Unschooling: What we Learnt
This year is our 7th year homeschooling. It was one of the biggest life changing decisions we made. I have learnt so much about myself, education and my children. I have made a lot of mistakes but we have also gotten a lot right.
Our journey with Emma has been a particularly challenging one and I have tried so many different things with her, most working only very briefly. This led me towards the end of 2023 to the decision to unschool her. It was a huge leap of faith for me. Coming from a family of educators and having gone through very traditional schooling myself, the idea of homeschooling was very scary – I mean how could you just let your child do what they want – right?
Well that’s exactly what we ended up doing. Letting her do what she wanted for an entire year.
These are a few lessons I learnt along the way.
- Some children simple do not fit the traditional idea of schooling but that doesn’t mean they don’t want to learn.
- Learning doesn’t always look like maths and biology – it can also be learning to crochet, starting a business, baking and googling things of interest.
- It is ok if your child does “nothing” all day.
- Following your child’s lead means they are more engaged and interested.
- Trusting your child can be liberating and exciting for you both.
- Unschooling is not neglecting or giving up on your child – rather it is following their interests and where they want their education journey to go.
- As a parent, you know your child and you know what is going to benefit them – your gut is always right.
Together we decided to go back to a more structured form of schooling this year. it was her decision and so far it is going very well. She is more engaged in the work we are doing, she understands her own goals better and made the commitment to try this route.
We are taking it slow – some weeks we do a lot of work and some weeks, like now, she spends all day reading. Both are ok.
It may very well change at some point. We may go back to a more unstructured approach or we may switch to a formal curriculum or even a cottage school type set up. I don’t really know and it is pretty scary but it is also exciting.
