Unschooling

     Unschooling. Deep breath.Will I always have to defend it?  Will I always have to explain to people that I'm not just being lazy and negligent?  Do you know what it is?  It seems like most people know about it because of the families who give it a bad name.  The kids who only study video games and TV.  No that's not unschooling, no I don;t just toss my kids a crust of bread each morning and hope they survive the day.  Unschooling is away of life, a really beautiful way of life for us.
     Let me start off by saying that we do have a schedule, it is what works for us.  Our "core subjects" come first; spiritual devotional (Scripture study, prayer, pledge of allegiance, and song), Math, foreign language, and piano.  Those are our core subjects because that is what prayer inspired they be for my children.  Some days Devotional is the only "formal" subject we do.  After that they have a few other subjects they do, actually, if I am honest they do far more then a few.  One day I sat down and counted up the "subjects" we do each week because I was comparing my kids to other kids.  It turns out the list of regular subjects studied each week exceeded a dozen.  Most of the them were not formal sit down lessons, there were no books, no curriculum and yet we learned still.  But how?  Let me give you a few examples.
     Benjamin loves circuits and electricity.  I bought him a circuit maze set and he sat right down. I could see him analyzing it, the flow of current, closing the circuit, positive, negative, LED, and off he went.  I tired to do one of the puzzles, but I couldn't figure it out so he taught me...and by taught I mean he showed me how to do it. :) 
     Glen hates to write, but has discovered that he loves to write books.  You see I could force him to sit and do writing practice for a torturous 15 minutes, or I could buy him a notebook and encourage him to write down his ideas.  And now he sits, sometimes for hours, writing books.
     Elizabeth is learning to read and spell.  We have a book she practices out of, but I don't force. It's on the schedule and if I forget she reminds me.   Then she likes to practice writing the words she is learning to read, which of course reinforces the words in her mind.  Today her "spelling test" involved shaving cream. 
     Abigail is practicing writing her name so she can show it off to her friend at church.  She also counts EVERYTHING.
     We have learned about physics at the park, nature as we walk, politics, finances, building, far away places, cooking, the list if endless.  Learning really is a way of life.  When people ask me if we go through the summer I think they envision sitting at a desk every day.  It's easy to go to school every day when you see that we are surrounded by opportunities to learn.  Sometimes sitting in church becomes an art lesson as a bored child asks for a piece of paper and draws what he sees.  Sometimes a trip tot he park becomes a lesson on seeds or bugs as curious children ask questions.  Every week when we go grocery shopping we learn about measuring weight, estimating price, sticking to a budget, how the food got there.  November isn't just about Thanksgiving around here, it's a lesson about the government, voting, politics, laws, check and balances.  April is a great times to talk about taxes, what is it, where does it go, do you think it's good or bad. Books teach so many lessons I cannot even begin to list it all.
   You see, unschooling is about finding opportunities to learn from every experience in life.  It's about seeing the interests of the child and encouraging them, proving opportunities to learn, and often, finding someone to mentor them.  They know what they love, they have an intense desire to learn!