AE Conference, 11th June Part 1

I went to the LTTL Conference on Saturday as part of my ongoing mission to discover as much as I can on this thing called Autonomous Education. I found it quite inspiring. Here’s my account of the day.

Italics are the points of the speaker (not verbatim), normal text is my thoughts.

The first speaker was Imran Shah.  He is a child-protection social worker whose children are home educated. He spoke about Attachment Parenting and how vital it is.

The attachment phase is birth – 7/8 years old, and in this time, the child should spend most of their time with the mother (or primary carer). Attachment techniques can still benefit older children, even if the attachment phase wasn’t ideal (maybe it’s never too late!)

Attachment is a biological process. All warm blooded animals have some form of attachment with their young. A part of the brain called the limbic brain is the seat of what we call emotion and love, and connections are made from there to the pre-frontal cortex during attachment. Attachment actually grows a child’s brain. Research shows that the brains of the Romanian orphans (who had their basic survival needs met, but were shown no love or affection) were not as well developed as ‘normal’ children.

The attachment process is biologically compulsory, but our cognitive functions try to override it. In this culture, we are encouraged to separate from our children as early as possible; wean at 6months, baby in cot, in another room, go back to work and put baby in nursery and so on.

Benefits of Attachment Parenting include emotional resilience, ability to deal with stressors later in life and impulse control (the ability to wait for things, or think things through properly.

How to practise Attachment Parenting? All you need is: Responsiveness (react to their needs), sensitivity (be aware of them), proximity (be close to them), time (they’re only young for a short time, make the most of it).

I found this, the first talk of the day, extremely challenging. And it tapped into a feeling that Imran even noted, that all mothers feel guilt. I didn’t practise AP with my eldest 4 children, thought I did (and do) with my youngest 2. However, even though I feel bad for the missed opportunities, I do think that it’s never too late to build strong and loving relationships with all my children. All I have to doiswork out how!!

The next speaker was Sandra Dodd, a famous unschooler. She spoke about unschooling in general, and it was less about how kids learn when unschooling, but how radical unschooling (giving children autonomy over all aspects of their lives, not just in education) happens, and some pointers on how we can do it.

Move on from past, don’t deny it but don’t let it consume or dominate the present. Don’t live in the future either, now is the place to be. Planning is good, but don’t forget the now. If you have one foot in the past and one in the future, you’re pissing all over today.

We can spend too much time regretting the past, or worrying about the future, and the present, the joy of the now, just passes us by. One of the keys to unschooling successfully is to live in the now, to savour each moment.

Stop listening to the destructive voices in your head.

Changing your mind is ok, but explain things, it’s ok!

One of the holy grails of parenting is ‘consistency’. If you say you’re going to do something, you must do it. Well actually, that’s not true. The only thing that it’s vital to be consistent about is honesty. Be honest. Sandra gave an example about smacking. You might, in temper, threaten to smack your child. And you might feel that if you don’t carry through your threat, you child will continue to do whatever the undesirable behaviour is. But that doesn’t have to be the case. You can change your mind. But, and here’s the important point, it is better to explain to your child that you have changed your mind, and why, and then you can both talk about what has happened, and resolve matters. Explain how you made a choice (to smack), and how it wasn’t a good one. Then you made a better choice. And you could also talk about the situation that let to the threat of smacking in terms of choices too.

Be forgiving of people living their own lives with you.

No one will do things in exactly the way you’d like. But they’re all doing what you’re doing, the best they can. If you cut them some slack, they’ll do the same for you.

Parents should be partners to their children doing interesting things.

Unschooling isn’t letting kids run wild doing what ever they want. That’s bad parenting. Join in with their games, invite them to sit alongside you when you’re at the computer, let them cook or help you cook. Give them a broom when you have the duster, get down in the dirt with them when they discover worms. Live alongside them, not behind or in front of them.

Pick up on cues, not just on the words said.

Remember when your child was a baby and they couldn’t speak? You had to pick up on their cues and respond to them? Carry on doing that. You can avoid a lot of conflict that way…

If you look and find the best in each moment, you’ll help others do the same.

Positivity breeds positivity (And the reverse is true too).

Avoid ‘just’. Nothing is just, it’s a denial of a situation. 

And ‘only’. It’s not ‘only’, or ‘just’, it ‘is’. It’s not ‘just potatoes’ to my 4 year old, it’s the most disgusting thing ever and if I make her eat them she will make herself sick. If I understand that today she hates potatoes and she doesn’t have to eat them, then she’ll probably eat everything else. It’s not ‘only a picture’, it’s a picture your 14 year old drew. Even if it’s not a masterpiece, she’s worked at it, and if you take time to point out the elements depicted or techniques used, she’ll feel acknowledged.

Also avoid stupid, awful and I hate.

Get back your sense of wonder. Cynicism is fashionable, forget it.

Be like your 4 year old again, be wondrous at the world!

Think and act peacefully and with wonder and your life will be more peaceful and wonderful.

If you tell your child what’s better or worse how can he make his own choices. Denying their thoughts destroys their confidence in their choices. Let go of control, it will work in the long run.

It’s cold, put a coat on. You can’t be hot. It doesn’t hurt that much. Don’t be silly, I was only joking. You don’t need to cry! Sound familiar? It does to me. I have major control issues I need to work through…

Live by principles rather than rules.

Some people live for tomorrow in a way that makes today fail.

 

I’ll stop there as there’s a lot. I shall post soon about the other speakers, and about the thought processes the event as a whole triggered in me.