Rock or water balloon?
Mica
On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 7:35 AM, Sandra Dodd <Sandra@...> wrote:
> **
>
>
> Someone threw this word-rock at me (well, officially at many anonymous
> people) on someone's facebook wall where some badmouthing was going on. I
> don't want to throw rocks there; it's someone's facebook wall. I do want to
> bring it here to put it on a shelf with other projectiles, though, and look
> at it.
>
> "The cognitive dissonance between the principles of unschooling and the
> sheer number of people who come away from many RU sites/groups deeply hurt
> by the judging is pretty amazing, as is the seeming lack of concern that a
> philosophy that is so much about connection and acceptance is being used to
> negate the feelings and perspectives of so many people."
>
> "Sheer number" is an archaic idiom. It's like "countless numbers" or
> "unfathomable depths." Dramatic hyperbole.
>
> I never, ever have used the term RU for unschooling. I use "unschooling."
> When I use "radical unschooling," I pronounce all the consonants, or I write
> out every letter. So some of what that person is cranky about, or "knows"
> about unschooling didn't come from me.
>
> I/we are accused of seeming to lack concern that "a philosophy that is so
> much about connection and acceptance is being used to negate the feelings
> and perspectives of so many people."
>
> I would like to negate the feeling that person has that some "RU
> philosophy" is about "connection and acceptance."
>
> Connections between ideas, yes. Acceptance of children as important people,
> yes. Not connection between all people and parents anywhere no matter what
> they think, do or say, and not acceptance of every idea anywhere no matter
> what it is.
>
> Sandra
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Sandra Dodd
-=-I like the way you brought the rock here to look at Sandra - I'm guessing
that the decision was like choosing to avoid a scene in someone else's
house?-=-
I don't do housecalls, though. I'd rather work with groups. I write here, mostly. If people want my opinion, this is the best place for it.
-=-Rock or water balloon?-=-
Time-release truths are my favored tool.
Sandra
that the decision was like choosing to avoid a scene in someone else's
house?-=-
I don't do housecalls, though. I'd rather work with groups. I write here, mostly. If people want my opinion, this is the best place for it.
-=-Rock or water balloon?-=-
Time-release truths are my favored tool.
Sandra
Mica
Ah, I wasn't completely comfortable with my comparison but couldn't work out
why, now I fear that by placing the comparison after your clarification it
seems like I might have been referring to your own words as a weapon, which
was not my intention...
I meant (and didn't achieve) to convey how, after your viewing, the original
statement seemed less like a rock than a balloon or something that you
easily deflated, punctured - but a balloon doesn't give a sense of a
projectile - and so water balloon.
with your "time release truths" I'm imagining your comment to be something
like a sticky paper-wad coated in anti-virus that penetrates the water
balloon to defuse it prior to impact.
why, now I fear that by placing the comparison after your clarification it
seems like I might have been referring to your own words as a weapon, which
was not my intention...
I meant (and didn't achieve) to convey how, after your viewing, the original
statement seemed less like a rock than a balloon or something that you
easily deflated, punctured - but a balloon doesn't give a sense of a
projectile - and so water balloon.
with your "time release truths" I'm imagining your comment to be something
like a sticky paper-wad coated in anti-virus that penetrates the water
balloon to defuse it prior to impact.
On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 12:09 PM, Sandra Dodd <Sandra@...> wrote:
> **
>
>
> -=-I like the way you brought the rock here to look at Sandra - I'm
> guessing
>
> that the decision was like choosing to avoid a scene in someone else's
> house?-=-
>
> I don't do housecalls, though. I'd rather work with groups. I write here,
> mostly. If people want my opinion, this is the best place for it.
>
> -=-Rock or water balloon?-=-
>
> Time-release truths are my favored tool.
>
> Sandra
>
>
>
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Sandra Dodd
-=-with your "time release truths" I'm imagining your comment to be something
like a sticky paper-wad coated in anti-virus that penetrates the water
balloon to defuse it prior to impact.-=-
Nah.
Like an idea that someone hears, and it pisses them off SO MUCH that they memorize it so they can tell their friends what a STUPID (or "RIDICULOUS" some people say) idea it is. And in a year or two, it has stayed with them, and their other ideas are failing them, and the stupid idea they were sure was insane is still in there, occasionally speaking its name, and some of them come back over here and say, "I used to think you guys were crazy, but..."
It happens fairly frequently.
I'd rather they had the emotional calm and intellectual maturity to hear it the first time and think "I don't understand that" instead of "that stupid idea is ridiculous." More people stay than leave.
In that same hostile discussion at facebook, someone else said she never went back around "RU discussions" after her first visits, and that she respects her children's right to be the way they want to be, and that their family is FULL of labels, and depression. But by god, it's HER depression and it's nobody's business, and RU "dogma" is stupid. [The last sentence is my summary of all the rest; the first part was near paraphrase.]
I'm not going to send someone to her house or anything. Seriously, if people want to discuss unschooling they should come here, or find another place where people understand it, rather than reject it horribly while insisting they ARE unschoolers. But the sad part is that the sorrow, depression and hostility would dissolve if she/they cared more about finding joy than about defending depression.
Is that dogma? "RU dogma"?
It's what Maslow wrote in 1943. There was no such thing as unschooling.
OH! Where I went to find the date (I was thinking it was later 40's) there was this:
****Maslow studied what he called exemplary people such as Albert Einstein, Jane Addams, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Frederick Douglass rather than mentally ill or neurotic people, writing that "the study of crippled, stunted, immature, and unhealthy specimens can yield only a cripple psychology and a cripple philosophy."[3] Maslow studied the healthiest 1% of the college student population.****
That matches another quote I like lately that I might not be able to find easily. (I dug five minutes; I'm going to quit for today.) Richard Carlson, in *Living at the Speed of Life* talks about mental health, and parallels physical health. Mental health shouldn't be defined as the bare recovery from mental illness. Just as physical health isn't barely walking after a broken leg, it's running and jumping and being strong, and happy, and for those things to come easily. I don't know what example he used; sorry. That's not even a paraphrase then, but his point was that "health" (mental or physical) should be robust, whole, and strong.
"Recovery from depression" shouldn't just be "yes, okay; this morning when I woke up I wasn't sorry to be alive," but should be in the sweetly calm happiness to the giddy excitement range. If an unschooling family thinks they might be barely going through sufficient motions to be unschooling, people on this list will say "But move toward it being easier, and happier."
That's not dogma.
That's sharing joy.
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
like a sticky paper-wad coated in anti-virus that penetrates the water
balloon to defuse it prior to impact.-=-
Nah.
Like an idea that someone hears, and it pisses them off SO MUCH that they memorize it so they can tell their friends what a STUPID (or "RIDICULOUS" some people say) idea it is. And in a year or two, it has stayed with them, and their other ideas are failing them, and the stupid idea they were sure was insane is still in there, occasionally speaking its name, and some of them come back over here and say, "I used to think you guys were crazy, but..."
It happens fairly frequently.
I'd rather they had the emotional calm and intellectual maturity to hear it the first time and think "I don't understand that" instead of "that stupid idea is ridiculous." More people stay than leave.
In that same hostile discussion at facebook, someone else said she never went back around "RU discussions" after her first visits, and that she respects her children's right to be the way they want to be, and that their family is FULL of labels, and depression. But by god, it's HER depression and it's nobody's business, and RU "dogma" is stupid. [The last sentence is my summary of all the rest; the first part was near paraphrase.]
I'm not going to send someone to her house or anything. Seriously, if people want to discuss unschooling they should come here, or find another place where people understand it, rather than reject it horribly while insisting they ARE unschoolers. But the sad part is that the sorrow, depression and hostility would dissolve if she/they cared more about finding joy than about defending depression.
Is that dogma? "RU dogma"?
It's what Maslow wrote in 1943. There was no such thing as unschooling.
OH! Where I went to find the date (I was thinking it was later 40's) there was this:
****Maslow studied what he called exemplary people such as Albert Einstein, Jane Addams, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Frederick Douglass rather than mentally ill or neurotic people, writing that "the study of crippled, stunted, immature, and unhealthy specimens can yield only a cripple psychology and a cripple philosophy."[3] Maslow studied the healthiest 1% of the college student population.****
That matches another quote I like lately that I might not be able to find easily. (I dug five minutes; I'm going to quit for today.) Richard Carlson, in *Living at the Speed of Life* talks about mental health, and parallels physical health. Mental health shouldn't be defined as the bare recovery from mental illness. Just as physical health isn't barely walking after a broken leg, it's running and jumping and being strong, and happy, and for those things to come easily. I don't know what example he used; sorry. That's not even a paraphrase then, but his point was that "health" (mental or physical) should be robust, whole, and strong.
"Recovery from depression" shouldn't just be "yes, okay; this morning when I woke up I wasn't sorry to be alive," but should be in the sweetly calm happiness to the giddy excitement range. If an unschooling family thinks they might be barely going through sufficient motions to be unschooling, people on this list will say "But move toward it being easier, and happier."
That's not dogma.
That's sharing joy.
Sandra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Jenny Cyphers
***I'd rather they had the emotional calm and intellectual maturity to hear it the first time and think "I don't understand that" instead of "that stupid idea is ridiculous." More people stay than leave.
In that same hostile discussion at facebook, someone else said she never went back around "RU discussions" after her first visits, and that she respects her children's right to be the way they want to be, and that their family is FULL of labels, and depression. But by god, it's HER depression and it's nobody's business, and RU "dogma" is stupid. [The last sentence is my summary of all the rest; the first part was near paraphrase.]
I'm not going to send someone to her house or anything. Seriously, if people want to discuss unschooling they should come here, or find another place where people understand it, rather than reject it horribly while insisting they ARE unschoolers. But the sad part is that the sorrow, depression and hostility would dissolve if she/they cared more about finding joy than about defending depression.***
If kids grow up seeing the world in negative, pessimistic and dire ways, by the time they are teens and young adults, it will be very hard to help them change that way of thinking. The fact is, that labeling a kid can do all kinds of damage. Understanding human behavior is interesting. Labeling came out of the DSM, which stands for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for mental disorders. I'd like to emphasize the DIS in disorder. It implies that something is wrong with you. That manual is huge. I'm sure that there is a small percentage of the human population with real mental disorders.
What I don't like about labeling kids, is that kids change all the time. A small intense child can grow into a calm adult. Once a label is slapped onto that child it will likely impact her entire life with the possibility of her not being able to grow into a calm adult. I don't understand why any parent would want to do that to their child, box them into a set of characteristics like that.
With all the variations of humans in the world, it seems that there is hardly a "norm", especially outside of the school system. Why make a disorder out of a human variable? Celebrating differences and what makes a child special and unique is great and can be a huge focus in unschooling simply by the sheer fact that the child isn't in a classroom of other kids expected to fit into a specific way of being. If your child doesn't need to cancel out their personality in that way, a parent can focus more of their energy on helping that specific child learn how to get on in the world and find their place, their niche, their comfort. The only way I know how to do that is in a positive and happy way. It can't help but be positive and happy to help a child be the very best person they can be!
Putting a label onto a child is like ending a sentence before you've even formed the outline for the story you were about to write. It's not world expanding and world opening. It shuts people up, boxes them into a specific set of characteristics. Once that's done a child can be expected to behave according to that set of descriptions.
It's like the difference between living a Squidward life or a SpongeBob life.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
In that same hostile discussion at facebook, someone else said she never went back around "RU discussions" after her first visits, and that she respects her children's right to be the way they want to be, and that their family is FULL of labels, and depression. But by god, it's HER depression and it's nobody's business, and RU "dogma" is stupid. [The last sentence is my summary of all the rest; the first part was near paraphrase.]
I'm not going to send someone to her house or anything. Seriously, if people want to discuss unschooling they should come here, or find another place where people understand it, rather than reject it horribly while insisting they ARE unschoolers. But the sad part is that the sorrow, depression and hostility would dissolve if she/they cared more about finding joy than about defending depression.***
If kids grow up seeing the world in negative, pessimistic and dire ways, by the time they are teens and young adults, it will be very hard to help them change that way of thinking. The fact is, that labeling a kid can do all kinds of damage. Understanding human behavior is interesting. Labeling came out of the DSM, which stands for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for mental disorders. I'd like to emphasize the DIS in disorder. It implies that something is wrong with you. That manual is huge. I'm sure that there is a small percentage of the human population with real mental disorders.
What I don't like about labeling kids, is that kids change all the time. A small intense child can grow into a calm adult. Once a label is slapped onto that child it will likely impact her entire life with the possibility of her not being able to grow into a calm adult. I don't understand why any parent would want to do that to their child, box them into a set of characteristics like that.
With all the variations of humans in the world, it seems that there is hardly a "norm", especially outside of the school system. Why make a disorder out of a human variable? Celebrating differences and what makes a child special and unique is great and can be a huge focus in unschooling simply by the sheer fact that the child isn't in a classroom of other kids expected to fit into a specific way of being. If your child doesn't need to cancel out their personality in that way, a parent can focus more of their energy on helping that specific child learn how to get on in the world and find their place, their niche, their comfort. The only way I know how to do that is in a positive and happy way. It can't help but be positive and happy to help a child be the very best person they can be!
Putting a label onto a child is like ending a sentence before you've even formed the outline for the story you were about to write. It's not world expanding and world opening. It shuts people up, boxes them into a specific set of characteristics. Once that's done a child can be expected to behave according to that set of descriptions.
It's like the difference between living a Squidward life or a SpongeBob life.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]