Criticism, Reviews, and Paying It Forward

Sometimes I’m not very sensible: I try to do too much. I want to blog and vlog and podcast and write books and host a community and occasionally sign in to Instagram. But I really don’t have time to…

Sharing Some Thoughts on Learning to Read

 I was asked to share some thoughts on learning to read and write. Shall I start with reading? When I created this blog, Gemma-Rose was almost a fluent reader so I haven’t written many stories on this topic. I will…

Real Life Family Unschool Maths

A few years ago, when my daughter Sophie was 10, she started to say, “I’m no good at maths. I hate it!” At the time, Sophie was using a formal structured maths course. When she started sighing over her work,…

Latest

All About Strewing

I have a few strewing stories in my blog’s archive, and I’d like to include a couple of them in my unschooling book. Maybe Time for Some Strewing and What to Do When Strewing is Rejected would be appropriate choices. Have you read these stories? If you haven’t, you could listen to them. I’m sharing and discussing them in this week’s podcast. In episode 114, I answer the following questions: What is strewing? When do we need to do it? How do…

Spreading the Radical Unschooling Message

Not so long ago, I made a podcast called Why You Should Consider Radical Unschooling. I wanted to encourage everyone to let unschooling spill over into all aspects of life, and not just the educational part. I wanted to say, “Unschooling is very good indeed, but radical unschooling is even better. Take the next step. Don’t be scared.” Don’t be scared? Yes allowing kids to make their own decisions about all areas of their lives might sound frightening. What if they…

What if Unschooling is Wrong?

Today, I’m sharing an incomplete thought. Some thoughts are like that. They sit at the edge of our minds, refusing to enter completely. We could dismiss them, but they might hold something of value. If only we could grasp them properly and put them into the right words. Do you ever wonder: “What if unschooling is wrong?” We could be quite happy, and then one day, out of the blue, doubt descends. Our trust begins to waver. We think: “What…

How Do We Encourage Our Kids to Be Independent Learners?

I’m still podcasting while I’m writing this unschooling book series. Here’s this week’s episode! This week, I’m sharing and discussing the story Independent Learners, Toast and Heavy Washing Baskets. Show Notes Leonie’s blog: Living Without School podcast music: Twombly by Podington Bear, (CC BY-NC 3.0)…

Today I Saw Thomas

it’s our son Thomas’ birthday. This morning, the girls and I visited the cemetery. When we arrived, we saw people preparing for a burial. A grave was open. There were chairs arranged in the shade ready for the bereaved who hadn’t yet arrived. Thomas is buried at the back of the cemetery in the children’s section. As we got closer, we could see two bunches of flowers in the bowl that sits on top of his grave. Someone placed them there…

Critics, Unschooling, and Independent Learners

 A New Podcast Series Do you listen to my podcasts? I’ll still be making new episodes while I’m working on my book. These episodes will be shorter than my usual ones. Each one will be based on a blog post from my archive. Today, I published the first episode in this new series: Critics, Unschooling, and Independent Learners. If you’d like to listen to it, you can find episode 111 here on my blog, on iTunes (or should that be…

It Begins with a Question

Gemma-Rose and I gaze upon the flowers. They’re pretty, bright, colourful, showy. A gorgeous backdrop for a photo. We raise our cameras. Cameras down. We look around. There’s a Chinese gentleman. He’s standing in a garden bed erecting a parasol. We ask a question: Why? The man smiles. His eyes sparkle. Words tumble from his mouth: I’m sheltering the peonies – the imperial flower of China – from the warm Australian sun. There’s more. We lean closer and listen. The man…

Perfect

I raise my camera to my eye and frame my daughter Sophie within the viewfinder. She grins before raising her own camera. I almost protest and say, “Hey, I look terrible! Don’t take any photos of me!” But I don’t. A mother and a daughter out on a picnic, enjoying each other’s company. Joy rises up within me. It chases away any thoughts of my appearance. I don’t care what I look like. I just want Sophie to capture this…
1 … 51 52 53 54 55 … 109

My Unschooling Books

Parents and Kids

Will We Have Done Enough?

Are our kids ‘doing enough’? Maybe we often ask ourselves that question. But what do we mean by ‘doing enough’? Do we worry that…

How All Kids Are Amazing

The other day, I read a parenting article in which the author said that parents can love their kids too much. I told my…

The Ladies Fixing the World

How Unschooling Doesn’t Guarantee a Fairytale Life

Yesterday evening, like all Sunday evenings, my kids who live locally came to dinner. Six of us gathered around our dining room table, savouring a meal cooked by my husband while enjoying the usual end-of-the-week lively catch-up conversation. There was a time when we dreamed that all our children would buy houses on the same street as our family home.…

Learning to Read and Trusting Unschooling

It is absolutely essential that we are curious people who are excited about the possibilities in life. The atmosphere in our homes gets picked up by our kids so they think it’s normal to learn, to be curious, to follow thoughts and ideas and try things out… I was battling with my kids for a while. They kept saying, ‘Why…

Is It Working? Wrestling with Doubt in Unschooling

A grey day arrives that completely blots out the memory of all the preceding good days. We feel overwhelmed, tired, worried and lost. We wonder why we ever decided to unschool. A puddle of doubt about unschooling forms around us. What do we do? Cecilie, Sandra and I are discussing unschooling doubts and sharing our experiences in episode 10 of…

Christian unschooling

Could Ebooks Save My Unschool Blog?

The other day, I logged into my blog hosting account to find out when my next payment is due and how much it will be. When I saw the bill due later this year, I gulped and said to my husband, “Do we want to spend so much money on a site that’s often slow or offline because of a…
Go toTop