I haven't been feeling much inspiration lately in terms of blog writing, which I'm hoping will sort itself out soon, but in the meantime I wanted to share something written by someone else with you guys... I know that a large percentage of the readers of this blog are very interested in unschooling, so a while back when my sister Emi was having a written debate with some friends and let me read it, I asked her, since she doesn't blog herself, if I could share what she'd written on my blog. She said yes, which I am very thankful for! It got lost and forgotten about entirely for a while, but she kindly dug it up for me when I asked her to! Keep in mind this was written at something ridiculous like 2 or 3 at night, so I've fixed the typos that are unavoidable at that time of night (morning?), as well as editing out the names of those involved in the debate!
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First, to (name removed): I don't understand how you can say you 'don't see how far in life you could get in unschooling'. I know people who have gotten through their entire lives (or at least their lives so far, up to the age of thirty-something, in the case of the oldest unschooler I know), and done just fine. Well, more then fine; really well, actually^^. So yes, you can get through life wonderfully being unschooled, that has been proven by many people.
People in high school get to choose their own paths only to an extent. While you are in high school, you must take certain classes and follow certain rules. You have much less freedom then an unschooled person. You can choose your own path once you leave high school, but by that point most (don't jump on me here, I'm saying most, not all) people have developed a narrow view of what their options are. Unschoolers (again, on a whole, not in the case of every individual), having lived free lives, can often see many more possibilities for how to live their lives, often not in the mainstream way most people do. And just to point out, by saying you choose your path by what classes you do well in, you're proving my point that you don't /really/ get to choose your own path. What if you'd never been interested in math, never done well in math class, then in your last year of high school you developed a burning passion for science and decided you wanted to be a scientist? Since you'd never done well in the math required, you'd probably just go into some other CEGEP course and never realize your dream of being a scientist. Whereas an unschooling person, who'd spent their entire lives knowing that they could learn what they want, when they want, and in whatever way they want, would find ways to learn math, then go into university taking science courses, and become a scientist like they wanted to be. Unschoolers have never had their education restricted by false notions that one has to learn certain things at certain points, or that certain doors become closed to you after certain points, all because of arbitrary rules.
As for coming into public school, I am wonderfully happy with being unschooled, so I don't want to try public school. The reason I suggested that you guys try unschooling is because I've gotten the impression from all of you that you're not happy with school. (I know for sure that two of you have directly said you dislike school to me before).
To (name removed): That 'well it works for you, but it wouldn't for everyone' argument is one I hear quite often, and it is a reasonable concern, but I disagree. It is true that by high school, there are indeed a lot of people who wouldn't know what to do with themselves without teachers telling them what to do. But that is because they've spent their entire life being instructed in how to spend their time, what to learn, what to do and what not to do, etc. All children are born with the instinct to learn. Babies touch things, put them in their mouths, mimic adults, and learn naturally. Toddlers still have that curiosity about the world, the urge to explore, to figure things out, and to ask questions. School puts a child in a classroom where they cannot learn naturally by interacting with the world, forces children to sit still and keep their hands to themselves, squashing their natural urges to learn. They aren't allowed to follow their particular interests and passions, they're not allowed to learn about what they love; instead, they're forced to learn a prescribed set of things, whether they find those things interesting or not. They're forced to learn for fear of disappointing their parents, being told that they've failed, being looked at as stupid by their peers. And through being forced to memorize facts that they don't want to, and by being kept from learning about the world in a natural way, that instinctive desire to learn is dampened and sometimes destroyed entirely. By the time a child reaches high school, chances are good that they don't know what to do with themselves without instruction. They probably have no desire to learn on their own, because learning is synonymous with work.
So in a way, you might be right; Maybe you would have no motivation to do anything, and maybe a lot of teens wouldn't. I know that I, for one, sometimes don't have much motivation either, but because of my natural tendencies towards laziness and procrastination, I've learned ways of dealing with that and motivating myself.
Also, it might be good to mention here that a lot of people, even by high school, would be motivated to learn about the things they're interested in. I'd bet the great majority of people wouldn't be motivated in the slightest to learn a lot of the stuff taught in school, and that's okay. People don't need to know everything taught in school to get by in life. You can argue that people do need most of what's taught in school to get by in life, but I know many, many people who were unschooled, learned little of what schools teach, and are now adults functioning well and earning money in the 'real world'.
As for your second point, you are assuming that everyone wants to go to CEGEP or trade school or get a job at that age. Some people give CEGEP a miss and go to university; some people give CEGEP and university a miss and never go to any sort of school; some people already know a trade, and don't need to go to trade school; some people do want to go into the traditional path of university or trade school, but want to spend some time getting used to the freedom that leaving school gives them, and just doing (and learning about) what they love before they follow that path. My point is, regardless of your age or how long it takes you to adjust to being out of school, it's never too late to leave.
Of your argument, the point of parents is the only point I agree with. Sadly, that is a huge reason that does stop people from unschooling. I just hope that more parents will be more open minded and put more trust in their children and their children's capabilities ^^.
To (name removed): First point, the world being anarchy would be better then it is now in my opinion, but that's a whole 'nother debate :P. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but basically you're agreeing that school is controlling and directs people onto certain mainstream, pre-determined paths, and that this is a good thing, because otherwise people wouldn't all work mindlessly in our current societal system. I'm honestly not trying to be snide here, but really, that seems like what you're saying, and I couldn't disagree more. To have a system that controls people and molds them into certain lifestyles that the government deems worthy is completely immoral, in my opinion. As for peoples' general stupidity, I believe that it is in good part because they have gone through a school system that discourages thinking outside the box and teaches obedience of authority without question. As I touched on before while replying to (name removed), if people were allowed to learn naturally from the world around them, they would (as a whole) develop into more open minded, thoughtful people who were better capable of handling new situations, new problems, and new ideas. I know that the people who are unschooled now are certainly all of those things.
Moving along, I find the term 'real schooling' kind of insulting. There is nothing less 'real' or valid about unschooling. Also, again to do with your phrasing, in my opinion nothing should be imposed on the masses, but once again let's leave that for another debate. You say that if school is not imposed on people, they will be ignorant and poor, but this is just not true. I don't know how many times I've said that I know lots of intelligent, well rounded, socially adept, money making unschoolers, but it seems I need to say it once more at least. Clearly, as thousands of unschooled people prove, unschooling does not breed ignorance or poverty. So why do you think, if more people were unschooled, that that would change? Unschoolers aren't some elite group of people who were genetically pre-determined to be motivated and intelligent; the lifestyle leads to those qualities. About not being taken seriously in the work force, again, that's just not true, and I feel the need to delve into a few different reasons why. First, no one puts 'unschooled' on their resume. If a person goes on to CEGEP and/or university, they would put those qualifications on a resume, and no potential employer would care what they'd done through their high school years. Ditto if they went on to trade school and acquired papers touting their qualifications there. Secondly, you are assuming that all unschoolers want to get traditional jobs and join the regular workforce, with is an incorrect assumption. Again, I draw on examples of unschoolers I know who are self-employed, people who have started their own businesses, who have become midwives or massage therapists or travel tour guides or one of any number of other nontraditional jobs. If an unschooler wants to make money through being self-employed, they can, and and if an unschooler wants to get a traditional job, they can go through university/trade school/courses to get what they need to get hired for that job. The key thing is that unschoolers know how to learn and accomplish things on their own, without being instructed or forced, so they're capable of taking whatever path they choose and doing well on that path.
In that whole first paragraph of yours, what you seem to be saying is that if everyone was unschooled, it would unbalance our current society. This is most likely true, and I think that a society that breeds such ignorance, bigotry, violence and poverty as ours does would be better off with the changes that free-thinking, open-minded, curious, competent unschoolers could bring to it.
On to your second paragraph! (Whoof, getting tired typing fingers here :P... Hope you guys are still reading and understanding all this... I'm falling asleep at the keyboard^^'!)
A child should not be pressured, by tools such as a marking system, into learning things that they do not want to learn. No one ever needs to be forced to learn; a person will learn what they need to live in our world without being forced. I cannot stress this point enough.
To address your last point: I will start by saying you have been extremely disrespectful in your comments, especially this last one. It seems to me you're saying unschoolers can't socially interact as well as people in public school. (It kills me a little inside to see people still using this ancient 'but if you don't go to school, you must be isolated and un-socialized!' argument -_-'). This is simply not true. Do you think I'm socially inept? I certainly know all my unschooled friends my age, and all my unschooled friends who are adults living in this 'real world' of which you speak so much are doing just fine socially. They interact with many people on a daily basis, they have friends and a social circle (or few), some of them do indeed work side by side with co-workers every day. And they are perfectly capable of doing so. It is perfectly possible, in fact easy, to socially network without school. Let me use the obvious examples of extra curricular activities, such as sports, cadets, guides, 4h clubs, etc. etc. etc. Also through community, getting to know your neighbors and (in the case of teens and kids) people in your neighborhood who are your age. (I think it'd be great if people actually developed a strong sense of community and knew the people living closest to them). Also, through the unschooling community, such as conferences, local support and activity groups, etc. You know, my social life is most fun in the summer, when everyone's out of school, because then I actually get to see, talk to, and interact with my schooled friends a lot, instead of having them trapped in schools (where they're encouraged to sit quietly and learn for most of the day, rather then socially interact as you imply, I might add).
Well, I think that's everything... Sorry if some bits don't make sense or if there are typos, it's 3:09 in the nigh- morning, and I don't want to proof read this heckuva long message -_-'.
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Isn't my sis a wonderful writer? She writes fiction mostly (also wonderfully), but I always love seeing her forays into non-fiction, because they are always good. And I am envious of her debating skills (she's even better when it's not 3 in the morning! :-P).
Peace,
Idzie
Friday, October 30, 2009
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Article on un/homeschooling in local paper
Remember that interview on unschooling my mom did ages ago? Well, the article finally came out! And guess what? It's actually positive!! There are a couple of misquotes and slightly inaccurate facts, but hey, it's positive!! :-P Here is the link! EDIT: I just want to make a note that how me co-leading a discussion at ONE conference and having a column published in ONE magazine was turned into me "speaking at conferences and being published in magazines" was thanks entirely to the reporter, not my mom. :-P
Peace,
Idzie
Peace,
Idzie
Saturday, October 3, 2009
How I came to be an unschooler
I've been thinking, and unless I'm much mistaken, I've never actually told the story of how I came to be an an unschooler... I simply popped up with a blog at age 17 saying "hey, I'm unschooled!". :-P So this is the story of how I came to be an unschooler! Some of it is taken from what my parents have said, since I was pretty young when some of this went down, but I'll do my best to tell it accurately!
Before I was born, neither of my parents had ever even considered homeschooling. It just never entered their minds. But my mom was, and still is, a hippie, so she did plan to breastfeed. Because of that, she joined the Le Leche Leauge when I was born (or possibly before I was born... I don't know how those things works! :-P). Now, my mom had plenty of gentle discipline, unconditional parenting, type books, I was never let to cry, lived in a sling for ages, and all those other attachment parenting practices (she never used that term, though I don't know why she didn't... She must have seen it used in all those books she read!) so she was the type who liked to keep her kids close, and be involved in their life.
At the Le Leche Lauge, she was exposed to an idea she'd never been exposed to before: homeschooling. And she liked it! Being the type of parent she was, she didn't like the idea of sending her precious little girl off to spend her days with strangers. ;-) So she started reading and researching, and decided that she really did want to homeschool! My dad, on the other hand, was less enthusiastic. He's the most traditional minded of my immediate family, and he thought school was best, so my mom agreed that they would at least try it out. So off I went to half-day kindergarten at age five! I didn't really mind it. Neither did I love it. I had fun sometimes, but I was always happy to head home afterwards, as well (and I find it surprising that I actually remember that!). However, partway through the year, we started getting strange phone calls. Obscene phone calls, actually, and when they were traced (yeah, my parents actually had the police trace them) it was discovered that it was a kid in grade 2 making them. Sad, eh? So that about convinced my dad, and halfway through my first, and only, year of school, I was pulled out.
Our homeschooling started out in a way that many unschoolers will be familiar with: school-at-home! Well, sort of. Since this is my mom we're talking about, we never had a schedule of any sort. But she did buy a reading program (Sing, Spell, Read & Write! *Shudders*), and sort of tried to get me to do it regularly. Through that, I learned how to sound out words and stuff, though I didn't really read, per-say, and we never ended up finishing the program.
For years our "schooling" is a bit of a blur, I'm afraid. I was pretty young! I know that we had various school books and programs and stuff, but the only thing I can ever remember my mom actually trying to force was math. We did lots of fun science experiments, as well as watching Nova and Nature and similar shows avidly (I say we, because my sister reached school age with no one ever suggesting she go to school, so we just continued to learn together!). My mom always read aloud to us, poetry, stories, the newspaper, and I started actually reading at age 8 or 9 when she was reading Harry Potter too slowly for my taste! We never did book reports, though I'd enthusiastically tell my mom about whatever book I was reading. None of us considered that "schooling". We considered it life! I memorized poetry, and wrote both poetry and stories before I could even read (I'd narrate them to mom ;-)). My sister ad I would play spelling games for fun, and we relished our regular trips to the library, where we'd get whatever books we wanted (Emi would always max out her card, ending up with huge piles of books that my mom and I would then end up carrying, since she was too little!). Throughout this time period, my mom would tell everyone that we were doing "child-led" homeschooling.
Throughout that time, the only thing that she ever attempted (I say attempted because she'd often fail) to force was math. I was somewhere around 10 or 11 when I started completely refusing to do math workbooks, and, well, I guess that's when we moved over to full fledged unschooling!
We didn't really know it, though, and I always felt, because my mom always felt, since she was surrounded only by public schoolers and homeschoolers, that we "should be doing schoolwork!". We didn't, but I guess unschooling wasn't fully embraced in our house until a mere couple of years ago. When we fully, truly, embraced and accepted that what we were doing was *right*, it felt so much better! I started reading and thinking and talking about it, and was just like wow, this really is a wonderful thing we're doing! I think that made my mom very happy. She'd *known* what we were doing felt right, but there had always been that fear, that "what if", until I said gee mom, I like what we've been doing! :-P
And the rest is history.
Oh, and I invite my mom to make any corrections to my story if she so wishes. :-P
Peace,
Idzie
Before I was born, neither of my parents had ever even considered homeschooling. It just never entered their minds. But my mom was, and still is, a hippie, so she did plan to breastfeed. Because of that, she joined the Le Leche Leauge when I was born (or possibly before I was born... I don't know how those things works! :-P). Now, my mom had plenty of gentle discipline, unconditional parenting, type books, I was never let to cry, lived in a sling for ages, and all those other attachment parenting practices (she never used that term, though I don't know why she didn't... She must have seen it used in all those books she read!) so she was the type who liked to keep her kids close, and be involved in their life.
At the Le Leche Lauge, she was exposed to an idea she'd never been exposed to before: homeschooling. And she liked it! Being the type of parent she was, she didn't like the idea of sending her precious little girl off to spend her days with strangers. ;-) So she started reading and researching, and decided that she really did want to homeschool! My dad, on the other hand, was less enthusiastic. He's the most traditional minded of my immediate family, and he thought school was best, so my mom agreed that they would at least try it out. So off I went to half-day kindergarten at age five! I didn't really mind it. Neither did I love it. I had fun sometimes, but I was always happy to head home afterwards, as well (and I find it surprising that I actually remember that!). However, partway through the year, we started getting strange phone calls. Obscene phone calls, actually, and when they were traced (yeah, my parents actually had the police trace them) it was discovered that it was a kid in grade 2 making them. Sad, eh? So that about convinced my dad, and halfway through my first, and only, year of school, I was pulled out.
Our homeschooling started out in a way that many unschoolers will be familiar with: school-at-home! Well, sort of. Since this is my mom we're talking about, we never had a schedule of any sort. But she did buy a reading program (Sing, Spell, Read & Write! *Shudders*), and sort of tried to get me to do it regularly. Through that, I learned how to sound out words and stuff, though I didn't really read, per-say, and we never ended up finishing the program.
For years our "schooling" is a bit of a blur, I'm afraid. I was pretty young! I know that we had various school books and programs and stuff, but the only thing I can ever remember my mom actually trying to force was math. We did lots of fun science experiments, as well as watching Nova and Nature and similar shows avidly (I say we, because my sister reached school age with no one ever suggesting she go to school, so we just continued to learn together!). My mom always read aloud to us, poetry, stories, the newspaper, and I started actually reading at age 8 or 9 when she was reading Harry Potter too slowly for my taste! We never did book reports, though I'd enthusiastically tell my mom about whatever book I was reading. None of us considered that "schooling". We considered it life! I memorized poetry, and wrote both poetry and stories before I could even read (I'd narrate them to mom ;-)). My sister ad I would play spelling games for fun, and we relished our regular trips to the library, where we'd get whatever books we wanted (Emi would always max out her card, ending up with huge piles of books that my mom and I would then end up carrying, since she was too little!). Throughout this time period, my mom would tell everyone that we were doing "child-led" homeschooling.
Throughout that time, the only thing that she ever attempted (I say attempted because she'd often fail) to force was math. I was somewhere around 10 or 11 when I started completely refusing to do math workbooks, and, well, I guess that's when we moved over to full fledged unschooling!
We didn't really know it, though, and I always felt, because my mom always felt, since she was surrounded only by public schoolers and homeschoolers, that we "should be doing schoolwork!". We didn't, but I guess unschooling wasn't fully embraced in our house until a mere couple of years ago. When we fully, truly, embraced and accepted that what we were doing was *right*, it felt so much better! I started reading and thinking and talking about it, and was just like wow, this really is a wonderful thing we're doing! I think that made my mom very happy. She'd *known* what we were doing felt right, but there had always been that fear, that "what if", until I said gee mom, I like what we've been doing! :-P
And the rest is history.
Oh, and I invite my mom to make any corrections to my story if she so wishes. :-P
Peace,
Idzie
Monday, September 28, 2009
NBTSC 2009
Now, how to write about this? I have a mild head cold, so my brain feels rather stuffed up and slow, yet I don't really want to put off writing about NBTSC because I'm sure too much of it will slip past my mind if I wait too long! I don't want to write about it in a chronological way, as I have with the conferences I've been too, so I'll try something different...
To start with, as you'll know from my earlier posts, I wasn't looking forward to NBTSC all that much. I felt like I may have been getting sick, and like camp, perhaps, wasn't right for me at this time. However, from the moment I got there, things were vastly better than I'd thought they'd be! I knew a huge portion of the people there, so instead of being overwhelmed by all the people rushing around, I was cheerfully greeting old acquaintances and friends and happily talking to new folk as well! It amazed me that I genuinely wasn't feeling very shy... I didn't feel like hiding in a corner, or only talking to people I knew well. I was quite happy conversing with those both new and old! So the week got off to a good start in that way. And the getting sick bit I'd worried about didn't happen. :-) Also, we were put into our advisee groups that first evening (advisee groups are groups of about 10 campers and one staffer who meet daily to check in about how they're feeling, play games, or just generally do whatever they want within that group), and the staffer for my group was actually the person I was hoping I'd get after reading the staff bio's on the NBTSC website!! He's a green anarchist, and just a totally awesome guy all around. So that was really cool. :-) Also, I simply loved my advisee group as a whole! The people were awesome, and it was just a really nice atmosphere.
The first night was fucking COLD! That wasn't so cool. I slept badly, was really sore in the morning, and although I was fine in the daytime, that second evening was the worst I felt in terms of mental well-being the whole week. I wasn't really homesick, but I sure as hell was warmth-sick!! However, my mom had dropped off extra blankets around supper time on the first full day (she was staying at a local campground for a couple of nights) so despite my worries that I'd have another horrible night, I slept just fine. :-)
From then on out, the week was just great! I had some wonderful conversations about anti-civilizationism/green anarchy with multiple people, listened to a very interesting debate about anti-civ stuff between other people, had conversations about freeganism, nontraditional paths (i.e. not going to college and/or getting a normal job), unschooling, politics, and a ton of other awesome things. I love the fact that at camp, Monsanto is a bad word, and that if I made some comment dissing corporations, mainstream media, government, or similar, it was practically guaranteed that at least one or two people who heard would instantly jump in with agreement! That freedom to state my opinions openly felt really good. Now, that doesn't mean that most peoples opinions were as overall... extreme(?) as mine, just that I found common ground with many people. I have to thank Julie for her Utopia workshop, and Mike for also being a green anarchist, because those two things made me brave enough to openly talk about my views, when usually I'm not willing to in big groups since I *know* everyone will disagree vehemently and I'll end up feeling bad! After that first time, being open about my views was much easier for the rest of the week. :-)
I also just really felt that I made a lot of good connections with people. Some were small connections, with people I never really talked to, but we'd always share a smile. Others I felt a really strong connection with, whether or not we talked much, or simply spent a lot of time with each other! That felt really good. And I really, really want to keep in touch with people. I also think that anyone from camp who's ever in the area should come visit me. ;-)
Oh, and I also exercised a lot more than I usually do. I was up and down the rocky hill to my cabin multiple times a day, and also went on a great but quite difficult hike (up the side of a mountain. The view from the top of the trail was incredible!), canoed out to a rope swing and swam (now that was tons of fun but damn, that water was COLD!), and just generally wasn't nearly as much of a couch potato as usual. :-P Something I'm actually missing already about camp (besides the people, which is a given) is the amazing, healthy, 100% vegetarian food! So. Good.
So yes, NBTSC was good this year. I still don't really feel like it was *life-changing* as such, but it was certainly good. I befriended amazing people, had some great times, and yeah, it was just generally really *good*. :-)
Now, remember how I said I managed to stay healthy the whole week? Well, on Saturday when my mom picked Emi and I up from camp, I felt fine. However, not long into the drive home, my throat started feeling scratchy. Talk about timing! So I do have an actual cold now, but so far it's mild (*knocks on wood*) so I'm not overly bothered. I'm just hibernating for a few days while I get better, and then I'm going to go out into the world! :-) I do feel inspired in some ways, and I've committed myself to making some changes in my life. Many fairly minor, one or two more major. And, well, I'll just have to see how that goes. :-)
Peace,
Idzie
To start with, as you'll know from my earlier posts, I wasn't looking forward to NBTSC all that much. I felt like I may have been getting sick, and like camp, perhaps, wasn't right for me at this time. However, from the moment I got there, things were vastly better than I'd thought they'd be! I knew a huge portion of the people there, so instead of being overwhelmed by all the people rushing around, I was cheerfully greeting old acquaintances and friends and happily talking to new folk as well! It amazed me that I genuinely wasn't feeling very shy... I didn't feel like hiding in a corner, or only talking to people I knew well. I was quite happy conversing with those both new and old! So the week got off to a good start in that way. And the getting sick bit I'd worried about didn't happen. :-) Also, we were put into our advisee groups that first evening (advisee groups are groups of about 10 campers and one staffer who meet daily to check in about how they're feeling, play games, or just generally do whatever they want within that group), and the staffer for my group was actually the person I was hoping I'd get after reading the staff bio's on the NBTSC website!! He's a green anarchist, and just a totally awesome guy all around. So that was really cool. :-) Also, I simply loved my advisee group as a whole! The people were awesome, and it was just a really nice atmosphere.
The first night was fucking COLD! That wasn't so cool. I slept badly, was really sore in the morning, and although I was fine in the daytime, that second evening was the worst I felt in terms of mental well-being the whole week. I wasn't really homesick, but I sure as hell was warmth-sick!! However, my mom had dropped off extra blankets around supper time on the first full day (she was staying at a local campground for a couple of nights) so despite my worries that I'd have another horrible night, I slept just fine. :-)
From then on out, the week was just great! I had some wonderful conversations about anti-civilizationism/green anarchy with multiple people, listened to a very interesting debate about anti-civ stuff between other people, had conversations about freeganism, nontraditional paths (i.e. not going to college and/or getting a normal job), unschooling, politics, and a ton of other awesome things. I love the fact that at camp, Monsanto is a bad word, and that if I made some comment dissing corporations, mainstream media, government, or similar, it was practically guaranteed that at least one or two people who heard would instantly jump in with agreement! That freedom to state my opinions openly felt really good. Now, that doesn't mean that most peoples opinions were as overall... extreme(?) as mine, just that I found common ground with many people. I have to thank Julie for her Utopia workshop, and Mike for also being a green anarchist, because those two things made me brave enough to openly talk about my views, when usually I'm not willing to in big groups since I *know* everyone will disagree vehemently and I'll end up feeling bad! After that first time, being open about my views was much easier for the rest of the week. :-)
I also just really felt that I made a lot of good connections with people. Some were small connections, with people I never really talked to, but we'd always share a smile. Others I felt a really strong connection with, whether or not we talked much, or simply spent a lot of time with each other! That felt really good. And I really, really want to keep in touch with people. I also think that anyone from camp who's ever in the area should come visit me. ;-)
Oh, and I also exercised a lot more than I usually do. I was up and down the rocky hill to my cabin multiple times a day, and also went on a great but quite difficult hike (up the side of a mountain. The view from the top of the trail was incredible!), canoed out to a rope swing and swam (now that was tons of fun but damn, that water was COLD!), and just generally wasn't nearly as much of a couch potato as usual. :-P Something I'm actually missing already about camp (besides the people, which is a given) is the amazing, healthy, 100% vegetarian food! So. Good.
So yes, NBTSC was good this year. I still don't really feel like it was *life-changing* as such, but it was certainly good. I befriended amazing people, had some great times, and yeah, it was just generally really *good*. :-)
Now, remember how I said I managed to stay healthy the whole week? Well, on Saturday when my mom picked Emi and I up from camp, I felt fine. However, not long into the drive home, my throat started feeling scratchy. Talk about timing! So I do have an actual cold now, but so far it's mild (*knocks on wood*) so I'm not overly bothered. I'm just hibernating for a few days while I get better, and then I'm going to go out into the world! :-) I do feel inspired in some ways, and I've committed myself to making some changes in my life. Many fairly minor, one or two more major. And, well, I'll just have to see how that goes. :-)
Peace,
Idzie
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Thoughts on NBTSC
I leave for Not Back to School Camp on Saturday!! My feelings on going are really mixed, and honestly, right now, I'm not really looking forward to it.
Last year was my first time at NBTSC, and I really didn't have as good a time as I could have... I found being in such a large, high energy group with no one whom I knew well to be incredibly stressful, and then I got a nasty cold on top of that. I wrote very honestly of my experiences last year here if you want to check it out. Come late Winter, however, I really wanted to do it right. To actually be more social, and really get all that I could get out of being with a large group of unschoolers! However, about a month ago, basically when I realized NBTSC was so close, I started feeling that it really wasn't right for me, for where I am in life right now. Now, I don't really feel that I do know what's *right* for me right now, and as a wise friend pointed out, perhaps I'll discover that at NBTSC! Then of course there's also the issue of sleeping outside in two walled cabins in the cold September nights of Vermont, the open air showers, and the outhouses, none of which make me terribly happy. I like camping usually, and don't fuss about stuff like that, but I'm having a hard enough time adjusting to the fact that Fall is here after a ridiculously short Summer, and I'm really not enjoying the colder weather, so the thought of being dumped outside in the cold makes me grumpy! :-P
Complaints about small things aside, I'm a very different person from the one I was last year. I notice it, and the people who've known me a while notice it even more! So I'm sure that my experience this year will be very different from last year. Whether it'll be positive, negative, or mixed, I do not know. I just know that it'll be different!
Moving on to something different, and totally wrecking the flow of this post, I realized that I don't think I ever actually announced that I have a Twitter account. I kind of snuck it into the links on the sidebar, but who reads those anyway? So, my point being, I have a Twitter account, so if you want to connect with me there, that's great! :-)
There are also a couple of cool things going down, but I'll save writing about those for another post...
Peace,
Idzie
Last year was my first time at NBTSC, and I really didn't have as good a time as I could have... I found being in such a large, high energy group with no one whom I knew well to be incredibly stressful, and then I got a nasty cold on top of that. I wrote very honestly of my experiences last year here if you want to check it out. Come late Winter, however, I really wanted to do it right. To actually be more social, and really get all that I could get out of being with a large group of unschoolers! However, about a month ago, basically when I realized NBTSC was so close, I started feeling that it really wasn't right for me, for where I am in life right now. Now, I don't really feel that I do know what's *right* for me right now, and as a wise friend pointed out, perhaps I'll discover that at NBTSC! Then of course there's also the issue of sleeping outside in two walled cabins in the cold September nights of Vermont, the open air showers, and the outhouses, none of which make me terribly happy. I like camping usually, and don't fuss about stuff like that, but I'm having a hard enough time adjusting to the fact that Fall is here after a ridiculously short Summer, and I'm really not enjoying the colder weather, so the thought of being dumped outside in the cold makes me grumpy! :-P
Complaints about small things aside, I'm a very different person from the one I was last year. I notice it, and the people who've known me a while notice it even more! So I'm sure that my experience this year will be very different from last year. Whether it'll be positive, negative, or mixed, I do not know. I just know that it'll be different!
Moving on to something different, and totally wrecking the flow of this post, I realized that I don't think I ever actually announced that I have a Twitter account. I kind of snuck it into the links on the sidebar, but who reads those anyway? So, my point being, I have a Twitter account, so if you want to connect with me there, that's great! :-)
There are also a couple of cool things going down, but I'll save writing about those for another post...
Peace,
Idzie
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Overview of the Northeast Unschooling Conference 2009!
(This first paragraph was written last night. I ended up giving up after then and postponing the rest until today! :-P)
So, you know how I said I was going to write a daily journal entry unless I was having too much fun? Well, I was having too much fun! I'm honestly torn about whether or not I should write about the conference now, because I only arrived home today at about 7:30 pm and I'm ridiculously tired (hanging out with people was the priority at the conference, not sleep), but at the same time I really want to write about it while everything is still fresh in my mind! So I'm going to plow through the exhaustion, and hope that what I write isn't complete crap! (As I said above, I gave up on that idea. Instead, I'm writing Wednesday, when I'm slightly (only slightly) less sleep deprived!)
Day 2 (I counted the first day of travel as day 1) which also happens to be August 27
The 27th was Emilie's 16th Birthday, as well as being the first day of the conference! I felt really bad when I forgot to wish her a happy Birthday in the morning, but a friend of hers had discovered when her Birthday was and made her a lovely card, then got it signed by a ton of people at the conference. It was really sweet, and made Emi happy. :-)
Conference registration opened, and people just hung around the registration area talking. I didn't really know anyone well, so I was being pretty shy... My mom started talking to people so I just trailed around bouncing between my mom and Emi, until I got into a conversation, along with my mom, with Erika. I have to thank her for being the first person to make me relax and laugh!
I went to Eli's World Travel Photos session, and although there wasn't a great turnout (apparently the first time slot in a conference isn't necessarily the best), I enjoyed seeing the cool photos, and I had some interesting conversations with the people who were there about Montreal, Quebec, our culture and history, family history, and similar interesting things... I also got a henna tattoo, which is something I've wanted to do for a while, so I'm happy I finally did! It's mostly worn off by today, but it's still visible...
The whole afternoon my mom was stealthily arranging a surprise for my sister. In the evening, just before karaoke started, they played Happy Birthday and pulled out a cake. She was completely surprised, so that was awesome. :-)
Since I'm not exactly much of a karaoke person, I headed outside to throw a Frisbee around with a bunch of people instead. Now Frisbees, I like. :-)
After that, I headed to bed... Probably my earliest night of the whole week!
Day 3 (august 28)
This day was lots of fun, but so long it almost felt like two separate days! First off, I stumbled down to the Tie Dye workshop, where I greatly enjoyed dyeing my shirt in cool ways. I'm thrilled with how it turned out! I also got my feet and legs dyed, thanks to some very enthusiastic young kids with squirting dye bottles! :-) I then went to the Artist Trading Card funshop. I'd never heard of ATC's before, but I LOVE the idea! You take a small card (2 1/2 by 3 1/2 I believe) and do whatever you want with it. Collage, painting, drawing, basically creating a miniature work of art, then trade it with someone else for their miniature work of art. That way, everyone ends up with awesome artwork from all different people. Really cool!
The card at the top (I couldn't get the picture to rotate for some reason) has the most wonderful little story. It reads:
A lone fisherman sat on a stretch of beach. His single fishing pole was planted in the sand. Along came a businessman on vacation. "Why don't you have two poles so you can catch more fish?" the business asked. "Then what would I do?" asked the fisherman. "Then you could take the extra money, buy a boat, get nets and a crew, and catch even more fish." "Then what would I do?" asked the Corsican. "Then," said the businessman, "you could move up to a fleet of large ships, go whole-sale, and become very rich." "Then what would I do?" asked the Corsican. "Do whatever you want!" shouted the businessman. And the Corsican replied, "I am."
After lunch (or in my case most probably after hanging around with people or something, since I was either too busy or didn't feel like eating most of the time while I was there!) I went to a discussion called Unschooling Teens, then to one called Sex, Drugs, and Alcohol, both of which were interesting. THEN I went to a session with Michael about GLBT issues, which ended up being more of a presentation on transgender issues, which I'm glad of. It was a great session! I think that too often people focus entirely on sexual orientation, and forget that gender identity is something extremely important that more people should be talking about! EDIT: Bonnie wrote a cool post on that here.
That evening, I stayed up late talking to people and listening to beautiful music played, and sung, by Julian (check out his stuff here).
Day 4 (August 29)
Went to Erika and Kathryn's Even More Different talk, which was great and really got me thinking. After that, I spent most of the lunch break having fascinating conversations.
I picked at food a bit, talked to people a lot, then went to Eli and my discussion, Untraditional Adult Paths. There was a really good turnout, which tells me that this is something that should be talked about more at unschooling conferences, since apparently it interests a lot of people! I feel it went really well. Most people were a lot more interested in Eli's input, since he's been doing things "untraditionally" for a while now, but I'm happy with what input I did give, and it was great to hear from several people who have managed quite well without either college or regular jobs. :-)
After that, I went to a photograohy funshop! There were only a few of us, so basically we just hung around chatting about photography, then wandered around a bit taking pictures. It was fun.
We fed a couple of people sandwiches, then it was on to the entertainment of the evening. An absolutely AWESOME band called Fishing With Finnegan, made up of grown unschooling siblings, was playing, and they were tons of fun. They play Irish, Scottish, English, and American folk, and they do it with much humour and a unique flair. I highly reccomend that you check them out! After the concert, I sat around talking with a couple of of the band members, as well as the other cool people I'd been hanging out with. Even once the band members were dragged away by the rest of their family, I stayed talking to people for a while more... Are you noticing a theme here? Another long but good day.
Day 5 (August 30)
The last official day of the conference, I was finally relaxed enough to pretty much just be myself. That always seems to happen with me. I only ever relax at the end of an event! After closing remarks, I, can you guess? Yup, hung around talking to people for a couple of hours! Then I played a game that was quite popular, especially with the moms (they were intense at that game. Scarily intense. O_o), called Bananagrams.
Annnd after that, virtually everyone who hadn't left right after closing remarks went out for Sushi! It was kind of funny actually. Someone called the restaurant ahead of time to make reservations, but the restaurant understood the reservation to be for 3 to 5 people, when really it was for 35!! Luckily, they managed to fit all 45 of us in (more people went then had oroginally said they would). My table played hang man (with much laughter and joking around) while we waited for our food, and the sushi was really good. Fun times. :-)
Having entirely given up on getting any decent sleep while still at the con, I was up late with a bunch of people who decided to not sleep at all... I was actually one of the first to bed, at 2:30 or so!
Day 6 (August 31)
The last conference activity was a picnic in Salem, right on the beach. I played Frisbee, hung around with peeps, and went for a long walk on the beach...
I also came very close to heading straight to Texas for the Rethinking Education conference with a couple of friends! It was a crazy plan that ended up not working out (airfare was just too expensive), but it really brought home the fact that it's very possible to just take off across the country when you feel like it, so I've decided I'm going next year. That conference looks awesome, and there's no reason why I shouldn't go!
It was sad saying goodbye to everyone, and the hotel felt so very quiet and lonely that night...
Day 7 (September 1)
We drove home. Pretty simple, really.
Now, this post feels like such a skimming of the surface (and I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot of the surface stuff as well). I had so many wonderful conversations, such a wonderful time overall, so many new thoughts and realizations, that I can't possibly fit it all into one post. There are several issues and things that I plan on devoting whole posts too, but for now this will do. Some interesting posts you may want to check out, that are to do with this conference, are Jean's post on "unparenting" at the conference (it was pretty bad), and Bonnie's posts entitled Shit Happens. Even to Unschoolers. and Highlights from NEUC 2009. Eli also wrote an overview of the conference here.
As I said, more to come soon!
Peace,
Idzie
So, you know how I said I was going to write a daily journal entry unless I was having too much fun? Well, I was having too much fun! I'm honestly torn about whether or not I should write about the conference now, because I only arrived home today at about 7:30 pm and I'm ridiculously tired (hanging out with people was the priority at the conference, not sleep), but at the same time I really want to write about it while everything is still fresh in my mind! So I'm going to plow through the exhaustion, and hope that what I write isn't complete crap! (As I said above, I gave up on that idea. Instead, I'm writing Wednesday, when I'm slightly (only slightly) less sleep deprived!)
Day 2 (I counted the first day of travel as day 1) which also happens to be August 27
The 27th was Emilie's 16th Birthday, as well as being the first day of the conference! I felt really bad when I forgot to wish her a happy Birthday in the morning, but a friend of hers had discovered when her Birthday was and made her a lovely card, then got it signed by a ton of people at the conference. It was really sweet, and made Emi happy. :-)
Conference registration opened, and people just hung around the registration area talking. I didn't really know anyone well, so I was being pretty shy... My mom started talking to people so I just trailed around bouncing between my mom and Emi, until I got into a conversation, along with my mom, with Erika. I have to thank her for being the first person to make me relax and laugh!
I went to Eli's World Travel Photos session, and although there wasn't a great turnout (apparently the first time slot in a conference isn't necessarily the best), I enjoyed seeing the cool photos, and I had some interesting conversations with the people who were there about Montreal, Quebec, our culture and history, family history, and similar interesting things... I also got a henna tattoo, which is something I've wanted to do for a while, so I'm happy I finally did! It's mostly worn off by today, but it's still visible...
The whole afternoon my mom was stealthily arranging a surprise for my sister. In the evening, just before karaoke started, they played Happy Birthday and pulled out a cake. She was completely surprised, so that was awesome. :-)
Since I'm not exactly much of a karaoke person, I headed outside to throw a Frisbee around with a bunch of people instead. Now Frisbees, I like. :-)
After that, I headed to bed... Probably my earliest night of the whole week!
Day 3 (august 28)
This day was lots of fun, but so long it almost felt like two separate days! First off, I stumbled down to the Tie Dye workshop, where I greatly enjoyed dyeing my shirt in cool ways. I'm thrilled with how it turned out! I also got my feet and legs dyed, thanks to some very enthusiastic young kids with squirting dye bottles! :-) I then went to the Artist Trading Card funshop. I'd never heard of ATC's before, but I LOVE the idea! You take a small card (2 1/2 by 3 1/2 I believe) and do whatever you want with it. Collage, painting, drawing, basically creating a miniature work of art, then trade it with someone else for their miniature work of art. That way, everyone ends up with awesome artwork from all different people. Really cool!
The card at the top (I couldn't get the picture to rotate for some reason) has the most wonderful little story. It reads:A lone fisherman sat on a stretch of beach. His single fishing pole was planted in the sand. Along came a businessman on vacation. "Why don't you have two poles so you can catch more fish?" the business asked. "Then what would I do?" asked the fisherman. "Then you could take the extra money, buy a boat, get nets and a crew, and catch even more fish." "Then what would I do?" asked the Corsican. "Then," said the businessman, "you could move up to a fleet of large ships, go whole-sale, and become very rich." "Then what would I do?" asked the Corsican. "Do whatever you want!" shouted the businessman. And the Corsican replied, "I am."
After lunch (or in my case most probably after hanging around with people or something, since I was either too busy or didn't feel like eating most of the time while I was there!) I went to a discussion called Unschooling Teens, then to one called Sex, Drugs, and Alcohol, both of which were interesting. THEN I went to a session with Michael about GLBT issues, which ended up being more of a presentation on transgender issues, which I'm glad of. It was a great session! I think that too often people focus entirely on sexual orientation, and forget that gender identity is something extremely important that more people should be talking about! EDIT: Bonnie wrote a cool post on that here.
That evening, I stayed up late talking to people and listening to beautiful music played, and sung, by Julian (check out his stuff here).
Day 4 (August 29)
Went to Erika and Kathryn's Even More Different talk, which was great and really got me thinking. After that, I spent most of the lunch break having fascinating conversations.
I picked at food a bit, talked to people a lot, then went to Eli and my discussion, Untraditional Adult Paths. There was a really good turnout, which tells me that this is something that should be talked about more at unschooling conferences, since apparently it interests a lot of people! I feel it went really well. Most people were a lot more interested in Eli's input, since he's been doing things "untraditionally" for a while now, but I'm happy with what input I did give, and it was great to hear from several people who have managed quite well without either college or regular jobs. :-)
After that, I went to a photograohy funshop! There were only a few of us, so basically we just hung around chatting about photography, then wandered around a bit taking pictures. It was fun.
We fed a couple of people sandwiches, then it was on to the entertainment of the evening. An absolutely AWESOME band called Fishing With Finnegan, made up of grown unschooling siblings, was playing, and they were tons of fun. They play Irish, Scottish, English, and American folk, and they do it with much humour and a unique flair. I highly reccomend that you check them out! After the concert, I sat around talking with a couple of of the band members, as well as the other cool people I'd been hanging out with. Even once the band members were dragged away by the rest of their family, I stayed talking to people for a while more... Are you noticing a theme here? Another long but good day.
Day 5 (August 30)
The last official day of the conference, I was finally relaxed enough to pretty much just be myself. That always seems to happen with me. I only ever relax at the end of an event! After closing remarks, I, can you guess? Yup, hung around talking to people for a couple of hours! Then I played a game that was quite popular, especially with the moms (they were intense at that game. Scarily intense. O_o), called Bananagrams.
Annnd after that, virtually everyone who hadn't left right after closing remarks went out for Sushi! It was kind of funny actually. Someone called the restaurant ahead of time to make reservations, but the restaurant understood the reservation to be for 3 to 5 people, when really it was for 35!! Luckily, they managed to fit all 45 of us in (more people went then had oroginally said they would). My table played hang man (with much laughter and joking around) while we waited for our food, and the sushi was really good. Fun times. :-)
Having entirely given up on getting any decent sleep while still at the con, I was up late with a bunch of people who decided to not sleep at all... I was actually one of the first to bed, at 2:30 or so!
Day 6 (August 31)
The last conference activity was a picnic in Salem, right on the beach. I played Frisbee, hung around with peeps, and went for a long walk on the beach...
I also came very close to heading straight to Texas for the Rethinking Education conference with a couple of friends! It was a crazy plan that ended up not working out (airfare was just too expensive), but it really brought home the fact that it's very possible to just take off across the country when you feel like it, so I've decided I'm going next year. That conference looks awesome, and there's no reason why I shouldn't go!
It was sad saying goodbye to everyone, and the hotel felt so very quiet and lonely that night...
Day 7 (September 1)
We drove home. Pretty simple, really.
Now, this post feels like such a skimming of the surface (and I'm sure I'm forgetting a lot of the surface stuff as well). I had so many wonderful conversations, such a wonderful time overall, so many new thoughts and realizations, that I can't possibly fit it all into one post. There are several issues and things that I plan on devoting whole posts too, but for now this will do. Some interesting posts you may want to check out, that are to do with this conference, are Jean's post on "unparenting" at the conference (it was pretty bad), and Bonnie's posts entitled Shit Happens. Even to Unschoolers. and Highlights from NEUC 2009. Eli also wrote an overview of the conference here.
As I said, more to come soon!
Peace,
Idzie
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Day one of NEU conference
Day 1 (August 26th)
I found out that I have Internet access!! The hotel provides it for free, which is great. I decided what I'll do is write a daily journal entry (unless I'm too busy having fun!) but wait until home so I can upload photo's to go with each day before publishing, EXCEPT for this post, which I'll post now to let people know what I'm up to... I doubt I'll have time to answer comments or emails before I get back, so please don't be insulted if I don't respond until then!
So, we were supposed to leave at at 10:00 am this morning, but due to our usual taking forever to get out of the house thing, by the time we actually left it was closer to 1:oo! We had a cool drive. As we passed through the mountains in Vermont and New Hampshire there were really low hanging clouds, so that we were literally driving through them. They also partially obscured the mountains, so the whole place looked really surreal and magical... Way cool. :-)
We arrived at the hotel at about 8:00 pm, and as I write this at 10:45, I've already met three people/families I know! I have a good feeling about this conference, and I hope that it'll be lots of fun! For now though, no socializing for me. I'm tired, so I'm going to just go to bed... Tomorrow registration opens at 2:00, but hopefully I'll get a chance to hang out with peeps earlier tomorrow, unless of course I decide I really just need to sleep...
Peace,
Idzie
I found out that I have Internet access!! The hotel provides it for free, which is great. I decided what I'll do is write a daily journal entry (unless I'm too busy having fun!) but wait until home so I can upload photo's to go with each day before publishing, EXCEPT for this post, which I'll post now to let people know what I'm up to... I doubt I'll have time to answer comments or emails before I get back, so please don't be insulted if I don't respond until then!
So, we were supposed to leave at at 10:00 am this morning, but due to our usual taking forever to get out of the house thing, by the time we actually left it was closer to 1:oo! We had a cool drive. As we passed through the mountains in Vermont and New Hampshire there were really low hanging clouds, so that we were literally driving through them. They also partially obscured the mountains, so the whole place looked really surreal and magical... Way cool. :-)
We arrived at the hotel at about 8:00 pm, and as I write this at 10:45, I've already met three people/families I know! I have a good feeling about this conference, and I hope that it'll be lots of fun! For now though, no socializing for me. I'm tired, so I'm going to just go to bed... Tomorrow registration opens at 2:00, but hopefully I'll get a chance to hang out with peeps earlier tomorrow, unless of course I decide I really just need to sleep...
Peace,
Idzie
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Untraditional Adult Paths
It's now official: Eli Gerzon and I are doing a discussion called Untraditional Adult Paths, with the following description:
After all the freedom of unschooling what happens when you're not at all interested in a traditional adult path of college and working in an office? Grown unschoolers Eli Gerzon and Idzie Desmarais will talk about their thoughts, struggles, and triumphs with finding work and a life that pays the bills, is joyful, and contributes to the world.
If you're going to the conference, perhaps I'll see you there! :-)
Peace,
Idzie
After all the freedom of unschooling what happens when you're not at all interested in a traditional adult path of college and working in an office? Grown unschoolers Eli Gerzon and Idzie Desmarais will talk about their thoughts, struggles, and triumphs with finding work and a life that pays the bills, is joyful, and contributes to the world.
If you're going to the conference, perhaps I'll see you there! :-)
Peace,
Idzie
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