In my early days of unschooling, I started off my learning journey right from home, exploring subjects on my own terms. From there, I took what I learned and put it into practice out in the real world. I tried my hand at everything from working with computers to getting my hands dirty in a cowshed. Along the way, my friends and I started a learning club where we learned everything we could from video editing, 3D animation to programming.

Embracing the Neurospicy means celebrating the different ways we process information while promoting acceptance, and rejecting stigma and intolerance. Unschooling is a flexible environment that protected my offspring’s authenticity.

Conflict is an essential piece when people are learning and living life together, and it is necessary. There are many different ways to engage in and approach conflict, and many ways it shows up in SDE communities and unschooling families. Listen to our panel discussion about the different ways conflict is approached at their centers, in their Flying Squads, and in their individual SDE relationships.

Self-Directed Education (SDE) principles are often talked about in relation to older kids, but what does this mean in the context of caretaking and raising babies? Like in all of SDE, there is no one way to do things, but many guiding values with a basis in trust and respect for young people. Hear about what SDE means to us in the context of caring for the youngest humans, and our collective struggles, questions, ideas, and successes as we raise our babies as free people.

Finding comfort in a community full of alternatively educated folks and truly feeling like I belong

April’s Open Call was about playing with the concept of advertising SDE – What does an SDE ad feel like? What does it highlight? Does […]

Rural communities have the fewest educational choices. They default, therefore, to the local public school, which is a disservice to their kids. SDE could be their escape.

DEcentralization and Ownership of web 3 is asking “Where is DEcentralization & Ownership in education?” Unknowingly, web 3 will “create” what it thinks does not exist. Self-Directed Learning is DEcentralized Learning owned by Learners & supported by adults. Web 3 tools including blockchain, DAOs and DeFi invite us to “on chain” SDL, celebrate self governance in a DAO and find solutions in new funding models. Some folks on Web 3 Blvd are oblivious to the folks on UNschooling Ave. Some folks on UNschooling Ave are fearful and distrusting of Web 3 Blvd. I am yelling up the street for everyone to “MEET ME @ THE CORNER!” Let’s PLAY!

What are the underpinnings of a young person’s transition to adulthood? What do healthy and satisfying adult lives look like? Using a discussion-based approach, we explored how adult allies (in families, SDE centers, youth groups, etc.) can support young people in their transition to adulthood while encouraging and respecting their autonomy and independence.

In this article, I emphasize the subjective or personal nature of learning per my recent PhD research.

The Vawisai model of SDE was recently ruled to close by a Board of Education lawsuit.

“I think I want to try out conventional school.” This sentence can be alarming for those of us who are committed to an SDE and unschooling path. But there are many reasons young people might be compelled to try out school. Listen to this panel for an honest discussion about how this has come up in their family, reasons why young people might want to try out school, what the conversation is like when talking about joining school, and ways to navigate the school system when your SDE kid is in it.

In this session, we talk about what education and learning can mean when we begin to see children as whole, complex, capable people. We discuss all the various ways young people learn and how reducing learning to something concrete and measurable strips it of the many ways it can happen and look like. We also talk about why it even matters to recognize learning, by discussing invisible learning as a way to push back on dominant narratives around children, education and learning.

A poem about unparenting

A workshop on the role storytelling can play in self-directed education and how we can support ourselves and others in creating and collaborating