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http://unschoolingourselves.blogspot.com/2012/03/unschooling-them.html

unschooling them

Whether we decide to school, homeschool or unschool our children, we need to understand that schooling does not happen in the school establishment anyway. By the age of five or six, our children have already been schooled by their guardians, and to a great extent have already shaped their basic personality.
The establishment, in each country, is a mirror of the collective belief systems that its citizens have adopted. But now things are changing. We find that we need to connect on a global basis, more and more. The internet and technology in general has shown us that we are above all humans and inter-connected. Whatever happens at any random place in the world affects us all, at one point or another, sooner or later.
The issue is not to dismiss our cultures or our social characteristics, to deny our individuality. The real challenge right now is to connect through diversity, to embrace our differences and to have compassion. All add up to the larger picture, every individual contributes to the creation of the whole.
Are we prepared to accept this new challenge? Are we willing to leave our own comfort zones and reach out to other humans for the purpose of creating a world where each is accepted, each is respected through personal responsibility for our thoughts, feelings and actions?
We would like to contribute in our special way as parents and professionals, each in our field but also outside of it, to making this world a better place, our lives worth living and to leave it better than we received it. There are no “specialists”, for as soon as we believe we are, we limit ourselves to our knowing (which is always narrow, considering the unknown). We learn from our mistakes and appreciate life enough to rise above our believed limits. We contribute to one another but ultimately We guide ourselves. Thus, we have a greater responsibility to our children. We give them who we are. 

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Tags: comfort, ourselves, unschooling, zone

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Comment by xristiana on April 22, 2012 at 2:07am

I couldn't agree with you more. That is why unschooling or anything that we want for our children, begins with us. Parenting is the most important "job" and sacred role that we take on (in my opinion). It begins with our own inner child and our relationship with it. http://unschoolingourselves.blogspot.com/2012/03/what-about-us.html

Comment by Meredith on April 21, 2012 at 5:05pm

I should be clear that I don't mean material resources necessarily. Time is a resource - parents who don't have time can't be involved with their kids (that's something which can hinge on material resources, though, for some). Parents who lack confidence can't extend much trust. Parents who have experienced a lot of hurt may not be able to express caring in ways that feel good to children. Parents who have felt helpless too many times aren't as likely to allow children to explore. Those kinds of resources are pretty important to unschooling. 

Comment by xristiana on April 21, 2012 at 7:36am

I'm not so sure that it is resources so much that are needed as caring, involvement and trust. Children, when allowed to explore themselves and life from the very beginning, as is the natural thing to do, amazingly find ways to learn and never lose their interest in exploring, expanding and changing. But yes, that's just my knowing, based on three children and a whole lot of students, both adults and children. Each person is different and should be allowed and supported to following their own truth. Thank you for the comment.

Comment by Meredith on April 21, 2012 at 7:07am

Schooling most certainly does happen in schools, the trouble is that schooling isn't the same as education - and neither schooling nor education are necessarily beneficial to learning. What schools and education can be, sometimes, are resources - but not every person needs the same resources. Unschooling allows families to create different sets of resources which are helpful to the individual members of that family... provided the family has the resources to unschool, which not every family does. 

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