Mar 19, 2019

What is Radical Unschooling?

Radical Unschooling (RU) is Unschooling, Self-Directed Education with no curriculum, applied to all of life. RU Students self-regulate their sleep, diet, body care, screen time and more. Boundaries for respect and safety are used instead of rules. Relationships render punishments obsolete. Parents are guides and examples rather than enforcers. At first, this can sound insane. I come from a very strict and abusive 1970's childhood and raised my first with what I'd been taught. It was just second nature. A Freeschoolin' life would have sounded crazy to me. But, having royally failed using that method, with Hope I was determined to find out what WOULD work for our family. I did some research, knowing we wanted to homeschool, and stumbled upon some people sharing their positive experience with Unschooling. Which led to finding out about Radical Unschoolers. These families claimed living without punishments, without bedtimes, without school, without arbitrary restriction, was key to cultivating free thinking, confident, capable adults. They said learning happened all the time. They seemed so happy together!

That's what we wanted! So we let go. We let go of the rules and kept boundaries for safety. We let go of school and embarked upon life learning together. We let go of fear and started living a life beyond our wildest dreams. And here we are! Hope is teaching herself to read, to create, to be kind, to explore. She is a problem solver, a positive thinker, and a snazzy dresser. She knows herself and her limits. It really works. Radical Unschooling. Or as we like to call it, Freeschoolin'! What are your inhibitions about Radical Unschooling or Unschooling? Love to hear from you!

This Week

We put on a FreeArt event at our local library for homeschoolers to craft and do art freely with no instruction, just imagination! We are so thankful to everyone who came out, brought supplies and made it a fun time for all. There was even a Tardis in our rental room! Much to our surprise, a drum class was being held so we wrapped up our event early to take advantage of the opportunity to drum together. We also got outside for some sledding, snow play and bushcrafting! Hope had so much fun whittling a stick with Freeschoolin' Daddy's knife!