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I have a question that may or may not have anything to do with the
unschooling viewpoint but here goes anyway ...

Do you all have a list of chores that you expect your children to
do? For instance, do you expect them to clean their room and do
their share of the work around the house ... even if it is just
taking the garbage down to the road or picking up their own gear and
not leave it for mom?

The reason I ask this is because I have a friend that is seriously
interested in the idea of unschooling but has real concerns about how
it would impact the needs of the family unit. Maybe I'm not saying
this completely right ... does the loose or non-existant "control" of
the child's education STOP when it comes to their responsible
participation in the everyday running of the family household?

Do you have consequences when they don't do their share of the
chores? Do they have tv or stereo taken away? Are these
consequences consistently enforced?

If they are, then how does that go back to not enforcing consequences
if the child doesn't do anything "constructive" towards his or her
education during the week. And I'm sure constructive isn't exactly
the right word to use either ... that definition and labels issue
again ... but how do you deal with the issue of being permissive in
their education and not being or being too permissive in their
participation in the family's life?

OK, I'm done now ... <sigh> ... the questions were just flying at me
from a friend and I didn't have a ready answer for her since I
unschool with just one of my four children and can live like that.
But, I know a bunch of unschoolers wouldn't agree that I was
unschooling since I'm not doing it with all my kids. Oh
raspberries ... I'm sure someone out of the 500 or so members on this
list understanding what I mean. I appreciate any constructive <grin>
feedback you can offer.

Kathy

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> Do you all have a list of chores that you expect your children to
> do? For instance, do you expect them to clean their room and do
> their share of the work around the house ... even if it is just
> taking the garbage down to the road or picking up their own gear and
> not leave it for mom?

We're talking philosophy here, not experience, 'cause my kids are young. But
chores or housekeeping to keep the house livable are different from chores
"cause they might as well learn now."

One is part of life, and one is part of schooling.

:-) diane