Sandra Dodd

On a facebook page, only four mutual friends, newly friended; names removed except mine.
I'll comment later. I'm going to go buy breakfast food and then go to sleep early. I thought some people might have fun playing with the ideas in and about this exchange.

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Recently new to Unschooling mom:
Love this wisdom about chores and family harmony from my unschooling guru, Sandra Dodd.

http://www.sandradodd.com/chores/
Radical Ideas about Chores
Kids blossom and get bigger from doing adult things because they want to, instead of kid-things they have to do because they're small.

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Sandra Dodd ooooh... Thanks, but a lot of that writing is other people's, and the original ideas changed my life when I heard them, and I can't take credit for all of that! But I'm glad people are liking some of it!

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Person from the Past:
Fine and good if both parents are on board, but when one's agenda is to undermine everything "family," the kids learn the passive-aggressive power of refusing, being contrary and digging in heels. Unfortunately, this power dynamic can remain even after the negative parent is out of the home.

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Sandra Dodd:
Both parents need to be in agreement for most things in life--buying a car, a house, deciding where and whether kids will go to school. The ideas are for those who want the and can use them.

A book about building a house won't work for someone who doesn't own land and can't afford building supplies, but I think it's okay that "build your own house" books exist. I see no benefit in complaining about them.

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Person from the Past:
I guess I was just pointing out the obvious--that radical chores don't work for everyone.

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Sandra Dodd:
‎"Radical chores" isn't a good name for what those pages are talking about at all. There's discouragement there of even thinking of "chore," but to do things out of generosity and love.

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Person from the Past:
Whatever. I'm not up for splitting hairs, so I'll restate: "The concept does not work for everyone or in all situations."

BRIAN POLIKOWSKY

 
<<<<Whatever. I'm not up for splitting hairs, so I'll restate: "The concept does not work for everyone or in all situations.">>>

Work? what does she mean it does not work?
What is the measure that she has that following those ideas about chores in the home work or not?
 

Alex Polikowsky

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Pam Sorooshian

> >>>Whatever. I'm not up for splitting hairs, so I'll restate: "The concept
> does not work for everyone or in all situations.">>>


I think the concept she thinks we're talking about a clever way to get our
kids to do chores without it seeming like we're forcing them. She's saying
it won't work (they won't do them voluntarily) if one of the parents has
poisoned the atmosphere with negativity and the kids are already really
resistent.

Well, yeah, true.

But, I think the concept we're talking about has little to do with chores,
really, but is setting the stage for our kids to learn to be thoughtful,
responsible, kind, generous, careful.

We set the stage in various ways: modeling the characteristics we want our
children to develop is probably the most important. A necessary condition,
I think. We also are inviting - we welcome them to join us as WE behave
thoughtfully, responsibly, kindly, generously, and carefully. We give them
opportunities to experience how it feels to be that way (good, it feels
good). But ALL of this hinges on having a nonadversarial partnership type
of relationship with our kids in the first place.

-pam


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Schuyler

>>Person from the Past:
Whatever. I'm not up for splitting hairs, so I'll restate: "The concept does not work for everyone or in all situations."
<<
 
I'm not sure under what circumstances not forcing your child to do chores doesn't work. My memory of my childhood burdened with chores is that my mom worked harder to get me to make my bed than it would have taken her to do it on her own as a sweet gift that she offered to me. She made up chore charts for me in her beautiful penmanship with a space for each daily or weekly chore that I accomplished to be marked with a gold star. My brother and I had alternating dishes nights. On my night there were always words. Always a fight over when they were going to get done and what punishment I would achieve if I failed to do them in whatever time limit had been set. I cannot imagine that the kerfuffle surrounding my inability to take my chores as a joyful sharing of the burden of being a part of a family was less than the labour required to pick up my or my brother's slack.
 
I suppose my parents believed that they were instilling in me a work ethic that would carry me through my life. They weren't seeking to lessen their own burden but to raise my brother and I up with the knowledge of the effort involved in making a household run smoothly. Although that may have been a goal lost in the haze of their fury at my complete failure to do just one simple chore without it turning into a massive argument. Lots of what they did was fueled by a motivation to make me a better adult. Or to make my society a better society even if it was to my and my brother's cost. Childhood is a very transient experience, but adulthood lasts a lifetime, or something. I think that's an easy view to get lost in.

Chores don't make things easier. Not for anyone. If your life is too big for you to manage alone, find other ways to manage it, pare it down, hire folks to help, close off bits of it. Assigned work for your children won't instill in them any values, or it is unlikely to. I knew that doing dishes sucked. I knew that making a bed was pointless. I knew that mowing the lawn was a huge, huge task that made you hot and sweaty and wasn't worth the effort. David, who had no chores as a child, doesn't know the same truths. He sees things that need doing and he does them, because he doesn't want things to need doing. I don't know if his lack of chores or my surfeit of chores made it so, but I don't give Simon and Linnaea chores and find that if I ask them to help, they mostly say yes and move with a quick step to come and help. And if they say no, well, I was going to say we accept it, but yesterday Simon's back was needed to help push the car into the garage, so
no wasn't accepted. But he was willing to have us override his no without any complaint. I can't think of another time in recent memory where David or I have pushed Simon or Linnaea to do something that they had already refused to do. And I do believe the lack of a work requirement has made a difference in how willing they are to help.

I don't think chores work. I don't think it's a concept issue. I think it's a disconnect between what is being taught and what is being learned.

Schuyler



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Schuyler

Ahh, right. Maybe she read the quote "Kids blossom and get bigger from doing adult things because they want to, instead of kid-things they have to do because they're small." and interpreted it as some kind of chores in disguise thing.
 
It seems, from the whole exchange, that she was just sort of miserable at the idea of doing anything with her partner involved. And was blaming all disconnect that her children may have with her on her unhappy marriage. Goodness, I imagine that she was filling up her house and her children's experiences with at least as much bile as she was arguing that a disconnected partner might be doing.
 
Schuyler
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From: Pam Sorooshian  

> >>>Whatever. I'm not up for splitting hairs, so I'll restate: "The concept
> does not work for everyone or in all situations.">>>


I think the concept she thinks we're talking about a clever way to get our
kids to do chores without it seeming like we're forcing them. She's saying
it won't work (they won't do them voluntarily) if one of the parents has
poisoned the atmosphere with negativity and the kids are already really
resistent.

Well, yeah, true.

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Sandra Dodd

-=-I think the concept she thinks we're talking about a clever way to get our
kids to do chores without it seeming like we're forcing them. She's saying
it won't work (they won't do them voluntarily) if one of the parents has
poisoned the atmosphere with negativity and the kids are already really
resistent.-=-

And I have NO expectation whatsoever that she ever even clicked on the link.

When that person was around 12 or however many years ago in discussions elsewhere, she would say "No it won't" to just about every positive suggestion anyone ever wrote. Eventually, it seemed aimed at me, and she went off elsewhere and badmouthed me. She's not the only one who has done that.

Still, at my house, I was gathering all the best and most peaceful suggestions people were making in those discussions and adding them to our collection of ways to live more peacefully together. I LOVED the more peaceful, more gentle suggestions. I didn't scoff at ideas about being sweeter to kids. I tried to be sweeter to my kids, and to my husband. And now, years later, I'm still married, two of my kids are still home, we're all nice to each other, and one of those nay-sayers from years back shows up divorced, apparently not happy with her children, and still saying "not it won't" about what I've collected and made available.

The reason I posted there at all was to share credit, because the poster was giving all the credit to me.

There have been more posts there:


Page owner/original poster:
gently....softly...it's not about hair-splitting, it's about mind-shifting and reframing.


Another person:
Isn't refusing the *opposite* of passive-aggressive? Seems like pretty clear communication. But, if refusal's not allowed, or is seen as less valuable than yes, that can create a lot of negativity and strife. There's no 'digging in heels' if one's response is accepted.

Sandra Dodd

-=- yesterday Simon's back was needed to help push the car into the garage, so
no wasn't accepted. But he was willing to have us override his no without any complaint. I can't think of another time in recent memory where David or I have pushed Simon or Linnaea to do something that they had already refused to do. And I do believe the lack of a work requirement has made a difference in how willing they are to help. -=-

When I really need Marty (our current biggest strongest guy, though Keith's nearly recovered from his two shoulder surgeries in two years) I say "When you get a minute, I need you to do something for me."

Sometimes he will say, "Mom, I need your help."

Those things happen once in two months or so, and because I haven't ever pretended to "need" him, and I save it for when it really is something I can't do on my own, he doesn't roll his eyes or resist, he comes and helps me generously and fully.

When he says he needs my help, being a grown man as he is, I still don't say "You need to ask nicely" (because he DOES say it nicely), or you should ASK me, not tell me. Because I know that if he didn't actually need help he wouldn't ask.

That relationship is 23 years old now, and we know each other well, and trust each other. Every bit of positive thought, action and energy I have given to my relationship with Marty Dodd has paid off in the kind of person he is, in the peace with which he sleeps at night, and in his sweetness toward his dad and me. Someday he might be that sweet to Holly. :-) [Sometimes he has been.]

Sandra

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Sandra Dodd

-=-It seems, from the whole exchange, that she was just sort of miserable at the idea of doing anything with her partner involved. And was blaming all disconnect that her children may have with her on her unhappy marriage. Goodness, I imagine that she was filling up her house and her children's experiences with at least as much bile as she was arguing that a disconnected partner might be doing. -=-

Bingo.
That was my first thought.
As sharply resistant and negative as she has shown herself in homeschooling discussions over the years, could it be possible that her ex husband could have been "the negative parent"?

Another aspect of doing what needs to be done, in the whole large section on chores, is that being helpful and positive helps others around you learn to be that way, too. If someone whose negativity is so large that it's affecting people on other continents can think that her husband is "the negative parent," that was a TON of negativity in one place. What if she had started being sweet and positive earlier?

I have a friend who has been divorced three times, and has two grown children by her second husband, a guy she met in a bar. (Isn't the internet a MUCH better place to meet people than in dark bars?) The last time she visited, she was talking about the ordeal of helping her son move across the country, and one part of it was an unmade bed, the morning they were leaving and she said she wasn't going to make that bed for him, and she rolled her eyes when she told me the story. I said maybe if she had made beds for people over the years it would have been better. I actually said it. I didn't say the full thought which was "maybe your son would be nicer and you wouldn't be living all by yourself." That would be cruel, but I did say something. It seemed so sad and so obvious to me. She had never, ever, given generously. She always, still, measures and requires and shames.

Sandra

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Pam Laricchia

<< Those things happen once in two months or so, and because I haven't ever pretended to "need" him, and I save it for when it really is something I
can't do on my own, he doesn't roll his eyes or resist, he comes and helps me generously and fully. >>

I think this is a huge factor. Not manipulating them into doing things for you builds trust so they understand when you honestly want their help.
Whether or not *they* think you should need their help, they trust that when you ask, *you* believe you need their help. And they respond to that.

<< But he was willing to have us override his no without any complaint. I can't think of another time in recent memory where David or I have pushed
Simon or Linnaea to do something that they had already refused to do. >>

One of those rare occurrences happened last night for me. Let's see how long the story setup takes. LOL! I was at the dojo for my son's karate
classes. Before class, one of the mom's told me her daughter had bought a ticket to join us at a concert in a couple months (I drove dojo teens to a
trampoline birthday party last Saturday, she was with us, heard about the concert, and I offered her our last car spot if she wanted to come). The mom
was going on about how when they searched for tickets and lots of places said the show was 19+. I said I was pretty sure we'd have noticed that, and
that the notice about the venue change earlier in week had said old venue tickets would be honoured so I doubted it had changed. But she was pretty
adamant that at least the first venue was 19+ and I started to wonder.

I still had 2 hours of classes to wait, I knew the tickets, sitting at home pinned to our bulletin board in the kitchen, would say if there was a 19+
restriction. It was stuck rolling around in my mind so I decided to text my daughter Lissy (17) to ask her to look at our tickets. I explained to her
what the mom had said. Lissy was busily working in her room and here's how the conversation went ...

Lissy: I know where they are but I don't wannnnaaaa

Me: LOL!! Pretty please? I don't wanna worry. (I laughed first to acknowledge her "whiny" reaction, it's a funny, dramatic persona she can bring out
as needed. Not to belittle her for not wanting to stop what she was doing. It works well because she knows that.)

Lissy has sent you an image (she thought to take a pic of the tickets! proof beyond mere words: "All ages welcome.")

Me: You rock sooooo much!! I'll show her the pic. Love you!!!

Lissy: You too

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Yay! I asked her to do something for me that she didn't want to be interrupted to do, and I still rock. I know she understood the feeling of being
stuck with a gnawing and annoying almost worry. :-)

Pam

Jenny Cyphers

 ***Goodness, I imagine that she was filling up her house and her children's experiences with at least as much bile as she was arguing that a disconnected partner might be doing.***

That's what I was thinking too!  I couldn't find the thread on facebook, so I couldn't read all the rest of the stuff said to know anything about that person (granted, I didn't look very hard!).  What I do know without a doubt, is that even if the other partner is a real turd, one partner can make up for a lot of that by being sweet and kind and and creating an atmosphere and house of peace without or without help from anyone else.  People who are real turds probably won't stick around and if they do, then they may just come around from all that sweetness.  Clearly it can't hurt anyone to be kind and sweet.


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