What purpose does this forum serve for you?

[marbel]

5 minutes ago, SKL said:

I think sometimes it's a voice that implies you're angry / exasperated with people who express different thoughts ... even when those people aren't trying to be contrary.  And even in threads that you start by requesting others' views

I don't know how to explain it without having a specific example, where I could point out the words that create that "voice."

Just using this as a jumping-off point... there are posters here - and again, I don't know if you @Not_a_Number are one of them - who will ask for opinions/advice and then when people give them, come up with ways the respondents are wrong. 

I mean, what's the point then? If I ask for advice, I'll just thank people for it even if it's not what I wanted or needed. At least I hope I do! 

People don't always communicate perfectly. 

Edited December 4, 2022 by marbel

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, marbel said:

Just using this as a jumping-off point... there are posters here - and again, I don't know if you are one of them - who will ask for opinions/advice and then when people give them, come up with ways the respondents are wrong. 

I mean, what's the point then? If I ask for advice, I'll just thank people for it even if it's not what I wanted or needed. At least I hope I do! 

People don't always communicate perfectly. 

Yep, I do this, and I can say that the reason I do it is so I can provide more information. I'm unlikely to benefit from generic advice, and most things people say at first are generic. 

I can see how it comes off as unfriendly, but I am also not entirely sure what the alternative is. 

[Carol in Cal.]

Just now, Not_a_Number said:

Yep. I buy that. I've been defensive about stuff. Perhaps I'm still doing it on here. That's entirely possible. 

It gets tiresome disagreeing with people so often 😕 . But that's not everyone else's problem, that's mine. 

You might want to consider cutting back on direct follow up questions a bit (by direct I mean, those directed at specific posters).  

And generally, I mostly (and you don’t have to do this, but just, you know, as an idea) state my views once, explain them one other way, and then let that subject go.  People can disagree with me, and that is truly fine, but also, I think that most of the time I can make my views understood even if there are those who are not going to share them, and that is truly sufficient.  I think it’s nice that this is a place for that.  We don’t march in lockstep but we do try to understand dissenting views.  It’s not that I don’t want to engage.  Rather, it’s that I feel like I have engaged once I’m understood.  I don’t need people to agree with me to feel like I’ve engaged.

I also try very hard to avoid ‘parting shots’ on the way out of a discussion, that just make the same point or that imply that any who disagree are stupid or wrong.  Extended back and forth tend to devolve to that point, and it’s not, IMO, productive.

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, Not_a_Number said:

Yep, I do this, and I can say that the reason I do it is so I can provide more information. I'm unlikely to benefit from generic advice, and most things people say at first are generic. 

I can see how it comes off as unfriendly, but I am also not entirely sure what the alternative is. 

Musing more about this, this is not something I'd do in real life. I'd thank someone and back off. But then I rarely ask for advice in real life. 

[marbel]

1 minute ago, Not_a_Number said:

Yep, I do this, and I can say that the reason I do it is so I can provide more information. I'm unlikely to benefit from generic advice, and most things people say at first are generic. 

I can see how it comes off as unfriendly, but I am also not entirely sure what the alternative is. 

I think the alternative is to be very clear what advice/opinion/information is needed, and what is not. That's not necessarily easy, and sometimes it's not clear that such clarification is needed until deep into the thread. If you are getting generic advice maybe you are being too general in  your question?  

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, Carol in Cal. said:

You might want to consider cutting back on direct follow up questions a bit (by direct I mean, those directed at specific posters).  

Yeah. I've been thinking about that. It's a good idea to just write a long, clarifying post as opposed to get into one-on-one discussions. I don't do that enough. 

 

1 minute ago, Carol in Cal. said:

And generally, I mostly (and you don’t have to do this, but just, you know, as an idea) state my views once, explain them one other way, and then let that subject go.  People can disagree with me, and that is truly fine, but also, I think that most of the time I can make my views understood even if there are those who are not going to share them, and that is truly sufficient.  I think it’s nice that this is a place for that.  We don’t march in lockstep but we do try to understand dissenting views.  It’s not that I don’t want to engage.  Rather, it’s that I feel like I have engaged once I’m understood.  I don’t need people to agree with me to feel like I’ve engaged.

That's a good perspective. 

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, marbel said:

I think the alternative is to be very clear what advice/opinion/information is needed, and what is not. That's not necessarily easy, and sometimes it's not clear that such clarification is needed until deep into the thread. If you are getting generic advice maybe you are being too general in  your question?  

No one will read your essay if you try to provide all the background at first. This isn't actually an easy problem. 

It's more that you really can't have one-on-one conversations via megaphone, and if you want to have them, I suppose one ought to take it to PM. 

[Carol in Cal.]

3 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Yep, I do this, and I can say that the reason I do it is so I can provide more information. I'm unlikely to benefit from generic advice, and most things people say at first are generic. 

I can see how it comes off as unfriendly, but I am also not entirely sure what the alternative is. 

Maybe think about fleshing out your question and the background for it more before posting it?

One thing I used to love about discussing curricula here is you could get answers with a great deal of specificity and customization, but to do that you did need to convey the background and what your child/family is like fairly thoroughly.

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, Carol in Cal. said:

Maybe think about fleshing out your question and the background for it more before posting it?

One thing I used to love about discussing curricula here is you could get answers with a great deal of specificity and customization, but to do that you did need to convey the background and what your child/family is like fairly thoroughly.

This is maybe actually inadvertently a good explanation for why I have trouble 😂. I don't use curricula precisely because I try very hard to match the exact place someone is. And I tend to think there are lots and lots of relevant details about a situation, and even if I provide ALL my details, I find that people grab on to the ones that feel familiar to them from their life and ignore the ones that are harder to process. Frankly, I do that, too. 

That being said, I do like the idea of providing more details in a more impersonal way. I think it's a good idea not to make people feel defensive by singling them out. 

[SKL]

8 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Yep. I buy that. I've been defensive about stuff. Perhaps I'm still doing it on here. That's entirely possible. 

It gets tiresome disagreeing with people so often 😕 . But that's not everyone else's problem, that's mine. 

This might be an example.  I'm not sure what you mean by this.  It kinda reads like it's tiresome living in a world where everyone else is so much stupider than you.  Not sure if that's how you feel in your heart, but I can say some people reading that will not feel great about it.

[wendyroo]

36 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

You aren't being mean, because you phrase it in terms of you and not in terms of my immutable personal characteristics. That's the key difference. 

See, and I was very carefully to word my comment as a statement of how your posts make me, and perhaps others, feel.

Quote

I really, really like discussing education/homeschooling methods and pedagogy...but, frankly, not with you. 

From many, many of your posts I get a strong "my way or the highway" vibe which reads as belittling and off-putting. It often seems that you lack any humbleness; that you truly think that you are qualified enough to know the right answers for every situation...even those that you have no experience with and could not possibly appreciate the complexity of.

It is ironic, because you repeatedly tell people that your kids are "hard" and expect others to accept it without questions or suggestions. But others come along and say that their kid needs X or that in their complicated situation Y is required, and your answers almost always feel very patronizing to me, along the lines of "Well, it is okay if you want to be wrong. Maybe someday you will see the light and realize that I am right."

Just food for thought.

I'm also confused how writing posts that your posts are "my way or the highway" or seem to lack humbleness are "immutable personal characteristics". They seem pretty mutable to me...if those around you are willing to honestly tell you how your words make them feel. You are certainly under no obligation to change how you communicate, but you seemed to want to, and I was trying to give you information from another point of view.

In any case, you are obviously welcome to write me off as "mean", it won't hurt my feelings. Mostly because I am fairly certain that I am not a mean person. For example, I remember sewing masks for your whole family and mailing them to you during the pandemic...twice. 

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, SKL said:

This might be an example.  I'm not sure what you mean by this.  It kinda reads like it's tiresome living in a world where everyone else is so much stupider than you.  Not sure if that's how you feel in your heart, but I can say some people reading that will not feel great about it.

Hmm, I can see that. 

It's more that I'm really spiky in terms of things I know and I don't, and I tend to post about things I've thought about a lot, and that small set of things I have a lot of strong opinions about. 

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, wendyroo said:

See, and I was very carefully to word my comment as a statement of how your posts make me, and perhaps others, feel.

I'm also confused how writing posts that your posts are "my way or the highway" or seem to lack humbleness are "immutable personal characteristics". They seem pretty mutable to me...if those around you are willing to honestly tell you how your words make them feel. You are certainly under no obligation to change how you communicate, but you seemed to want to, and I was trying to give you information from another point of view.

In any case, you are obviously welcome to write me off as "mean", it won't hurt my feelings. Mostly because I am fairly certain that I am not a mean person. For example, I remember sewing masks for your whole family and mailing them to you during the pandemic...twice. 

PM me if you want me to explain. I'm happy to. 

But yes, your post read as hurtful to me in a way that the other post I commented on didn't. 

I appreciated the masks. 

[lewelma]

50 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

I tend to have strong and unconventional opinions. 

Strong yes. But unconventional? From my point of view, I have never found your opinions very unconventional. Maybe we are in it together. lol

[SKL]

3 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

No one will read your essay if you try to provide all the background at first. This isn't actually an easy problem. 

It's more that you really can't have one-on-one conversations via megaphone, and if you want to have them, I suppose one ought to take it to PM. 

How to compose a post is really important, and worth the extra time and thought up-front.  What I try to do is choose my first words for most clarity of purpose, so people can decide if they want to get involved or not.  Then I break things up as much as possible for clarity and impact.  I make considerable use of bullets, which I think are easier to read.  Those who still don't want to participate are free to pass.

That said, I often need to add clarification later.  I will usually add it as an ETA in my first post as well as a clarification post downthread.

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, lewelma said:

Strong yes. But unconventional? From my point of view, I have never found your opinions very unconventional. Maybe we are in it together. lol

Except you're much, much, much nicer than me 😂.

I've really appreciated your guidance over the years, by the way. You have a lot of wisdom. And I've found how you describe interacting with your kids very useful. It took me a while to take it to heart, but it has really changed the vibe of the household. 

[SKL]

5 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

This is maybe actually inadvertently a good explanation for why I have trouble 😂. I don't use curricula precisely because I try very hard to match the exact place someone is. And I tend to think there are lots and lots of relevant details about a situation, and even if I provide ALL my details, I find that people grab on to the ones that feel familiar to them from their life and ignore the ones that are harder to process. Frankly, I do that, too. 

That being said, I do like the idea of providing more details in a more impersonal way. I think it's a good idea not to make people feel defensive by singling them out. 

Examples can be very helpful.  For example, posting an actual math problem vs. trying to explain the conceptual difficulty.  Or posting an actual conversation (or parallel fake one) rather than trying to describe a difficulty in relating with a person.

[Carol in Cal.]

4 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Hmm, I can see that. 

It's more that I'm really spiky in terms of things I know and I don't, and I tend to post about things I've thought about a lot, and that small set of things I have a lot of strong opinions about. 

Others have strong opinions, too.  And they might be right, though partially contradictory to yours.

[BlsdMama]

4 hours ago, Garga said:

Not too long ago, the majority of the posts on the forum were actually homeschool related. I was here constantly getting tons of ideas for curriculum and ideas for teaching every subject under the sun at every grade level. I learned an amazing amount of information about parenting and became a better parent for the time spent here learning about gentle parenting. You know how they say that kids don’t come with a manual? Well, this was the next best thing. Whatever issue I was having as a parent, 50 other people here had had it, too, and had figured out how to deal with it in a constructive way.

Then all the homeschool and parenting posts moved over to Facebook (I’m assuming), which I think was a terrible loss. FB isn’t designed to be properly searchable in a way that these forums are. I wasn’t able to handle the way FB is set up so I haven’t been on the WTM FB page in ages.

I was lucky in that just as this forum was mostly closing down as a homeschool resource, my homeschooling journey ended. (Though I do wish there was more about parenting on here. I could ask, but in the past, the forum was chock full of people bringing up parenting issues that I could read ahead of time and learn from. Now it’s just once in a blue moon.)

So, now I’m here because I love having a place to talk and listen to people who will also talk and listen. They won’t just spout a thoughtless meme, but will actually form opinions and arguments that make some sort of sense. I forget that most online interactions consist of someone blindly parroting something they’ve heard, followed by someone blindly parroting some opposing viewpoint they’ve heard, and sometimes I accidentally get sucked into a conversation that I think will be enlightening, but just turns out to be a bunch of nonsense.  But here, people have to defend their stances and they do so with respect and thought.

I also appreciate the diversity of opinion. I’ve been on these forums for 14 or so years, and they’ve absolutely changed who I am as a person in an entirely positive way.  

For the most part, this. 
 

I’ve been here for twenty years now and I used this forum and another as my social outlet. When we move to another area, the online communities were my constant. Now that we’ve been here for eight years with no plans to move, the other forum has dissolved and this one has moved into the background though I’m here daily. 
 

I often come for opposing viewpoints, “consider this,” moments. I very much miss my other forum, especially as the parents of older and adult kids. 
 

When I was younger, I enjoyed the debate and less so now. Although TWTM has made me a more thoughtful person, it has also made me less certain and more anxious. Here you get peoplesz’ inner thoughts and it can make you wonder what goes on in your real life peoples’ heads. In some ways, I wish I was more naively optimistic than I am now and I’m sure the forums have played a part in that simply because we sometimes are more candidly open than we’d be face to face. 

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, Carol in Cal. said:

Others have strong opinions, too.  And they might be right, though partially contradictory to yours.

They might. Of course. I've been wrong many times in my life. 

But I can't interact with people as if I don't think I'm right if I do. I don't think that would work for me. It would come off weird.  

I suppose that might mean I'm not humble. I'm certainly not humble about everything, anyway. I often post about things I have strong opinions about. 

Maybe part of the answer is that there's a limit to how much interaction people want to have with someone who's too confident. It's too annoying. 

[lewelma]

8 minutes ago, wendyroo said:

See, and I was very carefully to word my comment as a statement of how your posts make me, and perhaps others, feel. 

I will say that I found your post very confronting.

[Not_a_Number]

3 minutes ago, BlsdMama said:

Although TWTM has made me a more thoughtful person, it has also made me less certain and more anxious. Here you get peoplesz’ inner thoughts and it can make you wonder what goes on in your real life peoples’ heads. In some ways, I wish I was more naively optimistic than I am now and I’m sure the forums have played a part in that simply because we sometimes are more candidly open than we’d be face to face. 

Yeah. That's exactly the trade-off I've been thinking about. Thanks for affirming. 

I learn a lot, but it also gets under my skin. It can be hard. 

[Pawz4me]

3 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

When did this get easier, out of curiosity? 

I'm a late bloomer (always have been) and it didn't really start happening for me until well into my 50's. I slowly got to the realization that I just don't care whether people agree with me or not on most issues. All I can control is me and my own thoughts and actions. If people are wrong . .  shrug. 😉 (But seriously--after years of reading the forum and being  exposed to so many different opinions it finally sunk in that people can disagree with me and have very valid, well thought out reasons for doing so. And that's okay.)

1 hour ago, marbel said:

Being on a forum of any kind requires willpower though, right? If I think someone is wrong about something, but I know there is no point to me saying it, it takes willpower to keep my mouth shut/fingers off the keys. 

It certainly does at times.

 

15 minutes ago, marbel said:

Just using this as a jumping-off point... there are posters here - and again, I don't know if you @Not_a_Number are one of them - who will ask for opinions/advice and then when people give them, come up with ways the respondents are wrong.

I used to help moderate a large, busy forum. In our Mod Lounge we referred to those types of posters as "Yes, buts." That was a long time ago, but I still mentally check myself anytime I'm tempted to start a reply with "Yes, but . . "

[lewelma]

5 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Except you're much, much, much nicer than me 😂.

I've really appreciated your guidance over the years, by the way. You have a lot of wisdom. And I've found how you describe interacting with your kids very useful. It took me a while to take it to heart, but it has really changed the vibe of the household. 

I'm so glad that I could be helpful. It is so hard, I think, to look in to your own life as an outsider. When you are in the middle of things, your are immersed.

I find that your approach has always been to have an honest soul-searching question, gather information from the hive, completely disagree with everyone because it is so hard to see outside of your own experience, but then you store these comments and ideas in the back of your mind to mull over. The next step seems to be that you think for days and weeks about what people have said, and then change your mind and find some novel way of combining your own thoughts with those of others into a unique solution for you and your children. Seems like the hive is a critical part of this soul-searching process for you.

[catz]

1 minute ago, lewelma said:

Strong yes. But unconventional? From my point of view, I have never found your opinions very unconventional. Maybe we are in it together. lol

I've never found number's opinions unconventional either.  Maybe just willing to engage longer and harder than most.  I do think tone can be hard online.  

I've been here on and off for oh so many years. I am also not particularly thin skinned but I am much more able to walk away or ignore.  Just the past year have I gotten aggressive with my use of the ignore function and my own willpower with it.  I will also say, I have stepped away for LONG seasons when it hasn't served.  And people do that ALL the time noticed or not, nothing wrong with it if an online community isn't working for a season of your life.  I kind of stepped back iinto online communities during covidd because I'm still trying to find any semblance of an adult social life now that my kids are older and local mom communities I thought were rich and full just disinigrated during covid.  

I came here for homeschooling stuff originally.  My youngest is a high school senior an dual enrolling full time.  I do appreciate the dicsussions.  This community has changed a TON since the early days.  I don't have the energy or bandwidth to carry out long back and forth discussions.

I also really appreciate anonyimity here.  To be honest, I have a few people on ignore who JUST stress me out because they post so much personal info about other people it makes me uncomfortable lol.  And that is 100 percent me, I will own it.  You do you people.  I am much more willing to share more via PM and I have had some great PM conversaations over the years.

Oh - and WAY back in the day I did connect to a bunch of people here during social media, most are not here any longer.  They are still some of my favorite social media peeps and I have met some IRL.  

[Carol in Cal.]

16 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

This is maybe actually inadvertently a good explanation for why I have trouble 😂. I don't use curricula precisely because I try very hard to match the exact place someone is. And I tend to think there are lots and lots of relevant details about a situation, and even if I provide ALL my details, I find that people grab on to the ones that feel familiar to them from their life and ignore the ones that are harder to process. Frankly, I do that, too. 

That being said, I do like the idea of providing more details in a more impersonal way. I think it's a good idea not to make people feel defensive by singling them out. 

Customization is a key benefit of homeschooling, and the original homeschoolers mostly didn’t even have curricula to use, per se.  You might really like some of the oldest homeschooling books that elaborate on this.  I’ve read a lot of them, although it’s been so long since I did so that I would be hard pressed to come up with a book list to suggest.

If you don’t have it already, I strongly suggest trying to get ahold of the first edition of TWTM, since it was ‘pre-curricula’ for a lot of subjects and ages.  It’s the most ‘train the trainer’ type book that SWB has written.

Many of us old timers used a mix.  So, I would not have been looking for a curriculum that would be ‘all in one’ or to use exclusively for one or more subjects.  Rather, I would have been looking for one that covers certain things particularly well, or that teaches the teacher especially effectively in a case wher the child is resistant, or very keen, or needs more practice than the teacher wants to devise after teaching the concepts, or something like that.

I did customize our homeschooling a great deal—some without curricula, and some by using multiple curricula for different goals.  In fact, when I look at people homeschooling right now, I think that the most unfortunate thing is that there has been a trend to trust and teach curricula rather than one’s actual children.  

But curricula are helpful for completeness, for practice, and for a variety of approaches if a child needs something that their parent can’t figure out.  I don’t think you should write off using them, if only as a jumping off point or an idea generator.  I’m glad you don’t use them exclusively.

And in general, about adding more and more details down thread because it’s too hard to be comprehensive up front—there ARE middle paths, and maybe you will find one that suits you.  Including ALL details is self-evidently impossible, but maybe including a few more summary clues would result in more useful feedback.

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by Carol in Cal.

[Not_a_Number]

I have to say, I do have trouble in real life with how mouthy I am, too 😂. Not everyone likes how vehement I can get about things. It's a polarizing trait. 

That being said, situations in which I've pretended not to be confident and opinionated haven't actually gone well for me. I just wind up feeling ignored and resentful. My opinions are, for better or worse, really important to me. 

So then the question is what one does with one's strong opinion if one has a town square and a megaphone . . . 🤔

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, Carol in Cal. said:

Customization is a key benefit of homeschooling, and the original homeschoolers mostly didn’t even have curricula to use, per se.  You might really like some of the oldest homeschooling books that elaborate on this.  I’ve read a lot of them, although it’s been so long since I did so that I would be hard pressed to come up with a book list to suggest.

If you don’t have it already, I strongly suggest trying to get ahold of the first edition of TWTM, since it was ‘pre-curricula’ for a lot of subjects and ages.  It’s the most ‘train the trainer’ type book that SWB has written.

Many of us old timers used a mix.  So, I would not have been looking for a curriculum that would be ‘all in one’ or to use exclusively for one or more subjects.  Rather, I would have been looking for one that covers certain things particularly well, or that teaches the teacher especially effectively in a case wher the child is resistant, or very keen, or needs more practice than the teacher wants to devise after teaching the concepts, or something like that.

I did customize our homeschooling a great deal—some without curricula, and some by using multiple curricula for different goals.  In fact, when I look at people homeschooling right now, I think that the most unfortunate thing is that there has been a trend to trust and teach curricula rather than one’s actual children.  

But curricula are helpful for completeness, for practice, and for a variety of approaches if a child needs something that their parent can’t figure out.  I don’t think you should write off using them, if only as a jumping off point or an idea generator.  I’m glad you don’t use them exclusively.

And in general, about adding more and more details down thread because it’s too hard to be comprehensive up front—there ARE middle paths, and maybe you will find one that suits you.

 

Thank you very much for the perspective!! 

[SKL]

2 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

They might. Of course. I've been wrong many times in my life. 

But I can't interact with people as if I don't think I'm right if I do. I don't think that would work for me. It would come off weird.  

I suppose that might mean I'm not humble. I'm certainly not humble about everything, anyway. I often post about things I have strong opinions about. 

Maybe part of the answer is that there's a limit to how much interaction people want to have with someone who's too confident. It's too annoying. 

Many of us have toned things down because we realized we aren't as consistently right or as smart as we once thought we were.  Concurrently we learned to value other people's wisdom, experience, and intelligence more.  We might even admit that we still have more to learn ... even about our pet passions.

[lewelma]

19 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

even if I provide ALL my details, I find that people grab on to the ones that feel familiar to them from their life and ignore the ones that are harder to process. 

This is very insightful. 

[wendyroo]

5 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

But I can't interact with people as if I don't think I'm right if I do.

But can you ever just think you are right for you?

I think that is what I find most off-putting about your posts. Your black and white insistence that if something is "right" then it must be right for everyone...in every situation...with every kid.

While on the other hand, nothing the rest of us morons suggest could possibly be useful or relevant to the question you asked, because we clearly are not "spiky" like you. 

 

[Not_a_Number]

3 minutes ago, lewelma said:

I'm so glad that I could be helpful. It is so hard, I think, to look in to your own life as an outsider. When you are in the middle of things, your are immersed.

I find that your approach has always been to have an honest soul-searching question, gather information from the hive, completely disagree with everyone because it is so hard to see outside of your own experience, but then you store these comments and ideas in the back of your mind to mull over. The next step seems to be that you think for days and weeks about what people have said, and then change your mind and find some novel way of combining your own thoughts with those of others into a unique solution for you and your children. Seems like the hive is a critical part of this soul-searching process for you.

Yes, that's a very good read. That's what I do. 

I tend to disagree with people MUCH more if it's a hard question I've already thought about a lot. If I'm just posting for brainstorming, I think I'm less contrary. 

But yeah... people's precise solutions don't tend to work for me. But bits of their approach might. 

I've actually implemented a LOT of things that I've been told about on the forums. It's interesting that I present as someone who doesn't listen. That's not my internal experience at all. 

But your description is great. That's exactly right. I feel almost uncomfortably seen 😉. 

(My DH has been describing occasionally feeling like a pinned butterfly in our conversations recently 😂. I know him well, I see right through this despite his masterful political skills, and he says it's both nice and uncomfortable. Your description makes me feel like that!) 

[catz]

I also hardly used any curriculum prior to high school with my kids.  That doesn't seem that weird to me.  Curriculum discussions here also used to be brutal.  I don't have a lot of patience to one size fits all.  I have HUGE respect for SWB and did read TWTM when we were considering homeschooling but I wouldn't call us classical homeschoolers by any stretch.  It was helpful as information but not as a guide for my own kids.  

[Terabith]

I should also add that I found and bought and loved SWB's book in like 1999, years before I had my first child.  I bought The Story of the World as it came out, again before I had my kids, for my own benefit.  So when I started looking for homeschooling advice, it's not like I was looking at a wide assortment of philosophies and homeschooling resources.  I explicitly came looking for assistance with her method.

Now, as it turned out, her method worked well in some respects for my oldest and less well in other aspects, but it was pretty much a non starter for my youngest.  I kept saying to myself, SWB says, "Reading is easy!" so why am I having SO MUCH TROUBLE teaching my obviously bright child to read.  Who turned out to be dyslexic, dysgraphic, had severe anxiety and perfectionism, and had a major memory issue.  Reading was NOT easy, and neither was anything that required memorization.  

But by then I'd found the hive, and was better able to do some customization.

[Carol in Cal.]

10 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

They might. Of course. I've been wrong many times in my life. 

But I can't interact with people as if I don't think I'm right if I do. I don't think that would work for me. It would come off weird.  

I suppose that might mean I'm not humble. I'm certainly not humble about everything, anyway. I often post about things I have strong opinions about. 

Maybe part of the answer is that there's a limit to how much interaction people want to have with someone who's too confident. It's too annoying. 

No one is suggesting that you should not be confident or believe that you’re right.

Just that, it’s actually a sign of MORE confidence to believe that you’re right in one circumstances and that that rightness might not map into others, and leave space for that.

[lewelma]

Just now, wendyroo said:

But can you ever just think you are right for you?

I think that is what I find most off-putting about your posts. Your black and white insistence that if something is "right" then it must be right for everyone...in every situation...with every kid.

While on the other hand, nothing the rest of us morons suggest could possibly be useful or relevant to the question you asked, because we clearly are not "spiky" like you. 

 

This is still coming across as aggressive. I hear what you are saying, but you are using hyperbole in a way that feels hurtful. 

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, wendyroo said:

But can you ever just think you are right for you?

I think that is what I find most off-putting about your posts. Your black and white insistence that if something is "right" then it must be right for everyone...in every situation...with every kid.

While on the other hand, nothing the rest of us morons suggest could possibly be useful or relevant to the question you asked, because we clearly are not "spiky" like you. 

Sometimes I think I'm right for me and sometimes I think I'm right in general 🤷‍♀️. And sometimes I'm wrong about the former and sometimes I'm wrong about the latter. 

But yeah, I often have opinions that extend past my kids. And if you're saying I'm generalizing them too much, I probably am, you're right. 

[Not_a_Number]

I don't think telling me to not be confident in my generalizations is going to work out for me. The things I'm confident about aren't always just about me. I don't think I'd be able to act that way. 

I just... I don't know... I don't think that way. I think in systems 🤷‍♀️. 

[teachermom2834]

1 minute ago, Not_a_Number said:

I have to say, I do have trouble in real life with how mouthy I am, too 😂. Not everyone likes how vehement I can get about things. It's a polarizing trait. 

That being said, situations in which I've pretended not to be confident and opinionated haven't actually gone well for me. I just wind up feeling ignored and resentful. My opinions are, for better or worse, really important to me. 

So then the question is what one does with one's strong opinion if one has a town square and a megaphone . . . 🤔

Your opinions are fine and I would say that WTM is full of confident people, mostly women, and it isn’t confidence that people have trouble with. You just have to say your piece and then move on. Unless, of course, you find the posters who want to spar. Because I’m allowed to have my opinions, too, right? And if it feels like the only way to end an exchange is to agree with you then what do I do with my opinions? If you keep questioning me and tagging me and making me prove my point over and over I’m going to feel badgered. That isn’t because you are too confident or too smart. I’m confident too and I’ve thought alot about my opinions and have lived a long time now. So we need to just agree to disagree. Most times the boards here are full of posters disagreeing about something on one thread and then laughing together about something different on another thread. There is room for all kinds of opinions. We don’t actually have to convince each other of anything no matter how strong our opinions are. 

 

 

[fraidycat]

24 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Hah. Well, here's hoping the same thing happens for me. 

I'm definitely finding it easier to let go as I get older. But I don't think I'll ever be thick-skinned, either. It's just not who I am. 

But I do want to figure out how to interact with the world given who I actually am. 

One thing that I try to do if I find myself getting worked up (both IRL and online) is ask myself "does this person's opinion on this particular subject matter to me?".

For example, some people in my family or friend circle, I would ask for financial/investing advice, but I wouldn't go to them for fashion advice. The people I would ask for fashion advice generally are NOT the people I would ask for money advice. 

So, I define for myself which opinions matter to me and just let the rest roll off my back. Even when it is people I love or enjoy spending time with, not ALL of their opinions matter to me because I don't see them as "advice worthy" on every subject they might express an opinion on. They are still entitled to their opinion, and I can strongly (and mostly silently) disagree with that opinion and just move on with my life. 🤷🏻‍♀️

 

[lewelma]

1 minute ago, Not_a_Number said:

But your description is great. That's exactly right. I feel almost uncomfortably seen 😉. 

I just wanted others to know that there was a process that you seem to go through, and that they are focusing just on the 'disagreeing with everyone' phase. We all learn in different ways. Yours is more confrontational than other posters, I will admit, but I think that is part of what I like. You are sincere in trying to learn, you ask really difficult soul searching questions, you expose your own foibles. I very much value your posts. 

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, teachermom2834 said:

Your opinions are fine and I would say that WTM is full of confident people, mostly women, and it isn’t confidence that people have trouble with. You just have to say your piece and then move on. Unless, of course, you find the posters who want to spar. Because I’m allowed to have my opinions, too, right? And if it feels like the only way to end an exchange is to agree with you then what do I do with my opinions? If you keep questioning me and tagging me and making me prove my point over and over I’m going to feel badgered. That isn’t because you are too confident or too smart. I’m confident too and I’ve thought alot about my opinions and have lived a long time now. So we need to just agree to disagree. Most times the boards here are full of posters disagreeing about something on one thread and then laughing together about something different on another thread. There is room for all kinds of opinions. We don’t actually have to convince each other of anything no matter how strong our opinions are. 

I think I already agreed with that in my last post 🤷‍♀️. You're right. I should post and leave things be. 

I'm certainly not doing that in this post, though, which is maybe a good point 😂. I do hear you, though.

[ikslo]

17 minutes ago, lewelma said:

I will say that I found your post very confronting.

I found it to be spot on.

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, ikslo said:

I found it to be spot on.

Then I recommend you don't talk to me, same as wendyroo? Suggestions that require me to change my internal landscape aren't useful to me. But I can fully believe you find me really annoying (you're obviously not alone) and if the annoyance doesn't outweigh the benefit of interacting with me, there's always the ignore button. 

[Carol in Cal.]

3 minutes ago, Terabith said:

I should also add that I found and bought and loved SWB's book in like 1999, years before I had my first child.  I bought The Story of the World as it came out, again before I had my kids, for my own benefit.  So when I started looking for homeschooling advice, it's not like I was looking at a wide assortment of philosophies and homeschooling resources.  I explicitly came looking for assistance with her method.

Now, as it turned out, her method worked well in some respects for my oldest and less well in other aspects, but it was pretty much a non starter for my youngest.  I kept saying to myself, SWB says, "Reading is easy!" so why am I having SO MUCH TROUBLE teaching my obviously bright child to read.  Who turned out to be dyslexic, dysgraphic, had severe anxiety and perfectionism, and had a major memory issue.  Reading was NOT easy, and neither was anything that required memorization.  

But by then I'd found the hive, and was better able to do some customization.

OMGosh this takes me back.

How many, many times I tried to gentle down the ‘Reading is easy’ thing for others, since I had such a hard time coming to terms with it myself.

I also remember planning lists being a thing, incessantly.  As in, what are you going to do for 5th grade next year?  The answers were not all curricula, although curricula dominated, but not usually all in one types and almost never all from one company—often there would be things like, “For math I’m going to shuffle together these two curricula plus extra practice with this computer program”.  Or, “I’m still deciding between TOG and Sonlight for history/lit.”  Or, “I’m using Writing Strands—here is why.”  These were such useful threads, because they included the rationale for these decisions, which people had thought about a ton ton.  And since there were so many participants, there were no answers that were deemed right for everyone.  It was so great!

[Melissa Louise]

Just now, Not_a_Number said:

I have to say, I do have trouble in real life with how mouthy I am, too 😂. Not everyone likes how vehement I can get about things. It's a polarizing trait. 

That being said, situations in which I've pretended not to be confident and opinionated haven't actually gone well for me. I just wind up feeling ignored and resentful. My opinions are, for better or worse, really important to me. 

So then the question is what one does with one's strong opinion if one has a town square and a megaphone . . . 🤔

It's tricky. I have strong opinions too. 

A lot of head butting that happens here isn't because you (or I) have strong opinions, but because others disagreeing ALSO have strong opinions! 

I wouldn't heap it all on your own head, frankly. When conversations go downhill, that takes more than one person!

Is it possible you are understimulated as a homeschooler? Debate and argument are my go-tos when understimulated, but it's better to find that stimulation elsewhere, imo.

Here is some positive feedback. I can't remember what you and I were arguing about, but you 'owned' being a jerk about one aspect of it. And right then, all.my annoyance dropped away, because it's very disarming when someone allows themself to be whole - not '100% right at all.times and a paragon of moral virtue'. 

There's a lot of psychological splitting that can be seen on forums - 'we' are right (good), 'they' are wrong (bad). 

I liked that you owned your own (limited) jerk nature 🙂 because let's face it, we all have one, and most of us have exhibited it at one time or another. 

 

 

 

[wendyroo]

3 minutes ago, lewelma said:

This is still coming across as aggressive. I hear what you are saying, but you are using hyperbole in a way that feels hurtful. 

You're calling out "off-putting" in an "I statement"? It just means "unpleasant, disconcerting, or repellent". I do, and am allowed to, find her posts unpleasant. I'm not trying to constrain her right to post. I'm not reporting her posts. I'm simply reporting how they make me feel: disconcerted and repelled.

Let's remember, she is the one who just a few posts up said (perhaps even boasted reading between the lines) that, "I have to say, I do have trouble in real life with how mouthy I am, too 😂."

I don't have a reputation for being mouthy or mean in real life, and after a decade on this forum I don't think I have that reputation here either.

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, Melissa Louise said:

I liked that you owned your own (limited) jerk nature 🙂 because let's face it, we all have one, and most of us have exhibited it at one time or another. 

Thanks! 

That's definitely one of the things that makes me bearable in real life, too 😂. I will own things I feel like I'm being a jerk about. 

So, I'm mouthy and opinionated and overconfident a LOT but I also don't make things personal and I'll own up if I think I'm wrong. 

It's definitely polarizing, as I said. 

[Melissa Louise]

8 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

Sometimes I think I'm right for me and sometimes I think I'm right in general 🤷‍♀️. And sometimes I'm wrong about the former and sometimes I'm wrong about the latter. 

Everyone thinks this at times. I don't really believe people who say they don't. 

I do believe some people find it easier than others not to say it 😂

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, wendyroo said:

You're calling out "off-putting" in an "I statement"? It just means "unpleasant, disconcerting, or repellent". I do, and am allowed to, find her posts unpleasant. I'm not trying to constrain her right to post. I'm not reporting her posts. I'm simply reporting how they make me feel: disconcerted and repelled.

Let's remember, she is the one who just a few posts up said (perhaps even boasted reading between the lines) that, "I have to say, I do have trouble in real life with how mouthy I am, too 😂."

I don't have a reputation for being mouthy or mean in real life, and after a decade on this forum I don't think I have that reputation here either.

I mean, it's scanning as aggressive to me and lewelma, I guess? I'm not sure what it is we're supposed to do about that. That's how it FEELS to US.