How Kids (and Adults) Learn

In this week’s podcast, episode 108, I’m telling some stories and chatting about how kids and adults learn: What is the best motivation for learning? Why do we persist using teaching methods that we know aren’t working? Why do we waste…

Can We Force Kids to Exercise?

Yesterday morning, my daughter Sophie approached me with her arms outstretched. “Can I have a hug, please, Mum?” “Oh no, no!” I said backing away. “It’s far too hot to hug.” “You have to hug us, Mum,” said Gemma-Rose with…

Are You a Curious Unschooler? [Podcast]

I recorded a new podcast episode! That might surprise you because it’s been quite a while since my last episode. I’ve become a bit of an unreliable podcaster. But, hopefully, that’s about to change: I’m planning to record a new…

Latest

Lacking Inspiration

My writing life goes round in circles. At times, I feel excited. I have lots of things I want to write about. My words flow onto the computer screen, no problem at all. And then one day I wake up and I feel flat. When I write, my words are two-dimensional. No amount of effort will pump them up and make them exciting. A few times in the past, when I’ve been in one of these phases, I’ve written a…

Letting Our Writing Imaginations Go Wild

The day before yesterday, while we were driving down the back road to town, we saw a tractor. “I’m glad it’s not going our way,” I remarked as it crawled along the road in the opposite direction. Yesterday, we were out on the road again. And again we came face-to-face with another slowly chugging tractor. This morning, as we were driving out of our village… “Look another tractor!” “The third this week!” Now tractors aren’t an uncommon sight in our…

Real Life Maths: Designing a Dream Home

“Anyone want to watch Grand Designs?” I shout. My family appears. “We do!” We turn on the TV, slip a disc into the DVD player and settle back to enjoy. In every episode of the TV lifestyle program, Grand Designs, a couple or family builds their dream home in their dream location. In every episode, something goes wrong: “The house will go over-budget,” someone predicts. “The windows won’t arrive on time.” “They’ll find an underground river just where they want…

Stolen Paintings and Real Life Maths

Last week was a hunting week… My daughters and I watched as the FBI tried to hunt down a number of stolen masterpieces. And then I went on a hunt for some real life maths experiences. (Where’s all that maths everyone says the world is full of?) Did the FBI recover the paintings? Were the criminals apprehended? And did I find some maths notes to add to my rather empty looking homeschool records book? All will be revealed in this week’s…

Is it Necessary We Agree with Each Other’s Ideas?

A reader once linked one of my posts to her blog and added the words: “I don’t agree with all her ideas, but I like this one.” Someone liked my post! I smiled. But a small part of me thought, “What’s wrong with some of my other ideas?” I wanted the reader to agree with everything I have to say. Is that just a natural reaction? Have you ever felt that way? Maybe most of us want our opinions to…

How to Live Radically

Radical unschooling children don’t necessarily brush their teeth, or shower and if they want to exist on an exclusive diet of coca cola and donuts, well, that’s up to them. Or so the stories go. And for some people that might not sound a very attractive way of life at all. But what if we forget about teeth and showers and junk food?  Perhaps there’s something far more important at the heart of a radical way of life… What if…

When Our Help and Strewing Are Rejected

My daughter Charlotte used to be openly enthusiastic about everything. Every evening she’d be eager to tell me about all the things she’d discovered that day. She’d listen to my ideas and ask for resources. Then things changed. During the last year or so of Charlotte’s official homeschooling years, she stopped turning to me for suggestions. If we did get together and mull over ideas for learning, she never followed up on anything. My help was often rejected. “What did…
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My Unschooling Books

Parents and Kids

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.…

Resources for Unschoolers

Strolling towards the shopping centre, I spy an older man with three hand-reared brightly coloured parrots. A few wide-eyed kids are gathered around him, and as I watch, he transfers a parrot to one of their shoulders, where it bounces lightly upon its feet, nuzzling a little ear. The child grins, hardly daring to move. The children have questions which…

Christian unschooling

Does Christian Unschooling Interest You?

I’ve written three unschooling books: I focused on the educational side of unschooling in Curious Unschoolers. I extended the unschooling story in Radical Unschool Love by sharing parenting thoughts and stories. And I offered practical suggestions for turning all those interesting unschooling ideas into something real in families’ lives in The Unschool Challenge. Three books. A trilogy. Everything I can…
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