The Beginners Guide to Unschooling

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Theres nothing I get asked about more as a parent than unschooling, and nothing I recommend
more to other parents.
Its an educational philosophy that provides for more freedom than any other learning method,
and prepares kids for an uncertain and rapidly changing future better than anything else I know.
My wife and I unschool four of our kids, and have been for several years.
And yet, as powerful as I believe unschooling to be, Ive never written about it, because the truth
is, I certainly dont have all the answers. No one does.
The beauty of unschooling is in the search for the answers. If anyone had all the answers, there
would be no search. And so what Id love to teach unschooling parents and kids is that the search
is the joy of it all.
But Im getting ahead of myself: what is unschooling? Why should you do it? How do you do it?
What should you read? Well talk about all that today.

What is Unschooling?
First, its a form of homeschooling. But theres no easy answer to that except in comparison to
regular schooling. Theres no one way to do unschooling, and people who do it often do it for
many different reasons in many different ways.
However, this is how I describe it in contrast to school:

While school has classes with subjects, unschooling doesnt.

While school has goals set by teachers and the school system, the unschooler (the kid) set
his or her own goals.

While in school, knowledge is handed down from the teacher to the student, in
unschooling the student is empowered to learn for himself.

While school has specific books or sets of learning materials, unschoolers can learn from
anything books they find, things on the Internet, siblings or parents, the outdoors,
museums, people working in interesting fields, anything.

While school is structured, unschooling is like jazz. Its done on the fly, changing as the
student changes.

While students in school learn to follow instructions, unschoolers learn to think for
themselves and make their own decisions.

While students in school are asked to learn at pace arbitrarily set by administrators,
unschoolers learn at their own pace.

While in school, learning happens in the classroom at certain times, in unschooling

learning happens all the time, and there is no division between learning and life.

Let me emphasize that for a minute: in unschooling, life itself is learning. There is no doing
school you are learning all the time.
Unschoolers learn just like you or I learn as adults: based on what interests them, figuring out
how to learn it on their own, changing as they change, using whatever resources and learning
materials they find, driven by curiosity and practical application rather than because someone
says its important.
This is how I learn as a self-employed writer, as an entrepreneur, as a parent. Its how our
children will learn when theyre adults. Why not have them learn like that now?

Why Unschool?
Lets think about what school is about: preparing kids for jobs (and life) in the future a future
thats probably a decade or more away. Now think about a decade or more of change: how many
of us predicted 13 years ago what life would be like today? Did we know about the economic
recession, or the changing job market, or the fact that things like smartphones and iPads and
ebook readers would be so widespread? And thats just the start.
If we cant predict what our kids future will be like, how can we decide today what they should
be learning to prepare for that future? Were preparing them for todays jobs, not tomorrows
jobs. School teaches kids a set of facts and skills that they might not need in the future.
Unschooling takes a different approach: kids learn how to learn, how to teach themselves. If you
know how to learn and how to teach yourself, then you are prepared for any future. If in the
future the things we know are obsolete, then the person who knows how to learn anything will be
ready to learn whatever is in use in the future. The person who only knows how to learn from a
teacher will need a teacher to teach him.
More reasons to unschool:

Its how entrepreneurs learn. Schools prepare kids to follow instructions, like good
employees, while entrepreneurs take charge of what they need to know and make
decisions for themselves, navigate through uncharted waters. Unschooling prepares kids
to be entrepreneurs instead of robots.

Its much more natural. The school system is a fairly modern invention, and isnt how
humans have learned for the majority of our history. Unschooling is the learning method
used for most of human history including by people like Leonardo Da Vinci, Leo
Tolstoy, Mozart, Einstein and Benjamin Franklin.

Its freer. The structure of school is good for people who like decisions made for them,
but if you like making your own decisions, and figuring out things based on current
needs, you will want more freedom.

We learn with the kids. While in school, many parents are removed from the learning
process, and ask the teachers to take responsibility for their kids education, with
unschooling you learn with your kids. The most important learning Ive been doing is
learning about learning. We figure out, together, how people learn, whats the best way to
learn, for each kid.

Learning is unlimited. In school, learning is limited to the classroom and homework

time. Then kids believe they stop learning and they can go play and live life as if
learning is boring and they only do it because theyre forced to. But unschoolers learn
that learning happens all day long, every day, no matter what youre doing. If youre not
studying a textbook, does that mean youre not learning? Cant you learn from playing
games, going for a hike, talking to strangers? How about from figuring out how to cook
dinner, or fix a broken faucet, or make a fort? Learning is all around us, and its fun!
Thats what unschooling teaches us.

There are many more reasons, of course, and each person will find her own reasons. These are
just a few of mine.

How to Unschool
This is the hard part, because there is no right way to do it, no single way. And parents who are
starting out always, always want to know how to do it. I know we did, and the honest truth is,
were still figuring out the answer.
Why is there no answer? Because every kid is different. Everyone has different needs, interests,
abilities, goals, and environments. What would you say if people told you there was only one
way to live your life, one way to do your job? Youd hate it, because it would take away your
freedom, and also all the fun.
Telling you how to unschool is like taking away your freedom and all the fun out of it. The
questions are everything, and the finding out is the fun.
That said, I will offer some ideas of how we unschool, and some ideas of how you might
approach things but these are just ideas to start you out!

College bound. Our 16-year-old has decided he wants to go to college, and so studies for
the SAT on his own, and is taking some free college courses online, and writes practice

college essays on topics he chooses. He also learns things on his own, like programming
or 3D animation, and plays the guitar.

Origami master. Our 13-year-old wants to get good at math, so does some math courses
on Khan Academy. She also makes origami and weaves friendship bracelets and reads
teen novels and Archie comics and plays piano and goes to the park to play basketball
and likes to learn to cook.

Wolves and wizards. Our 8-year-old loves to read about wolves, and often will pretend
hes a wolf. Also a wizard or werewolf. He likes to play games and read with us and
make up stories and draw. Hes pretty good at math on his own, though we dont really
study that with him much.

Forts and restaurants. Our 6-year-old likes to be read to and isnt into reading on her
own, though shes been learning to read through games and reading with us. She doesnt
like math but will do it in games. She makes forts and art and likes to play outside and
pretend she owns a restaurant or store.

The power of questions. When the kids ask a question, thats an opportunity to find out
something. Well look it up together, or look for books on it in the library.

People you know are incredible resources. If your kid wants to be a chef, you might
know someone who is a chef or owns a restaurant. If your kid wants to create iPhone
games, you might know a programmer. If your kid is interested in science, you might
know a marine biologist. And so on. Connect them with these people.

Games are your best friend. Play all kinds of games. Dont be concerned with what
theyre learning. Theyll have fun, and learn that life can be play, and so can learning.

Fun projects. Working on art and science projects can be a lot of fun.

Pursue interests. If the kid is interested in something, show her how to find out more, or
play with it.

Deschool. If youre new to unschooling, and your kid has gone to school for awhile, its
often a good idea to deschool. That means to not worry about learning or schooling for
awhile a couple weeks, a couple months. The idea is to get them (and you) out of the
mindset of schooling, which can be very difficult, because weve been trained to think in
terms of school. We think we need to be productive teachers and students, and that school
has to be done a certain way, and that if the kids arent learning something from an
activity, it has no value. All that is crap, of course, so take some time getting out of that
mindset.

Expose them. Learn to give kids a variety of stimuli books and magazines lying
around the house, watch shows about interesting things, play old board games, get out

and explore your town, meet different people, find stuff together on the Internet. This
exposure will help them to explore new interests even if they dont seem interested at
first, the exposure will allow them to find new things on their own.

Learn as you go. The most important thing is that you need to figure out what works for
you. Try different things. Play. Make things. Go out and do things, meet people, have fun
learning about new things. Fun, always fun, never hard work unless its fun, never force,
always get pulled.

Be patient. You wont see results right away changes in your kid will happen over
time, as he learns that learning is fun and can be done all the time in lots of ways. You
also might get frustrated that your kids doesnt want to study or read or write papers or
whatever. But instead, let him play music or play pretend games or read comic books or
play outside.

Trust is important. Its hard in the beginning (were still learning to do this), but its
important to trust that kids can learn on their own, with minimal guidance, and that if
theyre interested in something, theyll learn about it. We all think kids cant learn on
their own, but they can.

Before you get the wrong idea, I should give credit to Eva for doing most of the unschooling
work, and being better at it than I am (Eva is really great, though she wont admit it). She has
read more books and websites on the topic than I am, and does the majority of the unschooling
on a daily basis (though I do help out as much as I can). I should also give credit to my awesome
sister Kat, who inspired us to unschool, and is one of the most amazing unschooling moms I
know.

More Reading
This isnt a definitive guide I dont have the experience or knowledge to write that guide.
Better people than I have written much more on the topic, and while I cant provide a
comprehensive list, I will share some books and sites to get you started (many are from Eva and
my sister Kat):

Sandra Dodd one of the first and best writers on unschooling.

John Holt another of the seminal writers on unschooling, a classic.

A-Z Homeschooling so many things for homeschoolers. So many.

Khan Academy amazing resource for learning all kinds of subjects.

Open Culture such a powerful collection of free learning resources, including a list of
free online college courses, language learning, and so much more. Wow.

Clickschooling newsletter with links to learn about different learning topics.

Schmoop a fun way to learn literature, history and more.

Reading Rants blog by a librarian who gives reading suggestions for young adults.

Free Rice game for learning different subjects.

YouTube Its an interesting video site that you might not have heard of. But what an
incredible resource for learning videos learn French or Spanish, math raps, and much
much more.

Self-Made Scholar free classes.

Free-Range Kids how to raise self-reliant children.

The Sparkling Martins for unschooling inspiration.

Homeschoolers Guide to Getting Into College its not only possible, but very doable.

Life Learning Magazine on non-coercive, interest-based learning.

Natural Child learning to treat children with with dignity, respect, understanding, and
compassion.

Joyfully Rejoicing great overview of unschooling philosophy with more resources for
learning more.

Zinn Education Project excellent resources for learning history, Howard Zinn style.

Coursera free online courses.