Sandra's report on the conference (part 2)
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After that video discussion I stood and talked with Kathy Ward and another
couple of people for a while, and that was really pleasant.
At lunchtime I went to the appointed place to meet with some people from the
Always Learning list for lunch. Eight altogether, and it was perfect.
Then Richard Prystowsky and I did our joint workshop, which is becoming a
tradition. This year we did "Peaceful Parenting."
But here's the exciting part for me:
Frank Smith was there, the author of The Book of Learning and Forgetting (and
other books, including a new one about math-learning.
A few years ago, Laura Derrick pressed me to read that book and I whimpered
and she bought a copy and laid it on me and said READ. She was right.
So Frank Smith was the second speaker Saturday morning, part of the
keynote/intro stuff, and he was wonderful. Spoke without notes, clearly,
simply, sincerely and directly. I was mightily impressed.
So the weekend whizzed by, I played recorder with Carol Narigon in the talent
show, and later did a ballad with a singalong part (words calligraphed by me
years ago on a long paper banner, held by Pam Sorooshian's daughter Roxana
who knew the song, and her assistants), talked with lots of people, laughed,
played...
Sunday spoke twice, went to lunch (already told that part, but I'm coming to
a new aspect.
When we were sitting to talk at lunch, Laura Derrick was just beaming. She
had something to say. It was this: "Frank Smith talked about you in his
session."
After the initial presentation, there were two Frank Smith question/answer
sessions, one on Saturday and one on Sunday at 9:15.
The 9:15 was in the same room where I had spoken earlier.
Someone else in the lunch group (Meghan? Pam Hartley?) had heard it too and
said someone asked him what he had thought of my session and he said he had
really liked it, especially the bit about not defining "science" and
"history" (or some such, and his sessions weren't taped so I can't double
check).
I hadn't even seen that he was in my session, which makes me think maybe
there were more than sixty people, or he was sitting behind someone bigger.
And he mentioned me two other times in that session on his own, after the
initial question.
So that was pretty cool.
When I was speaking with Richard I saw Frank Smith was in the audience! We
had a turns-taking schedule and about twenty minutes in when I knew Richard
had a ten minute segment coming up, I went to refill my water, and get him an
extra one. While I was at the water table, Mr./Dr./Prof. whatever he is
Smith rushed over to the table (not knowing, I guess, I was going to fill up
two glasses and stall around anyway), and shook my hand VERY warmly and said
he wanted to tell me how much he enjoyed my unschooling talk, and I thanked
him and said I was flattered to hear he had mentioned me. He kinda shrugged
shyly and politely and we talked about him being in this session, and I went
on back.
He left about 2/3 of the way through it, but that's fine because except for
an early mention of Maslow's heirarchy of needs and people needing to feel
safe and secure in order to learn well, the rest wasn't about learning but
about parenting and family life.
My personal favorite type of homeschooling exchange is online bulletin
boards, because people can get a variety of answers and some discussion on
those answers without leaving home. I like writing because it can be used
twice.
But I know some people really like and need the visual and aural input of a
live speaker. And the energy of that many homeschoolers (very many
unschoolers in the case of the HSC conference) and their VERY fun kids all
around is another kind of input that can give people months of wondrous
confidence.
So I think a conference can be a boost to unschooling confidence that's just
not available otherwise.
Conferences have an aspect that's like a party. It can't be entirely
predicted or guaranteed how the electricity of the combination of people will
flow, but when it's good it's GREAT and when it's slow it's still an
opportunity to hear a variety of in-person voices and see dads interacting
with their kids, and to see the vendors' stuff in person and to see people's
eyes when they speak.
As parties go, this year's HSC conference was a bubbly happy one!!
Sandra
share
with us. How was the conference you attended/presented at? >>
After that video discussion I stood and talked with Kathy Ward and another
couple of people for a while, and that was really pleasant.
At lunchtime I went to the appointed place to meet with some people from the
Always Learning list for lunch. Eight altogether, and it was perfect.
Then Richard Prystowsky and I did our joint workshop, which is becoming a
tradition. This year we did "Peaceful Parenting."
But here's the exciting part for me:
Frank Smith was there, the author of The Book of Learning and Forgetting (and
other books, including a new one about math-learning.
A few years ago, Laura Derrick pressed me to read that book and I whimpered
and she bought a copy and laid it on me and said READ. She was right.
So Frank Smith was the second speaker Saturday morning, part of the
keynote/intro stuff, and he was wonderful. Spoke without notes, clearly,
simply, sincerely and directly. I was mightily impressed.
So the weekend whizzed by, I played recorder with Carol Narigon in the talent
show, and later did a ballad with a singalong part (words calligraphed by me
years ago on a long paper banner, held by Pam Sorooshian's daughter Roxana
who knew the song, and her assistants), talked with lots of people, laughed,
played...
Sunday spoke twice, went to lunch (already told that part, but I'm coming to
a new aspect.
When we were sitting to talk at lunch, Laura Derrick was just beaming. She
had something to say. It was this: "Frank Smith talked about you in his
session."
After the initial presentation, there were two Frank Smith question/answer
sessions, one on Saturday and one on Sunday at 9:15.
The 9:15 was in the same room where I had spoken earlier.
Someone else in the lunch group (Meghan? Pam Hartley?) had heard it too and
said someone asked him what he had thought of my session and he said he had
really liked it, especially the bit about not defining "science" and
"history" (or some such, and his sessions weren't taped so I can't double
check).
I hadn't even seen that he was in my session, which makes me think maybe
there were more than sixty people, or he was sitting behind someone bigger.
And he mentioned me two other times in that session on his own, after the
initial question.
So that was pretty cool.
When I was speaking with Richard I saw Frank Smith was in the audience! We
had a turns-taking schedule and about twenty minutes in when I knew Richard
had a ten minute segment coming up, I went to refill my water, and get him an
extra one. While I was at the water table, Mr./Dr./Prof. whatever he is
Smith rushed over to the table (not knowing, I guess, I was going to fill up
two glasses and stall around anyway), and shook my hand VERY warmly and said
he wanted to tell me how much he enjoyed my unschooling talk, and I thanked
him and said I was flattered to hear he had mentioned me. He kinda shrugged
shyly and politely and we talked about him being in this session, and I went
on back.
He left about 2/3 of the way through it, but that's fine because except for
an early mention of Maslow's heirarchy of needs and people needing to feel
safe and secure in order to learn well, the rest wasn't about learning but
about parenting and family life.
My personal favorite type of homeschooling exchange is online bulletin
boards, because people can get a variety of answers and some discussion on
those answers without leaving home. I like writing because it can be used
twice.
But I know some people really like and need the visual and aural input of a
live speaker. And the energy of that many homeschoolers (very many
unschoolers in the case of the HSC conference) and their VERY fun kids all
around is another kind of input that can give people months of wondrous
confidence.
So I think a conference can be a boost to unschooling confidence that's just
not available otherwise.
Conferences have an aspect that's like a party. It can't be entirely
predicted or guaranteed how the electricity of the combination of people will
flow, but when it's good it's GREAT and when it's slow it's still an
opportunity to hear a variety of in-person voices and see dads interacting
with their kids, and to see the vendors' stuff in person and to see people's
eyes when they speak.
As parties go, this year's HSC conference was a bubbly happy one!!
Sandra