Can you be an unschooler and still plan?
A recurrent question of mine.
I realize that while my more structured homeschooling sometimes burned me out and didn’t leave a lot of room for organic learning, it still gave me something to work on, something that felt productive to me. At the end of the day I could say: X child did Y, I did W and Z, and so on. This is something I seem to need to feel motivated to keep going.
Home management is useful and necessary but it isn’t really productive — most of the results, sadly, are gone in a few hours or a day. Even the projects like decluttering aren’t really what I’d call meaningful. They are means to an end — more streamlined living and better use of resources — but in themselves, they won’t matter in a year or a century.
Mothering is useful and necessary, too, and there are various parallels with house management, but of course it goes further into the relationship sphere. Take friendships or marital relationships. They require interpersonal skills, time and creativity and flexibility, but they aren’t strictly “productive” — the benefits accumulate over time. Mothering is like that.
Then there are outside missions or vocations/ avocations. I do a little here and there on that front, both paid and volunteer basis, but nothing very systematic or that I can point to and say unequivocally: “There! I did something!” It’s all sort of minor and sporadic. And if I increased my commitment to outside activities, I think I would shortchange my family. That may change when I only have one or two older kids at home, but with a whole crew including a nursing preschooler and a medically fragile youngster, I think I need to devote my best energy to the home front.
So I guess my structured homeschooling fit a niche in my life and now I need to find a way to do this in a more unschooling framework. Record-keeping, like I’m doing on this blog, is something. But I think I need to have some kinds of plans and goals to feel like I’m actually, possibly, getting somewhere instead of spinning my wheels.
Can you plan and still unschool?
JoVE at Tricotomania has two posts up about “Curriculum Planning” for:
I like the way she looks at her daughter and then looks for something that will suit her learning style, personality, AND the goals she has for her.
Faith at Dumb Ox Academy is thinking of each child one by one, setting goals and rounding up resources: so far she has considered
Theresa at Lapaz Farm Home Learning is planning for her ten year old and I am thinking my Kieron would like an approach something like this.
I am going to be on the look-out for more of this kind of planning posts — I know I’ve found others that I’m not remembering now.
Here’s another list of goals from A Room of My Own.
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