Happy Birthday Brennan

Brenny turned 12 yesterday! I remember his birth vividly...
He is now as tall as me, looking me in the eye...

He was my easiest birth, anyone who knows me knows that birthing is not easy. So out of 4 his was the best because he actually wanted to come out :)

All my kids are unique as I know everyone's are, their births are just the beginning. Actually pregnancy is the beginning, they have unique personalities in the womb.

I love you buddy, you are awesome!

School? No way...

Everyday I see more news about how schools are banning this and forcing that. The latest was about the little plastic bracelets that kids wear. They are distracting them from learning.
Pay attention!

Schools are constantly taking away anything that promotes individuality, creativity or just plain free time play.

So many have cut recess to just a few minutes, no talking at lunch, no talking in the bathroom...

I don't know about you but I sure can't sit there and pay attention to dribble that I have no interest in...

They wonder how homeschool kids will socialize? Remember being told repeatedly that we weren't there to socialize?

It's ironic... really... and sad, oh so sad.

Kids are holed up in prison and expected to perform, pay  attention and regurgitate on command. With no regards to individual learning style or personality,

We must all conform, we must all be vanilla...

I really do not hold high hopes for reform. I truly believe the whole system is corrupt and the only way to fix it is to break it down and  rebuild it.

Get rid of all the boards, I'm so sick of people thinking they know what your child NEEDS to know!

Get over yourself you do not know  what my kid needs or any other kid for that matter!

I'll tell you what kids need...

Love, security, freedom to learn, grow, play and choose...  Opportunity, choice, freedom...

They do not need curriculum or scopes and sequences to be compared to other kids.

Kids are people, they are individuals and should be respected and treated as such!

Some signs around the house

Baby bird

Here he is today, we found the eggs on April 1st. He will be ready to fly away soon. This is so cool, we have never witnessed the hatching to the flying. The kids check on him everyday.

Unschooling

There has been a huge influx of media attention lately, unfortunately it's mostly negative. It paints unschoolers as neglectful parents whose kids will grow up to be failures.

I don't have all of the links and I don't really care to link them. Anyone who is on the internet lately has seen them for sure.

I don't want unschooling in the mainstream media. The masses are dumbed down, in the box and  indoctrinated. They can't even fathom that there are choices to be made. They see public school as the end all and be all to life. You can't possibly amount to anything if you aren't forced to be in prison for 12 years. You must be told what to do and what to think. We can't have free thinking people pursuing their own interests running amok.

We usually talk about what unschoolers don't do. We live as if school didn't exist. No grades, no tests, no curriculum, no forced lessons, no school period. We also don't follow arbitrary rules and limits imposed on us just for obedience.

We live and learn period! We do not need school, school is an artificial place that is never replicated in real life. Why people are so gung ho to say that school prepares you for life is beyond me.

We are living in the real world now, children are people now. They deserve to be treated as such. They deserve freedom to learn and grow and change and be who they are now, not what we think they should be in the future.

My friend Frank said *Unschoolers Do what they want*

Simple, yet true.

We learn about the world by living in it. We follow our interests wherever they may lead. We are happy, whole people just living our lives as if school didn't exist.

If that threatens you then you need to examine that and not put a negative spin on how we live because you don't have a clue.

Nature in our yard

This nest is in a bush in our front yard.

Here one egg hatched.This is one week later.

It's amazing how fast they grow. The mama leaves and comes back, she watches us from the roof. We pose no threat to her and her babies. We are waiting for the other eggs to hatch.

No school?

I've often thought of what it would be like if there were no school. What would people do with their kids? Would they actually make different choices? Better choices? Be more responsible?

Makes me wonder...

Society has been ingrained with the indoctrination of the public school system. The main point of the system is to control the masses. We can't have free thinking people out and about all day deciding what to to with their time.

The system is government daycare at best. People can't wait to unload their kid so they don't have to be responsible for them.

If this sounds harsh, tough, it's how I feel, what I think from years of observing parents.

Yes, there are some great involved parents who still send their kids to school. Why? I have no idea.

Having to work is no excuse. There are many single parent homeschoolers and many dual working parents. Be creative, find a way to work so your kids don't have to be put in school.

I actually don't think teaching should be a profession. Look at what it is today. Teachers have to follow the school boards orders. Now they are pushing more and more  testing and teachers being compensated by student test scores.

That is absolutely ridiculous!

Tests are meaningless, degrading and harmful. They have no measure of true knowledge, some people are great test takers and can bullshit through even though they don't know the answers.

The system is seriously flawed and politicians think more money and more standards are the answer.
Well it isn't the answer. It doesn't work! The system is broken and has been for as long as I can remember, it's just getting worse.

More and more people are homeschooling these days but so many never will.

Schools as we know them should be banned. They should be some sort of cooperative learning center where people can choose what they want to learn, how and when. Of course this would mean being responsible and trusting people. There needs to be some sort of option for those that would never homeschool.

This will not happen anytime soon because people are used to being controlled, coerced, punished and rewarded.

I believe that too many people just don't think about the fact that the school system owns their kids. Kids deserve to grow and learn and be free to choose and be respected as people.

Kids do not belong in school wasting away their precious youth and being forcefed useless facts to regurgitate on demand.

Learning is natural and not something that needs to be forced. We don't need to be taught how to read and write, we can and do learn without instruction.

In this age of the internet, information is a click away, we can find out anything we want, we can learn about anything we want. School is an outdated institution.

Schooling takes away the natural ability, it makes learning a chore and something that has to be taught by a master.

School is damaging our youth, look around you.

I wish people would wake up!

I wish parents were responsible and respectful.

George Carlin Proud Parent Bumper Stickers

More John Holt

"We destroy the love of learning in children, which is so strong when they are small, by encouraging and compelling them to work for petty and contemptible rewards, gold stars, or papers marked 100 and tacked to the wall, or A's on report cards, or honor rolls, or dean's lists, or Phi Beta Kappa keys, in short, for the ignoble satisfaction of feeling that they are better than someone else."

Satire or not The Onion nailed it!

http://www.theonion.com/articles/increasing-number-of-parents-opting-to-have-childr,17159/

Law and Order CI

I just watched an old episode from 2004, I think...

Controlling dad, post partum depressed mom with 4 kids under 7....

Oh my God! It was awesome and awful!

All she wanted was to be a good mother. He controlled her, he made schedules, he encouraged HOMEschooling!

He discouraged therapy and treatment for PPD.

So she decides to kill herself and take her kids with her. Except she and her oldest survive and the 3 little ones die.

I know this is fiction but how many times do we hear of PPD or murder suicide or homeschooling wackos????

This episode just tugged at me....

The controlling man.... I don't go for those... I want to smack them upside the head.

He manipulated his wife, he made her think she wasn't good enough, she couldn't live up to his schedule of expectations, she was clinically depressed.

I had 4 kids in 7 years, I know what it's like. I had some PPD after the third, not realizing it at the time...

Of course I don't have an asshole for a husband!

Unconscious Mutterings

1. Burrito :: Mexican, beef
2. Spike :: Lee, heels
3. Tougher :: I'm tougher than you think
4. Mock :: Don't mock me
5. Slurp :: Slurpee
6. Knock :: knock, who's there?
7. Conference :: Unschooling conference, I would love to attend someday
8. Madness :: I love the madness
9. Minds :: powerful minds, criminal minds
10. Connection :: Everything is a connection,

Luna Nina

Boomerangs

More of Jared's creations.

Jared's airplanes

Jared made several paper airplanes and here are some of them. He has the Russian military and the US Military. He looked up the words in Russian and wrote it on the side of the plane.

No title?

I get myself into discussions and feel misunderstood. For me, it would be easier if we were sitting next to each other having a conversation. I have gotten better at written communication but I am not a prolific writer and I tend to really try to get to the point and lose a lot between head and fingers.

This whole unschooling thing, trying to discuss it, what it is, what it isn't...

I have my own opinions and you can disagree with me all you want.

If there were no school, there would be no unschooling. It would just be living :)

I abhor the system, and if people want to hold on and cling to it and try to be unschoolers and still use the system, who am I to tell them not to?

The truth is I am a rare breed and I want absolutely nothing to do with the system period.

It irritates the hell out of me that the government thinks they have rights to my children and what and how my children learn.

We live and learn as if school didn't exist. It's so simple to me yet apparantly so complex to many.

I would do away with the system, it proves useless, damaging and completely dysfunctional.

The focus on money, tests, grades and standards is wrong.
What about the children?

They are people, they deserve to be trusted and respected, they deserve to have free reign over their own minds and bodies.

The fact that you have to ask permission to pee is appalling.

Control the masses, that is the purpose of school, it has nothing to do with education or real learning.

I  know that the school system generates over 50% of the GNP I can't recall the actual number. It would totally screw up society as we know it if school just stopped.

Think about what happens when a traffic light goes out. The sheeples don't know what to do, confusion and accidents ensue because people are so used to be told what to do and when to do it. When left to actually think for themselves and problem solve they are clueless.

Yes there are exceptions to this, I'm one of them and I know several who are. The sad truth is that the masses are dumb and can't think for themselves.

Why continue to support a  system that is truly detrimental to our society?

Don't know, I want no part of it.

If more people actually stood up or withdrew from the system it would fall.

Unschooling

There seems to be a *thing* about what unschooling is, who is an unschooler, what's the difference between unschooling and radical unschooling?

I have written many times about my take on this.

It seems that the people who get their panties in a wad about some of us trying to *define* unschooling are the ones who aren't really unschooling.

I really don't care what you do. My concern comes in when people say thay are unschoolers BUT...

Either you are or you aren't. It's really simple for me, black and white. I know it's not that simple for all.

Why do people want to join the unschooling movement and still hold on to schoolish ways? I don't know the answer to that. They are the ones who muddy the waters, they are ones who confuse newbies, they are the ones who say I'm an unschooler not an unparent.

Hello!!!!
We parent in partnership not as authoritarian adversaries.
We are parents, we are unschoolers. Unparenting is neglect, plain and simple.
So many things are just plain to me.

I have completely DEschooled, I have no more school hang ups. If you don't deschool you will never unschool.

If you hold on to  anything from the school model you won't unschool.
You need to step away, exam, shift your paradigm. Be a bold, non -conformist, just let go.


You need to deschool and leave your kids alone. Do not impose your hang ups on them!

Kids learn naturally until they are forced otherwise.

Get over yourself and let your kids live and learn in freedom.

Learning is as natural as breathing and my 4 always UNschooled kids are proof of that.

So unschooling means something, it's not do whatever and call it unschooling.

John Holt first coined the term and he meant no school. Unschooling means no schooling whatsover and so much more.

Educate yourself!

Jared's city

I tried to get it in one picture but it didn't look right.

Unconscious Mutterings

1. Suitcase :: pack for a trip
2. Exhaust :: tail pipe
3. Olympics :: sports
4. Video :: game
5. Cargo :: ship
6. Previously :: before
7. Wild card :: jack
8. Artificial :: school is artificial, unschooling is natural
9. Gambling :: betting
10. Exhibition :: game

Luna Nina

John Holt quote

Education... now seems to me perhaps the most authoritarian and dangerous of all the social inventions of mankind. It is the deepest foundation of the modern slave state, in which most people feel themselves to be nothing but producers, consumers, spectators, and 'fans,' driven more and more, in all parts of their lives, by greed, envy, and fear. My concern is not to improve 'education' but to do away with it, to end the ugly and antihuman business of people-shaping and to allow and help people to shape themselves.

Peri-Menopause support

I started a group on facebook and it's up to 52 members.

Please join us if you are experiencing the hormonal issues of peri menopause.

Peri- menopause support

If we aren't  facebook friends, look me up, follow the widget in the sidebar I just added.