Deschooling Myself

I think that the last few weeks I have really made some great progress in deschooling myself. I know that for unschooling to work for us I have to deschool myself as much as possible. The last 3 or 4 weeks have been great in helping me do that and see that the kids can learn so much from just living together.

I think what has helped is that we were on holiday in England for 2 weeks so that helped me to stop thinking that they should be doing something and worrying whether they were learning anything. We just had fun together as a family going to the local park and feeding the ducks and playing funny games together. Then when we got back we were all pretty tired after having our flight diverted to Istanbul so we didn't get much sleep.

My brother in law came back with us and stayed for a week and so we went for days in here in Cyprus taking him places. I was really proud of Ellie as the last time he came to stay she wouldn't talk to him or in front of him. This time there was no shutting her up. She was a little miss chatterbox and I was so proud of her as her selective mutism makes it so difficult for her to speak to people she doesn't really know and she's only met him twice before. I think that unschooling has really helped her with this. She is doing great.

Then this week I've had flu and been pretty much horizontal for much of this week. So I've just spent time watching the kids and observing them playing together and it was so nice. This is how it needs to be all the time. They are learning so much just from some of the little imaginative games they play. I want to treasure them playing together like this for as long as possible as Josh is 9 soon and he might not want to join in games with his sister for much longer.

They have also been helping Vic do the garden. When we got back from England we couldn't believe how much the weeds had grown since we had been away and we both hate gardening. Vic has made a start on clearing it and the kids wanted to help. Josh especially is really good at pulling the weeds up and he says he loves it. Ellie likes looking at the worms that they are unearthing and millipede's and she likes collecting different stones and tapping them to make 'music'.

I feel like these last few weeks we have really come a long way and that I don't need to worry if my kids are learning anything as they are learning all the time and I love watching them discover things for themselves.

I think I have at last let go of the schoolish 'should's and aught's' and am just enjoying watching them grow up happy. My role from now on is to be their facilitator, guide, librarian, whatever they need from me as and when they need it.

Me and Vic were talking last night about how great things are at the moment and how brilliant the kids are. They have grown so much closer since we began unschooling and Josh is very protective of Ellie. Ellie's tooth came out on Sunday night and so the tooth fairy left Ellie 3 euros but also left Josh 3 euros too so they'd have the same and he gave his 3 euros to Ellie as she's his 'best sister'. It was such a lovely thing to do and I was proud of him for doing that. They were so well behaved as well when we were delayed in Istanbul and lots of people came up to us and complemented us on our well behaved children but they are like that all the time now they are so good and we love them to bits and couldn't imagine life without them. I love being able to spend so much quality time with them now and I would miss out on all that if they were in school.