This is the child. The one we say is too loud, too quiet, too distracted, too active, too shy, too stubborn, too immature, too disruptive, too slow…or just, too difficult. You know the child. She’s the one who doesn’t fit neatly in the classroom box. The one we label a problem. The one we try to change. But I can assure you this child doesn’t want to be a problem. See, it’s not that she doesn’t understand what is expected of her. She really does. It’s that she finds the path that leads to meeting those expectations suffocating. We’ve set a single standard for what every child should learn, wh ..read more

Last week — pinch me — I was lucky enough to host a MasterClass with none other than Julie Bogart, renowned homeschooling author, podcaster, community builder, and thought leader. Julie has been working in this space for some 3 decades now, and her voice has reached hundreds of thousands of parents, in turn helping so many children around the world (including five of her own). Julie has had such an interesting life, spanning time in Morocco, France, and the Congo. The Zoom was hosted in my Membership space, where folks in the community had submitted questions for Julie and I to discuss. Julie ..read more

This question came up recently in our member community, and I gathered these thoughts in my newsletter this week. If you’d like more home schooling Q&As and my thoughts around parenting, education, and child-led learning you can sign up for the newsletter over here. A reader asks I often find myself comparing my children to others their age (especially children who go to school, and especially in all those normal academic areas). It creates worry, and it’s unhelpful, but that thing of “where children should be at” is so engrained. How can I shake this? Theodore Roosevelt famousl ..read more

Imagine you are walking through a forest. You pass patches of flowers, flax bushes, ferns, and vines. You follow a line of low shrubs, your eyes drawn up into the towering trees above. You walk past a pond filled with water lilies, edged by tussocks. You stop beside a river, where you see moss growing on shaded rocks and yellow irises dotting the grassy banks.You reach the forest’s edge, blinking in the bright light as a lush green meadow stretches out in front of you. You are struck by how beautifully complex nature is. By how no two things are exactly the same. By how clear it is that some t ..read more

This reader question was sent in by email, and the resulting post was featured in my newsletter this week. If you’d like more home schooling Q&As and my thoughts around parenting, education, and child-led learning you can sign up for the newsletter over here. A reader asks How do you respond to people saying: “life is hard – if you don’t force your child to do things they don’t want to do, how will they be prepared for life?” There’s…a lot to unpack here. Firstly, this idea: I had it hard, and I turned out alright, so you – and everyone else – should have to go through that too ..read more

After sharing parts of our children’s school exemption applications last week, a lot of you replied asking about the specific curriculum we swear by. If that was you, you’re far from alone – it’s probably the question I’ve been asked more than any other since I started sharing our home education journey. What curriculum have we chosen to use, and why? How much did it cost? Have we tried any others? And, of course…do we recommend it? Today I’m going to tell you what the best curriculum is. The one we passionately recommend above all the others out there. The only one you’ll ever need. And ..read more

“Screens have given us access to more information, resources and inspiration than we’ve had in any other time in human history. They entertain us, educate us and connect us. They help us develop fine motor skills, research skills, communication skills…” “WAAAAIIIIT A SECOND. No. Screens have created a platform for sharing lives that are so curated they’re completely impossible to attain. They force us to compare and reflect negatively on our own lives. They’re making us more sedentary than we’ve ever been. They might be connecting us with people, but it’s usually at the expense of those standi ..read more

The three children sat at their desks, waiting. The first was deep in his imagination. In his mind he was turning rough shapes into creatures, the way he does on a page, filling them with colour and moving them through a story. He was a creative, artistic child, always imagining and dreaming and scribbling and drawing. The second was running her fingers back and forward across her right knee. She could hear the notes of the piano keys as she tapped, her left foot rising and falling on an imaginary pedal. She was a musical child, always composing and playing and singing and listening. The third ..read more

Children are very good at being in the moment. Adults, usually, are not. Not because we don’t want to be, but because we don’t really know how to anymore. From a young age we’re continually asked to shift on from moments we’re fully present in because there’s always something else to do. To work towards. To tick off. The next subject, project, worksheet, group activity, lesson, bell, lunch time, assembly, class, test, homework assignment…all week, every week. The model built for our children is based entirely on the concept of a start, a finish, and continual progression against benchmarks in ..read more

We’ve become completely obsessed with pushing children along a path of learning. Subjects, tests, benchmarks, progress, grades, awards, expectations, pressure…these words have become synonymous with childhood, and the age we start using them is getting younger and younger. Before a child has a chance to start exploring their uniqueness, who they really are and how they’d like to express that in the world, they’re asked to gather in a group and spend 13 years walking along the same path as everyone else. They’re told what they’ll be learning, when they’ll be learning, and where they’ll be learn ..read more