It’s 11:55 on a Saturday night. In just about 5 minutes, my husband will turn 42. For the last 15 years, I’ve had the privilege of sharing those birthdays with him. But not tomorrow. Tomorrow he will be winging his way to sunny Florida on business, while I keep the home fires burning. As I […]
Shhh…It’s a Secret
Okay, so it won’t really be a secret now – but for the past six months it has been. Given that my daughter Katy has barely been able to keep our soon-to-arrive guinea pig a secret for 2 days, I think six months is pretty impressive! Of course, I do have 33 years on her, […]
Farewell, Sweet Cactus
Those of you who checked my status on facebook yesterday have already heard the sad news. Faith’s cactus is now among the dearly departed. Surprisingly, the sad passing of our cactus is not actually a recent event. The plant should have received its last rites and undergone funeral services at least a month ago. But […]
Lucky 100: A Post About Posts
My last post, Unschooling: Who Takes Care of Mom?, was my 100th post on unschoolers.org! It’s been a two-year long journey since I sat in this very same spot writing my very first post, It’s a Wonderful Life – under protest. As my visionary of a husband likes to point out, this entire website was […]
Unschooling: Who Takes Care of Mom?
Today it was my turn to come down with the mild cold that my kids had last week – only for me, it was clearly shaping up to be not so mild. I got up, gave the kids breakfast, and got Katy ready for her play date with my mom. After her departure, I surveyed […]
Saying Sorry in Silence
Earlier this week, I had the remarkable experience of seeing how powerfully my own “inner story” affected my daughter, Katy. Yesterday, I had yet another amazing experience: witnessing the power of a silent “I’m sorry”. These days, my son Thomas tends to be the most mellow of my bunch. But yesterday, I could tell something […]
Peaceful Parenting: It’s All in my Head
My daughter Katy reminds me very much of myself. Nowhere is this more apparent than when she has what many people would call a “meltdown”. I remember what it felt like at her age to experience such enormous, strong emotions. Being a “spirited” child, I experienced all of my emotions intensely, including my anger. Back […]
An Unschooling Twist on Worksheets
Friends of ours recently gave us a bunch of old workbooks their kids had outgrown, and today I pulled one out just out of curiosity. It was kind of cute, using classic literature and incorporating a few skill-based worksheets. As I flipped through the pages, Faith’s eye fell on some cut outs of farm animals […]
Kohn: No Need for Rewards
…if your objective is to get long-term quality in the workplace, to help students become careful thinkers and self-directed learners, or to support children in developing good values, then rewards, like punishments, are absolutely useless. In fact, as we are beginning to see, they are worse than useless – they are actually counterproductive. -Alfie Kohn, […]
Say Goodbye to Standards: how unschoolers learn what they need, when they want
Because I’ve yet to entirely vanquish the schoolteacher in my head, every once in a while I find myself perusing the school system’s scope and sequence. This is a weighty document that spells out everything a child in a particular grade is supposed to have covered, and – with any luck – mastered. Eight years […]