Unschooling Voices (main page)

Unschooling Voices is a monthly collection of writings (mainly from blogs) on the topic of unschooling.

Details:
You can submit up as many posts as you’d like.
They can be old or new posts.
You can even submit a post that you read on someone’s else’s blog (don’t forget to ask their permission).
While most of the submissions are from blogs, Unschooling Voices welcomes all kind of information of interest to the unschooling community such as web pages, press releases, news stories, interviews, etc.
We’d also love to hear from the unschoolers themselves. Share your children’s stories, pictures, art work or web sites.
Submissions from new and seasoned unschoolers are equally welcomed!

FYI:
Your blog doesn’t have to be an “unschooling blog” to participate…just the post you sent in. Not every blogger who unschools has unschooling as the main focus of their blog.

I’ll suggest a topic question each month (if someone else is hosting, they can use their own question) for those who may like a specific topic to write about but you don’t have to use it. Or you can, and also send in something else. We’re real flexible…when in doubt, send it in. You can also answer questions from past months at any time. Just jump right in.

Just in case it comes up, anti-unschooling (is that even a word?) posts will not get through. Someone who is trying to understand unschooling and wanting advice on their doubts is fine. This is also not the place for posts about curriculim, unit studies, lesson plans or “making” children learn.

If you can link to this post somewhere on your blog or website or it would help to get the word out and be very appreciated by all of us who participate.

If you’ve participated before and would like to host an edition of Unschooling Voices on your blog or website, please leave a comment here.

Send It In:
Unschooling Voices comes out the first of each month. Please have your submission in in at least a couple of days before the 1st, so I have time to get it together. Posts submitted up to that day may still be added but if it doesn’t make it in, it’ll be included in the following month.

E-mail your submission to unschoolingvoicesATyahoo.com.
Be sure to write “unschooling voices”, “submission” or something like that, in the heading so I know it’s not spam or it will be deleted.

Information to send: (this is what I’ll use when I put it together)

1) Your name (or name you want to go by).
2) Your submission, in the form of a link.
3) A short (2-3 sentences is fine) description of your submission. I prefer to use your own description, rather than mine.

If your familiar with technorati tags, you can get some extra exposure by using the technorati unschooling voices tag in your post. Here’s the link to a tag generator that I use. If your submission includes photos, add them to our Unschooling Voices Flickr Group.

Editions:

Issue #1 July ‘06
How did you and your family come to unschooling?
On podcast

Issue #2 August ‘06
Do you extend the principles of unschooling (trust, freedom, etc) into any other areas of your child’s life?

Issue #3 September ‘06
(submitted by Laurie) “I would love to hear other unschoolers thoughts regarding allowance or payment for odd jobs or whatever you want to call it. I see a major benefit from the kids managing their own money but I’m not sure that I want to pay an “allowance” to the kids every week. But if I pay per job, do I pay to have them clean their room or do I only pay for odd jobs? Anyway, I’d love to hear the other thoughts/ideas/methods other unschoolers incorporate”.

Issue #4 October ‘06
Unschooling Math: If you’re like me and went to public school, you grew up being taught math from a text book. Now, as an unschooling parent, how do you live math when you’ve been conditioned to think of math in school terms. How do you go from one to the other?

Issue #5 November ‘06
On the topic of support in unschooling…how much do you have from family & friends? Are there other unschoolers near you or do you belong to an offline unschooling group? How important is having that support?

Issue #6 December ‘06
What interesting activites, projects or experiments have your kids done this past year? We’ve gotten some really cool ideas from other unschoolers so tell us what you’ve done in 2006! (Please remember this is an unschooling carnival…..don’t submit something that smells like school. LOL)

Issue #7 February ‘07
The topic is deschooling…either yours, your child’s or both. Tell us about it. What is/was it like? Personally, I found that I needed to deschool more than my kids. Do you find that to be true?

Issue #8 April ‘07:
There are two topics this month. Answer both, one…or neither and blog about something else (#1) Use the letters U-N-S-C-H-O-O-L to write about unschooling. Use what ever method you want, for example you can use each letter like “U is for…, N is for..”. Or you can have each letter start a new sentence or paragraph or try writing an acronym. (#2) A topic that comes up on the unschooling e-mail groups a lot is TV/computer/video games and how hard it is for parents to let go of control in those areas. What has been your experience?

Issue #9 June ‘07:
How has unschooling changed YOU? Yes, it’s about the kids, but is it ONLY about the kids? I sometimes think unschooling has changed me more than them. What are your thoughts? Also, here another short, just-for-fun question this month; share two photos that show what unschooling currently looks like in your house at this time.

Issue #10 November ‘07
Two questions again – please remember they’re always optional. First, what advice would you have given to yourself early in your unschooling journey? Second, ask your kids to take pictures of their favorite ________ (favorite whatever; person, place, thing, etc). Don’t forget to share them on our flickr group.

Issue #11 January ‘08
Unschooling through the ages: How, if at all, does unschooling look different as your child ages and grows. Is it different now than it was a few years back? What role does age play in unschooling?

Issue #12 Feb. ‘08
This months two questions were submitted by Kim at Relaxed Homeskool, where issue #12 will be hosted. Answer both, one or neither.
1)Write the unschooling manual for a newbie in 400 words or less- have fun!
2)Take the Unschooling Images challenge and describe your unschooling experience using pictures. Here’s the questions but you can add more or change them at will:
*Your favorite resource
*One field trip they loved and learned on
*The game they love so much they don’t realize it is educational
*What you’ve “strewn” lately
*Everyday task where they pick up lots of info
* A resource you have always wanted to purchase for the children but keep putting off
*What your kids think school is really like
* Best place to unschool

Issue #13: March ‘08
Silvia at Po Moyemu hosted this edition and has submitted this question: What do you do, as an unschooling parent, when your child expresses an interest in a particular topic and you don’t know how to help them in a way that doesn’t involve lesson plans and curriculum?

Issue #14: Submissions being accepted now
Summer at Wired For Noise is hosting this issue and her question for the month is ” What unexpected benefits did you gain from unschooling?”

Related Tags: unschooling voices, unschooling carnival, unschooling blogs, unschooling, unschool, unschooled, unschoolers

E-mail submissions to Unschooling Voices -# 7

These five contributions were submitted through e-mail and will be included in Unschooling Voices # 7.

Karen:
When we pulled our children out of school almost 3 years ago, I was aware of’deschooling, so we decided to give it 6 months and see how it went. Well, it ended up taking about a year before both girls got into the groove of homeschooling and then a little longer for unschooling. As a parent I think I still find myself needing to deschool on certain issues. I read a lot about unschooling, mindfulness and parenting and am going through a huge learning/growth spurt. Sometimes it can feel very overwhelming and uncomfortable, other days invigorating. I am still astounded at how conditioned I had been by the educational system. My girls had been in school for 2 years and the eldest 4 years, and the eldest did take the longest to ‘deschool’ but I also think that is a personality issue.

Sherry:
I just pulled my teens out last year at ages 14 & 15 in some ways we are still deschooling, I recognized that we needed a time of healing.The kids panicked when I told them we wouldn’t be doing assignments, tests, grades, etc. but within a few weeks they grasped and accepted what I was telling them. 15 y/o granddaughter stayed up all night on myspace, 14 y/o DS stayed up all night with video games. Both would sleep most of the day. I never said a word, just fixed them breakfast whenever they crawled out of bed. It has been only 7 mos. since they came home to school and I’m beginning to see them emerge from their “caves”. DS now gets on the computer to reserve library books online almost daily and we make 2-3 trips a week to pick them up. Granddaughter studies what interests her, writes reports and turns them in to me. I DLed homeschool tracker so that whatever they are doing I can create subjects, courses, and assignments that will give them a transcript. By doing this with the kids, I’ve begun to heal as well and give myself credit for all the things I’ve learned in the 30 something years I’ve been out of school.

Kim:
I find that overall, most of my life I have lead with much that philosophy….why did I need teachers setting a book in front of me and telling me to read chapter 3 and answer questions on the back of sheet. I felt like school was a way to keep us out of trouble for a couple hours each day, most of my learning came from passion, experience and simply put “life”!!
Deschooling came more when I went to college and learned how to study and gain knowledge from materials infront of me…not just following protecal but leraning on my own from my experiences with ppl and life.
I found such an enlightening bunch of “teachers” who knew how to approach life questions and such found science to be my outlet, my passion.
Thus looking into teaching as a profession, still believe that experience is the best teacher !! After having children, I swore never to teach mine the way I was taught, so to speak!!

Raquel:
When I first took my daughter out of school, I kept being told “Oh, she needs some time to deschool..usually one month per year at school” “eek” I thought,
“thats 7 months! I’m sure the local authority will love to hear that we are deschooling for at least 7 months.” As it was the local authority didn’t get in touch for a year..so by then we were pretty much deschooled..well we had a semblance of being deschooled at least. I think deschooling is what you do to get over the shell shock. The day my daughter left school we both were visibly shaking. We couldn’t quite believe we had done it. As “mum”, I put on a very chirpy face (after all this was originally my idea!) and I said ” Don’t worry..it’s perfectly legal..what can they do to us?” But deschooling in the UK isn’t just about getting school out of the system…it’s also abut getting the system out of our system.
People don’t just leave school..just like that..surely? Every policeman we saw walking up the high street made us quake. Every nosy shopkeeper made us want to curl up into a ball. Once we got used to staring police and shopkeepers in the eye, our worries turned to the work aspect. I ran out buying workbooks galore. I added 2 billion website links to my favourites..ALL educational!…I left the tv on the documentary channels…I put on BBC radio 4, even when nobody was in the room, in case osmosis was present in the house.
Whilst I was doing all this in between great bouts of worrying, my daughter was beginning to deschool without my knowledge. One day she would be picking up the workbooks, trying to fill them in, “IN CASE THEY COME AND BANG ON THE DOOR!”..and the next moment she would be playing on line with her website, learning html to get it looking good, without a care in the world. This would be interspersed with chatting to friends, making loads of pictures in “Paint”, and writing poetry.
I wasn’t too aware of the poetry until one day she declares, “mum, I won a poetry competition” “oh that’s great!” I thought thinking that it would look good in the report to the local authority. ” So what competition was it? When did you enter it? What is the poem?” I asked “oh just some national poetry competition..they are printing it in next months magazine..I wrote it one morning when you were sleeping” Winning a national poetry competition, and she won out of all ages even though she was only 10 at the time, is no mean feat, and I’m so busy trying to get her doing “stufff” for the local authority that I have missed the fact that my daughter is deschooling without me. She didn’t write that poem for any Education Welfare Officer to see, she wrote it because she wanted to.
It was at that point I realised that I should stand back and let the deschooling happen and trust that when it does it won’t be a disaster. The workbooks disappeared and we embraced deschooling and soon after that autonomous education. I don’t think we have fully deschooled.. who knows if we ever will? I still get moments of panic that she doesn’t know “enough” or she is getting “left behind”. But this happens less frequently, especially as she is growing into a beautiful, intelligent young lady. If not being in school is detrimental to a person, then 2 years out would have been detrimental to my daughter. There are no signs of this at all. It is the complete opposite.Deschooling was just a natural part of our home educating experience. I was the time where we experimented with concepts that terrified us, the time when we had to be our bravest, and the time when we really got to know ourselves. It was the hardest time to date, but also the most enlightening and worthwhile.

Laura:
When our son left school at age 8 he was broke little boy. Not spelling up to the schools standards caused him great grief and heart ache. The schools view of help was to remove him from class to the resource room for “help”. This help brought on a chain reaction of teasing, depression and tears on a daily basis. Mornings were so stressful I would feel like I was back in school.
Following a February missing lunch and a call from the school we left for greener pastures.
Deschooling came so natural it almost felt criminal we were so free. Of coarse finding the unschool discussion list gave me the strength to plunge forward into this new world of hope.
Dustin played video games, listened to audio tapes, watched movies,read surfing magazines and went shopping among other activities. Proudly claiming to be homeschoolers every place we visited we were on a mission. Homeschooling was well known in the winter of 99 however in Maine unschooling was still unheard of by many and rarely spoken about beyond a few lists. The following year we did begin to feel the doubts that creep in here ad there. Our son needed reassurance and we needed it too. We headed for the only place at the time that seemed to be advertising, Sylvan.
We learned a lot. We learned that our son wasn’t broken. (this still brings tears to my eyes knowing I could have been one of those parents who left him to lump it) We learned what we already knew.. he was just a child, our child. Armed with the knowledge that our past year of unschooling had helped more than two years(or more) of school could ever have we raced forward and to this day are now unschooling our other 3 children.. and ourselves.
Dustin is now 15 and helping to run the family business (his idea back in 1999 and also the creator of the business name) along with following his own interests of cooking, gaming and planning a cross country trip with friends.

Corners of my Home

Corners of my Home
Originally uploaded by Joanne G..

Here is another submission to the “Corners of my home” Flickr group.
This is in my kitchen. The walls are a sand color but they showed up more white in the picture. The top two shelves have waterfalls and the bottom has a snowman basket that holds our mismatched cloth napkins.

Blogging Chicks Blogroll

Rue tagged me

But first, a little plug for Rue’s book, Parenting a Free Child: An Unschooled Life.,

Okay, back to the matter at hand. I’m supposed to list 6 weird things about myself.

That’s an easy one. LOL!!

1. I’ve had tourists take pictures of me. I was working in Greenich Village in NYC and some tourists from Texas asked if they could take a picture with me. They said they had never seen a punk rocker with a blue mohawk and safety pins earrings and wanted to show their friends. LOL

2. I dyed my hair blue to match a dress I wore to a friend’s wedding.

3. My husband & I were intimate in the bathroom during an extremely boring wedding (not the one in #2).

4. I can’t be in the same room as someone brushing their teeth. It makes me feel like I’m going to gag and vomit.

5. I had a nightmare about H.R. Pufinstuf when I was a kid (after only watching their show once) and I still remember it vividly. To this day, I get creeped out when I see their picture.

6. For as long as I can remember, I’ve always had the feeling that I drowned in a previous life.

I asked my husband for 6 weird things about himself and here’s his list:

2. I can do this. It’s called gurning.

5. I didn’t smash cake in my wife’s face at our wedding even though I was encouraged from the sidelines, by her male cousins.
Hey what can I say-I did it all for the nooky.

6. I answered this.

I have to tag other bloggers but I’ll do that later. Feel free to answer it on your blog!