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 personalized, non-coercive, active, interest-led learning from life |
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from Life Learning magazine,
January/February 2010 On a journey from extremely traditional upbringings and an extraordinary evolution of our own parenting and educational philosophies, my husband and I are the free-living, life learning, gentle parents of two children who couldn’t be more different from each other. The story that follows is one of the many lessons that have come to us from the first-born of our children, our six-and-a-half year-old son Elijah. He is pensive, analytical, calculating, sweet, soft-spoken, sensitive and self-directed. Elijah has never been interested in anyone else’s direction, encouragement or desires. Even as a toddler, he would not mimic or repeat sounds or actions for entertainment value or video capture. He is not here to entertain but to experience and his actions are rooted in his desire to learn or express himself. All of his learning has occurred entirely organically and any imposition on his focus or suggestion to alter his style has, to this point, resulted in immediate emotional rebellion or future refusal to partake in that particular activity lest he be further derailed or manipulated.Here is an example, which took place at the very beginning of our decision not to school but before we discovered life learning. When noticing that his younger cousin could write her name (on the wall in marker, but she could write it, nonetheless), I held Elijah’s hand and tried to assist him with writing his own. The situation blew up into a full-blown battle of the wills as I held out an expectation and he exerted his will to be the director of his own learning path. He may have been barely four years old at the time and has only recently, over two years later, made occasional attempts to draw letters or words. He’s the reason, really, that we were drawn to life learning from our previously paved route directly to public school. Through frustration and intention to connect in any way possible with this intensely inquisitive and focused child, my husband and I slowly tore out the pages of our haphazardly laid plan to parent and educate our children and began to understand them, not as “our children” but as the incredible individuals that they are. . . To read the rest of this essay, as well as all back and future issues of Life Learning, subscribe today. Sarah Parent is the free-living, life learning mama to Elijah (7 years) and Sadie (5 years). Ten years of labor and birth nursing, mindful childbirth preparation, advocacy for women and families, which culminated in a master’s degree in nursing, clashed head-on with motherhood when the realization hit that money and degrees were no match for her sensitive, pensive son and spunky, wild-child daughter when it came down to where to spend her time. She and her husband Chris found whole-life unschooling and gentle parenting, traveling over bumpy roads of doubt and steep ravines of fear. She has found her voice in advocating for peaceful families and authentic children through gentle parenting and unschooling if only to support others in navigating those bumpy roads and ravines. She is the author of the Clan of Parents blog and the producer and host of Humans Being, a podcast focusing on gentle parenting and life learning issues.
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