Un-schooling Discussion

This thread is for an open discussion on the learning philosophy unschooling. Unschooling is an educational method and philosophy that rejects compulsory school as a primary means for learning. Unschoolers learn through their natural life experiences including play, household responsibilities, personal interests and curiosity, internships and work experience, travel, books, elective classes, family, mentors, and social interaction (definition from Wiki).

There are a few BellyBelly members who have selected unschooling and there are many more who would like to know what unschooling is all about. Please use this thread to explore options, ask questions, discuss the philosophy and bounce ideas off other members. Anyone is welcome to share an opinion or ask a question, from either side of the debate.

As per BellyBelly guidelines, there is to be no insulting or flaming other members. This thread will be moderated closely and inappropriate behaviour will result in a warning or infraction, accompanied by an immediate ban from this thread.

Background for my question - my sisters and I were homeschooled for high school. 2 or 3 times a year, someone from the Education Department would come out and check on our work, see what level we were at, and just generally make sure we were learning and not slacking off, lol.

Does that happen for unschooling? If so, how do you ensure your child is up to a certain level?

I have friends who homeschool and others who unschool, and I like both styles. I think unschooling appeals to me a bit more, being more individually led, but my mind keeps throwing up barriers like the one above. Hopefully I can get some questions answered now!

I have a question/comment....unschooling was discussed amongst a group of us recently. One in the group, a qualified teacher, homeschooled her children for a number of years, they now attend school. Her comment was that 2 of her children have learning difficulties - so unschooling totally suited them as the education system doesn't cater for them (yet they are now attending school) and that her boys will never learn to read or write no matter if they are taught at school home or forced to learned they will never learn to do it.

So is she right? Does unschooling suit the child with learning difficulties? And maybe not specific to the topic, but is there really no hope for some children to learn to read and write in 2014?

Having no personal experience, I think it would be better, simply because the parent can give the one on one time that the child requires. I remember reading Lucy's blogs about homeschooling Cyclone and finding the things that worked for HIM rather than what the class was doing, and how much better he did.

Different states have different requirements for homeschooling. In schooling is still educating at home, often parents will do I schooling but then show the dept of Ed what they have been doing eg. Dd went on a horse tangent so in her scrap book she drew them she researched them had excursions to a farrier, talked to xyz.. So parent then links each of these to different curriculum aspects... It is following the kids lead and encouraging them to find out as much as they can/want on each topic of interest.

Ps the example is not my DD, just an example

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Background for my question - my sisters and I were homeschooled for high school. 2 or 3 times a year, someone from the Education Department would come out and check on our work, see what level we were at, and just generally make sure we were learning and not slacking off, lol.

Does that happen for unschooling? If so, how do you ensure your child is up to a certain level?

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Yeah, it's still just a style of home education so the same rules apply. It's different in every state though, e.g in Qld you need to send in a plan at the start of each year for them to approve. At the end of the year you send a report and work samples showing how the child has progressed. So if you unschool it can be a bit tricky depending on the child but people still make it work.

Un schooling or homeschooling may suit kids with learning difficulties better than mainstream school - although I don't know about any research one way or the other.

As for whether there is no hope - kids with LD have perfectly typical intelligence, but struggle to pick up reading and wiring skills it doesn't mean they can't learn just that they find it harder. They learn differently than typically developing children. An LD doesn't go away, so in some ways yes, there is likely to always be a difference between them and everyone else - even in adulthood. But it doesn't mean it's a hopeless cause or that we should give up - because some kids find some great strategies and they work really well for them. Perhaps that's why some people have found home or unschooling better for their child.

I would like to begin with a disclaimer that our family unschools but I am not an authority on unschooling, all views and answers given are from my knowledge, perspective and experience with the topics and not intended to be seen as anything more than that. I will do my best to address things in this thread not because I feel I have to but because I am passionate on the topic, I enjoy writing and I wish to share with others in the hope it might benefit them in some way; this might not always be done in a speedy fashion as my time will always be prioritized to my family.

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Background for my question - my sisters and I were homeschooled for high school. 2 or 3 times a year, someone from the Education Department would come out and check on our work, see what level we were at, and just generally make sure we were learning and not slacking off, lol.

Does that happen for unschooling? If so, how do you ensure your child is up to a certain level?

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All home education falls under the same legal requirements regardless of the method or philosophy that guides it (except distance education which is not technically homeschooling as you are still enrolled to a school you are then accountable to them and they are accountable to the Government). The requirements vary depending on state so it is hard to give a simple answer to your question but you can unschool in all states of Australia and satisfy the legal requirements. If it is something somebody is serious about pursuing then I can point them in the right direction for information about their state. NSW is generally regarded as the most difficult state to satisfy home education requirements and that does involve home visit interviews as well as the drafting of plans and reports. Victoria is generally regarded the easiest and requires parents to simply sign a form expressing their intention to home educate each year. I am from QLD which is somewhere in the middle of those.

You do not need to ensure your child is at a certain level. In essence, when you need to provide documentation, you need to demonstrate they are provided with a rich and encouraging learning environment and making progress individual to them in eduspeak. In my state there are a number of different guides and forms you can use to plan and report offered both by the Government and by people and organisations outside of it (some are more suited to unschooling than others) or you can draft something up yourself. The national curriculum is available for anyone to access and utilize in this process.

How I keep records is mostly photographically, it is just a really quick way of doing things. I also jot down notes during the day when I have a chance (usually quotes from my children, other things I can generally remember simply from the photos) and I journal at night. I also keep a portfolio for each of my kids that is usually organised by a theme or central idea (so Ancient Egypt or Life Cycles or Space). These are not specifically for legal requirements, they are for personal use firstly but when I look back over those things I am able to get a clear idea of what my children are learning and line it up with the national curriculum. Samples of work can be anything a child has done; writing can be from a shopping list or a letter or labeling pictures for example and it can be photographed rather than an original copy.

I am currently unregistered as prep is not compulsory in QLD so you do not register until 6.5yrs of age but it is something I am prepared for and have seen others go through. It is a lot more work than having a set curriculum you are following to show them but it is definitely not impossible and in my mind worth it.

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Does unschooling suit the child with learning difficulties? And maybe not specific to the topic, but is there really no hope for some children to learn to read and write in 2014?

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I think children in an unschooling environment are supported to reach their potential, whatever that potential may be and therefore, it can suit any child because it is meeting them where they are at in a way that suits and speaks to them (that isn't to say that schooling might not also suit them). I do know of families with children who have special needs who unschool. Health professionals such as OTs and speech therapists can be accessed by anyone as needed and there are support groups online where information about the most suitable ones can be found (ones that will support and account for the fact a child is unschooled).

There are people who are hearing impaired or sight impaired or who have low muscle tone or things such as dyslexia that can impact the difficulty of learning to read and write so are there people who might never be able to do so? There are probably some cases where those issues are significant enough to prevent reading and writing. But no hope is not a concept I am fond of, I always try to have a lot of hope and optimism in life and I think cases like that would rare. Being 2014, a person who cannot read or write does have options that will enable them to have a full and successful life regardless.

Outside of that, I think generally speaking a child who is surrounded by literate people and a culture that contains words will develop a desire to understand those things and be able to achieve that with support. Our eldest daughter (5) is beginning to work the whole thing out little by little, it doesn't always look how it would within a school setting; one of the biggest ways in which she has begun to decode language is through researching different pokemon - bulbapedia has a database of gifs that demonstrate moves pokemon possess and as she knows what a lot of moves look like already she can use those to figure out the word. More and more she can recognize the words without having to visit the gifs. Reading is less required to progress in a home environment so there is less of a rush to achieve it or a road block if you have not. There is a saying "learn to read then read to learn" and that does hold some weight in a classroom setting where a teacher needs there to be a certain level of independence in the cohort to get through the required work with everyone but at home I can be available to my daughter to read her books or spell out words and she isn't in a position yet where she needs the ability to read to further her learning.

I've been mostly schooled, partly homeschooled and partly unschooled. Prefered the unschooling - without it, I would have been a dropout. Would love to unschool, but have to work so can't. I do my best in the summer hols to unschool after the first week ("recovery week") so we can learn together and enjoy.

Quick question - what do others do for language learning? I'm planning a short jaunt to France and maybe to Austria, as Liebs has some French and says he would like to learn German now, but how do I start him off? My German isn't that good so it will help me too.

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Quick question - what do others do for language learning? I'm planning a short jaunt to France and maybe to Austria, as Liebs has some French and says he would like to learn German now, but how do I start him off? My German isn't that good so it will help me too.

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Depends what your son enjoys doing really and how motivated he is to learn. You could start with introducing food or music or art, set a cultural tone and atmosphere. There's books or you could get one of those computer programs if you think he will like that. Or just browse the web, watch YouTube tutorials and that sort of thing. Or attend a class together? You could go around the house together labeling things with sticky notes. You could watch shows with english subtitles on. Play memory matching the other language word to an English word or picture. All sorts of things.

You don't need to think of how to introduce something in an unschooling way, any path to learning can be unschooling if it is travelled by choice. Just offer ideas and resources without expectation and support him through the ones that resonate best.

DS had a girl in his class in Canberra who home schooled 3 days a week and did 2 days a week of Italian immersion. To do that obviously you need to be near a bilingual school that is prepared to accommodate you but I'm sure there are other ways of harnessing outside help.
An au-pair or nanny who uses the language, there are lots of language playgroups, we listen to language CDs in the car.

I like book learning, he doesn't. Hence the need for help! We do words and phrases already, but not much more. Liebs isn't much into reading stories in other languages either.

I will look into DVDs etc, but here the other languages are usually Danish, Finnish and Israeli, so have to keep searching!

When I was learning German I watched a lot of Inspector Rex lol. Not sure what age group that would suit though, been a while since I've seen it.

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I like book learning, he doesn't. Hence the need for help! We do words and phrases already, but not much more. Liebs isn't much into reading stories in other languages either.

I will look into DVDs etc, but here the other languages are usually Danish, Finnish and Israeli, so have to keep searching!

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My DD is using websites she found via google to learn some Japanese. Google is your friend.

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My DD is using websites she found via google to learn some Japanese. Google is your friend.

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Which reminds me, there is one called 'duolingo' which is free and apparently good (I haven't used it).

Just asked DD. She uses Travel Linguist.

Duo lingo is good and free as well. Also while using it, you are helping to translate the web.

FYI - 60 minutes is about to do a segment on unschooling.

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FYI - 60 minutes is about to do a segment on unschooling.

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That was last week.

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FYI - 60 minutes is about to do a segment on unschooling.

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Yes was last week but I did watch it on the website yesterday. Was only ten mins or so - not as sensationalist as I thought it might be, but not very informative either.

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Yes was last week but I did watch it on the website yesterday. Was only ten mins or so - not as sensationalist as I thought it might be, but not very informative either.

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Yeah, I thought it was actually ok. Thought it would be way worse like whenever they do a story on attachment parenting and make us all out to be crazy hippies, lol. Was very short for a 60mins story though! There is an extra bit on the website about the socialisation question too which I'm surprised they didn't include.

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Yeah, I thought it was actually ok. Thought it would be way worse like whenever they do a story on attachment parenting and make us all out to be crazy hippies, lol. Was very short for a 60mins story though! There is an extra bit on the website about the socialisation question too which I'm surprised they didn't include.

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I think it helped that really the only bit I thought really 'out there' was letting 5 year old stay up till 3:00AM, but that was in the US (and my brain tends to disregard a lot of stuff from there, maybe wrongly). I tend to believe that adults and children do better overall in life if they are awake more in daylight hours (this is probably to do with my views on the importance of connection to the outdoors, as is more difficult to be outdoors at night).

I thought the 60minutes segment was alright. It was pretty shallow and short and there were comments all through it that I thought needed to be expanded on lest they be misconstrued. But it was fairly balanced.

The Martin family is pretty extreme, I think they skate a little too closely to permissive parenting personally from my exposure to them. When Joe spoke about being on a trampoline at 3am, I was just thinking well that isn't going to help anybody connect with the idea of unschooling lol. If that happened here it would be rare because it would need to be agreeable to our whole family and respectfully done to those around us in regards to noise etc, I can't imagine it being feasible often at all. An example from my home though is the other night DD1 woke up at 9pm and we watched an episode of pokemon we intended to watch earlier (she fell asleep waiting for me to settle DD2 at about 5pm) and then we both went to bed but I was already up and intending to be up for longer, if it was 3am then I would have explained it was 3am and I needed my sleep and we could watch first thing in the morning (and a similar thing has happened before, DD1 was fine about it and went back to sleep no issue). My needs are also important and sleep trumps watching things, DD1 understands that concept even at her age. I don't worry about her taking advantage of me because she doesn't have to, when I can say yes I do and when I say no it is for a valid reason that I can explain to her. Now conventional parents probably wouldn't be letting their kids get back up like that but it's possibly more understandable than being on the trampoline at 3am whenever they want to. Maybe lol.

If people want to learn more about radical unschooling I generally aim them in Sandra Dodd's direction as I think her take is a bit more realistic and respectful to all family members and the community (plus she just has a stack of available information for free gathered not only from her but other long-term well respected unschoolers). I don't think it is ever a good idea to just let kids do whatever they want, whenever they want and I don't think that is what radical unschooling is about.

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The Martin family is pretty extreme, I think they skate a little too closely to permissive parenting personally from my exposure to them.

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Agree. And I would have liked them to make it a bit clearer the difference between unschooling and 'radical unschooling' which is obviously what that family does.

I think this post from 'Learning Happens' explains what unschooling is like for most people really well.

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Unschooling is not “Child-Led Learning”


by Pam Sorooshian


I do not refer to unschooling as “child-led learning” and I encourage others not to use that term because I think overuse of it has led to some pretty serious misunderstanding of what unschooling is really like.
The term, “child-led learning,” does emphasize something very important – that the child is the learner! I couldn’t agree more. However, it also disregards the significant role played by the parent in helping and supporting and, yes, quite often taking the lead, in the investigation and exploration of the world that is unschooling.
On an unschooling email list, someone once asked if it was “okay” as an unschooler to ask if her child wanted her to read to him. She expressed concern that that was being overly leading – that she should wait for him to ask her, if he was interested. In other words, she thought unschooling should be entirely “child led.”
Questions like this concern me because it is such a distortion and extreme position and far removed from the reality of the unschooling life that my family has lived.
Unschooling is more like a dance between partners who are so perfectly in synch with each other that it is hard to tell who is leading. The partners are sensitive to each others’ little indications, little movements, slight shifts and they respond. Sometimes one leads and sometimes the other.
Asking a child if he wants you to read to him should not be thought about as any different than asking if he wants
to go outside and play pirates or help you bake a cake or wash the dog or play a game.
Unschooling IS very very often comprised of asking if the kids want to do something. That is a HUGE part of unschooling. (Caps for emphasis.)
Unschooling is also strewing – bringing ideas, objects, experiences, opportunities of all kinds into their lives. We don’t force them. We don’t force them. But we certainly offer. And we often recommend, too. And once in a while we say, “I think you should….”.
Unschooling is not child-led learning. Neither is it parent or teacher-led. It is child- focused. It is child-considered. It is child-supporting.
When someone asks if it is okay to ask if their kids want to read with them, I am really worried that they are taking a far far too hands-off approach – a wait-and-see approach – sitting back and waiting for the kids to come up with ideas of what they want to do. Unschooling parents are very involved in offering the world to their child. There is an art to knowing when to back off and when to step up and be actively involved, but even when kids are busily pursuing an interest on their own, unschooling parents are paying attention and readying themselves to offer enhancements or extensions or alternatives, etc.
Calling it “child-led learning” gives the wrong impression. It leads to people thinking unschooling means waiting for a child to tell the parent, “I want to do math.” That’s not at all how it works.

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Agree. And I would have liked them to make it a bit clearer the difference between unschooling and 'radical unschooling' which is obviously what that family does.

I think this post from 'Learning Happens' explains what unschooling is like for most people really well.

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Thanks for that post Heaven - that is a good explanation - it is what I understood from my limited reading on the subject.

A lot of the comments I read after the 60mins thing showed that people really just didn't get it at all. Thinking that the parents did nothing and the kids learned nothing. I actually think unschooling is much harder and requires a lot more effort from the parent than if you were to homeschool with a curriculum. There's no guide for you. Unschooling parents have to be constantly on the ball, looking for the learning in everything, finding ways they can encourage and extend their kids learning, ready and motivated to answer questions always, etc etc. That's a pretty tough job! Such a fun one though imo :)

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I actually think unschooling is much harder and requires a lot more effort from the parent than if you were to homeschool with a curriculum.

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This is exactly why unschooling isn't for us. I think it's a great option for some families and kids and I love seeing it work, but I feel like I couldn't teach my kids enough. I would like to do it, but I feel like the standard is high and I would be constantly worried that I'm not doing enough for my kids. I mean I can come up with things to do for part of the day, but to try and have them learning and doing the activities I've seen, I don't feel like I could do it. I totally respect those of you that do.

As for the 60 Minutes show, I get that they want to represent both sides of a story, for and against. I thought the Australian families were wonderful "for" stories. But for the against, I thought the Dr was quite useless. He had no backup for his opinions that it was bad. Just "the kids won't learn to read and write". Why not? And the American family were on the very extreme end, I think the way JF and Heaven explained about it not being child-led was good. I think they're much more into permissive parenting, letting they're children make every decision. Sometimes kids just don't know enough yet to make the right decision.

I'm sure you would be awesome at it Teeki, if you decided it was right for your family! IMO it's really about teaching them how to learn, and fostering a love of learning. As long as you know how to learn, how to find information you're after, then you can learn anything you want these days! Information on anything is so easy to find now. It's a huge responsibility though and it was really scary to consider at first. I mean, I am solely responsible for their education at the moment. eek! But no one loves them as much as I do, no one is as motivated to see them do well as I am, no one knows them like I do, so I am the right person for the job. It doesn't matter if sometimes I don't have the answers, we have fun finding them out together. The more I thought about it, the more I felt it was right for our family, and so I couldn't let fear stand in the way. I kept thinking I only get one life with them. They only get one childhood. So I had to do the same as what everyone else does, choose what I thought was right for my child, even if it wasn't the norm. So far I must say, it's pretty damn awesome. I actually expected negative comments when we told people we would be home educating, but I have had nothing but positivity from friends and family who see what our life is like which is nice!

Oh, I totally agree about the 'expert' on 60mins. Just because you're an 'expert' doesn't mean your opinions are right if you can't back them up with research. I didn't hear him mention any research? I heard him talking about unschooling on the Morning Show too and he said something about kids not being programmed to learn reading and maths without a trained teacher, and that learning to read and write is the hardest thing a kid will ever do. I just laughed. My DD1 who has just turned 5 is learning to read and write. She is reading short beginner books now and writing phonetically. She also loves maths. She taught herself to skip count by 2s, 5s, and 10s by playing with her abacus. Even DD2 who is 3 does basic maths. Of course they are motivated to learn these things! It's part of everyday life!

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This is exactly why unschooling isn't for us. I think it's a great option for some families and kids and I love seeing it work, but I feel like I couldn't teach my kids enough. I would like to do it, but I feel like the standard is high and I would be constantly worried that I'm not doing enough for my kids. I mean I can come up with things to do for part of the day, but to try and have them learning and doing the activities I've seen, I don't feel like I could do it. I totally respect those of you that do.

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It's a big responsibility but it is definitely way easier than it sounds/looks/seems! There is so much information and support out there too which helps a lot. And I think it is much simpler than committing to the schedule and requirements of school personally. I would find it so hard having the bulk of my interaction with my kids during the week be centered around school; getting up and ready and to school, the afternoon routine and homework, getting to bed 'on time' and even more so if these are things the child is resisting. Kindy days were always kind of stressful for us and that was only a couple of days a week. Now we are busy but we aren't rushed and it makes all the difference.

I always seem to have quite a lot of free time really. I think a little bit of preparation goes a long way and what you see of people's lives (FB, blogs, whatever) is always just a snapshot. Say the art explorations I set up; that would be once or twice a day, maybe 10minutes to chuck together and then the kids might play with it about an hour and then 10-15mins cleaning up (and I just throw everything in the shower - kids, paint brushes, string, sponges, rocks, whatever we have used so I don't really have to do much there even). My kids are up around 8am and in bed around 6pm so with 10 awake hours that's a pretty small portion of the day! A lot of time is spent outside - climbing, bike riding, jumping on the trampoline, running around and kicking a ball, looking for insects or rocks or sticks or leaves, water and sand and mud play - all things that I don't really need to have much input in. Then they spend a lot of time just playing together - setting up farms, pretending to be superheroes, puzzles, musical instruments, doll house, lego, marbles, trains, blocks and they have free range of a lot of art supplies that I don't need to help them with like glue and collage materials, water colours (I just refill their water at the end of the day or maybe once in the middle if they've been particularly busy there), textas and pencils and crayons, tape and scissors, playdough so I could be spending a lot of time doing other things or just watching, I kind of like playing though so I do a bit of that haha.

You do sort of settle into a natural rhythm and it actually flows very easily. And you play to your strengths too I think, mine is art and conveniently my girls take to it also but there are so many other great ways people connect and learn with their children, you just have to find it and tap into it. Actually little cute story, DP and DD1 were playing with their new blocks and DD1 asked what he would like to make and he said he wasn't sure, that he wasn't really creative like this like mummy and you and DD2 are, that he was creative with food, in cooking and so DD1 said well, use that, let's make food with the blocks -- and that's just what you do, you find your thing (and your kids) and you use it to explore other things.

Oh and I think a little bit of worry is normal, it keeps our choices in check to rethink whether it is working out at times. And I do worry at times, I'll look through our photos and think oh DD1 hasn't really done much maths lately then I remember she was dividing food portions for the family or ruling out squares to cut for her tesselation art or measuring her height and DD2s and figuring out how much taller she is and I realise how much math there really is in living and exploring the world and how she enjoys figuring things out, how easily she works out what might help her do that and that those are important steps in the process, that she is learning a lot not only from using math to solve problems but identifying the problems to solve too.

But it is hard when you're doing something so unchartered, when I don't know whether they'll read at 5 or 10 it makes school look like a nice map of comfort for those things sometimes but I also think the price paid for that can be quite high. Higher than I'm prepared to risk.

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But it is hard when you're doing something so unchartered, when I don't know whether they'll read at 5 or 10 it makes school look like a nice map of comfort for those things sometimes but I also think the price paid for that can be quite high. Higher than I'm prepared to risk.

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I feel the same. At first it was the opposite and I felt home educating would be risky because it all depends on me and what if I get it wrong! And then the more I read, and the more I saw it worked, and the more confident I became that I could do this I felt that school would be the more risky option because I am putting their education in someone else's hands.

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This is exactly why unschooling isn't for us. I think it's a great option for some families and kids and I love seeing it work, but I feel like I couldn't teach my kids enough. I would like to do it, but I feel like the standard is high and I would be constantly worried that I'm not doing enough for my kids. I mean I can come up with things to do for part of the day, but to try and have them learning and doing the activities I've seen, I don't feel like I could do it. I totally respect those of you that do.

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My thoughts are a little different, I don't worry that I couldn't teach my kids enough, but more that the range of what I would teach would be more limited to my own areas of interest and what I know exists. The whole you can't know what you don't know type of thing. As an adult I am always discovering things I never knew existed e.g. I work for a tractor company currently, I had never heard of them, now I know them I see their tractors everywhere. My concern would be that my 'filter' on the world would be too narrow - one thing about education outside of the home is that they will meet and be involved with people I don't know in any way and will be quite different to us - in terms of interests/backgrounds etc - so they can be introduced to things I know nothing about and have never even thought of, some of these things may not be good things but I like the chance nature of it.

JF - I think you said in other thread about unschooling families can have both parents who work - how does that work and what sort of jobs can they do?

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My thoughts are a little different, I don't worry that I couldn't teach my kids enough, but more that the range of what I would teach would be more limited to my own areas of interest and what I know exists. The whole you can't know what you don't know type of thing. As an adult I am always discovering things I never knew existed e.g. I work for a tractor company currently, I had never heard of them, now I know them I see their tractors everywhere. My concern would be that my 'filter' on the world would be too narrow - one thing about education outside of the home is that they will meet and be involved with people I don't know in any way and will be quite different to us - in terms of interests/backgrounds etc - so they can be introduced to things I know nothing about and have never even thought of, some of these things may not be good things but I like the chance nature of it.

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I guess the thing with that is that we can access the national curriculum so are able to introduce our children to those things that come standard with school. Things that they might have been exposed to in school outside of that (from classmates and teachers and the cultural/interest/lifestyle diversity and such), well that's still a lucky dip from school to school and child to child (who and what they'll be around and what they'll pick up from it and be inspired to pursue from that too). I think out in the world there is just as much chance as in the classroom of stumbling across things, I mean you went to school and are still discovering new things, I went to school and am still discovering new things so that's kind of normal right? No method is going to be able to cover every single thing out there. So I don't expect I'll be able to bring everything into our field of vision during our time unschooling (but then I know a school experience has its own limitations in that also) but being motivated and curious I think goes a long way so those are things I try to maintain in myself. And I get ideas from the other people we meet and they get ideas from us, there is still an exchange of interests and culture within home educating communities (both physical and online) who are far from a homogenous group. We were at the park the other day and stumbled into an African drum circle, you go to the library and notice a new book about Japanese cuisine and start trying to replicate some, you hear a quip on a TV show relating to some historical event you are unsure about and look into it further, in or out of school there are so many ways in which a desire to learn about something is sparked and it is kind of unpredictable what will and won't stick. It does involve being very interested in the world yourself I think and taking the time to notice things and make connections but after a while it becomes so second nature and just happens and your kids bring a lot to you too, they have all sorts of bizarre thoughts and questions I'd never considered before.

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JF - I think you said in other thread about unschooling families can have both parents who work - how does that work and what sort of jobs can they do?

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It would be difficult to both work a standard 9-5pm monday to friday schedule though I do know one family where the dad works that and the mum is a part time teacher; you can use family daycare, have a nanny type person employed or have family members involved (or a combination of that), I'm not sure how ideal that would be but it seems to work for them. Otherwise just working different schedules, I actually find a lot of people drawn to home educating already work irregular sort of hours; DP works 3pm-7pm most days (so you can imagine how well that would sync up with school and why we were inspired originally to find something different) so I could find a job that would fit around that if needed. I know a lot of families have one parent as the main worker on a more regular standard schedule then the other does more freelance type jobs - photography, artists, writers, make-up artists (like for weddings and photoshoots type things), celebrants - or more casual things like selling on ebay/etsy/markets or maintaining a blog or things like Tupperware just for a little added income. There's nightfill or keeping books for a company or working from home might be an option for some. A lot of trade type jobs begin early and finish early so the other parent could work something in the later part of the day/night. It kind of depends what you're working around and what skills you have and also how much family time you are prepared to give up for a second income.

I thought the same as JF. If I'm worried they're not learning what they're supposed to, the australian curriculum is online for anyone to see so I can always check. I went to a private school myself and don't feel I was exposed to people from different backgrounds at all :/ And I'm not sure my kids would be either if I sent them to school because I can't choose which school (they're zoned) and the local one doesn't fill me with confidence. Depends on your lifestyle and where you live I guess! I also thought about the fact that there are things that I wouldn't even know to introduce them too because I don't know them, but then realised it's the same at school. They don't get introduced to everything in the world. Just whatever they decide to include in the Australian curriculum. And then when you're older, like you said wysiwig, you learn whatever you need to get along or whatever you're interested in. And the questions my kids come up with about things, LOL, all I need to do is follow that and I end up learning about totally random things that I never even would have thought of anyway.

I wanted to mention something that really concerned me about the families that appeared on 60 Minutes. The children that were homeschooled all had problems with literacy and numeracy. The only ones that didn't were the girls that had gone to mainstream school for a few years before being unschooled. Does this concern you?

No, I'm not really influenced by such a small sample size shown briefly on a TV show. Shows like that usually focus on the top and bottom percentiles as it is more dramtic/shocking/controversial. There was one still struggling to read and write, there was one with a PhD. I think you'll find that most are somewhere in the middle of that, much like in school settings.

It is something I am mindful of, it is something I pay attention to and consider when building our environment at home because of course I don't want them to have problems that could have been avoided but I can see numeracy and literacy developing in my children and that is what is important to me; their stories, not anybody else's.

Did they all have problems? I thought only the two youngest boys in the family of all boys had trouble with literacy (and mainly the youngest one)? Pretty sure the oldest one had a PhD and worked for Google or something. Their Mum was also a teacher as well so I kind of thought that if she couldn't teach them to read then they would have struggled in school as well and maybe there was some learning difficulties there. Honestly, I'm not sure I'd be ok with it if my children didn't learn to read. I really think that's important. But I don't really see how it's possible unless there are learning difficulties. We have so many books, we read every day, they see me reading and writing all the time, so they see the value of being able to read and are motivated to learn. My DD1 (5yrs) wants to know how to write things and asks me all the time and consequently is reading at the same level as her schooled peers now. So for me personally it's not concerning because it hasn't been an issue so far.

I'm actually kind of amazed at how it all happens. We have no specific sit down learning time every day. It's kind of just when things come up and we talk about it and she wants to know more or she needs to work something out. Or if she's been interested in something I might set up a little activity for her that I think she might like which she can do when/if she likes. And yet, I was looking at the prep curriculum for maths a couple of days ago, wondering where we're at and what she would be doing if she was at school, and we have covered all but two things already and gone further in some areas. How did that happen? Just from her natural curiosity and desire to learn I guess. It's pretty awesome that she is still learning all that and is also able to spend the majority of her time playing, which is what I think she should be doing at her age.

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I also thought about the fact that there are things that I wouldn't even know to introduce them too because I don't know them, but then realised it's the same at school. They don't get introduced to everything in the world. Just whatever they decide to include in the Australian curriculum. And then when you're older, like you said wysiwig, you learn whatever you need to get along or whatever you're interested in. And the questions my kids come up with about things, LOL, all I need to do is follow that and I end up learning about totally random things that I never even would have thought of anyway.

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I totally agree that it is the same at school the set of things they get introduced to at and through school won't encompass everything. It it a 'lucky dip' but I like that - I like the fact it is out of my sphere of influence - I will always have the opportunity to introduce them to stuff I know about - because although they may go to school I don't believe that is the their sole avenue of education or even their main avenue. I am not saying school is better than 'unschool' is just a different method. I don't think school gives a particularly broad view of things, but from my perspective I just like the fact that being part of that system gives them exposure to all sorts of things and through us (parents, families, friends) etc. they get exposure to other things.

About the 60 mins thing - and the literacy and numeracy - to me whether or not they had struggled with literacy and numeracy they seemed to have found a career that they enjoyed - and to me that is a good outcome. Maybe they could have gone to school and struggled but learned to read and write but not discovered a career path that they enjoyed. Maybe if 'unschooling' is only measured on literacy and numeracy it wouldn't come out so well, but maybe it would do better if measured on career measures associated with people enjoying what they do.

At the end of the day you can't really ever say if school or unschool has the better outcome because how do you define the better outcome - that depends on your perspective - so really all you can do is think about what sort of things are more important to your own situation and then maybe one method or another or a combination will work best for a particular situation.

I do think it interesting that reading about people who have been unschooled, that there seems to be far more who have developed into with a more 'creative' than 'scientific' bent, and more involved with academic/educational careers than working for bigger corporations (I know one on 60 Mins worked for Google who are now quite big, however Google are a bit of a special case and perhaps a good example of a company which actively embraces thinking a bit differently and using it to its advantage). I studied Molecular Biology and I never got on with any of the lab work because I couldn't cope with the discipline needed, always wanting to tinker and fiddle and try out new things instead of just repeating the steps to get results - never quite learning when to reign in my curiosity. I wondered if 'unschooling' was less likely to lead to that type of discipline - or if it is more to do with genetics. Also this leaning towards creative maybe is in part due to the fact that professions with alternate hours that might work well for 'unschooling' can tend to be more creative - so therefore the likelihood is that their children are more likely to head that way as well. I don't see it as a bad thing, different educational structures and philosophies in schools also do tend to influence people in a way that may makes them more likely to pursue certain career paths than others - (I work with many people who have been through the educational system of another country - which is different to the Australian system - and you can see it has influenced how they tackle certain things) - and it takes all types of people to make the world.

I have thought that before wysiwyg, that perhaps people drawn to unschooling tend to be more creative and then possibly have a higher chance of their children following suit. From my reading there is actually a higher percent of home education graduates that go into STEM courses and careers than from traditional schooling but there is not a lot of research that separates out the various methods of home education. I agree it is hard to study unschooling because the outcome isn't intended to be greater academic success but just reaching the personal potential and how do you accurately measure that unless you clone the same child and have one travel a traditional schooling path and the other unschooling and see what happens. Happiness, secure identity, close family bonds - they are all much harder to measure than the results of a test. People within the unschooling community are currently trying to push for research but it is proving quite difficult and that is before you even get into try to decide well what are we actually looking for here and how are we going to do that. There is some research into things like play based learning and more hands on approaches for younger grades. And there are democratic schools and streams within schools that have more sort of concrete figures. But the research is definitely patchy and sparse.

I've never had a career but my best subjects in school were math and chemistry (top of my class) and I wanted to become a marine biologist (still do and hope to one day). But I did well in all my classes really, typical solid A student. I dropped art quite early into highschool though because "art is a hobby not a career" and "there is no stable future for an artist", I felt pressure that it would waste whatever intelligence I had to go down a creative path. But I am drawn to art, it is something I adore and love - all forms from performance to visual to writing. I get itchy fingers to create. Sometimes it feels like there are those who think I have wasted my life, my brains, my talents (nobody would blame my private school education though haha I had all the 'best opportunities' so it is I who has wasted it, two unplanned pregnancies doesn't help my case there). But I love my life. I imagine that son feels similar; he has a career path, his life doesn't sound miserable in the slightest but all anybody can focus on is his difficulty in reading and writing. People all struggle at something you know?

Definitely takes all sorts in the world.

Funnily enough I got accepted to do Marine Biology at University, but then changed my mind and went to a different Uni to do a more general biology course.

I do find it surprising that within the unschooling community there is a push for research - because what is the end aim? Once you have shown whatever the results are what would it change what would it make different?. I can understand research into play based learning etc, because play based learning can be studied and be applied in school type environments.

Say unschooling was shown to have the best results - it is not like that can then be adopted across the board. Also I think part of the problem with the education system, is the desire to measure, quantify and standardize it - better to keep those things away from 'unschooling' in my opinion.