A List of Things I love and or find important

Teaching my children naturally
never squashing their curiosity
forming a close family bond
spending as much time as a family as we can
having great adventures with our family
loving each other
being respectful of each other
learning about animals
making the planet a healthier place
learning empathy
learning self-respect
reading
fitness
fun
gardening
learning about nature
being as self-sufficient as possible
crafting
making home remedies
using natural products
having outside time daily
learning about a lot of things
keep a simple home
learn the lost arts of homemaking
Teach our children to take control of their lives
let the kids choose religion (if they do)
Do not make sheep of our family
keep our lives small so we can enjoy more
teach our children that people are more important than traditions


Our future

1. I am not a religious person, I would say I am a humanist
2. I love my country and my freedom
3. I believe all people are equal, period.
4. I love my family
5. I love traditions
6. I love experiencing new things
7. I love cooking and homemaking
8. I no longer feel the need to retain friendships that do not lift me up but instead keep me "in the trenches"
9. I don't have to please anyone but myself
10. My opinions are as important as the options of others.
11. I am still a kind person even if I assert my rights
12. I don't have to have things to be happy
13. I need to be healthy and fit.
14. My marriage is lasting and important
15. I make healthy home cooked food for my family
16. We no longer eat processed food
17. We love our life!!!

Is it me???

Some days I just don't know...yesterday I had a lively discussion with a friend about schooling and the value of standardized testing. I could not believe that an intelligent mother in this day and age doesn't understand the problems with standardized testing. She blabbed on and on about how important the testing is to find out if the kids are learning or not. We discussed other things about school and how kids are often times either way ahead or behind their peers and the additional stress this causes (boredom for the advanced kids and frustration for the kids who are a little "behind"). She didn't get the idea that schooling is not child or family friendly. She also did not understand why someone would homeschool when schools are provided and spewed out a lot of untrue things about homeschooling in our area. I let her blab on and corrected her a couple of times when I could get a word in edge wise. She is a very overbearing person as a whole so I didn't bother getting into detail with her.

How do people not know these things? Why don't they think about these things? Why don't people question the system?

Unschooling

Like most people I never had much reason to think about the education system in this country until we had Little Miss. The Chief and I both have a very negative view of "education" in our area. We've both been in private and public schools and we agree with neither system. He had a lot of trouble in school, he was misdiagnosed with learning disabilities, had other disabilities that weren't diagnosed, embarrassed, bullied and generally abused. I was bored, so bored that I spent my high school years getting in trouble instead of getting an education and since I didn't make waves at school no one ever said a word. There was never discussion about the fact that I wasn't living up to my potential or that I should skip a grade or start taking college level courses. There are a lot of other things I could go on about, but I'll stop here for now.
The truth is that our girl is very smart and wonderful and funny and beautiful and I don't trust her education in the hands of an underpaid, overworked, annoyed test teacher (because that's what they do now...teach testing). My husband is not totally sold on the idea yet but we've had discussions about our lack of faith in the current system. We want our girl to keep her sense of wonder, to explore her world, to be confident and to keep herself (most of all this). She is a learner by nature (all kids are), she craves knowledge and I think that makes her a prime candidate to unschool. Now, to convince my husband...