Ideas index, "Random" portal

An index to the "Playing with Ideas" blog. Not alphabetical, because few of the topics lend themselves to that, but it's easily searchable, and fun for browsing.
http://sandradodd.com/blogs/thinkingsticks

Site transporter:
http://sandradodd.com/random
You don't need to remember the link. There's a "Randomize me" link at both of these:
http://sandradodd.com/unschooling
http://sandradodd.com
There are 200 URLS in it now and if I keep working on it without flagging, there will be five or six hundred in a few days.
No more pesky decision-making about which unschooling page to read!

Video game design and discussion

Two new links on video games (top two links):
http://sandradodd.com/videogames


I usually wait until I have three items to declare, but I'm trying to get ready to go to the HENA conference in Arizona, and don't want this to wait until next week.

I'll see some of you soon.

Randomization, food and "About a Boy"

NEW! Random link option on the food section (and others will likely pop up other places on the site).
http://sandradodd.com/food
upper right

Food Chat the second, March 4 in the U.S., which is March 5 early in Australia.
http://sandradodd.com/chats/food2

There are additions to the Monkey Platters page:
http://sandradodd.com/eating/monkeyplatter

Transcript of a chat on "About a Boy," with links and excerpts:
http://sandradodd.com/chats/aboutaboy

Food freedom, chat and a contest

There's a good discussion at AlwaysLearning about young children and food limits, particularly in adopted children who were food-deprived before they came to the unschooling home.

At the bottom of this page I've put my favorite part so far:
http://sandradodd.com/eating/idea

There is a chat scheduled for Friday, February 27, about food and unschooling.
http://sandradodd.com/chats/food
I plan to put up a transcript, so the link should have something useful whether you go there before or after.

I want photos for my monkeyplatters page:
http://sandradodd.com/eating/monkeyplatter
The best images received between now and March 15 will get prizes, by mail, for real. "Best" will mean most interesting or attractive or fun. It might be some combination of the arrangement of the platter and the photography too. I don't care if photos are cropped or photoshopped or re-colored. It's not a photography contest. It's a call for inspiration for other moms to make platters of fun foods for their own kids.

Send images or questions to me here or put them on your blog and send me a link, or send me a link to where they are on flickr or photobucket or somewhere, if I can lift them from there.

"Lazy," London, and other "L" words

Something short but strong has been added in the words of Robyn Coburn to
http://sandradodd.com/lazy
and so it's a good time to bring that page out again!

I'll be speaking at a conference in London on July 25.
http://www.londonunschoolingconference.com/
Because July 24 is Learn Nothing Day, I will have to be vigilant in that environment!

The Letter L
Holly discovered Billy Idol last week, and I reminded her of "Letter L," a Sesame Street bit.

She sent the youtube version to some friends of hers, and so it's been played here lately. I wanted to share it with any who might have known "Rebel Yell" but not the Sesame Street treatment of it:

Transition: School to Unschooling

http://sandradodd.com/chats/schoolTOunschooling

There will be a chat on Friday, the 20th of February, 3:00 EASTERN, 1:00 Mountain, and there's the time-translating site linked above.

No special guest. Anyone with experience, questions, ideas or concerns about how to change from a school life to unschooling should come and help!

Pretty much it will be about deschooling, but maybe with some more particular questions about the relationship with the school and schoolkids.

TV, video games, computer use, food, marginal utility

Schuyler Waynforth will speak on these ideas at the Life is Good conference this fall, and this will be a way for her to see what questions and concerns she might want to add to that presentation.

When the discussion arose about this chat, Schuyler wrote:

I would love to have a chat on and about video games / television / computers all those sorts of bugaboos. Since it is what I'm going to talk about at Life is Good it might be nice to have a practice question time. I know you did a food one for the first one which I missed. It might be a nice subject to encore, or even to be part of a discussion about television. They all fall under the same rubric, really, the idea of marginal utility. At least that is where they fall in my head.

To get to the transcript:
http://sandradodd.com/chats/schuylergames

Transcript of Pam Sorooshian chat

Pam Sorooshian answered questions about her family's history, religion and experiences on January 6, 2009 in a chat. The transcript has been edited for easier reading and is here:
http://sandradodd.com/chats/pamsorooshian

Guest Post on "Blogging 'Bout Boys"

Today I'm the guest blogger at "Blogging 'Bout Boys."

http://bloggingboutboys.blogspot.com/2009/02/guest-post-sandra-dodd.html


The chat transcript and links from the Kirby Dodd/WoW chat are sufficiently edited that I'm willing to have people go there:
http://sandradodd.com/chats/WoW

Other chat transcript pages will be forthcoming.

Thursday, February 12 Ren Allen will be the guest on the chat.

Monday (maybe Monday) later in the day, maybe another discussion on World of Warcraft with members of an unschoolers guild, and others.

Wednesday, February 18, Schuyler Waynforth will chat about video games, TV and computers

Details of chats are at
http://sandradodd.com/chat

Do It, and "We're onto something big."

If you're going to unschool, do it now and do it well.
SandraDodd.com/doit

Contentment, Abundance and Joy
http://sandradodd.blogspot.com/2009/02/contentment-abundance-and-joy.html
We're onto something big. We are creating and maintaining an international co-op for helping to see the beauty and the power in everyday, peaceful, happy learning.

Kirby and Pam S; Reading; What should people eat?

I have a new chatroom on my own site which I'm just LOVING. If you're reading this while it's new, there's a chat later today and one tomorrow, same time. Thursday, January 5 it's Kirby Dodd, my 22 year old firstborn, about World of Warcraft, and tomorrow it's Pam Sorooshian on unschooling and parenting and life. Details are here:
http://sandradodd.com/chat
and from there you can go into the chat room any time to check it out, maybe make yourself an account and upload a photo (or get one of your kids to do it for you, if they're old enough to upload). But the room allows for anonymous participation and also guest-with-a-name presence.

These are also new:

Joyce on learning and reading (third item, righthand column)
http://sandradodd.com/bookworship

What should people eat?
http://sandradodd.com/eating/diets

There are recent photos of me in a few recent blogposts, in case anyone who reads this isn't a blog follower:
http://sandradodd.blogspot.com

Paths, watching others, boundaries, young children

How to Avoid Trying to Control Husbands, regarding unschooling
New by De/Sanguinegirl
http://sandradodd.com/control
(bottom of the page)

Me, quoted very nicely, in an article by an eclectic homeschooler:
http://www.homeschooldiner.com/basics/family_matters/watching_video_games.html

If the child's boundaries should be respected, what about the parents?
http://sandradodd.com/peace/newview
Robyn Coburn, third item on that page

One of the live chats is now a page. I'm not quite finished with the right column, but it's worth sharing already.
http://sandradodd.com/youngchildren