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Looking for your best unschooling advice

1K views 3 replies 3 participants last post by  SweetSilver 
#1 ·
As DS is approaching "school" age and I am thinking more and more about how he is learning, I'm looking for any advice, from the general to specific, you could offer. You know, the kind of advice you wish you had had when you first started out.

More specifically, I'm thinking about how to know when your child is ready to learn something. DS, at 4.5, is gradually learning to read, but aside from story time with us or at the library, or the occasional educational show on television when he is visiting with my parents, I'm giving him very little instruction. I ask him questions in our conversations like, "what is the first letter of...", or he will even ask me something about reading or spelling and I'll try to get him to figure it out on his own. As for printing, he can print his own name but has a rather short attention span for any sit-down sessions with pencil and paper. And with DD, at 18 months close at hand, I find it challenging to do anything specifically geared to DS's learning. She's just too wiggly and curious with whatever we're doing, and I have to limit our activities to things that we can include her with. I'm not particularly stressed about how much DS is learning at this time, because I think he's learning what he's ready for. But I am wondering how any of you knew when your children were ready for something, such as reading/writing, or formal music instruction, and how you overcame challenges of having other children on hand who were demanding your attention too. Do children learn anyway, with minimal instruction, as long as you provide an environment that is stimulating and set a good example?

Also, how did you work out scheduling issues? Did you find that a more structured day worked better, or a more free-flowing approach? Do you limit how much "extra-curricular" activities you involve your children in (sports, music lessons, clubs, drama, etc. not taught by you)? Do you wish you had done less/more in this area? Do you wish you had started them earlier/later on certain things?

These are just a few of the questions I can think of right now. I'm sure there are more! Really, I'm looking for anything you've got, things you wish you had known when you were starting out. Even if it's something really obscure. Anything goes!
 
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#2 ·
Do children learn anyway, with minimal instruction, as long as you provide an environment that is stimulating and set a good example?
Yes, resoundingly! They may take a little longer to get the first couple of toe-holds in some new skill-set, but once they do, they often make short work of the rest.

As for scheduling ... I do not do structure easily or well, so our days have tended to be very free-flowing and flexible, all the more so when the kids were young. We didn't really start 'extra-curricular activities' until age 6-ish and beyond, though my younger two did try out some stuff a bit younger than that because they were dying for a piece of what their older siblings were doing. Six-plus was the right age for us to start introducing these things, and we would usually just add at most one per year. We usually tried to have no more than three outside-home-and-family activities going on per week.

Miranda
 
#3 ·
As for scheduling ... I do not do structure easily or well, so our days have tended to be very free-flowing and flexible, all the more so when the kids were young. We didn't really start 'extra-curricular activities' until age 6-ish and beyond, though my younger two did try out some stuff a bit younger than that because they were dying for a piece of what their older siblings were doing. Six-plus was the right age for us to start introducing these things, and we would usually just add at most one per year. We usually tried to have no more than three outside-home-and-family activities going on per week.

Miranda
I'm the same way. Right now, structure for me is just for getting through the household tasks in more or less the same order every day, then trying to reserve some time for whatever activity for the kids that I can come up with, either going outside to play, making some art, going for a small excursion or to the library. Until they are a little older, I think this is enough for me, and for them.

I've had friends who, for instance, were putting their child into gymnastics at age three, and other such activities. Maybe it works for them in their lives, but for me, I just didn't feel ready (or that DS was ready) for something like that. DH and I have been talking about putting him in soccer camp this summer, and I'm still not sure if I'm ready, or if he is. We'll see when the time comes.

When it comes to anything approaching academics, I'm letting them lead the way. I figure that if DS isn't interested in something, it's because he's not ready to learn it yet. And, like you, I find that DD is eager to be included in whatever DS is doing, so I have to restrict his activities to whatever is safe for her to do too.

Thanks for commenting, Miranda. It helps to know I'm on the right track.
 
#4 · (Edited)
My first thought about when they are ready to learn something is that more often than not I discover they already learned it. :p

Really, it was trial and error. I knew what my daughters liked and brought in books and resources for them to play with. Some things clicked, most didn't. Repeat. Watch. Repeat. I would bring back things that failed after a few months or a couple of years. I would notice that the girls liked not only certain subjects, but almost any subject offered in a certain format (graphic-novel-type books for example). The child-sized-but-real tool sets I bought for them 4 years ago are finally getting some use. It's can be a constant back-and-forth but if you don't sweat it, it's easy.

ETA: I find it useful sometimes to err on the side of complexity. Kids can find value in books and tools in other ways, not just the way they were intended. It can almost be a better guage of what your child is ready for.
 
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