Chris Ester wrote:
As an early unschooler, I grabbed the big roll of paper and taped it on the wall and let my daughter rip. I spent time watching her draw and drawing with her. Now, on reflection, I might have asked her to only draw in a specific place and painted it with really scrubbable paint. I would have still drawn with her and at some point I would have invited my children to help me scrub the walls (not required them, just invited) so that I wasn't the only one having the fun. We would have sung songs about scrubbing the wall (this is the way we scrub the wall...). This might have failed and I might have ended up with crayon all over the walls of my home, and we would have had to gotten out the big roll of paper and have a wall scrubbing party.... But either way, there would not have been a little girl who was shamed or punished for exploring the world with crayons.this is part of a longer quote, with a link to the original, here: Babies
Karen James wrote:
That painting on my son's wall started when he had an idea. He grabbed a ladder from our garage. He grabbed some paint from my stash. He painted some. I painted some. He told me what he wanted to see...an apple tree, a robin, a raven, some sunflowers. Now it covers half of his room, and he loves that place. You never know where their inspiration will take them. You never know where it will take you if you are bold enough to follow!I remember when Ethan was around three. I left the room very briefly to answer the phone. We had been drawing. As I was talking I heard, "Circles. Circles." I came out to see what he was doing to find him drawing big circles on a freshly painted wall. His circles I could paint over at any time. I still had lots of that colour of paint. That pride at drawing big beautiful shapes I could never recapture at any cost if I had have chosen to scold him. He turned to me all smiles. He had discovered circles. I had rediscovered what exuberant learning looked like.
"A magical fish ate a mummy seaweed and a daddy seaweed and nibbled a baby seaweed. Some magic got into the baby seaweed and changed him into a magical sea creature."
Brie Jontry Feb 17, 2012
Noor learned a lot about various adobe programs simply by using them and also watching videos on YouTube. Eventually, she wanted more than what she was figuring out on her own (she was 7 at the time), so we looked high and low for someone who'd work with her in a way that matched what we know about her and the way she learns. Easier said than done! We ended up finding the perfect person, but he lives thousands of miles away. Not at all a problem thanks to Skype. Honestly, I don't think it seems even slightly odd to my 8yo "digital native"I'm happy to sing the praises of Daniel Phillip Moyer Artisan from here to eternity! Feel free to message me, if interested in my gushing.
There are some things I'm more than capable of learning alongside Noor, and others which I can't wrap my head around. That's where Daniel comes in; our lives have been made so much richer as a result.
