Two Canadian sisters, nine spectacular kids, no school.
This week my seven year old learned numbers. At least, numbers into the hundreds. She can identify any number up to 999 and say it correctly. I don't know how or when my three older kids learned to do this, but I do know how my seven year old did it: through a stupid video... Continue Reading →
Some of our "school" supplies.
Leave kids to their own devices and they’ll come up with some great stuff—like a trip to the local police station!
With the world at their fingertips, what child has time for school?
This is unschooling this week: Recently I really got into the soundtrack of the Broadway musical Hamilton, and after lamenting that I wish I could just see the storyline so I’d understand better what was going on when I listened, my husband Brad found this this video, and we watched the whole thing. Since then,... Continue Reading →
One of the local elementary schools is in my neighbourhood, so I pass by their sign board relatively often. Over the summer, this is the message they had up: And I thought it was cool how, in principle anyway, we seem to have shared values. The difference, I suppose, is in application. Their admonition to... Continue Reading →
Let's get schooly for a moment. Not that I think spending your life comparing yourself to others is a great plan, but when you're living alternatively, occasionally getting schooly has its benefits. It can help to validate one's own choices, and help others to understand said choices, by speaking their language. I come in peace.... Continue Reading →
Here's a thing about unschoolers: we are an incredibly amorphous group. You can't even fairly call us a group--we have no leader, no rule book; we're all over the map. All we have are ideas. Sure, those ideas started with one man, who put them into some great books, but there's still about a million ways to... Continue Reading →
Today I got the first Life of Fred math book, "Apples", back from a friend who'd borrowed it, because five-year-old L had asked to start reading them together. I haven't read them at all since November when I finally noticed I was killing the joy of math in E by pushing it. I think the... Continue Reading →
