🍄 How Freeschoolin' Reduces Stress
Life Has No Shortage Of Challenges.
But there's no reason we have to make it more so by forcing adherence to schedules that don't work with our family's natural rhythm.
Illness, financial and emotional needs are just a few factors that could make trying to access a good education through a well established, often rigid system, very difficult and sometimes impossible.
This is why it's so important not to adopt a once size fits all approach to learning. It happens for everyone differently and education facilitation should reflect that.
Not attending a brick and mortar school allows us to live without the travel, social and financial pressure. No curriculum means we avoid the costs and intricate work of choosing the best one. Without tests and grades we have no worries of passing or failing. It is the fear of school minded programming that bring stress to learning. The deadlines, arbitrary comparison to peers, disruptive, rigid daily schedules. The constant, real worry that you have to keep up to the pack in order to be all you can be. Even homeschooling can bring this stress when school is attempted to be recreated at home.
It is incredible the amount of stress we omit from our lives by Freeschoolin'/ Radical Unschooling.
We can freely learn what comes naturally, without worry or anxiety. When life challenges arise we can focus on them fully and learn all we need to pull through them.
The principle "Life Is Learning", and how we've seen it proven through educational professionals, grown unschoolers, current unschooling families and our own experiences, is the foundation on which we stand confidently, knowing not only are we not missing out on education, we're allowing it to fully flourish in our family, not just through childhood, but all life long.
THIS WEEK
I'd like to report that we had a much smoother time this week compared to the last few, but I'd be lying if I did.
Of course there was lots of chicken play with our 3 week old chicks, Birdzbee, Cricket and Lucky and 5 month old chickens Goldie the Rooster and our 2 hens Nugget and Hay Hay. We slept in the tent in a thunderstorm, worked on our garden, cared for our horse, dog and cat, had friends over and worked on future plans. Hope and Jaze played an intense version of D&D (Dungeons and Dragons) that she is IN LOVE with, Hope rode her bike and did lots of waterplay in the bath. (Like hours a day.)
The thing we struggled with most this week was our car. As we mentioned in last week's blog, the morning of June 27th I discovered my driver's side tire was totally flat. We had been out the evening before getting groceries from Nicholyn Farms and feed for our horse. We had no issues with the car, tires included, yet my tire was indeed flat the next morning. After a few days to process all that went down, we called CAA, a company I've been with since my 20's, to put on the spare so we could get the car to the shop and have it replaced properly. The CAA technician they sent wasn't from their company, but I've had this before and hadn't had a problem. Till now. He got lost, and was clearly agitated because of it when he arrived. He literally waved me off, dismissing me, the card and car owner, entirely and proceeded to angrily exclaim that our car needed to be moved for him to service it. We were calm and tried to co-regulate the mood of the conversation by asking what we needed to do, without retaliation to his rudeness. This is when we discovered the second MOSTLY flat tire. I had said to Jaze on the 27th that I thought the back tire looked really low too but we were in such a hurry to make it to the field trip, I didn't think of it again until we moved the car for the tire change. The technician continued being pissed off regardless, so Jaze and I just tried to get everything ready for him to get on with the job. I went inside once the car was moved so I didn't have to deal with his energy. Jaze reported that he unbolted the tire, felt around the underside of our car, looked worried, shrugged and proceeded to jack up the car. It lifted less than half way when it crashed to the ground, making the CAA technician jump back. He declared, "This tire change is over!", and before I could process it, had come up and request I authorize a flat bed. I agreed but checked the time and our garage was closed. At this point, it started to downpour. The CAA technician took to his truck after telling Jaze, "No, no, no, I'm leaving!", and before I could cancel the flatbed he'd ordered, he was gone. Jaze spent an hour or more cancelling the tow until the next morning and complaining about this horrible experience with the CAA technician. The next day the car went to into the shop. They filled up the tires, checked everything for damage and were patient as we recharged from our ordeal. 2 days later we were told the tires were holding air perfectly, no issues were found. It's important to note, the tire was never rebolted by the CAA technician, and we didn't know that this wasn't procedure to unbolt tires before jacking it up. So no one thought to look to make sure the tire was bolted on and it was even test driven by the garage and there was no issue. We went on Friday to grab our car and sure enough the tires looked great. No issues. We were charged nothing and happily began the drive home. Until we drove about a minute away and there began a clunk in my drivers's side tire area. And as I drove, it got worse. I never thought about the tire being unbolted, I assumed it was damage from the crashing down thanks to the CAA technician and hoped to get it home and sell it for scrap. But it got worse. I actually got on the highway. And quickly got off. I took the back roads. We all were silent with fear as I drove, the sound got worse. I ended up on a rural road near a quaint little home and could not ignore the urge to stop any further. I asked Jaze to get out and check the tire, maybe it had gone flat again. Jaze came back to the car wide -eyed. He said,"The tire almost came off. You have no idea how close it was." We sought the help of the house owners, a tire iron, a phone, anything. Myrtle, was not only helpful, she was so welcoming and kind. She invited us to see her gardens and pool, gave us a cucumber from her vines and told us the history of their place. Myrtle, and her husband Keith, are making little pantries to go around the community and she proudly showed them off. Her flags on her front yard included a native friendship flag in place of the usual Canada Day celebration flag they display. They were heartbroken to hear of the atrocities indigenous people have suffered at the hands of Canada and didn't feel much like celebrating. They had been on the land since before they were married and built the house in 1972. Jaze used their phone and our garage had someone come out to ensure all our tires were secure and safe, so in about an hour and a half, we were back on our way home, with new friends and good memories made. What was nearly a tragedy ended up being a lovely adventure. What was wonderful is that it felt like pre-pandemic times where people helped people, connected and shared freely. Our car is operational (yay!), but we are looking for another now and to sell this one. Hope did a lot of art, as per usual. She also played Planet Zoo, Minecraft, Among Us with an online group, spoke to her maternal Gramma on the phone and watched youtube, Tic Tok and shows with Jaze and I.
SUBJECTS:
Reading, Art, Technology, Resourcefulness, Problem Solving, Automotive Safety, Community, Socialization, Physics, Science, Homesteading, Responsibility, Team Work, Geography, History, Nutrition, Body Care, Emotional Intelligence, Compassion, Generosity, Resilience, Critical Thinking, Power of Positivity, Math, Finances, Animal Care, Home Maintenance, Communication, So Much More.
VIDEO
Hope And Her Chicken Babies! (3 Weeks Old)
How You Can Help Us
We talked about our struggles in last week's blog post and called out for help. We are very close to finishing our 2nd Freeschoolin' children's book, which we hope will help in our goal, but until it is ready we are going to be asking anyone who can to spread the word of our currently available titles and our Freeschoolin' Clothing and More shop.
Our biggest following is on Facebook and they show maybe 500 people out of 11,000 what we post because we won't pay for ads. If we had the people's help in sharing about Freeschoolin' and what we offer I am sure we could get more of the support we need as a little family trying to make it in this crazy, big world. I do custom illustrations, logo packages and more, all of which you can contact me about.
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Much Love Always,
Wendy
About the Author
Wendy Elizabeth Hart - Author, Illustrator, is a radical unschooling, homesteading Mom of 2 amazing kids and wife of more than 12 years to her bff, Jaze. Together with their daughter Hope, 11, they live a life of daily discovery in rural Ontario, Canada and share it with the world to connect with and support other families in the unschooling community.
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