Unschooling: The Little Way
I would like to tell you a story of Suzie Andres and St Therese and homeschooling. But first I must start with a tale of grief. Grief? Yes, it was through grief I first met St Therese and her Little…
What About My Perfect Homeschooling Success Story?
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Accepting, Respecting, and Loving Unconditionally: An Unschooler’s Thoughts
In episode 70 of my podcast, Trust, Respect, and Love Unconditionally. my daughter Sophie shared some very insightful thoughts about respecting kids, accepting them for who they are, and making them feel unconditionally loved. Here is a transcript of part…
Christian Unschooling: Do Kids Need Silence and Space to Hear God?
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Having the Confidence to Ignore the Opinions of Others
Gemma-Rose is eight years old, and she still can’t tell the time. Well, that’s not quite true. If I put my watch in front of her and say, “What’s the time?” she’ll screw up her face and look unhappy for…
Unschool Maths Records: 20+ Ideas for Evernote
Is anyone looking for ideas on how we can use Evernote to record unschool maths? I hope so because I have put together a list of 20+ ideas I use! 1. Copy and paste infographics Recently, we’ve been pondering such things as how much does the average person spend at Christmas? How many Christians are there in Australia? How do people fund their Christmas shopping? We found some infographics which gave us the answers. 2. Clip any stats associated with…
Unschool English Records: 20 Ideas for Evernote
I love Evernote. I think it’s A Perfect Method for Keeping Unschooling Records! You might already know this if you’ve read some of my other Evernote blog posts or watched my videos. Yes, I’ve got a lot to say on this subject! A while ago, I promised to make some Evernote videos on each of the 6 Key Learning Areas. So far, my attempts to record screencast tutorials have failed due to technical difficulties. But today, I thought: Why not…
The Awesome Teacher and Other Stuff
My daughter Sophie is very busy. Every morning she opens her computer, impatient to begin work. “What are you doing?” I ask. “I’m coding. I’m modifying the template on my ‘test’ blog.” Sophie shows me what she’s doing. “Are you writing the code from scratch?” I ask. “Sometimes. Other times I’m making changes to other people’s code.” I don’t mind Sophie spending hours coding. I can see she’s learning a lot while enjoying herself. But I do have a problem:…
From Around the Web: Unschooling and Learning to Read
How do unschooled children learn to read? Can we trust them to learn to read in their own time? What if a child is still not reading after a ‘reasonable’ amount of time? I’ve gathered a few blog posts from around the Internet on unschooling and learning to read. I hope you enjoy them! 1. How Late is a Late Reader? by Luminara King from Living the Education Revolution Our daughter, did not learn to read until just before her twelfth…
Why We Don’t Have to Push Kids to Work Hard
This morning, my husband Andy watched as our girls and I got ready to go for a run. As we laced up our shoes, he grinned and said: “What a mean mother you are making everyone run before breakfast!” Although Andy was joking, I’m sure many people might take his words seriously. Perhaps they would indeed think I am a mean mother because what other explanation is there? Surely four girls wouldn’t choose to get up early, pull on their…
Getting Older, Unschooling, and Moving On
My unschooling blog has a limited life. One day, in the not too distant future, I will no longer have anything to write about. My youngest child will have grown up and moved onto a new stage of her life. I’ll no longer be sharing her unschooling learning, and so it will be time for me to move onto a new stage in my life too. What will happen to me when I no longer have children at home to…
Fabulous Christmas: Gift Ideas and Traditions
My head is always overflowing with creative ideas, and there’s nothing I like better than turning them into reality. And so I spend lots of time making things. But they’re things no one can hold. You see, I’m a virtual creator. I make things while tapping on my computer keyboard. But during Advent it’s different. At this time of year, I make real 3-dimensional things. And so do my girls. You might find us at the kitchen table kneading a…
Trying to Be a Fun Mum
When my first two children were very small I had a best friend called Mellie. We got on extremely well despite being very different. I was an always-in-control type person. As well as liking an organised and spotless house, I liked my children clean and tidy and always presentable. Hair ribbons were good too. I encouraged my children to sleep and eat at regular times and I loved empty plates. In contrast, Mellie was a very relaxed and comfortable-with-herself type…
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 Jeans-Wearing Rule
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Why We Should Freely Choose to Do Difficult and Unpleasant Things
Let’s be realistic: no one will freely choose to do what’s difficult and unpleasant, will they? A mother once told me this is exactly…
Unschooling: Trusting the Process and Letting Go of Control
“I kind of love my title for this podcast. It’s very ambitious. Let’s fix it all!” And so begins another Ladies Fixing the World conversation in which Cecilie Conrad, Sandra Dodd and I dive deep into unschooling, sharing our thoughts and experiences. In S2E4, we discuss Unschooling: Trusting the Process and Letting Go. Want to know more…
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…
How Unschoolers Can Deal with Questions and Sceptics
My mother-in-law visited us for the birth of our son, Thomas. After he died and we’d buried him in his tiny white casket, Andy’s mother asked me if we wanted more children. As I replied, “Oh, yes!”, my mother-in-law’s face dropped into a disapproving frown. “She thinks we already have enough kids,” I thought as my defence hackles rose. But…
Christian Unschooling and Other Things
I made a new podcast episode! Yes, after an absence of a few weeks, I’m back. So where did I go? Nowhere in particular. I was just at home enjoying lots of slow summer days. Maybe I was feeling lazy. But yesterday, that changed. I suddenly felt like getting back to work. And so I thought I’d record a catch-up…
Christian Unschooling: Letting God into Our Kids’ Lives
I used to tick off my spiritual boxes religiously every day. I said a lot of prayers and read my Bible. And I got extra ticks whenever I was able to get to daily Mass, so I made the effort to get there as often as life allowed. It wasn’t easy doing all that, but I did it. I had…