Rockzipfel in Germany - Coworking w/ children

Johanna

17 Jul 2009, at 5:26am

Hello there, some of you might remember me: Johanna from Germany.

In Leipzig, Germany, we've just created a place called "Rockzipfel".

Rockzipfel is a coworking space for parents. This pioneering coworking office is open for (attachment) parents and children, inspired by Liedloff, Scott Noelle, Unschooling, TCS and many other brilliant people like you!

I've just uploaded a summary on our project and wanted to let you know - not only because we need your help, but also to spread the word. I've been involved in this project for a long time now to make it happen - and I encourage parents to do the same!

We need your help. Please visit our summary in English:

http://www.rockzipfel-leipzig.de/welcome-to-rockzipfel

(The rest of the website is in German... but you can take a look at the pictures at the starting page!)

Thanks and greetings from Germany
Johanna

PS. if you have questions on our project or need help initiating one - we'll be glad to help!

Johanna

17 Jul 2009, at 5:26am

Lori

18 Jul 2009, at 12:45pm

This is most likely a bogus email. Currently, it is illegal to home teach your children in Germany, let alone unschool.

Recently, a family left Germany in order to avoid prosecution for not sending their children to school. In light of this information, I doubt that this request for help is legitimate.

Lori in Michigan

Rue Kream

18 Jul 2009, at 5:52pm

>> In light of this information, I doubt that this request for help is

legitimate.

**Hi Lori - While you are correct that it is currently illegal to
homeschool in Germany, this is a legitimate request. Johanna is German
and is active in the unschooling community. ~Rue

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

Johanna

18 Jul 2009, at 7:38pm

> >> In light of this information, I doubt that this request for help is
> legitimate.
>
> **Hi Lori - While you are correct that it is currently illegal to
> homeschool in Germany, this is a legitimate request. Johanna is German
> and is active in the unschooling community. ~Rue

Oh, sorry, I see how that could be confusing. That's true, unfortunately, we can't unschool. We can only...

- do it anyway and risk being caught, paying fees or even have our children brought to school BY POLICE FORCE (madness!)
- do it anyway and try not get caught (I know a few who have done that, but I don't dare myself)
- some Germans manage to get their children into some school officially, but their kids are not really in there. Problem is, the kids have to lie and stay inside the house for the typical school hours
- some Germans do it anyway, and openly try to discuss it with the media, with the courts etc. Only a few pioneers (like the "Neubronner's", they are probably known to some of you) dare to, because it is time consuming and needs a lot of courage (and money)...
- some try some kind of part-time thing: let the kids go to school, don't force homework or fake it yourself (I did that for a while, wrote that silly stuff myself, left handed so it would look like my daughter's!), let them stay at home if they want and write notes to the teacher saying they're sick...
- some have to move outside the country (which is sad, because it thinnens our movement. All those courageous people have to leave he country, and then obviously to the media and decission-makers it looks "there is not enough demand"... madness!)
- some move to bigger cities and try to get a place in one of the rare "free schools" where at least the children can learn "free", like "unschooling in a building", mostly with more or less democratic structures (which is at the end not really free because you have to go anyway and some "teachers" who are supposed to trust and only help on demand... can't let it go *sigh*, that's where we are right now - at the verge of leaving the country - again *sigh*)

That's all for my 10-year-old daughter. I have two other kids, 3 and 1, whith whom I try to work at the parents-kids-office "Rockzipfel" :-) and for who I initiated this project.

I also work for the "unerzogen Magazin", a print magazine which promotes and informs about Unschooling, Homeschooling or better: just the freedomg of choice for one's own education, as well as attachment/respectful parenting, free/democratic schools etc. Our magazine has issued articles from many of those pioneering unschoolers that you all know well over there:

(All in German)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/aktuelle_ausgabe/?view=ad&aid=111 I
Interview with Rue Kream on Money/Pocketmoney (free)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=31&mid=2
Interview with Joyce Fetteroll on "Yes-Environment" (free)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=4&mid=1
Interview with Kelly Lovejoy on Organic Learning ("Don't poor children in poor countries who can't go to school (and stay uneducated) prove that Unschooling doesn't work?") (free)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=83&mid=5
Article from Sandra Dodd on maths (she's gonna put it on her website, too)

Check them out to see their pictures in their "bio"-box ;P :)

(not for free but for a small fee via paypal are the following:)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/aktuelle_ausgabe/?view=ad&aid=116
Dayna Martin on Radical Unschooling

(the following are from German authors...)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/aktuelle_ausgabe/?view=ad&aid=118
Unschooling Travel report (Southamerica)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=103&mid=6
How to reconcile Unschooling and Jobs (of the parents)

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=82&mid=5
Unschooling & maths

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=67&mid=4
Unschooling & learning to read

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=50&mid=3
How does learning with Unschooling "work"?

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=51&mid=3
Interview with Rina Groeneveld, Unschooling family sometimes living in Germany

http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/archiv/?view=ad&aid=3&mid=1
What's unschooling?

And here you can see me: http://www.unerzogen-magazin.de/download/?b=false&artID=17

The third from the left ;)

----

We're a young movement :) Be patient with us.. we'll get there! And now go help Rockzipfel! ;) (just kidding... no need to help us from that far away. With my last e-Mail I primarily wanted to reach the ones who know me from the time I was active here (that's about 2 or 3 years ago)... and with this email I just wanted to make sure that you all know about the German movement, so that if at some point some German finds her way here and doesn't know about a movement in Germany, you can tell her about us. I'm too busy to be reading here nowadays :).

Also, the idea behind "Rockzipfel" is just so cool, maybe it might come in handy for someone out here seeking for solutions to their problems concerning (co)working and children and all that... Maybe then we can exchange experiences :-)

Greetings
Johanna

http://www.rockzipfel-leipzig.de/welcome-to-rockzipfel

Ren Allen

19 Jul 2009, at 12:37am

--- In [email protected], "Lori" <aldrichnine@...> wrote:

>
> This is most likely a bogus email. Currently, it is illegal to home teach your children in Germany, let alone unschool.
>
> Recently, a family left Germany in order to avoid prosecution for not sending their children to school. In light of this information, I doubt that this request for help is legitimate.
>
> Lori in Michigan
>

I know Johanna, she's been an active member here in the past. You are correct that it IS illegal to homeschool in Germany, which is why they are creatively finding ways to support their children in spite of the limitations of law.

Ren
radicalunschooling.blogspot.com

melanie kuhn

19 Jul 2009, at 3:44am

hello All

I know exactly what you are talking about, I am a German and we just ran away form Germany 2 years ago because of that!!!

I was able to home school my kids for 4 years because my husband is an American and he use to work for the armed forces in Germany.

After he's job came to an end, he had to clear the base and therefore I lost the right to home school .

They made a new law at that time , that kids must attend Kindergarten if their can't speak german well.

Of course I had to bring my daughter there and that is how they found out that I was home schooling my oldest sons

and then the trouble started :(

I was fighting with the authorities , who were forcing me to put my kids in to school. we went back and forward and they gave me a break for 6 months and I had to prove I was schooling my kids, so at that time I had to bring the work books form calvert school to them , to show what I'm doing.

Oh my, we told them we going to send your kids to the UK , at first we had to lie. So they left us alone.

But it was so stressful , to lie and hide.

Anyways we got tired of being hunt down and havening to lie.

We moved to the Uk for 2 months and after that my husband got a job in the middle east .

so we ended up here in Qatar , right next to Saudi .

And it is great nobody is asking you , what are you doing with your kids , or what are you not doing with your kids.

We are finally free !!!

I wish all the best to all those parents that are fighting the system and hope it will change someday!!!

Melanie Kuhn

To: [email protected]
From: dialog@...
Date: Sat, 18 Jul 2009 23:38:51 +0000
Subject: [unschoolingbasics] Re: Rockzipfel in Germany - Coworking w/ children

> >> In light of this information, I doubt that this request for help is
> legitimate.
>
> **Hi Lori - While you are correct that it is currently illegal to
> homeschool in Germany, this is a legitimate request. Johanna is German
> and is active in the unschooling community. ~Rue