zenmomma *

>>One question, I have noticed that by my children's investigating-
when they see something interesting they are all for checking it out
but quickly get bored or don't want to go in depth.>>

Don't assume that kids are looking for a lot of depth each time they express
an interest in something. While some of them do get caught up in great
interests (Pokemon, historical fiction, rockets, dinosaurs, etc.) lots of
others are satisfied with the short answer while quickly moving on to the
next quetion. But those quick little interests and those quick little
answers will help create meaning in your child's big picture of the world.
Another piece in their puzzle of the universe, to use PamS's analogy.

>>How do you keep up b/c I find myself getting these great ideas only to
>>find myself left in the dust and they have moved on.>>

Well if it really is interesting, then keep on with it for yourself!
Learning is not just for the kids. :o)

Life is good.
~Mary



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Leslie Avery

I have a about to turn 20 year old who is not sure
what direction he wishes to go, right now he is into
writing music, which is okay by me after having a
terrible career in the school system. (I took him out
at the age of 17). My husband's company will not
cover him under their insurance plan because I have no
documentation stating he is enrolled in a "school".

Any suggestions would be very helpful.

Leslie
>
>
>
>
_________________________________________________________________
> MSN Photos is the easiest way to share and print
> your photos:
> http://photos.msn.com/support/worldwide.aspx
>
>


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[email protected]

In a message dated 8/14/02 8:15:34 AM, ljbakavery@... writes:

<< My husband's company will not
cover him under their insurance plan because I have no
documentation stating he is enrolled in a "school". >>

The cost of unschooling is the loss of those kinds of benefits.
We won't have the "good student" discount when our kids drive. Oh well.

If insurance is more it's still way cheaper than tuition or even the expenses
related to public school if they're in sports, theatre, music, after-school
Japanese (going through the list of their friends' extra-curriular stuff...)

Sandra

joanna514

>
> If insurance is more it's still way cheaper than tuition or even
the expenses
> related to public school if they're in sports, theatre, music,
after-school
> Japanese (going through the list of their friends' extra-curriular
stuff...)
>
> Sandra

On the news last night they did a report on the expense of "back to
school" items. Clothing and supplies ran an average of $250 per
child.
One lady with 5(4 school aged) boys being interviewed said she was up
to $1000. They gave a web site to go to for advice on keeping the
cost down this year.
Joanna

marji

At 15:22 8/14/02 +0000, Joanna wrote:

>One lady with 5(4 school aged) boys being interviewed said she was up
>to $1000. They gave a web site to go to for advice on keeping the
>cost down this year.


Oh, yes! I know that site!! It was www.unschooling.com , right? ;-)

~marji~ (who is almost always lurking but constantly learning and
benefiting from this list! Thanks to everyone for the gems!)


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

KT

A full time job with benefits?

My young adults work if they want anything more than basic food and
shelter--and they at least have to have plans for the immediate future.
I won't even give them rides if they're not working. It seems harsh,
but it's a work ethic thing that I was raised with that I just can't shake.

Tuck

Leslie Avery wrote:

>I have a about to turn 20 year old who is not sure
>what direction he wishes to go, right now he is into
>writing music, which is okay by me after having a
>terrible career in the school system. (I took him out
>at the age of 17). My husband's company will not
>cover him under their insurance plan because I have no
>documentation stating he is enrolled in a "school".
>
>Any suggestions would be very helpful.
>
>Leslie
>
>>
>>
>>
>_________________________________________________________________
>
>>MSN Photos is the easiest way to share and print
>>your photos:
>>http://photos.msn.com/support/worldwide.aspx
>>
>>
>
>
>__________________________________________________
>Do You Yahoo!?
>HotJobs - Search Thousands of New Jobs
>http://www.hotjobs.com
>
>
>~~~~ Don't forget! If you change topics, change the subject line! ~~~~
>
>If you have questions, concerns or problems with this list, please email the moderator, Joyce Fetteroll (fetteroll@...), or the list owner, Helen Hegener (HEM-Editor@...).
>
>To unsubscribe from this group, click on the following link or address an email to:
>[email protected]
>
>Visit the Unschooling website: http://www.unschooling.com
>
>Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
>

KT

>
>
>If insurance is more it's still way cheaper than tuition or even the expenses
>related to public school if they're in sports, theatre, music, after-school
>Japanese (going through the list of their friends' extra-curriular stuff...)
>

But he's almost TWENTY. He should be working, at the very least.

Tuck

kayb85

My oldest is only 9, so I don't have any experience here, but
something about that doesn't sit right with me. I don't know exactly
what...maybe I'm thinking that a child raised with unschooling should
*according to my theory* lol find a way to contribute to society and
his family without being told that he HAS to go out and "get a job".

I know my husband sure wouldn't go to work if he didn't have to and
looks forward to 18 years from now when he can retire at the age of
50. But he wasn't raised with unschooling. He was raised to grow
up, graduate from highschool, and get a job.

Shouldn't it be different for unschoolers?

Sheila

--- In Unschooling-dotcom@y..., KT <Tuck@m...> wrote:
> A full time job with benefits?
>
> My young adults work if they want anything more than basic food and
> shelter--and they at least have to have plans for the immediate
future.
> I won't even give them rides if they're not working. It seems
harsh,
> but it's a work ethic thing that I was raised with that I just
can't shake.
>
> Tuck
>
> Leslie Avery wrote:
>
> >I have a about to turn 20 year old who is not sure
> >what direction he wishes to go, right now he is into
> >writing music, which is okay by me after having a
> >terrible career in the school system. (I took him out
> >at the age of 17). My husband's company will not
> >cover him under their insurance plan because I have no
> >documentation stating he is enrolled in a "school".
> >
> >Any suggestions would be very helpful.
> >
> >Leslie
> >
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >_________________________________________________________________
> >
> >>MSN Photos is the easiest way to share and print
> >>your photos:
> >>http://photos.msn.com/support/worldwide.aspx
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> >__________________________________________________
> >Do You Yahoo!?
> >HotJobs - Search Thousands of New Jobs
> >http://www.hotjobs.com
> >
> >
> >~~~~ Don't forget! If you change topics, change the subject line!
~~~~
> >
> >If you have questions, concerns or problems with this list, please
email the moderator, Joyce Fetteroll (fetteroll@e...), or the list
owner, Helen Hegener (HEM-Editor@h...).
> >
> >To unsubscribe from this group, click on the following link or
address an email to:
> >Unschooling-dotcom-unsubscribe@y...
> >
> >Visit the Unschooling website: http://www.unschooling.com
> >
> >Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
> >
> >
> >

Tia Leschke

>
>
>On the news last night they did a report on the expense of "back to
>school" items. Clothing and supplies ran an average of $250 per
>child.

That's absurd. One thing I never did when I had kids in school was to buy
a whole pile of new clothes at the start of the year. One new outfit . . .
maybe. They grow, for Pete's sake. When they needed new clothes is when
they got them. Well, maybe not new before their teens, but new to them.
Tia

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt
*********************************************
Tia Leschke
leschke@...
On Vancouver Island

Tia Leschke

>
>But he's almost TWENTY. He should be working, at the very least.

Wasn't this the kid who had gone to school? We let a couple of our
(formerly) schooled kids have some time to unschool their way into life
after they left school. (These were the ones whose other parent opposed
homeschooling.) I think it did them a lot of good. What's so magic about
age 19 that a kid automatically has to be grown up and out into the working
world by then? We aren't supposed to worry if a kid isn't reading by some
certain age. Why should they be ready to work by a certain age? I've even
heard of some parents who were willing to support their kid away from home
but not in college during the "college years" if they were doing anything
that could lead to a career.

I think chucking a kid out of the house at a certain age to make it on
their own is something like throwing a kid in the water so he'll learn to swim.
Tia

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt
*********************************************
Tia Leschke
leschke@...
On Vancouver Island

Tia Leschke

>I have a about to turn 20 year old who is not sure
>what direction he wishes to go, right now he is into
>writing music, which is okay by me after having a
>terrible career in the school system. (I took him out
>at the age of 17). My husband's company will not
>cover him under their insurance plan because I have no
>documentation stating he is enrolled in a "school".
>
>Any suggestions would be very helpful.

I wish I had some ideas for you, but I'm so glad I live in Canada, even
with its warty medical system.
Tia

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt
*********************************************
Tia Leschke
leschke@...
On Vancouver Island

kayb85

Health insurance is kind of like government money in some ways. When
they give out the money, they tell you what you can do with it. It's
all about them telling you what THEY think you should be doing. They
think it's good for kids to be in school, so they offer big
incentives to keep them in school. And they probably feel very self-
righteous about this "good" thing they're doing. Kind of like a
teacher handing out stickers for kids who learn their lessons well.

Schools train us to live in a world where we accept these kinds of
incentives. Unschoolers are going to have these things to deal with,
but the more we deal with them and inform others why we deal with
them differently, the better chance we have of having an impact on
the world.

I know we hardly use our health insurance at all now that our family
is being treated by a homeopath. The insurance won't pay for a cent
of it. They want to discourage anything other than allopathic
medicine.

I remember once when my insurance would have paid for a vaccination
but wouldn't pay for a blood test to see if the child was already
immune (turns out he was and didn't need the vaccination!) And when
I wanted to use infertility drugs, the insurance wouldn't pay for it
but they would've paid for an abortion. It's all about choice, and
insurance companies don't want to give it to us.
Sheila

--- In Unschooling-dotcom@y..., Tia Leschke <leschke@i...> wrote:
>
> >I have a about to turn 20 year old who is not sure
> >what direction he wishes to go, right now he is into
> >writing music, which is okay by me after having a
> >terrible career in the school system. (I took him out
> >at the age of 17). My husband's company will not
> >cover him under their insurance plan because I have no
> >documentation stating he is enrolled in a "school".
> >
> >Any suggestions would be very helpful.
>
> I wish I had some ideas for you, but I'm so glad I live in Canada,
even
> with its warty medical system.
> Tia
>
> No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
> Eleanor Roosevelt
> *********************************************
> Tia Leschke
> leschke@i...
> On Vancouver Island

[email protected]

<I don't know exactly
what...maybe I'm thinking that a child raised with unschooling should
*according to my theory* lol find a way to contribute to society and
his family without being told that he HAS to go out and "get a job". >


I remember reading that this young man was taken out of school at 17 and is
now 20. If my son needed some extra time to "grow up" after the societal
expectation of 18 as an adult, I would help him do so with love and support.
~Elissa Cleaveland
"It is nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction
have
not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry." A. Einstein

KT

>
>
>I know my husband sure wouldn't go to work if he didn't have to
>
That's just it, the part I can't shake.

I don't get a paycheck for what I do, yet I do a lot of work. I take
care of our 8 yo, I keep house (sporadically <g>), I do the finances. I
have mega-guilt sometimes and need constant reassurance from dh that
what I do is valid and valuable to him, even if I'm not bringing in a
paycheck.

It would be nice if I could simply allow my kids to "work on their
music" for the benefit of the greater good, (they might be next Elvis,
who knows?--one of them wants to be) but I don't think that benefits
them much at this point in time. They're not gifted in such a way that
would make giving up everything else for that greater good worthwhile.

One of the qualities that I value is independence. How can I foster
that in my young, able-bodied men if I allow them to be completely
dependent?

Don't get me wrong...there's no hard-and-fast rule in our house. Each
of my two older children are met by me at the point of their need. My
20 yo doesn't work as much as my 17 yo. They have different strengths
and weaknesses, and their goals and aspirations are different. I don't
treat them the same by any means. Different circumstances require
different reponses. But here is a minimum amount of participation in
the household and in the workforce that is required. The only harm I
see in it is that they haven't known the satisfaction of hard physical
labor, like I did when I was a teenager, and is the tradition in my
family (picking tomatoes, yard work, etc.). I think they're too soft,
but I let it go because they handle themselves maturely in other areas
and I believe they will know how to work hard when the time is right.

But that's the part I can't shake. Able bodied people should be working
and contributing to society in some way.

Tuck