Brown

Annette,
You talk of patience:

> Hafidha wrote (very patiently I thought): "By lazy I mean the inclination to
> be inert."
>
> If one needs a definition of lazy, I have never seen a better one! This made
> me laugh out loud!

I think 'patiently' refers better to the parent who allows his / her child the
space to come to activity on their own. I have never seen an unschooled child
(and rarely a schooled child) who has an 'inclination to be inert'. This
description would only apply to a child who had had all initiative beaten out of
them (literally or figuratively) by adults. Non-action is not necessarily
inertness or laziness. Some people are thinkers, and some take a lot longer to
get through thinking. I don't believe it is possible to know what is happenning
inside someone else's head. You ask a kid 'what are you thinking about?' and
s/he answers 'nothing', you may think s/he is being lazy or inert, I would
assume that they didn't want to talk to me about it.

In my experience, a 'bored' child left alone to be bored (still talk to them but
don't nag), trusted to come through, will eventually burst forth in activity and
creativity, often into a totally new interest.

IMO it is, yet again, a matter of trusting our children - and being able to keep
trusting, sometimes for a looong time.

Carol