Episodes

I’m happy to share the last of my HSC Adventures in Homeschooling conference talks with you, A Family of Individuals. In this talk, I focus on family relationships. In our society family harmony is a prized goal, promising an easygoing peace. It can be elusive, but we see some experienced unschooling families in action and […]

Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table! Quote of the Week “Unfortunately most people are convinced that when control fails it’s because they didn’t control enough.” ~ Joyce Fetteroll Listener Questions Aparajita’s Question Hi, I have an almost 3 year old son and we’ve been trying to make changes that lead toward radical unschooling. So we have tried to say yes more and let ...

Brenna McBroom is a 27-year-old grown unschooler. We had a fun conversation and touch on her transition from school, to homeschooling, and eventually to unschooling; finding connections as a teen; how her passion for ceramic art developed; her experience at Not Back to School Camp as both a teen and as staff; her new blog, […]

Glenna McAulay is an unschooling mom of two daughters, and both she and her husband have a wonderful perspective on living the unschooling lifestyle within their means. We talk about the perspective shifts around money and choices that have helped us over the years, as well as share some ideas for low-cost unschooling. QUOTE OF […]

Jennifer Andersen is an unschooling mom of two and the founder of ourmuddyboots.com and it’s related Facebook page. I had so much fun chatting with her! We talk about how we keep learning, over and over, that learning happens everywhere; triggers that can sneak up on us; the difference between natural and contrived consequences; how […]

Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table! Quote of the Week “As we focus on this Mind Movie—the story playing in our heads—we become attached to it and want it to be real, somehow. The problem is that when reality clashes with the story, we get frustrated, upset, bothered, angry, disappointed. These bad feelings can get in the way of our peace of mind and happiness. They can m...

I’m excited to share another one of my conference talks, Curious and Engaged, with you! It may have been through an unfortunate series of events that it happens to be this week, but after all the work I put into developing conference talks, I’m happy to have a way to share the audio version, as it […]

Jamie Maltman is an unschooling dad and avid board gamer. And in this episode, he shares with us what he loves about both these passions. We talk about how he built trust in process of unschooling, ways to stay connected as the working parent, learning through board games, and some great suggestions for new board […]

Cindy Gaddis is an unschooling mom to seven kids—and one son-in law! She’s also the author of The Right Side of Normal, a book about understanding and honouring the natural learning path for right-brained children. In this episode, we talk about helicopter parenting and control, cultural expectations, society’s focus on being busy, family relationships, and what unschooling looks like in larger families. Quote of the Week “Where did childhood go? Time and space to just be, play, explore, create...

Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. QUOTE OF THE WEEK “All I am saying … can be summed up in two words: Trust Children. Nothing could be more simple, or more difficult. Difficult because to trust children we must first learn to trust ourselves, and most […]

This week I thought I’d try something different! I want to share one of my conference talks, Time to Think, with you. With a few months of Q&A episodes under our belt, one of the threads we’ve seen running through many of the questions is the fear that bubbles up when we project our current […]

Carol Black unschooled her two daughters, now 22 and 26. Years ago she was in a teacher education program, but when she read John Holt’s How Children Fail the light bulb went off and she dropped out. Since then she has written some wonderfully insightful essays about unschooling, which you can read on her website, carolblack.org, […]

Lauren Seaver is an unschooling mom to 9-year-old River. She first considered the possibility of homeschooling way back when she was in college to become a teacher. Life took some turns, but a year (and three months!) ago, the opportunity to try out unschooling arose and they haven’t looked back. I met Lauren at the Childhood Redefined […]

Jo Isaac is a zoologist turned science writer and unschooling mom to Kai. She, ten-year-old Kai, and her husband Brett, live and learn in Melbourne, Australia. Her path of learning and unschooling has taken a number of interesting twists and turns and I really enjoyed hearing about some of them as we chat about ways we […]

Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. QUOTE OF THE WEEK “Worrying about the future takes us out of this moment.” ~ Anna Brown LISTENER QUESTIONS 1. I have been unschooling for a year and am loving it. Though my doubts and fears are creeping back since everyone […]

Gwen Montoya is an unschooling, single mom to Jamie and Zoe. She is pretty adept at weaving her work as a digital marketing consultant. I enjoy reading snippets of their lives on Facebook, so I was excited when she agreed to chat with me about relationships and the creative ways we can find to meet everyone’s needs […]

Alex Polikowsky is an unschooling mom to Daniel and Gigi. Her family runs a dairy farm in Minnesota, which adds an interesting dimension to their days! I met Alex when I spoke at the Always Learning Live symposium she hosted in Minneapolis a couple of years ago, and really enjoyed the brief glimpse of life on a dairy farm. I asked Alex to join me to chat about her daughter’s choice to go to school last year and what the experience was like. Quote of the Week “I am convinced that the best learni...

Emma Marie Forde is unschooling mom to two girls, Lily and Rosa. She’s also the founder of the website, rethinkingparenting.co.uk. Before having children, Emma was a clinical psychologist, a career that informed her choice to stay home with her own children and which eventually led her and her husband John to choose unschooling for their […]

Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question for the Q&A Round Table episodes! Quote of the Week “Whenever we are faced with particularly challenging problems, and we’ve certainly had them, I’m SO grateful for unschooling because I feel like it gives us time and space to breathe, the ability to connect, and to focus on what’s important, which is our relationships with each other.” ~ Anna Brown Listener...

Meredith is unschooling mom to Morgan and stepmom to Ray. Meredith has been active online in unschooling groups for years and I’ve enjoyed reading her writing for many of those. In this episode, we chat about what learning looks like with unschooling. It’s a big topic, and big episode. I hope you enjoy it! Quote of the Week “It could be said that unschooling has a recipe, but it’s not a recipe about unschooling. It’s a recipe about human nature. About people and relationships.” ~ Meredith Novak...

Jen is unschooling mom to Joseph, soon to be sixteen. She’s also recently returned to the world of work as a Child Life Specialist. I’ve know Jen for years, having first met her online, and then in person at various unschooling gatherings. I’ve always loved her perspective on the unschooling lifestyle and I had a […]

Teresa Graham Brett is an unschooling mom to two boys, Martel and Greyson. She’s also author of the book, Parenting for Social Change. Teresa’s background as a social justice educator brings a unique and interesting slant to her journey to unschooling. In this episode, she shares some great stories and the fascinating insights she has gleaned along the way. Of course, the journey never ends, we’re always learning. And in that vein, we talk about adultism, the conventional obsession with control...

Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question for the Q&A Round Table episodes! Quote of the Week “Shift out of the fear by going to your child and connecting with her over what makes her light up right now in this moment.” ~ Anne Ohman Listener Questions 1. Hello! I’ve been listening to the podcast for a while as well as immersing myself in unschooling resources. I’ve been slowly applying unschooling p...

Jennie is mom to three children, ages 6 and under, and they’ve been unschooling for a couple of years now—or more specifically, deschooling. Jennie and I have chatted on and off over that time, and she is actively working to shed the control and punishment she grew up with and not pass it on to her kids. I had a great time diving into deschooling with her! As she mentions in the episode, she’s interested in hearing other people’s experiences with their relationships with their spouse/partner as...