Deschooling is the process of changing the way you think about learning and education. It’s moving away from the idea that learning only takes place “in school” and/or by the methods traditionally used by schools.

I didn’t initially set out with a natural learning mindset. In addition to having attended public school for 13 years myself, we began our homeschooling journey using classical materials so we certainly have a lot of experience with curriculum, textbooks, workbooks, etc. But this last school year life just seemed to be constantly getting in the way of our schooling…it felt like we never had time to sit down and really hit the books and I was really stressed out about it. I remember praying and praying and praying some more and I kept getting the feeling that in answer to my prayers God was telling me to relax, relax, relax. (Easier said than done.)

So after many months of God pointing me in the same direction I finally began the task of deschooling. The first step was to deschool myself and Wonderful Hubby. We read books…

Learning All the Time by John Holt

Teach Your Own: The John Holt Book of Homeschooling by John Holt

The Unschooling Handbook: How to Use the Whole World as Your Child’s Classroom by Mary Griffith

Homeschooling Our Children Unschooling Ourselves by Alison McKee

The Unschooling Unmanual

We discussed what we knew about our kids, their strengths and weaknesses, what we knew about ourselves and our own educations, how we learned best as kids, what we remember about school, where we failed and where we enjoyed success. We finally began to see life through the lenses of natural learners.

Once we felt comfortable with this new mindset we stopped using the term “school” to describe what we did all day. If we happened to have time for a workbook or if we happened to be using a text book we called it “book work”. We wanted to the kids to start thinking about their education as something that was happening all day every day, not just when we were “doing school”.

I also stopped recording and referring to our learning by subject. When you break it down into math, reading, writing, social studies, etc., where do you put things like; helped Grandma move or watched Dad fix the leaky pipe under the sink or helped make and pass out fliers while looking for our lost cat? These things are educational and were part of our real life but they don’t necessarily fit into the little subjects my record keeping book provides me with so I went through the book and crossed out all the subject labels. Now I just record what we do as it happens and without worry of where it fits.

A few months into all of this now I will say that I’ve found our toughest “deschooling” task to be learning to trust each other. I have to trust them to learn with out my constant badgering and they have to trust me to let them say no when I suggest an activity they aren’t interested in. J is doing fine and is very curious about learning. W on the other hand is going about the whole thing a bit more cautiously. I really pushed him in the beginning and he doesn’t really believe yet that he has the freedom to say no.

Little by little we’re getting the hang of living and learning in a natural way. The boys still ask “Have we done school yet today?” and I still have moments of panic and wish they would engage in activities that are more obviously academic. But we’re getting over it and learning to value each and every moment we’re given.

Saying something like that out loud or typing it up and publishing it for the world to see would have scared me to death a year ago. However, much has changed here at Life and Love Learning Center and now I am able to write it with complete confidence. I’ve learned that my kids love to learn and are really very good at it. I’ve learned to set the workbooks aside and let God and life direct us to our next learning adventure. It’s taken me since November or so, thinking and praying the whole time but I guess you could say I’ve actually learned to relax.

Don’t get me wrong, I do still have a plan (I’m kind of a control freak to be honest). I have my Bible learning plan and my Spring and Summer Science Series. And I set a game or a project or some suggested activity on the table almost every morning and hope the kids will have at it. The difference now is that if they’re not interested, I try not to push it.

I’m really enjoying the path we’re on partially because I believe it has actually gotten me more involved in my children’s education than I was before. In the days of workbooks and curriculum I took the books off the shelf, we sat down at the table, did our work and then it was done. I was free at that point to take off the “teacher hat” so to speak and go on with my day. Now I have to make myself available as a resource, tutor, instructor and fellow learner at all times of the day.

For instance,

• Shooing the boys out of the kitchen so I can finish dinner is a thing of the past. Now I say, “Who wants to help me cook?” and I get my volunteer as involved as possible, sharing information and technique along the way.
• Games that we played every once in a while before have taken center stage in our home because Monopoly Jr. is great for learning addition, subtraction and multiplication, Wheel of Fortune for spelling and reading, Risk-geography and strategy, etc.
• I’m presenting them with, signing them up for and escorting them to more classes that they’re interested in because we now have the time to enjoy them, where before it may have interfered with “school”.
• We’re doing more hands on science experiments instead of relying on books and worksheets.
• We’re serving more and looking for volunteer opportunities in the community (again we now have time to do this).
• I’m not just presenting them with material anymore, now I’m paying closer attention to their interests, answering lots of questions, teaching them to use the Internet and library and generally helping them learn to learn.

Days like this and this have proven to me that natural learning is working and that it’s a great fit for my family. I don’t have to “force” them to “do school” and I don’t have to stress out about their education. They’re learning everyday and they’re loving it!

For the last several months he has been focusing his energy on learning to count money. Almost every day he would bring all of his money out and ask if we could count it together. And so we did…over and over and over. We also counted how many coins he had, sorted them by color and size and figured out how much he would have with “this” and the allowance he was expecting in a few days.

He’s recently discovered that there’s more to life than money and is now finding clocks, telling time and Roman numerals fascinating. Telling time I understand but Roman numerals is not something I was ever interested in as a kid. However now that I’m a grown up I’m enjoying learning them right along with him.

Here’s one of the books we’ve been reading together. I found it at a book sale cheap!

It’s so fun for me to see the boys learn and discover things they’re interested in. I really was one of those “unschooling skeptics” who thought, “What if they don’t want to learn math?” I’ll tell you what I’ve decided…lots of people don’t want to do math when you present them with an unending supply of worksheets…but math is every where and if you live and work (or play) in our society it is absolutely unavoidable and sometimes even fun to learn about!

If you know me at all you know that I’ve come a long way in my thinking (about math and about homeschooling!)

Hope you’re having a fun (and math) filled day!

Have a great weekend,

• Bible
• Math
• Reading and
• Art

That didn’t seem too bad and I actually really enjoyed it! (Except for the fact that W wasn’t anywhere near ready for reading at age 5!)

But I gave up the classical method when I realized that in 1st grade I was expected to add

• Geography
• Grammar
• Literature and
• Music

At that point I became afraid! How was I to teach literature and grammar and reading to a boy who wasn’t reading at all? I thought, “Why can’t literature and grammar and reading all be taught as one subject instead of three?”

I was overwhelmed to say the least. So when W went into first grade I became an eclectic homeschooler who used classical Christian materials as I saw fit and tweaked everything to suit us.

J started Kindergarten the following year, with W entering 2ND grade. At this point I was teaching

• Bible
• Math
• Reading/Literature
• Art
• History
• Latin
• Music (appreciation)
• Geography and
• Science

This was a good year for us, maybe the most comfortable one we’ve had so far. This was the year I became not only eclectic but “relaxed eclectic” in the schooling of the boys. By relaxed I mean we took no tests, used classical materials but did almost all of it orally or as we saw fit and took our time learning the things we set out to learn. Of course we had our ups and downs but as this post demonstrates, for the most part things were going really well!

And now we have entered our 4TH year of homeschooling. W is a 3rd grader (and finally reading!) and J is in 1st grade. We’re still using mostly classical materials and enjoy them (like I said before, we use them in a way that suits us.) But as I’ve mentioned this year has been tough. The dynamics have just changed. We only have 2 or 3 days a week that we are able to hit the books and I have been worrying a lot about that.

I’ve been operating under the assumption that in order for my kids to learn they had to do a little bit of EVERY subject every day but this year has proven me wrong. This year our learning looks different. One day we may do science, reading and art for 4 full hours (in the form of one project), and then the next day do 8 pages of math, read the Bible, write someone a letter and work hard on memorizing our spelling words. It’s not that they’re not learning, it just looks different!

I think I may be moving from “relaxed/eclectic” to semi-unschooling. It’s scary for me to even type that sentence, I just know that I am inviting criticism. The thing is, my kids like to learn. Listening to the Swiss Family Robinson on CD is fun to them. Creating a comic book about the life of Joseph is play to them. I’m not kidding! W loves to memorize math facts and Bible verses. J gets excited about writing letters to missionary kids and learning sign language. W will say, “I love writing!” and J says, “Everything is school.” We read constantly, discuss what we learn, watch documentaries and educational videos. We listen to Latin, literature and the Bible on CD. And just as important, they love to play and use their imaginations.

So, I’m going to relax and let them be. Everyday doesn’t have to look like every other and I don’t need to be in constant worry.

Enjoy your day!