The Fear of Failing

Last Wednesday morning, just after sunrise, we headed into the bush to record another music video for Imogen. “What song are you singing today, Imogen?” I asked. “May it Be from The Lord of the Rings, the Enya song.” “Do…

A New Unschooling Year Begins

 Andy returns to work tomorrow. He’s a primary school teacher. “This is Dad’s last day of holiday,” I say to the girls. They are quiet for a moment, and then it suddenly dawns on them. “You mean the new school…

Learning From My Children

My children are always eager to learn.  “Wow! That looks wonderful. Will you teach me to crochet too? Do you think I could make a blanket like yours?”  They always seem willing to have a go. They don’t worry about…

What Kind of Home Do Kids Need?

The other day, while walking our dogs through the bush close to home, I met a neighbour who warned me to watch out for snakes. He’d almost stepped on one and had sighted others that had slithered away. Years ago,…

Some Bits and Pieces…

The other day I was looking at a letter Gemma-Rose had written to a friend. It was long and detailed and her spelling was almost perfect. “When did you learn to spell so well?” I asked. Gemma-Rose shrugged her shoulders.…

Latest

Miles’ Model Munitions Germination

This is a guest post by unschooling teenager Miles Brack. About a month ago, my local home-schooling group held a “winter markets”. Mum suggested that I sell my wooden model guns… Setting up for the markets was a little hard. Seeing as I’d never met the audience I had no idea what to make for them. I had a hunch that the long guns had potential to be a best seller, but since they were the hardest and most expensive…

Ideas for Starting Unschooling

A few posts ago, I was talking about collaboration. Would anyone like to work with me as we try to spread the unschooling message? Could we light a gentle unschooling fire together? I was afraid no one would respond to my invitation, but quite a few people did! You might have noticed the recent guest posts which have widened the unschooling conversation. Instead of just reading my thoughts and ideas and hearing about what my family is doing, you’ve been…

Watching a Child Learn

This is a guest post written by Elizabeth Johnson. As mothers (and fathers) we are blessed with an incredible privilege: watching our children’s minds unfold to the world around them. I used to take great pleasure from seeing an “A” at the top of my daughter’s spelling tests and would congratulate myself on parenting well done when my son could parrot back to me the correct answers for an upcoming science test. Never mind the distasteful preparation on behalf of…

A Podcast Transcript: Passing On Our Values and Beliefs to Our Children

This post is a transcript of part of my podcast, Episode 102: Sharing Our Values and Beliefs With Our Unschooled Children. I edited my original words to make them flow better. I reordered some of them, cut out repetitions, and made some small additions so that my thoughts are easier to follow. (Unfortunately, words never fall from my lips in a perfect manner when I’m podcasting!) I don’t think it matters whether we have a faith or not, whether we are…

Sharing Our Values and Beliefs With Our Unschooled Children

We all have our beliefs. Even if we don’t have a religious faith, we still believe in something. We all have values which shape our lives. Is it okay if we share these beliefs and values with our kids? I’ve heard some unschoolers say that we shouldn’t influence our kids. They should be free to make up their own minds about such things without any input from us. I have a couple of problems with this opinion. For a start,…

How I Gave Up and Started Unschooling

A guest post by Venisa McAllister We started with high hopes. When my oldest daughter Sarah was old enough for kindergarten I enrolled her in a program called k-12. They would give us a computer, fun learning materials, and help me turn my daughter into a genius! We started with high hopes. How could it not work? Everything came beautifully organized in a large box and it seemed very well planned. The downside was that this curriculum was very big…

Adult Peer Pressure, Clothes, Rules, and Compassion

Have you even made decisions based on other people’s opinions rather than the needs of your own family? I have. I almost ruined my relationship with my eldest daughter by doing this. I chose to listen to my friends rather than to my child. You see, I wanted to be accepted by the group. I bowed to adult peer pressure. Adult peer pressure can affect the way we unschool. Sometimes we might find ourselves doing things we just aren’t ready for…
1 … 54 55 56 57 58 … 109

My Unschooling Books

Parents and Kids

Reassessing

It’s the first day of the official school holidays so my husband Andy is home from school for two weeks. He’s looking forward to…

The Ladies Fixing the World

Unschooling: Trust, Autonomy, and The Realities of Learning

The Ladies are Fixing the World again! Cecilie, Sandra and I are discussing the words ‘self-regulation’ and ‘limits’. When we say, “I’ve let go of control, and now I’m waiting for my child to learn how to regulate his time playing video games (for example),” do we have expectations about what that regulation should look like? Do we want…

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…

Losing Time

I’ve been reading a book called A Time to Die by Nicholas Diat, who visited eight monasteries to talk to the monks about the experience of death. Here’s something that caught my attention: One monk described how he cares for the old and sick, and how he has to guard against doing things in a routine way, trying to complete…
Go toTop