So I haven’t written about homeschooling for sometime now. For the majority of this year I participated in the weekly TOBY Homeschool Highlights which is a wonderful way to wrap up a week of learning activities for those who are Torah focused. Although my children are learning all the time, I just I haven’t found it in me to write an update since Sukkot. I guess with my studies, the farm, personal and family growth through Torah…I’ve been feeling a little burned out about homeschooling. You’ve seen the odd post over the last year or so about natural learning or unschooling. I will admit that I have been trying to find a way to satisfy my natural inclination to just let the children learn from life in an unstructured but meaningful way (which just happens regardless of whether I notice it or not) while alleviating my fears of not providing enough evidence of learning for the Education Department and all the while feeling like I just don’t have the passion for ‘school work’ like I used to.

I know that my children are learning simply by the fact that they are living! I see their natural progress as each one of them asks us to teach them and provide the tools needed to obtain information that they want in order to better understand the world around them.

I read this article from Beverley Paine this morning and I can so relate I wanted to share it here…

I remember the day I recognised that my motivation for asking my children to do ‘book work’ wasn’t so that they would learn something (academic) but because I needed reassurance that they had, despite ‘doing nothing’ for a few weeks, had actually learned quite a bit. Instead of asking them to do bookwork to learn I started asking them to do bookwork to keep my paranoia about the effectiveness of homeschooling at bay. By doing a few pages of book work for a few days they could quickly and efficiently dispel my lack of confidence (until the next bout of doubt would hit).
My children didn’t like doing bookwork for reasons that didn’t make sense to them. Helping mum feel okay and reassured was, to them, a legitimate reason for doing something they really didn’t want to do.
What did my children teach me? Life isn’t about achieving goals that will one day lead to a better paid job: it is about building relationships and friendships and giving our time selflessly to others to help them feel okay too.
© Beverley Paine

So I think for now, that is what I will do when it comes to bookwork; just ask them to do a little bit for me and apart from that, we will continue to play, read, farm, talk… live and learn…and I will keep reading to figure out how to turn that into something that the department will be satisfied with.

Maybe I might have something for a TOBY highlight this week, too. We’ll see!

This is from an article on The Natural Child Project called ‘I live therefore I learn: Living an Unschooling life’ by Pam Sorooshian.

The Role of the Unschooling Parent

• Show respect for all of a child’s interests equally.
• Keep the child in mind as I go through life, so that I notice things that might be of interest to that child.
• Find ways to include the child in my own daily life – live a more “open-book” life than the norm.
• Follow up on things the child is interested in – and do this in a wide variety of ways, not only by “getting him a book on it.”
• Live a family life that is rich with experiences of a variety of kinds both at home and outside the home.
• Have resources around the home that are interesting and stimulating – things that will encourage exploration of ideas.
• Discuss things – spend time in conversation. This is probably overall the most important parental “action” involved in unschooling.
• Have a playful attitude – play together, have fun, appreciate the amazing world around you. Don’t be cynical, be able to be amazed and find the world a fascinating place. This is the most important attitude for an unschooling parent.
• Be self-aware of your own thinking and behavior. Purposely stretch your imagination – question your own assumptions, check your own automatic impulses.
• Be very observant of what your child is really doing – don’t view him/her in a shallow superficial way. Recognize that there is a reason for a child’s actions, that a child is “born to learn” and is always learning. Get to know your child’s own special favored ways of learning.
• Wholeheartedly support a child’s passions even if, to you, they don’t look like “education.”

Principles of Unschooling

• Learning happens all the time. The brain never stops working and it is not possible to divide time up into “learning periods” versus “non-learning periods.” Everything that goes on around a person, everything they hear, see, touch, smell, and taste, results in learning of some kind.
• Learning does not require coercion. In fact, learning cannot really be forced against someone’s will. Coercion feels bad and creates resistance.
• Learning feels good. It is satisfying and intrinsically rewarding. Irrelevant rewards can have unintended side effects that do not support learning.
• Learning stops when a person is confused. All learning must build on what is already known.
• Learning becomes difficult when a person is convinced that learning is difficult. Unfortunately, most teaching methods assume learning is difficult and that lesson is the one that is really “taught” to the students.
• Learning must be meaningful. When a person doesn’t see the point, when they don’t know how the information relates or is useful in “the real world,” then the learning is superficial and temporary – not “real” learning.
• Learning is often incidental. This means that we learn while engaged in activities that we enjoy for their own sakes and the learning happens as a sort of “side benefit.”
• Learning is often a social activity, not something that happens in isolation from others. We learn from other people who have the skills and knowledge we’re interested in and who let us learn from them in a variety of ways.
• We don’t have to be tested to find out what we’ve learned. The learning will be demonstrated as we use new skills and talk knowledgeably about a topic.
• Feelings and intellect are not in opposition and not even separate things. All learning involves the emotions, as well as the intellect.
• Learning requires a sense of safety. Fear blocks learning. Shame and embarrassment, stress and anxiety – these block learning.

Thank you Betz, for your recommendation. I am enjoying this book immensely. Click on the image to purchase for a great price from the Book Depository. Here’s an excerpt to wet your appetite…

“For me, unschooling has meant a very different relationship with Andrea. I no longer find myself having to find ways to coerce her into doing what I think she should be doing academically. Instead, I look for the learning that happens on its own, and marvel at how well it happens. I worried that she would not make use of her talents if I didn’t ‘do something’. Being a teacher was something that came naturally to me, so having a daughter that didn’t really want to be taught has taken some adjustment. Now I feel more like a resource, and I do more suggesting than anything else. ”

I like it.

What is Natural Learning?

© Beverley Paine

Natural learning is very similar to unschooling. Natural learning builds upon a belief that learning unfolds naturally from within the individual and grows to include social settings, such as family, close friends, community and society in general. Natural learning follows closely the patterns of activity already existing in daily life, building a rich and comprehensive educational experience. Children become intimately involved in all aspects of family life, often including family working life. They are not closeted away from the world of adults, but are welcomed, in ‘apprenticeship’ roles, and valued greatly for their contributions. Where skills and knowledge are needed, within these rich social contexts, resources are always found.

On the Learning Naturally mailing list support group I asked the question:

“What does learning naturally look like at your place?”

For me natural learning is giving myself permission to learn; to recognise and honour that no matter what I’m a learner, can’t stop myself learning, and that each and every moment of every day I am learning something and it’s up to me to work out what (if I want to!).

Often I find that I’m learning several things all at the same time, and on different levels of understanding, as well as in different parts of my being.

I can consciously learn: that is direct my brain and body to learn something that I want or need to learn. Most of the time the whole learning process goes on without me being ‘in control’. That’s why I like to spend a lot of time reflecting, to work out what I’ve learned.

Often I find that I seem to be learning the same thing over again. I’m a slow learner! Sometimes I am learning the same thing over, but in a different way, so it’s actually a little bit new, or from a different perspective, or to a deeper level of understanding. I love it when the ‘aha’ moment happens in my head.

I’ve found that by examining closely how I learn I grew in understanding about how others learn, especially my children.

What I don’t think natural learning is … is a style of homeschooling. Or a homeschooling method or approach.

I believe that school kids and uni kids are anyone studying from a book or a teacher is learning naturally.

One of the list members posted that learning naturally is allowing oneself to live totally in the moment…

It’s very much a child-like state, isn’t it? I don’t think we have to worry too much about our children not learning naturally. What I learned from reading John Holt et al is that our job is to get out of their way, to stop interfering in their natural learning process.

I think a lot of people interpreted this as to mean “let the child do and learn whatever he wants”. I don’t think it’s that at all. Children don’t learn in a vacuum. They live within social units and their first lessons in life are about how to secure what they need from their parents in order to survive and thrive… Those first few months of life go so much easier when we, the parents, cue into the needs of the child rather than try to force them into fitting into our way of life.

The dance between new born and parent is a wonderful one to observe. I love the way this aspect of parenting is honoured among many new parents – and wish I knew 20 years ago what I know now!

It doesn’t seem to matter at what age/stage we recognise the need to join this dance, honouring the needs of the child nestled within the social units of family nestled within social units of community and culture…

What babies desperately seem to need is time… Time for us to take a breath, calm down, put away the imperative to fix, soothe, solve NOW and take the time to see the situation from a different perspective, empathise with others, pause and let a different section of our brain evolve the solution…

Children need us to pause too… We’re in so much of a hurry for them to grow up, get it right, do the right thing, be successful, achieve, do the best they can, make us proud, make themselves proud, finish what they are doing…

Living in the moment is taking the time to notice time passing…

“What we need to do, and all we need to do, is bring as much of the world as we can into their lives; give them as much help and guidance as they ask for; listen respectfully when they feel like talking; and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do the rest.” – Lisa Wood

Natural learning … allowing the process of learning to occur, unhindered by interference, in a social context where the learner is not isolated from the world of meaningful action. Natural learning … is simply following common sense.