EP 124: What is Confident Autonomy

Confident autonomy: this is the thing Kris and Akilah Richards intend to help nurture in their daughters, Marley and Sage-Niambi. There is no one definition of it’ it’s an ability to navigate the world with a strong sense of self, an awareness of the place in the world and their capacity to influence the people and situations within it, and the tools to life well, be good to people, and make a difference in their communities. Is that a tall order? Listen to a couple of excerpts from Akilah’s essays on unschooling and deschooling, and share your own definition of confident autonomy.  #BIPOCinSDE

Mad Question’ Askin:

Is it safe to raise our children to be confident and self-aware, or will that invite more chances for them to be unfairly targeted and harmed by the social or legal arms of a racist dominant structure?

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Speaker 1 0:00

You can't keep using tools of oppression and expect to raise free people.

Speaker 2 0:11

I am a s Richards and you are rocking with a community of black folks, indigenous folks and other people of color immersed or interested in self directed education. Tune in weekly for insights and strategies from unschooled as these schoolers, social justice organizers, Co op and nonprofit founders, recovering public and private school teachers and professors and believers in lifelong de colonized learning like what you're hearing. Head over to raising free people.com for more than 100 episodes of deep dope dialogue to fuel your education liberation. Here's an excerpt from an essay I wrote and the notes for it will be on the show notes page raising free people.com forward slash one to four what is confident autonomy? It's a term I've been using often since I started writing almost exclusively about unschooling as liberation work, so I'm going to pull a few excerpts from a couple of pieces. This one is called unschooling discoveries using a compass instead of a map and this section of the essay is titled Nurturing Confident Autonomy in our children. Progressive Educator and renowned author bell hooks once wrote this about learning. The heartbeat of critical thinking is the longing to know to understand how life works. Children are organically predisposed to be critical thinkers across the boundaries of race, class, gender and circumstance. Children come into the world of wonder and language consumed with a desire for knowledge. Sometimes they're so eager for knowledge that they become relentless interrogators demanding searching for answers. They learn almost instinctively how to think. Sadly, children's passion for thinking often ends when they encounter a world that seeks to educate them for conformity and obedience. Only though hooks and I would likely disagree on the role of compulsory education as part of a healthy emotional environment for children. We would definitely agree on the right to freedom of thought and expression for all people, including young ones through my lens. UNSCHOOLING is an effective option for countering that embedded conformity and obedience focus from society and my lens is not just my own. My view is shared among parents, thought leaders and even academics. This is why notable schools like Mit, Harvard, Stanford, and Duke continue to actively recruit non traditionally educated students. When children are supported by parents who help them identify how they, the children learn and what it takes for them to feel immersed in learning by way of exposure to new ideas and experiences and immersion hours of free time to uncover the layers within their areas of interest, then they can thrive as children and as adults. None of us have to surrender our children to the school system even when they are within it. We can counter the dangerous narratives promoted in schools that assert assimilation and sameness as the best route to financial success and stability and adulthood. We do this by prioritizing exploration of self and environment within the safe spaces of our guidance as their parents, but guidance doesn't mean deciding for them. It means giving them space to decide on their own interests and to decide on what to do to practice the skills that will help them to be more than students who become adults with education. These practices can help them become adults who benefit from a love of learning the way I see it. If my daughters know how they learn and their present enough to connect their abilities and deepest interest to pressing needs in the world around them, then they can leverage their skills to realize income, impact and genuine join their world. And this is an excerpt from a piece called respecting your kids' autonomy. Autonomy in summary is a life skill, not a luxury. Today more than ever, leading by example, by respecting our children and making room for confidence, self directed freedom, which is autonomy is not a luxury we grant to our children, but a vital skill they need to start practicing now in preparation for managing themselves, their time and ultimately their lives alongside overwhelming amounts of ever updating information as parents and community members, we'll get plenty of opportunities to practice a harmony between leaving room for our children to make their own choices and have those choices be supported by us. Respecting their right to choose is one way we can support children and respect their need for autonomy. That support doesn't always have to look like agreement. Either. Support can mean discussions around your reasons for concern about any choice that they make. Support can also mean allowing your child to make a mistake so that they can see the result of a choice for themselves. Essentially, respecting our children's autonomy is about the line between giving our children's space to get comfortable making choices about their own lives and spending an hour to provide boundaries and context within which they can safely explore their environments and respectfully communicate their needs and preferences. The lines are blurry sometimes, but if we continue to pay attention and choose observation and trust over fear, our children will show us in words and in actions how to give them the room to become whoever it is that they are meant to be.

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for a transcript of this show and any other relevant details that I can gather up, be sure to check out the show notes page raising free people.com forward slash one to four.