Did you know that caps from toothpaste tubes make great doll house accessories?

It’s either a great doll house cup or a cool doll house canister.  Your choice!

Keeping it simple,
Lynn ~:-D

Okay, here’s the next review.  Another book that we got for Christmas:

The Unschooling Handbook : How to Use the Whole World As Your Child’s Classroom

There’s a lot to like about this book–namely, validation that, yes, I am doing enough.

I have mixed emotions about homeschooling:  I love many of the subjects heralded as “classical,” but that did not come from having received a “classical” education myself.  I love nature and a gentle approach to teaching, which has always led me to keep a variety of Charlotte Mason “help” books on my bookshelf.  Life, however, continues to throw me curve balls and I have confidence that my children are smart and capable, so I’ve often found myself “settling” for an unschooling approach.  Somehow, though, unschooling has taken a liking to our family, and I have truly taken a liking to unschooling, and I find myself thinking that it is the only real way any of us truly learn.  

In the future I’ll write more about our unschooling adventures, but for now I just want to give you a short review of the book.

I think unschooling is misunderstood because it is so hard to define.  It’s different for every family.  There are, however, similarities that all unschooling families seem to have:  they do what feels right to them, they trust that all children have a natural drive to learn, and they choose not to force a curriculum on the family.

Some things you’ll get from this book:

• Personal accounts of what unschooling is for about 30+ families.  There are first-hand statements throughout the book to complement the topic at hand.
• Information and thoughts about how T.V. and modern technology fit in.
• Resources at the end of each chapter, including information on the three R’s.
• How various families record what they are doing to create a portfolio or transcript.
• How to deal with your children as they begin to change from child to adult.

Like I said, I already embrace unschooling.  We started out using it by default, but I really like the results I am seeing from it.  If you are tempted to unschool or wondering if you should continue unschooling, this book might be of great help to you.  It can, at the very least, settle some doubts.  If you don’t unschool but just want to know more about it, this book is very much for you.  It contains information beneficial to not just unschoolers but all homeschoolers.

Lynn

Unschooling Voices