The Ridiculous Joy of Unschooling

Here we are, today, working on the thirty-page document for our current distributed learning program in which this fifteen-year-old unschooler has to evaluate herself. We can hardly stop laughing to get the job done! Is it exhaustion? Delirium? The sometimes bizarre and meaningless expectations of our school system? No - it's just the ridiculous joy of unschooling!

We look at this document and, as my daughter plods through question after question, evaluating her interpersonal skills, her communication skills, her ability to remember various mathematical, theatre, and language concepts, we feel her freedom. Because she was raised without being evaluated by teachers or parents, she has an innate understanding of her own value. She can go through this list of prescribed learning outcomes and joke incessantly about it, because despite understanding that it's a useful hoop to jump through in order to attain her current goals, she doesn't feel threatened by it. At fifteen, she's confident in who she is.

Right on!