I am not there yet of course, but it is a question that has come up often for me recently and came up in one of the presentations last weekend also… so when I saw the following comment on my last post I thought it would be better to respond in a new post.

Bethany wrote:

I am getting ready to start homeschooling my daughter in the fall so I have been reading a lot about different methods of homeschooling and unschooling and all of that. I was interested to read your comments about unschooling but I admit I still have many hangups about the concept.

I expect my kids to go to college someday. How does unschooling prepare them for college? What is the transition like between free learning and the classroom learning that college requires? What about things that are required for them to know to get into college? I know when I was in traditional school I had subjects that I loved and subjects that I hated. All were necessary for me to get into college though (based on requirements of the college). I loved school and loved learning but given the option, I would have been more than happy to sit in my French and Music classes all day long and forget about Biology! I guess I’m still not “getting it” on how kids will be motivated to learn things they honestly have no interest in if it is left up to them?

And a second question. With the expectation of college in mind – standardized testing is unfortunately a necessary evil whether I agree with it or not. How does the unschooler prepare for that situation? Example: A person can learn about physics in action by watching a roller coaster, but can they sit down and do the calculations on the standardized test?

I really want to do some child-led learning with my daughter but I also want to make sure she is learning what she is “supposed” to be learning so she can achieve long-term educational goals.

Thank you for answering my questions (if you have the time!)

I think it is important to step away from the misconception that unschooling never has anything to do with school.

It is true that for a young child or even an adolescent, unschooling does look quite different and is very different. But it does not mean that unscoolers never see a school setting or follow a curriculum. The difference is that they are the ones that choose it and they do so because they are either interested or have a goal and use those resources as tools.

As an unschooling parent our job is not to just teach our children, but it is to guide them in order for them to learn how to teach themselves. Instead of simply giving answers, we give more questions and we guide them to figure things out. Books, tutors, curriculum and many other sources of information can all be part of an unschoolers life if that is what they wish or need.

So when/if  a child decides that they want to go to University, they will figure out what they need to achieve that goal and they figure out and understand what they will need in order to attain it, even if they have to do it just to do it, and not only because they’re interested in it…  That is just part of the path sometimes.

As children grow up to become self-sufficient, they are able to follow their goals, and from what I have read and been told by university faculty and homeschooling families alike, is that children who come from homeschooling environments are more goal oriented, have a clearer view of what they want and how to attain it and waste less time than their formerly schooled peers when they are in the university setting.

As for being able to function in a class setting, you have to remember that these are teenagers or young adults, they are there for a reason, to attend university or college. I can’t see how they would have trouble transitioning. I honestly think that it would be harder for high school students who often need to go through the transition of the teacher no longer reminding them to the to do their homework, having the freedom of going to class or not, or having full classes instead of classes in which discipline takes up half the time.

All of that being said, on a personal level, I don’t have any expectations of my children going to University, I believe that it is their choice and only their choice. I want my children to follow their dreams and be happy and if that means  getting a degree then I’ll be there if they need me and help them reach their goals, but I also wouldn’t be upset if they wanted to do a trade that did not require a degree.

I graduated from University and in many ways regret it… yes,  it was interesting and I met some cool people, but it left me with debt,  a degree that I can’t do anything with and knowledge that I could have attained on my own. I went because it was expected of me and I wasted time , and saw many others waste their time because I honestly had no idea what I wanted to do… (being a cooking/picture taking/sewing/stay-at-home homeschooling mom wasn’t on the guidance counsellors list…

Going back to my last post, I have confidence that whatever goal…whatever path is chosen, they will find the way to accomplish what they set out for.

When talking with other people about unschooling, the idea of unschooling is often met with awe and and agreement, however, the practice is often regarded as just not a possibility… at least not for “their” children…

“If I didn’t sit my kid down they would do nothing all day”

“I let my kid do what he wanted for a whole week and he played video games all week.”

“My kids just don’t have the motivation to learn things they don’t have to learn.”

After years of being schooled ourselves we have been taught that being forced, or at the least being “taught”, is the only way to learn… We were imprinted with the idea that school was the place to learn, it was often boring and mundane, but it was necessary, and we had to be there or we would be nothing when we grew up…

and of course we always looked forward to summer vacation so that we could do “nothing”…

but did we do nothing?… did we learn “nothing”? or was it just that it looked like nothing because we enjoyed it and we were not learning in the traditional sense, and we didn’t have anything to “show”… at least not if someone is looking at it from a schooling perspective.

I am saddened to see that so many people just do not have confidence in children, some  seem to think that unschooled children are just some other species of kids that are always wanting to do projects or wanting to “school” themselves… and I agree that there are some that probably do, and as kids get older then it is even more probable, but honestly in our house it isn’t like that, and I know that in the homes of other young unschoolers I know, it isn’t like that either.

What often happens is that for those who have tried to unschool for a short period after having “schooled” is that they don’t give their children or themselves the adequate time to deschool. As Sandra Dodd sums up beautifully “Stop thinking schoolishly. Stop acting teacherishly. Stop talking about learning as though it’s separate from life.”

A child may look like they are doing nothing but are they really? Are they honestly sitting there staring into space? and if they are, are they really thinking about “nothing”?

A child may play video games “all of the time” but are they really not learning anything? Do you really think that once the novelty wears off that they won’t move on, or if they don’t, isn’t it possible that their interest may stem into something else.

What does motivation look like? Isn’t it more likely that children are motivated but it is just not in what the parent thinks they should be motivated about. Can it be that when a child shows a bit of interest in something that the parent takes things over instead of helping to guide anf therefore the child loses the interest because it is not theirs anymore.

I truly have confidence in the fact that kids want to learn and they are always learning.  I have confidence that my kids will go into adulthood with all the knowledge they need to have. I think that everyone, homeschooling or not should have more confidence in children’s abilities and love of learning.

It saddens me to hear parents have so much lack of confidence in their children because though I have to agree that it is an ongoing struggle to put preconceived notions about education aside at times, it is the children who are losing the most.

The thing is, I don’t think that unschooling is for all families, but I do think that all children can be unschooled. I would rather hear that a family chooses not to unschool because of various reasons (lack of confidence in themselves, need to control, belief in traditional education etc) then to hear them blame their childrenby saying that they are just not able to learn by themselves.

I just watched this on Youtube and I thought that it would be interesting to share…

(this is the first part of seven… follow the link… all of them are there and easy to find)

Watching this really makes me glad that we don’t have cable TV anymore… even though in Canada there are more regulations against advertising to kids, I was appalled at seeing all the commercials when we watched TV when we had it…. yes we watch movies and the boys see advertisements out of the home and even in the home, but I think they are in no way near being bombarded with adds as most kids are…

Avoiding artificial colourings and flavours also seems to give us an edge when it comes to advertising foods and restaurants… the boys are attracted to them of course but they know that cool packaging is just to sell the product, but it is the ingredient list that sells it for us if we are buying…

I think the ultimate goal as a parent is of course not to shelter kids from advertising (or from anything else for that matter) because really…  it will never work and most importantly it will leave them quite unprepared in the future… No, the goal is to teach them what adververtizing does and how it works and give them the skills now to make the right choices.

Xavier decided yesterday that he wanted to take the training wheels off his bike but Simon was not able to get to it at that moment… So today when he asked again we all went outside and got the wheels off and watched him try riding for the first time…

Simon held him a bit but was able to let go for a second or two the first time that they tried…

but after about 5 min there was no need to help anymore and in the rest of the time that we were out there he knew how to push off and how to turn…

He is so proud of himself!!

and it really goes for show…
when kids are ready to do something they will do it, and they will do it quickly!!

Yesterday was the AQED/QAHBE (Quebec Association for Home-Based Education) Symposium…

I had avoided going the last years because there was not much that interested me in the presentations that were offered, but this year I decided to take a chance and go. I am  happy that I did so…

We left in the morning at about 6am and got there at about 7:15 and we were in the first arrivals… there was an intro and then the presentations started…

The first I went to was called “Eco-Education” and was basically about the language around homeschooling and about how the word “homeschooling”  misrepresents the act by giving the impression that it is “school at home” when it is so much more (or even not close at all to that model in the case of unschooling).  The words of “Eco-Education” in this situation doesn’t take on the meaning of ecological (though they can be intertwined) but takes on the meaning of “eco” as representing our “habitat”… our environment etc…

The second one was on “unschooling”… lol… I actually ended up taking a bit and I am glad I did… I had mentioned when I presented myself that I was an unschooler and that I was there to mingle with other unschoolers… and  soon after we left the room I was aproached by a woman who presented herself and her partner and we ended up talking for an hour or two about unschooling and eating lunch together… it was really great to meet them and I hope that we can keep in touch because they were great people whom I would love to know more… Sadly they live far away but I hope that there will be other ways to keep in touch…

I also met a cool homeschooling mama that came all the way from NB to meet other French homeschoolers…

After lunch there was a seminar but I ended up ditching it and talking with another couple that are in the other homeschooling group that I go to at times and we ended up talking for another hour about unschooling and kids and family life etc…

It was really refreshing to be around so many like-minded people…

In the afternoon I went to two other presentations…

One was on Waldorf and I kind of regret going to that one… though I went to a walforf school when I was young, I did not see it at all in the same way as was described…

The last one was on a theory called Parent-Guide, Parent-Complice, which turned out to be a really cool presentation about parenting… many of the things presented in the book reminds me about a little bit of  “Hold onto your kids” mixed in with “Playful Parenting” with a little bit of “NVC” thrown in… among other ideas that seemed pretty interesting…

After, I met with my friends and we headed out for supper and we had a great time eating and sharing before finally heading home at about 9pm…

Anyway… I am really happy to have been there and I had a lot of fun and I am honestly looking forward to next year…

Yesterday , the boys and I headed to the Electrium...

The Electrium is in Ste-Julie on the south shore of Montreal and is a place run by Hydro-Quebec to learn all about electricity…

The tour starts out with a few minute long films that were fun and held all of the kids attentions…

then they learned about safety,

then electricity/magnetism in Nature with electric eels and other fish, the human body, static electricity, power and circuitry…

It was really quite informative and most of all it was a lot of fun…

The boys loved it especially because everything can be touched and tried…

Xavier learning about how a circuit works….

This of course was a big hit…

But I think that this was Colin’s favourite part… the guy who was showing the tour let him go up even though he was a bit small… he told Colin not to take his hand of the ball and Colin listened so well that it was hard for him to hear when it was safe to do so… he just stayed so still and didn’t move…

If you are near or in Montreal the Electrium is on the south shore not too far away from the Island. It is free and though it is not a big place it is a lot of fun and even for little kids…

Colin has been spending hours upon hours drawing… he will grab a stack of paper and then sit at the table and just go… he can literally spend his day drawing…

I guess for some this isn’t a big deal… but Xavier doesn’t sit down to draw more than once every few weeks…. so this is new to me…

In the last weeks his scale has changed, what was once one or two Star Wars Characters  on a piece of paper has become full stories with all different characters, monsters, spiders, animals etc…. The details have changed greatly also… I love to sit and watch him draw and I love seeing where his imagination takes him….

I thought I would share this too… this is our kitchen wall next to where the table is and is often the first thing people notice when they come over…  I love displaying things this way!

We have a lot of books in our home, neither Xavier or Colin bring them out on a regular basis… we need to make some trips to Montreal more often and go to the library there because our local library just doesn’t cut it… there are no English books at all… it sucks because we could walk there…

Their interests are changing of course, and because they know our books, and the topics are not what are interesting them at the moment, books have just been collecting dust (except for a few of Simon’s that the boys love)… so a bit more than a week ago I asked the boys to each choose a book online… something that they would really like to read or look at…

Colin choose the “Star Wars Complete Visual Dictionary”

which is an amazing book that shows each character in full colour… there is so much detail on each page but it is not overwhelming… great book!

Xavier has been playing Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter nights and has been interested in learning more about the game of Dungeons & Dragons and has been looking through Simon’s old Monster manual for a while now… so he got “Monster Manual: A 4th Edition Core Rulebook”

He was  a bit disappointed that some of the monsters that he likes got cut out of the book but that doesn’t stop him from loving it and looking at it often…

Though they were a bit on the more pricey side then I usually would buy, I love the choices that they made because I know that these books will grow with them for a long time…

And the greatest part was that they were so excited to get their books and when they came they were so enthralled with them that they spent the day just looking at them…

(I put  this post up about an hour ago but I have to add this.. a few min ago)