Cornelia

Hello!
I was wondering if you might have some thoughts on where I could find some guidance for Deschooling as a parent. I was hoping for books or articles online or any other info which can help with this process.

If there is anything that addresses the issues raised by being an ex-boarding school unschooler I'd be very interested. Also, if there happened to be any ex-boarders on this list, I'd love to hear their experiences with this transition (and in general).
Many thanks,
Cornelia

plaidpanties666

http://sandradodd.com/deschooling

That's mostly about parents although it does touch on kids. The bulk of deschooling is about parents. Kids need time to decompress and heal, for sure, but adults need more than that, especially if we had kids in school or homeschooling for any length of time. At some point we bought into a whole lot of ideas (I know I did, and I think most parents do, too) about what's "good for children" (rules, structure, a good example, well rounded blah blah blah). So it takes time to work through all of that and figure out which parts of what we "know" actually make sense in real life and which are just those things that everyone knows because everone repeats ad nauseum.

Can't help you out with the boarding school aspect other than I suspect rebuilding trust and communication will be even bigger and harder than for other parents... although that's going to totally depend on what kind of relationship you and your kids had to begin with. If "home" was warm and comforting then working on keeping that feeling - that home is a refuge where people are kind and supportive.

---Meredith

Cornelia

Thank you Meredith!
Just to clarify - oh Lord no!! It wasnt my kids who went to boarding school!! It was me - I wanted to see if anyone had Deschooling the ex-boarder parent info, not the child. I don't think I'll be sending my children to boarding school anytime soon unless some strange circumstance arises I can't possibly imagine - eeeek!!
Cornelia

--- In [email protected], "plaidpanties666" <plaidpanties666@...> wrote:
>
> http://sandradodd.com/deschooling
>
> That's mostly about parents although it does touch on kids. The bulk of deschooling is about parents. Kids need time to decompress and heal, for sure, but adults need more than that, especially if we had kids in school or homeschooling for any length of time. At some point we bought into a whole lot of ideas (I know I did, and I think most parents do, too) about what's "good for children" (rules, structure, a good example, well rounded blah blah blah). So it takes time to work through all of that and figure out which parts of what we "know" actually make sense in real life and which are just those things that everyone knows because everone repeats ad nauseum.
>
> Can't help you out with the boarding school aspect other than I suspect rebuilding trust and communication will be even bigger and harder than for other parents... although that's going to totally depend on what kind of relationship you and your kids had to begin with. If "home" was warm and comforting then working on keeping that feeling - that home is a refuge where people are kind and supportive.
>
> ---Meredith
>

Schuyler

David went to boarding school. We drove past a day/boarding school today and he
got sad, not terribly, but a little bit. David really had a sense that there was
nothing good about boarding school. Nothing. His mom kept some of his school
reports and they ran him down in science among other things, he makes a living
as a lecturer at a medical school, as a scientist. It helps to have lots of
evidence of how wrong they were.

I think the kindness and generosity that he has with me and with our children
heals him. Loving life is a big part of his deschooling. Making choices about
when to eat, what to eat, those things are big kinds of freedom. I don't know
that he did anything specifically, but maybe boarding school was so awful for
him it wasn't anything he wanted to replicate with our children.

Schuyler



________________________________
From: Cornelia <corneliablik@...>
To: [email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, 15 December, 2010 15:44:07
Subject: [unschoolingbasics] Re: Deschooling the parent and/or ex-boarding
school


Thank you Meredith!
Just to clarify - oh Lord no!! It wasnt my kids who went to boarding school!! It
was me - I wanted to see if anyone had Deschooling the ex-boarder parent info,
not the child. I don't think I'll be sending my children to boarding school
anytime soon unless some strange circumstance arises I can't possibly imagine -
eeeek!!
Cornelia

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

Cornelia

Thank you for your post which I found very poignant and moving - I feel the same way about my experiences of school and also healing - in a way it has been helpfully extreme since I so clearly want to go down a different path with my own children that I have had to rethink it from scratch.
I suppose my question was because I feel like I have some holes in my experience of interacting with the world outside school (as a child) and would benefit from some guidance BUT having thought about it after your email I think that is just classical deschooling ie learning to trust myself & my own instincts & ideas from the inside out, rather than seeking external imput so much...still, I am interested in gathering information too as ideas all always helpful to chew on.
With thanks,
Cornelia (enjoying the snuggly cuddly twilight with my two little ones and cats, and husband, at home!!)

--- In [email protected], Schuyler <s.waynforth@...> wrote:
>
> David went to boarding school. We drove past a day/boarding school today and he
> got sad, not terribly, but a little bit. David really had a sense that there was
> nothing good about boarding school. Nothing. His mom kept some of his school
> reports and they ran him down in science among other things, he makes a living
> as a lecturer at a medical school, as a scientist. It helps to have lots of
> evidence of how wrong they were.
>
> I think the kindness and generosity that he has with me and with our children
> heals him. Loving life is a big part of his deschooling. Making choices about
> when to eat, what to eat, those things are big kinds of freedom. I don't know
> that he did anything specifically, but maybe boarding school was so awful for
> him it wasn't anything he wanted to replicate with our children.
>
> Schuyler
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Cornelia <corneliablik@...>
> To: [email protected]
> Sent: Wednesday, 15 December, 2010 15:44:07
> Subject: [unschoolingbasics] Re: Deschooling the parent and/or ex-boarding
> school
>
>
> Thank you Meredith!
> Just to clarify - oh Lord no!! It wasnt my kids who went to boarding school!! It
> was me - I wanted to see if anyone had Deschooling the ex-boarder parent info,
> not the child. I don't think I'll be sending my children to boarding school
> anytime soon unless some strange circumstance arises I can't possibly imagine -
> eeeek!!
> Cornelia
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>