Opinions Needed! New Packaging for JumpStart

JumpStart wants your opinion! JumpStart is looking at putting together a new product idea, and wants us moms and dads, grandparents, aunt and uncles, etc, to take a look and give them our two cents! Go see the new packaging and read up about it here!

You will need a password to get in, so use 'FRANKIE'.

I absolutely love this idea of a USB flash drive based learning game. Imagine, being able to put the game in your pocket, or purse! Yes, I know, it just might get lost in there until you dump it out and declutter again! How about putting the drive in one of those little pockets of your kids' backpack, and then they have can take their favorite game to the babysitter's house, or to their grandparents' house!

Maybe JumpStart will design the USB flash drives with an end that accepts a lanyard so that the drive can be clipped to a zipper, or keychain! Then you could clip it onto the zipper of the backpack, and it wouldn't fall out when the kids dump their backpack on the floor. Now that would be cool!

A USB Flash Drive would take up so much less room! A flash drive can fit into the tiniest of places! Instead of those bulky CD holders taking up all that room, you could have a small bowl, an extra pencil holder, or maybe just a drawer that you dedicate to flash drives! Some days that how I feel about SD cards and mini SD cards. Just find me a bowl to dump them in, and I'll sort through it when I need one!

You could have a cup or a can of your kid's favorite games on their desk. (I'm thinking a recycling art project!) Or maybe keep a can of games for special rewards! LOL Yes, I use fun learning games as rewards! The kids think they are getting something super special, and they are still learning! I love creating those situations!

OOOHHh what about hanging them from a chain?... You know like you can clip stuffed animals to a chain. Hmmm I can just see my artistic children getting creative and using them as decorations strung across the dresser front, etc!

Hmmm... I wonder if I am opening up a whole new can of worms?!

Okay, I know they are only looking at one per grade level... I just see this idea as spreading like wildfire! USB flash drive games...What a fantastic concept!

"Building Margin Into Your Life"

I read this the other day, and thought I would share. 

Building Margin Into Your Life

by Rick Warren

---

A lot of people are on overload and headed for a crash. Consider these statistics among U.S. citizens:

• People now sleep 2 1/2 fewer hours each night compared to people from one hundred years ago.

• The average work week is longer now than it was in the 1960s.

• The average office worker has 36 hours of work piled up on his or her desk. It takes three hours a week just to sort through it and find what we need.

• We spend eight months of our lives opening junk mail, two years of our lives playing phone tag with people who are too busy to answer, and five years waiting for people who are trying to do too much and are late for meetings.

We're a piled-on, stretched-to-the limit society; chronically rushed, chronically late, chronically exhausted. Many of us feel like Job did when he said, "I have no peace! I have no quiet! I have no rest! And trouble keeps coming."

Overload comes when we have too much activity in our lives, too much change, too many choices, too much work, too much debt, too much media exposure.

Dr. Richard Swenson says, "The conditions of modern day living devour margin. If you're homeless we direct you to a shelter. If you're penniless we offer you food stamps. If you're breathless we connect you to oxygen. But if you're marginless we give you one more thing to do.

Marginless is being thirty minutes late to the doctor's office because you were twenty minutes late getting out of the hairdresser because you were ten minutes late dropping the children off at school because the car ran out of gas two blocks from a gas station and you forgot your purse. That's marginless."

You need margin in your life. When you're not hurrying and worrying all the time, you have time to think. Time to relax. Time to enjoy life. Time to be still and know that God is God.

Pastor Rick Warren is author of the New York Times bestseller The Purpose Driven Life.

Obesity in Children Linked to Nature Deficit Disorder?

"Approximately 16% of US children (~ 9 million) aged 6-19 are overweight or obese. According to the Institute of Medicine, childhood obesity has doubled over the past 30 years for preschoolers and adolescents, and more than tripled for children aged 6-11 years old."



WOW! I was scanning through some Quick Facts about Nature-Deficit Disorder at education.com and ran across this quote. 


Is that just outrageous or what... no wonder people look at my kids and wonder how I "keep them so thin". 

Ummm... I researched nutrition, and did not just follow the government standards that no one actually fits into. I feed my kids lots of fruits and veggies, and keep sugar out the door. I allow for, and actually expect, lots of active and creative play. 



I even take walks around the neighborhood with them... yes, the 6 year old can walk a mile easy. I also find "neat" places to take them, like hiking through BLM land, or just off the boat launch at the public park... 






It can be quite easy when you get back in the hang of just doing it! Just open the door and walk through it. Need some ideas of what you can do out of the house... stay tuned, I'll try to post some of the things that we do, or ideas that we have.

More Ideas To Conquer Nature Deficit Disorder!

Is there a beach close by? Maybe there is a river or a creek? Water sources can be lots of fun, and an easy place to get back into nature. Whether it is collecting rocks and shells on the beach, or identifying the plants growing along a stream, water allows children a chance to start exploring. Just remember to bring the towels and extra change of clothes! Even when I tell mine NOT to go in the water, they push it. I hear pleas of, "I just want to get my feet wet." "I'll just wade in to my ankles." And the next thing you know, the pants are soaked to the knees.

My favorite water learning experience:
I took the kids to a playground/park/boat launch along the Colorado river last spring. It was a 70 degree day, but we had not planned to go to the park, and the towels and swimsuits were at home. The boys decided they were just going to throw rocks into the water... sounds safe enough, right? They made their way along the river bank watching the different flows of water as pools formed behind a rock, or in a little cove along the shoreline. They had planned to walk along the river bank until they came to the boat launch, walk up to the parking lot next to the boat launch, and then it would be time to go. They found some really cool swirling pools of water at the boat launch, and crouched to watch. Next thing I know, Little A lost his footing and slid in to the shallow pool...soaked to the waistline!

I got him calmed down and to the car.I found a towel that had left in the back of the car, and had him take off his shoes and strip the bottom half off to wrap up in the towel. He was miserable...after all, he was naked under that towel! He sat in his car seat, and demanded that it was time to go home. I made sure he was okay, and went to call in the other two kids.

We all hopped in the car (with lots of grumbling) and headed down the road. When I realized were were right by the thrift store, I decided to stop and get Little A a pair of pants so he wouldn't be so miserable. He wanted to come in with me to pick them out, and that is when we discovered that his shoes were not in the car!

We went into the thrift store and found a pair of pants, and to our delight a pair of blue (little A's favorite color) water shoes in his size! We bought our items, and he got dressed.

Next issue: The lost shoes.
We had originally been on our way to drop off some paperwork at a city office that day. And now we were coming up on the deadline of them closing. And Little A was sitting crying over losing his favorite pair of shoes. (I think things only become the favorite thing when it is forgotten or left someplace! LOL)Paperwork had to come first, but I promised we would drive back to the busy (very busy) park to look for his shoes after that.

We dropped off the paperwork, and headed back to the park. As we pulled up to the entrance to the parking lot, we looked over, and there were Little A's shoes. They were lined up at the edge of the parking space quite neatly waiting for us. It seems that he had taken off his shoes as he climbed into the car, and in all the rest of the commotion, no one noticed the little shoes sitting there.

Now I always bring water bottles, granola bars or boxes of raisins, a towel or two, and extra clothes in the car! Talk about a learning experience! FOR ME!

More cool idea books!

Nature Deficit Disorder - Is It Just For Kids?

I think as adults we sometimes forget that all of the things we worry about for our kids, are things that we should worry about for ourselves too. I would have thought that someone would have pointed out Nature deficit Disorder in adults first! As an adult, especially a parent, our time seems to be filled with time spent at our jobs (inside), and cleaning our house (inside).

It seems that we grew up and forgot about being outside. We should not stop growing when we become adults. Well, in physical size it is perhaps better to stop growing... no good comes from carrying around the extra pounds we all seem to battle. But our minds should never stop growing, learning. So many adults have forgot how to be happy, and just laugh at life. I wonder how much of that is because we have forgotten how to go outside and be in nature.

Life is so important. If all we surround ourselves with is non life, how are we supposed to have life ourselves. It sounds so silly and yet so simple. We are all energy, we are all connected. Go connect with something else living for a while. Hug a child, pet a cat, feel a plant leaf. And then go find some grass to walk through barefoot, some sand to tip-toe through, some water to splash through, and go feel the sun on your skin. Laughter is inevitable.

Life is good!

Natural Happiness/Nature Deficit Disorder

The New York Times had an interesting article about Nature Deficit Disorder the other day.
You can find the article HERE.

I have to admit I am still having trouble with this being real. Maybe it is because I am strong in the Naturalistic Intelligence, I have a natural tendency to want to get outside and explore! I have never thought before about how to do it. But I thought that I would try to share a few ideas of what we do.

First idea: Take a walk. 
The kids and I love to go for walks. When they were younger, I used a stroller for the youngest. As they have gotten older, they have ridden tricycles or scooters. Whether it is on wheels or feet, we just head out the door. It doesn't matter how fast you go. Some days, we stop every two feet to look at something. At every corner, we take turns choosing which way to go. We stop to chase butterflies or crickets. We stop to look at the flowers, or someone's decorations. We often have people come out of their houses wondering why we are standing in front of their house... we simply introduce ourselves, and tell them what we are admiring. We have met some lovely people that way. And some of them we go back to visit quite often!

Need More Ideas? Try These!

Education In The Age Of Media Literacy

"The naysayers who decry the loss of one kind of reading, while abandoning the many kinds of reading skills that youth need in a complex multi-modal world, are failing those students utterly."

http://www.osstf.on.ca/Default.aspx?DN=8406,8388,493,355,365,Documents

An article that discusses the necessity for educators to embrace the idea of media literacy, and integrate it into their curriculum rather than discouraging it or fighting against it.

I love this quote! When my now 16yo daughter started learning to read, she quickly became engrossed in magazines. She rebelled against chapter books, and even some Dr. Suess' stories were too long to capture her. But as she had quite a satisfactory reading ability, despite her choice of reading format, I was quick to remind the nay-sayers that she truly was reading. When pushed to test her reading ability, others were surprised to find that at the age of 7 and 1/2 years old, she was reading fifth grade material... 

She quite quickly embraced the idea of learning to create web pages when I introduced her to them, and has learned to navigate the internet like it is her own backyard. When she rebelled against the idea of writing reports, and grandparents were not close enough to hear her creative and dramatic presentations of what she had learned, she came up with the idea to create web pages. 

For me, it was never her learning or reading skill that was in question. It has always been a matter of her being able to present materials she had or was learning in a format that grandparents could see her skills improving. I guess I have down a decent job of integrating the teaching of media literacy over the years... and I am pleased as punch that she criticizes the spelling and grammar of "other kids her age" online as she travels at the speed of electrons across the world from the comfort of the living room.

Nature-Deficit Disorder -Are you serious?!

When I first heard this term I seriously thought it was a joke. Ha ha, how can anyone be deficient in nature? It's all around us, isn't it? You go outside and you step into it, right? Perhaps not. I have been reading about Richard Louv's book 'Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-deficit Disorder' lately. And it seems that it is quite serious.

Well, I spent several of my young years in Chicago. In the middle of the city like so many of the children who are the most at risk. I still question how anyone could possibly have a nature deficit. But if you need some inspiration, Jennifer Ward's book 'I Love Dirt!' is filled with 52 activities to help you and your kids discover the wonders of nature.

What I remember about living in the city is this: I remember living in an apartment. I remember the courtyard filled with grass and bushes and flowers. I remember apartments filled with plants. I remember talking to the squirrels that visited my windowsill. (It was my toddler to young primary years!) I remember feeding pigeons on that windowsill every morning... like they were pets. The advantage was the mess was outside!

I remember walking up the block to the stoplight, crossing the four lane street to get to the CTA bus stop. The bus driver stopped for us school kids, and took us up the block to school. It saved us walking past all of those brick buildings. I remember the black top paved playground for recess. I remember being fascinated by the plants that grew through the cracks in the black top. Not much nature there!

I also remember heading the other way down the block. We lived half a block off Lake Michigan, and we had a (in my little mind) vast expanse of sand to play in. There was a concrete path that I rode my bike down that went on for several blocks along the sand. I remember crashing into the concrete block at the end of the next street until I learned how to turn and stop on my bike... psychologically blocked at the age of 5...I just could not turn those handle bars! I remember entire days spent playing in the sand and water. I remember swinging from the branches of a Weeping Willow tree into the sand. I remember mud pies. I remember collecting shells. As an adult, I visited that same beach front again, and realized how much it had shrunk! Okay, I grew, and it really had always been that small.

I should really thank my mother at this point. She always made sure that we had a plethora of house plants around us, and that I knew all about whatever animals were around. I think we always had pets of some sort around...usually cats. She even signed up as a Brownie troop leader when I wanted to join Girl Scouts and there were no troops close by, so that she could take us camping and for nature walks. I guess I was lucky, and I suppose my upbringing has led to my disbelief.

Will Books Become Shadows Of The Past?

The Wall Street Journal had an excellent article on what the future of books may be. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123980920727621353.html
A lot to think about.

If you look down the path a little further, it starts to remind me of some of the sci-fi shows I have seen over the years where hard copies of books are left by the way side to collect dust, or burned, or banned.

In most of the shows the individuals have lost the knowledge they once had, and suffer for it. I wonder if we will be smart enough to avoid that fate, or will I be the die hard librarian, loaning out hard copies of books in the shadows of a dark, back alley someplace. 

Ah, the intimacy of books. How I love the way they smell, the feel of the paper pages... the way they transport me into another world. My computer may be my constant companion, but books hold my heart.

Jumpstart Learning Styles Quiz & "The Freedom To Be Me"

JumpStart put up this really cute interactive Learning Styles Quiz today... or rather they tweeted about it today. The kids and I headed over to try it out. Now let me stop to tell you to turn on your speakers when you head over, the JumpStart characters talk to you. I did not have the speakers on when I headed over there, and I did not want the distraction of everyone coming over to see what I was doing, so I did not turn them on. But we did figure out how to use it, and found that you could choose up to your top three answers to every question. If you only choose your top result, rather than your top three, your results may be quite different. 

Here's the link: http://shop.knowledgeadventure.com/JSA/profiler/learningstyle/jsprofiler.swf 

I am thrilled to say it works in Chrome!

I tried it out on J-Man first. With his top result only, he matched up with Frankie (interpersonal intelligence) first and Hopsalot (logical, mathematical intelligence) second. That seems to fit with him pretty well. Likes to work with others, a good leader, a problem solver, and very logical, sorts things into categories, keeps things neat, likes puzzles.

Then we realized you could do the top three choices and came up with different results. His first match was with Casey (bodily-kinesthetic intelligence), and second with Hopsalot (logical, mathematical intelligence). Really I get the logical, mathematical aspect, but kinesthetic? He is always attached to the computer, or sitting quietly having his "alone time", working on building something or reading a book.... where's the kinesthetic? (Kinesthetic is the learning style that needs to move, that needs to feel everything... the ones that drive people like me absolutely nuts! I know, I have two of them!) 

Ber and I started discussing where his kinesthetic side came in, and realized that as a baby and a toddler, that described him perfectly... but this is where Dad's PTSD comes in... "kids are to be kept quiet and out of the way." Somewhere in J-Man's defenses he built in this Visual Kinesthetic style to fit into the structure that Dad needed when he was home. He explored everything, could touch everything in his quiet "alone time". He could sit still and be quiet when Dad was home as he played on the computer. He became withdrawn sort-of, as much as he could with his overbearing, outgoing, bodily-kinesthetic little brother always around him!

J-Man has always been so much like me that I had to take a look at myself. I saw so much of the same thing in myself, and now I have to theorize that this Visual-Kinesthetic is an adaptation of Bodily-Kinesthetic. mind you, I claim only empirical research here. 

For me, it was public school. I was taught to be quiet, sit still at my desk, and only speak when I was asked a question. I turned into quite a meek little person. But in my mind, I found freedom. I turned to books as an escape. Sometimes it was a nature book that helped me escape to the wild, and in it I petted animals and explored their habitat. Other times it was a history book that carried me off to another place and time, where I could taste the dust that the wagon kicked up as the pioneers headed west. My favorites were the sci-fi/fantasy books, where I found ultimate freedom as I could experience being no longer bound by the shackles of servitude. I found the freedom to explore and do things they way I wanted to, I found the freedom to learn what I wanted and how I wanted... can you tell they empowered me?!

Perhaps this is what I wanted to create when I started homeschooling. With Life Learning, I believe I have been able to create what I always searched for as a child... "the freedom to be me" for each of my children.

"Arts-Integrated Education" -- A Perfect Partner for Life Learning

I think today is the first time I have ever heard the term "Arts-Integrated Education". I ran across an article about it on Education.com http://www.education.com/magazine/article/Arts_Integrated_Education/?cid=90.125. As I read through the article, which gives a basic understanding of what an Arts-Integrated Curriculum is, I realized it is what I have provided for my 16 year old. 

I am a very logical person, and I work in a straight line, one point at a time. Or at least that is how I learned to cope with public school when I was in it. Homeschooling has taught me a lot...about myself. I used to tell people that I learned as much, if not more, FROM my kids than they learned from me. Which is to say that I have learned way more since having children, and homeschooling them than I ever learned in a classroom in public school. And I was in an advanced or honors program through high school, so you would think that I would have learned a lot there.

The beginning of my homeschooling adventure was miserable! My daughter just did not pick up the things that I sat her down to teach her. I knew she was an intelligent child, as she learned things on her own at an incredible rate. But what was my role as her teacher supposed to be? She loved to do worksheets after she had already learned something... later worksheets became an assessment tool. I just could not get her to "sit down and learn"... I knew I was a capable teacher, I had been a tutor for three years in high school. 

I decided that perhaps I was missing something. So I went back and hit the books. I found everything that the local library held about how the brain works, and how children learn. I read about how foods affect the brain, I read about how girls and boys brains learned different things at different times. I learned about "Spirited Children", also known as strong willed. I read every homeschooling book the library could offer. I even ordered books in through there inter library loan program. I immersed myself in everything I could find. And I came to the conclusion that after graduating from a good high school with a decent grade, I knew absolutely nothing! 

I decided to try out different styles of homeschooling that appealed to me, that seemed like they might fit both me and my daughter. I started to pull together pieces of things that worked from whichever style we were using until I had something quite eclectic going...but it worked! One of the things that I realized was that my daughter learned best if we were singing, dancing, coloring, or watching a movie. We picked up movies for free at our local Blockbuster that were "Educational"... most of them were nature based, National Geographic type things. After watching a movie we colored ideas from the movie while we talked about what it was about. We found a song that taught the multiplication tables, and danced and sang to it. We made clothespin butterflies while we learned about different species of butterflies, their habitats, and migration patterns. I taught her to use the computer and learned some basic HTML that I taught to her, and the next thing I knew she was creating web pages about what she had just learned. 

An Arts-Integrated Education is one which uses different art forms to teach core lessons. It seems that is what I had unknowingly created for my daughter, and has ultimately led me to the style of home schooling known as Unschooling, Radical Unschooling, or (the term I use) Life Learning. Within Life Learning, my daughter can follow her "Arts-Integrated Education", while I follow the written word in whatever format it appears these days!

Are You Comfortable With Your Horror?

Is it possible to get so worn down by events in your life that you start to think that it has always been this way? And then once you find your way back out, why is it so easy to slide right back into?

It's funny, we were only supposed to stay in this God forsaken trailer for a few months. I said shortly after we moved in that it felt like it was sucking the life out of me... yes, the vampire trailer! We have seen the strangest things living here... We have lived under some really horrible conditions, because the landlord doesn't want to spend any money to fix things. And of the strangest occurrences is the one where we forgot that we could leave.

Okay, it is not quite that bad, we haven't found the money to move. But I think at this point it is better to just move. I am quite certain that the extra money we spend every month trying to fix or maintain things here will cover the extra expense of living someplace else!

And just today we realized how accustomed to the horrendous heat we have let ourselves become. I had forgotten that not everywhere in the south is plagued by hundred degree days by the end of April.Yes, it is time to break out of the comfort zone, and pick up and move!

And More About Life Learning...

Q: Do you ever worry that you will mess up?

A: Worry about it... no. I mess up all the time, nobody is perfect. And when the kids see you mess up, and then apologize, clean up, or fix it, then they learn to react the same way... no more lying because they might get into trouble.

And when you mess up, and the kids didn't see it.... go clean up, fix it, or apologize... you will feel better about yourself. Lying to yourself never works out well!

Q: Don't you have to be a teacher to homeschool?

A: Every state does have different regulations, but it is legal to home school in every state of the United States.

www.hslda.org is the website for the Home School Legal Defense Association. They have excellent information on the requirements of each state.

In most states, you do not have to hold a teaching certificate in order to homeschool your own children. 

Q: But am I qualified to teach them...can I really do it?

A: Everyone goes through thinking like this, sometimes for a long time. When I went through this, my mom said something that has stuck with me to this day. "Who taught her to walk, to tie her shoes, to get dressed, to brush her hair? Who taught her how to eat with silverware and drink from a cup? You are already her teacher, and you have been doing it for a few years now..." (Thanks mom!) Who teaches your children when they are not in school? How is it any different?

Keep the questions coming! I am sure I haven't covered everything yet!

More about Life Learning...

Q: What do you like about life learning?
A: Umm... everything! Life learning is a natural extension of attachment parenting for me. I love to spend time with my children. I regained my sense of wonder of the world around me by following my children's example, by learning to see things through their eyes. One of the things I like most about life learning is how much I have learned from my children!

I have learned to live life with excitement and wonder of what each new day will bring. I have learned to indulge myself in my whims of learning new things. I have learned to be creative and passionate. I have learned to fill every day with laughter and smiles and hugs, and not to hold on to regrets and grudges.

And yes, what I like most about life learning is how I have benefited by it!

Q: But what do the children get out of it?
A: Oh yeah, I knew I was forgetting something! Not really, I just want everyone to know that the benefits truly go both ways.
The children get to follow their dreams, learn autonomy, and learn self control. When anyone is able to learn what the want to learn in their favorite way, taking as much or as little time as they want, magical things happen. This is no less true of children. In allowing children to learn this way, you inspire their love of learning, and their ability to learn. I believe that there is no greater gift you can give your children than that... the ability to know how to learn.

Q: How is exactly do they learn self control by homeschooling?!
A: Perhaps the more appropriate term would be self regulation, but is that no the basis for self control? By allowing children to over do it, or push past the normal limits, they learn the consequences of those actions. When this is learned at a young age, there are a lot less problems or peer influence as they get older. in a way it promotes self esteem also. They know who they are, what they are capable of, and they are not easily swayed.
It certainly has made raising a teenage a mostly pleasurable experience...
My 6 & 8 yo boys on the other hand are still going through the over doing it stage! LOL

Q: Do you let them do whatever they want?!
A: That would be somewhere between silly and irresponsible. I let them over do it on things that will not hurt others, or (permanently) hurt them. Eating all the candy at one time may give them a stomach ache, but they will live through it! Then when they want to try it again, you remind them of their experience with it. Depending on how stubborn the child is, they may need to try it several times, just to make sure the results are always the same!
Other times, I tell them the possible consequences, and not to come crying to me about it when they get hurt. I will wash them up, bandage them, hold them, and remind them that I love them, but they may not whine about getting hurt. (Never with hold love and hugs... that destroys self esteem, and does not help them learn anything good. They will learn that they are not important enough to you, or perhaps that they are not good enough for you.)

What is Life Learning?

Life Learning is a version/ branch off of unschooling. The term unschooling provokes thoughts of not being schooled. For most people, that seems to make them think of not being educated. Not only is that NOT what unschooling is, it in no way reflects what Life Learning is.

I choose to use the term 'Life Learning' to reflect not just the way I educate my children, but in fact how I raise them, and how we live life. 'Life Learning' is an apt description of how I learn also. When I am interested in something, I find a way to learn about it. When life brings about new experiences, I see it as an opportunity to learn something new. A day without learning is like a day without laughter... pretty useless.

I thought I would try to answer some of the most common questions I hear...

Q: What is 'Life Learning'?

A: Life learning is in general like unschooling... maybe it is simply a positive phrasing of the unschooling concept. John Holt originally envisioned unschooling as learning from life, without the need for the aid of a structured school setting or a curriculum. Life Learning realizes this vision. It is living life, and learning from it.

Q: How does one go about 'Life Learning'?

A: Live life, include your children in everything. Provide an enriching environment.

Q: What is an 'enriching environment'?

A: Don't expect that if your child sits and stares at the same four walls every day that they will learn anything...  bring new things into your house, or take your children to see new things. Let your children see you learning, and making mistakes. Take the time to answer their questions, and explore their dreams with them. When they express an interest, help them find ways to learn about it.

Q: What about socialization?

A: What about it? When you include your children in your life, they will learn to deal with people of all ages. And they will learn how to do that by watching you. In Public School, children are put with other children of the same age and usually lack the social skills to deal with people of other ages.

My children think of our neighbors as their friends, even the ones who are old enough to be their grandparents or great-grandparents. And when my 16 yo goes to talk with her friends about her problems, I don't worry about it... her best friends are in their twenty's and thirty's, with a few teen agers, and even one or two younger friends thrown in. Best of all, I get to be one of those resources.

Do you have a question about life learning, unschooling, or home schooling that you have never known who to ask? Leave a comment, and I will post a reply. 

I have been home schooling in some form or another for over 12 years, and we have run the gamut from purchased curriculum to the explicit life learning that we have done for at least 4 years. Our transition to unschooling and life learning started about 10 years ago... I would love the opportunity to clear up misconceptions, and answer anyones questions about this matter.