abundance, changing the world, Joyce, "educational stuff"

Abundance
http://sandradodd.com/abundance

"New Improved" page. This writing has been published under two different titles, "Thoughts About Unschooling," and "Changing the World." It's written for people who don't know much about homeschooling, and so might be useful for sharing with relatives.
http://sandradodd.com/thoughts

I made a random page search for Joyce Fetteroll's page. It's on my own Joyce index page and also in the upper right corner of her page now:

http://sandradodd.com/joycefetteroll
http://joyfullyrejoycing.com/

Thought on the use of intentional/professional "educational materials" by unschoolers:
http://sandradodd.com/stages/materials

I hadn't shared the new art
for "the randomizer" here.
My friend Bo King did it,
who also did the trees
for my unschooling page.

A child's interests, food, and quotes

New story on the Focus, Hobbies, Obsessions page, lower left:
http://sandradodd.com/focus,
and below that, a link to a Pam Laricchia article (created from a 2007 conference presentation), with graphics.

Transcript of the second food chat, with some good links and a great little video:
http://sandradodd.com/chats/food2

Messy full version of the chat on ideas, quotes, affirmations (or maybe the edited chat, depending when you read this)
http://sandradodd.com/chats/affirmations

Two upcoming chats are listed at
http://sandradodd.com/chat

New title art by Jack and Lauren Stranahan at
http://sandradodd.com/peace/guns

Sandra Speaking (and travelling lots and a little)

My next four speaking engagements are detailed on my own blog. They are Albuquerque, London, San Diego and Santa Fe. That is one cool set of places!!!!!

Monkey Platters, Winning Images

           

Every person who has come into the house since yesterday has been recruited to choose a favorite and second favorite of 17 photos. I will contact the creators of those winning images separately. The names have been separated from the pictures, so I'll need to go through the notes to see whose is whose, but the three at top are the first, second and third place winners in that order.

I'm grateful to everyone who participated. Thanks!

These also have special mentions:
Marty's favorite:

Keith liked the colors on the one at the left, and said he would be like to taste the one at the right, more than the others. (But Keith's an old guy, and monkey platters are for kids to have variety, so it's just a comment. )

    
I really like this one myself, for the perspective and the colors:

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