I was interviewed here by Heather Sedlock, who writes a column entitled Special Needs kids 101.  Recently she was asked:

“Dear Heather,

I am considering homeschooling my daughter and came across a concept called “unschooling.” Is this the same as homeschooling? What is it about? It seems it’s about just living life and the kids aren’t actually taught anything. What do the kids do all day? Do you know anything about this?

Thanks, Tina”

I hope we answered Tina’s questions.  Like I wrote in my post, Defining Unschooling, it can be a fairly tricky lifestyle to describe.

I hope we did a pretty good job.  Enjoy!

The War on Kids is a documentary directed by Cevin Soling and presented by Spectacle Films.  It is a film that focuses on the injustices to children that are happening everyday in school.  It dives deep into the problems that exists concerning zero tolerance policies, security systems, the war on drugs, administrators and teachers, pharmaceuticals, public education, homework, and socialization.

Early on in the documentary we are told that children are assumed to do bad things unless they are absolutely controlled.  Or are we reminded?  Not so much when I was a child, but present day schools have adopted zero tolerance policies on weapons, drugs and alcohol. The War on Kids gives a multitude of examples of children being arrested, handcuffed, fingerprinted, and dragged out of school for seemingly minor infractions.  Children are being suspended for spit wads, pointing their fingers like guns, for having magic markers and Midol because administrators think they should “err on the side of caution.”

In the lesson on Zero-tolerance we see appalling, yet real comparisons drawn between a school and a low security prison.  Both are a policed institution, complete with metal detectors and security cameras.  For those who may not see it, it brings to light the destructive effects that controlling a child’s waking moments, thoughts, actions, appetite and body functions can have on a young person.

Especially important and insightful is the segment on pharmaceuticals.  It brings to light a lot of interesting and abhorrent facts concerning the drugging of our children.  The parents, the doctors and the teachers who drug children in order to force them to be someone other than who they are should be ashamed of themselves.  Drugs like Ritalin, and Adderall (and anti-depressants) destroy a child’s brain and immune system.  It causes depression, anxiety, stunted growth, obsessive compulsive disorder, psychosis, permanent ticks and in the worst cases suicide and death.  All in the name of  behaving, sitting still, and paying attention?  Really?

While I feel that knowing about atrocities like the ones shown in the film is important, I do not believe that school can be reformed.  The way the institutions run require these failures.  It’s fuel for more funding, more studies, more testing, and more control.  It keeps the school reformers focused on school reform and not the actual problem, the institution itself.  Children, human beings, should not be controlled any more than you or I.  While the film shows many extreme examples, like the shooting in Columbine or the SWAT team raid in Goose Creek, SC, it’s not wrong in making these assumptions about all public schools.  It’s worth noting that at my small high school in Vermont (which incidentally has a VERY LOW crime rate) my father was allowed to smoke cigarettes on the steps in his youth.   The next decade saw the school system stopping kids from leaving during the day, in the following decade stopped them from hanging out in certain areas, and a few years later built a fence to keep students on the grounds.  After I graduated, the students saw new security cameras  installed that even point at the bathrooms.  They already have a “resource officer” (policeman) so what’s next?

It also includes interview footage with John Taylor Gatto, and some other familiar names in the anti-school crowd.  I definitely recommend it. However, please know that it’s a strong film with extreme views and heart-wrenching footage.  It’s a warning for the future.  If schools continue on this path they will be freeing prisoners rather than graduating students.   Many already are.

Starring:

• Skylar
• Mia
• Layla
• Otto

In 1 week’s time we’re all getting on a plane and flying to Sandusky, OH for the Unschooler’s Winter Waterpark Gathering. We’ve been every year since 2008, the very first year. This year TJ and I are speaking in addition to some volunteering.

Here is a partial description from the program.

Modeling is For Clay: Real Kids Need Real Life, Right Now

TJ has been helping other dads by facilitating SSUD’s meetings. Heather recently spoke about their experiences at the Enjoy Life Unschooling conference in Frederick, MD. Heather also blogs about their experiences at: www.swissarmywife.net.

They will be leading a presentation: “Modeling is For Clay: Real Kids Need Real Life, Right Now”. When speaking of the word modeling, it is often misconstrued as a way to shape our children’s behavior. Let’s talk about modeling yourself for a change! Do you act in a way that you expect your children not to? Or, do you model good behavior in hopes that your children will mimic your actions? Let’s talk about you and how your children see you. Let’s lower our expectations, discuss why we shouldn’t be modeling and why we should be living authentically and in the moment.

This year the keynote speaker is John Taylor Gatto, author of several books, including Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Public Schooling. I’m honored to be speaking at the same conference as him and some other Unschooling gurus I have always admired. A couple of my favorite families, Ben and Kelly Lovejoy and Broc and Gail Higgins! Other speakers include: Laura Buoni, Debra Bures, Zoa Conner, Julie Cook, Dayna Martin, Laura Flynn Endres, Cindy Murphree, Cindy Gaddis, Jessie Voigts, and Demi Wirtz

I’m super excited for this, and feel so honored and so blessed to be sharing with conference attendees. TJ will also be facilitating the SSUD’s (Secret Society of Unschooling Dads) meeting. Who’s going? Leave me a comment! Don’t forget to say hi if you see us!!!

http://www.ugo.unschoolgathering.com

Remember Reagan?  My brother’s hopeless ass-wipe of a rescue dog that couldn’t stop shitting in every room of my new house?  Yeah that’s her.  Often, I really, really don’t like her.  Yet, just when I think it couldn’t get any worse, she manages to amuse the hatred right out of my body.

Shane (my brother) found himself a new apartment and moved out last week.  I’m glad to see him get his own space, but I do miss him.  Honestly, the only stress I felt while he was here concerned Reagan.  After hell-week over the holidays I’ve never really felt like I could trust her out of my sight.  For Christmas I got Shane a dog breed DNA test kit. We all just had to know why she sucked so badly at being a dog.

The whole time Shane was staying here we waited for those results. Everytime we checked the mail, we hoped those results would be in. We were SURE she was at least part Dachshund. I was sure she was not a Corgi but was definitely part Chihuahua. We joked that she was probably half German Shepherd. Well, the results came in the other day. Nothing could have prepared us for what they said. Our little 15lb Reagan is part: (in order from left to right on the photo) Maltese, German Shepherd, Saluki, Irish Setter, Belgian Tervuren, Chihuahua, Pembroke Welsh Corgi, and Chinese Shar Pei.

What the…??? I can barely believe my eyes, still. It’s so fascinating and amusing and downright amazing. I highly recommend the DNA test for anyone with a mixed breed dog.  You can find the instructions in PDF form here.  At first glance, with 13 steps it can look quite complicated, but really you are just swabbing the inside of your dogs mouth, and placing it into a sterile package for testing.  When we got the results, the kids and I spent some time researching dog breeds and enjoyed lots of laughter together! Now, when Shane brings her for a walk, or I bring her to the dog park we can proudly state that she is a German Shepherd mix.

Last night we all hopped in the Suburban to go to Michael’s.  The kids need some modeling clay and set material for stop motion films.  The Michael’s here is big, laid out pretty well.  They carry a lot more interesting products too.  I’m pretty excited they are having a sale on canvasses as I’ve been wanting to start painting.  Oil or Acrylic?  It all seems to be in the eye of the painter.  I’ve painted with acrylic before, I’d really like to set myself up with oils.  I was  also able to replace the tempera paint that froze and clumped during the move.  While the red looked like lumpy paint, the yellow was reminiscent of newborn baby poop.  Definitely in need of new paint.  I can’t ever get out of that store without at least 5 things I didn’t plan on and without spending t least 20 dollars more than I had intended!

JoAnne’s was across the street.  The kids had all fallen asleep so it was just Skylar and I.  I left TJ with the sleeping babes in the car and Skylar and I ventured into fabric heaven to find something new for our chairs.  They are old and dingy and have been through things I don’t even want to mention.  I *will* mention the paint and marker and the food spills and the holes.  It’s time.  They need to be recovered.  I poured over a lot of fabric not really finding what I was looking for.  I’ve been on a green and purple kick for awhile so I sort of wanted something with both colors.  I also wanted something busy so that paint or food spills wouldn’t show up too bad.  Lastly, something bright and happy but not loud!  I think I managed to succeed in everything I was looking for except it doesn’t have purple.  It has pink instead!

When I finally got to the counter with my cut fabric and slip, the cashier said “That will be 5 dollars and 36 cents.”  I just looked at her and said, “Seriously!?”.  I didn’t notice it was on sale, but even so I just bought 4 yards of fabric for 5 dollars and 36 cents.  Score!!!

After we had our party the other day I woke up in the morning to see the mess and said, “Wow!  My house looks happy!”  In the fabric store I described some fabrics as looking “angry” or “loud”.  After I covered the chairs I noticed that they looked “happy” and “inviting”.  This actually brought up an interesting conversation with Skylar.  He didn’t really understand what I was saying.  He says that houses and fabrics and chairs can’t be “happy” or “loud”.  He is an extremely literal child.  In the past I had to be extremely clear with my words to him or he wouldn’t understand me.  This is the first time it came up in a long time and I’m glad it did.  It was fun explaining to him that I thought if the house were alive it would happy that people partied in it!  Also, that if the fabric had a voice, it would be screaming!

Oh and… the chairs really ARE inviting. Shortly after I finished I came into the kitchen and the table looked like this!

“There’s a somewhat dichotomy between schooling & unschooling because one is where one is really well defined and the other is more open ended. Both are testament to their pedagogical nature.”

This came to me in a couple of Tweets yesterday.  First of all, I hate the word pedagogical.  It doesn’t really roll off the tongue nicely.  It causes sort of a gagging sound in the back of my mouth and causes me to try and keep repeating it until it doesn’t.  When I looked it up for verification I found that pedagogy is the science of instruction, and often refers to instructional style.  While  I can’t wrap my brain around the term “science of instruction” I do understand different instructional styles.  Unschooling is not an “instructional style”, and really should not be classified as one of them.  The problem with this is that most people can not see past adults having authority and control over children.  It’s extremely foreign to the mainstream to think that children might actually be anything but students.  The mainstream educational system incites many parents into thinking that children do not want to learn, will not and can not learn outside of a mainstream curriculum.  This couldn’t be further from the truth.  Unschooling children and teens learn in much the same way that babies and toddlers do before they are stuck in school.  Naturally, organically and through their own curiosity.  It is near impossible to *NOT* learn in today’s society.  This is the age of information and technology!

One of the problems with trying to define Radical Unschooling is that there is no simple answer.    If you give someone a definition you inevitably leave some other aspect out.  Some definitions give the wrong impressions, like child-led learning.  I don’t really like this one because I’ve heard of people not offering up anything interesting to their children because they think the child needs to think of it.  Some think unschooling is simply the lack of curriculum and freedom of academics.  But how can a child exercise his innate curiosity if he isn’t given the same right to explore life and be free from others control?

There is no one right way to unschool.  In timely fashion, Danielle Conger said on a list this morning, “…no such thing exists. (If someone says it does, I say they’re selling you snake oil.)” You can’t give an instruction booklet to living life.  If you closed your eyes, and imagined a world where institutionalized schools did not exist in any form, what would you see?  I see freedom.  Real freedom.  It’s not a theory or a feeling, it’s real and the freedom to learn whatever you want, whenever you want is undeniably valuable.  Still, it’s not just learning, it’s doing, seeing, touching, hearing, tasting, and feeling.  It’s living.

Radical Unschooling is less about an educational philosophy and more about freedom and not rehashing all those mistakes our parents made on us.  It’s living a full and interesting life, and not getting in the way of our children’s passions.  It’s providing our children with as much information as we can without the expectation that they learn it.  It’s about supporting their passions and going the extra mile to make sure they have access to what they need to explore that passion to the fullest.  It’s about the individual child, and knowing that he/she is a human being and cannot fit into a mold.  It’s about parenting, remembering what it’s like to be a child, and working hard to not spew the nonsense that was spewed upon us as children.  It’s about learning from others before us, and passing the knowledge to those after us.  It’s an organic life.  It just happens and it’s near impossible to not enjoy it.

Learning happens all the time and there is no reason it needs to be separated into neat little subjects.  Learning doesn’t have to be named or even noticed.  *GASP!*  It just is.  It’s happening, whether you like it or not.  When learning is forced upon children, they lose that curiosity and that zest for life.  They stop asking questions and start looking for a way out.  Life doesn’t stop at 3pm, so why should learning?

I’m watching my newly turned 5 year old learn to read.  He’s not learning alone, yet I am *not* teaching him.  He asks a lot of questions about letters and their arrangements.  He recognizes the shapes of some words.  He asks other adults in his life or that we meet together.  He is learning by using the computer, and playing video games.  He is learning to read because he lives in a text rich society with literate people.  He is learning to read right on schedule… HIS schedule.  It’s because he *wants* to read and he knows just how to get the information he needs, and he is needing it now.  Some children do not need this information until they are 10 or maybe 12.  They are all different and require different information at different times.  It is amazing, yet foreseeable because I trust that he will learn to read, when he needs to.  If I did not trust him to read, he would know that, and I would be getting in his way of his learning process.

Just like life, Radical Unschooling cannot be defined in simple terms.  It is there, to be contemplated, to be discussed, to be learned, and to be questioned.  It can be simple at times and more complicated at others.  We can learn from ourselves and we can learn from others.  We should not and most of could not being doing it alone.  The only common factor is our children and our unquestionable devotion to our relationships with them and their well being.

The last few days have been for socializing.  On Saturday we invited Ronnie and Frank Maier and their girls, and Dana Ellis and her family over for a small pot luck dinner.  We have also become friends with a local homeschooling family with 2 girls and invited them too.  We had a GREAT time.  Good food, good wine, good friends.  I couldn’t ask for anything more.  And when Milo came up the stairs and exclaimed, “We have new fwends!”, my heart couldn’t have been happier.  He’s really been missing friends.  He isn’t quite old enough to put his finger on who he misses for friends, but he knows he was missing playmates and companionship.  He’s even put aside his aversion to girls and is enjoying our new friends Layla and Mia.  Dana brought us some of her famous coffee, She’s roasts and sells at farmer’s markets in her area, and it’s really good!  Even TJ who doesn’t really discern different coffee much , was surprised how delicious it was.

It was Layla’s birthday last night and they all invited us to an artisan ice cream shop called Full Tilt.  I’m a basic vanilla gal and enjoyed mine with rainbow sprinkles of course!  TJ tried the mexican chocolate which has a deep chocolatey flavor with a hint of cinnamon.    They also carry Ube (a sort of sweet potato), Horchata, and Memphis King which is peanut butter, banana, and chocolate covered bacon!  They’ll even let you create a flavor if you have your birthday party there! I can only imagine what *my* kids would pick! In addition to the ice cream they serve local beer, sometimes host local bands, and is home to a slew of vintage pinball and video games which I think they rotate out on occasion.  The kids had a blast and I was thrilled to see arcade games that cost a quarter to play!  Just like old times!  The guy working at the counter, which I’m pretty sure was the owner, was also really friendly with us and the kids.  That’s also important to me.  I can’t count how many times we’ve gone somewhere and the employees treat the kids like a nuisance.  I love when my boys can interact with with people in the community.  It’s so important for them to see how the world works. Through meeting others around us they learn about so many different things. We all can’t wait to go back!

I guess that’s a silly question because you certainly *can* fail. Fail Blog has proved this in 365 pages and counting. Not only can you fail, you can also EPIC fail as proved by Epic Fail in 121 pages and counting. Obviously, these sites are for amusement and don’t exactly represent the failure I am speaking of. I’m really talking about that deep rooted sense of pure failure. What the question shortens up is, “What would you do if you weren’t taught since you were a tiny little child to fear the possibility of failure?”

The culture of school (and many an adolescence) tells us that there are only two options. We either Pass or we Fail. Of course there are sometimes varying degrees of Pass, but a Fail pretty much feels the same no matter how bad. It doesn’t matter how you sugarcoat grading systems either. My younger twin siblings, now 16, received a 1,2,3, or a 4 as a grade in Intermediate school as an attempt to do away with the stigma of grades. I can’t imagine that 1 felt much different than the F other kids are getting. I’m also quite certain that it’s an insult to a child’s intelligence when you tell him he didn’t fail just because he got a Frog and everyone else got an Alligator.

One evening a few nights ago I was sitting in our Suburban at the grocery store watching a young man, maybe 16, collect carts from the parking lot. He looked bored and unhappy and I immediately became curious about his real dreams. What it was he *really* wanted to do and why he wasn’t doing it? I’d be awfully surprised if he said “collecting grocery carts from a parking lot”. Why is it more important to just get any old job than to seek that which which brings you joy? Who knows, that might lead into a job doing what you love! Almost unheard of!

Our life is almost a grand experiment. I say almost because there are many who have traveled down this road before. Our life is free from grades, tests, scores, or having to “measure up” in some way. Any pressure my kids feel to succeed is a pressure they have chosen to put on themselves. I use Skylar’s love of wrestling as an example. He chooses to be there and to compete because it’s fun for him. It’s human nature to seek joy. However, after spending a lifetime in an institution that is constantly testing you, grading you, and urging you to measure up it becomes near impossible to even remember what you love to do. The fear of failure practically cancels out freedom of choice. My hope for my children is that they grow up and live their adult lives doing what brings them satisfaction and joy. I hope their decisions aren’t impeded by fear but, supported by a love of learning.

A recent Facebook status of a friend asked, “…I know most of you have careers etc. but if money/education/starting over wasn’t an issue, what would you be if you could do it all over?” I replied that it wasn’t, and is never too late to follow her dreams. However, I immediately wondered what caused this person to head down a path they were second guessing. Then a few others posted their dream jobs. Many people take life and career paths that aren’t their first choice because they have a need for measurable success. Often it’s someone else, like a teacher or a parent, who has defined for them what it means to be successful.

I suggest that failure doesn’t exist. It only exists in the minds of those who project it and those who fear it. Failure is a state of mind, not a fact. Dr. Judith Rich published an article in the Huffington Post that suggests, “No matter how complicated and difficult the dance on the tightrope may seem, remember, Love is always present. There is nothing to fear. You cannot fall. Rest in this Love.” The article although somewhat abstract, encourages us to step out of the box, love ourselves, and try something different. She asks, “And what about you? What if you knew you could not fail? What dance would you be dancing right now in your life? And what are you waiting for?”

I’ve decided to migrate this winter.  Not only from Vermont to Washington, but from Blogspot to Wordpress.  I’ve been meaning to do this for quite some time but the very thought of it caused meltdowns of epic proportions a little stress.  I didn’t have the time or the brain capacity to handle all the work involved and I was really afraid I’d lose content.  Now that we are all settled into our new home I decided to just go for it.  With the help of my sexy, knife wielding, super hero of a husband, the blog migration was fairly painless.  If you were a follower at blogspot, I *think* you will have to resign-up for upates on the right, and please bear with me as we make improvements.  If you are a new reader then please use one of the options on the right to follow me.

So yeah, follow me.  Or else…