Have you found that unschooling is unschooling yourself as well as your child?

[aquarius77]

I went to school but plan to unschool my kids in a couple years, I think I am looking forward to it as much for myself as for my kids.  That I might finally have time to learn stuff for fun, maybe find something I'm passionate about that I never knew about.  I'm just wondering if any of you have found unschooling to have enhanced your own passion for learning?  I did high school, then university right after then got a job and hate it, 10 years since high school.  I am so looking forward to my kids being a little more self-sufficient and all of us doing our own thing and learning about the world together.  

[mammal_mama]

Congratulations! And, yes, I have found it to be conducive to all kinds of learning and questioning in my own life. I started out questioning our society's dogma about education and child "training," and have now progressed into the realm of questining all kinds of dogma. It's been both scary and exhilerating!

[MOMMMYTO3]

I was a total "failure" in the traditional school setting, and a perfect candidate for Un-schooling.  The only problem is, I was extremely bright and have an almost un-quenching passion to learn, just not at a desk in a classroom.  Especially those elementary years.  My poor parents, what they must have expected me to turn out like!  Certainly not the "teacher" I have become to my own children.  There was something about my epic grades failure in school that prompted my mother to keep every progress report and major report card I EVER received.  I felt the same way reading them as an adult as I did receiving them as a child, Sick!  Not that my mother only reflected on the bad, not at all, she also kept every single one of my achievement awards no matter how major or minor they were.  But the point I'm making is how these letters, A B C D and especially F, affect me to this day! 

On this new radical journey I'm about to take with my son, my first order of business will be to un-school myself by trashing every one of those report cards.  They do not, and never will define my worth in this world.  How silly I was to allow it to, even as a woman in my 30's.  

It's amazing how much you learn about yourself through your children.  I am so blessed for the revelations they bring to light daily.  

I just finished my first year of home-school with my 9yr old DS.  We are switching to USing this new year.  I also have a 12yr old DD who chose School.  And a 4 yr old DS who is, by nature, an USer.

                                                              

[CrunchyMama19]

yes, this is one of my big reasons for deciding to "unschool". I got all the way through school and even got my PhD but never really felt like I "learned" until graduate school. Even then it was a lot of spitting out information on paper. Now I feel like I really get to explore and discover!

[aussiemumma]

Yes, I  totally feel this way too!

All the fear leading up to this point are from my own insecurities since I was a child at school.

It's crazy, liberating, emotional and exciting to be able to challenge ourselves and rise above our own fears while learning from our children.

C

[Midwitch]

Yes, very much so! Unscooling my daughter has enriched my own life in a way I never thought possible, and has given me so much ease and confidence in being myself and letting others be themselves. I was an A-student all way through school, went on to become a midwife, also with a's all way through, but after becoming a mom, seeing the world through my daugthers eyes and deciding to unschool (after having sahm'ed her) I realized that all that school and all those A's hadn't really been my choice, not from my heart.

So deciding to unschool dd has really, in a sense, set me free :)