Episode Two: Jan & Eloise 'The world needs more entirely themselves people'

Unschooling means 'parents allowing their children as much freedom to explore the world as they can comfortably bear.' (John Holt)

In this episode I talk to Jan and her adult daughter Eloise who were part of my unschooling community twenty years ago. Jan describes the fears and joys she felt when she took her oldest two out of school and unschooled her five children right through to adulthood. Eloise pays testament to her happy, carefree, self-directed childhood and talks about how unschooling impacts on her own parenting philosophy as a single mum of five year old Odetta. She discusses how it was for her to go to college at 16 and how her life progressed as an adult.

Jan’s central piece of advice to unschooling parents is: 'Relax, you’re doing the best you can.'

Eloise concludes that the best advice she could give any families embarking on home education is 'There is no one standard they need to be. They are entirely themselves and the world needs more entirely themselves people.'

Please email me if you have any questions, comments or would like any kind of support. I’m Jackie at: [email protected].

My heartfelt thanks go to my daughter Nell for producing this podcast series.

RESOURCES:

Jan recommends

- How Children Fail by John Holt

- How Children Learn by John Holt

- Summerhill by A S Neil

- Support group: Education Otherwise https://www.educationotherwise.org/

- The free academic resource: https://www.khanacademy.org/

Eloise recommends:

- My Wild and Sleepless nights by Clover Stroud. She describes it as ‘a gentle portrayal of her parenting experience’.