This month, James challenges the belief that self-directed kids can’t handle the world. He writes that allowing children to choose their own challenges and make their own decisions may prepare them better for grown life than adult-imposed tasks or hardships ever could.
If a 10-year-old is removed from school to direct his own education, will he just play video games all day? James Davis addresses this fear with a surprising answer.
A reader asks James: Do you ever worry that your kids won’t pick up proficiency in things that will serve them well but aren’t very appealing on their surface? Writing essays = not appealing. Being able to write well for the rest of your life = priceless…
If you want to try unschooling, you believe that a life of self-directed learning may be the best path for your child. But this new way of thinking about education may terrify the other people who love your child….
How can our kids learn the things they need to even if we aren’t chemists, literary scholars, biologists, volleyball coaches, and master-craftspeople? If we act intentionally, unschooling allows children to have more exposure to a wider swath of grown-ups than the modern educational paradigm.
Today’s question comes from my very own life. It’s one I was asked recently, but it’s also been a constant theme throughout our parenting journey, so it felt like a good one to address here: In the absence of school, how DO young people go about making friends?
I’ll begin to answer this question with another question: How do grown-ups go about making friends? How do people who aren’t forced to go to the same building every day make friends?