Vision for Life

How did we get here?  I must admit as a first time parent in my mid 20s there was no way that I ever would have envisioned that my eldest child would have been home educated for all but a couple of years of school.

Damien and I started out parenthood with the idea that our family unit was important, and that being connected and supported in our relationship was important and that supporting each other and our child(ren) was our priority.  Our main priority for ourselves when we met, was happiness and to have a happy relationship.  This was our vision for our future, and this has been the motivator for many of our decisions.

We started home education, because it seemed convenient for relocating back to Australia.  We stopped home education because Willow needed more social contact.  We returned to home education because Willow's happiness and our own family harmony were more important to us than the schooling system. 

With Willow being in school (in Scotland), home educated in Scotland, France and Adelaide, and back in school (in Adelaide) it became clearer to Damien and I that some of our own problems as young adults were purely to do with school and its systemisation.  We could see some of this appearing in some of the kids in Willow's school in Adelaide, certain behaviours that the 7yr olds were developing to cope with being in the system, that parents explained away as a stage, and that Damien and I with our new perspective could see was the kids finding ways to cope with have too few adults to spend time with, be supported by and to model grown-up behaviour from.

Within a very short time of removing Willow from school the anti-social behaviours that she was displaying at home vanished, and when on further questioning on my part, about how much happier she seemed, 7yr old Willow declared, "I don't have to act any more Mummy."

So this formed the basis for our decisions around education, these transformative experiences, started us on this wonderful and at times challenging but always inspiring journey that has lead us towards a usually contented home life based around education and learning.  This has meant that only Willow attended school, and that Gabriel and Arden have never been, and that Irving is heading towards being registered for home education next year.  For the littler ones in particular this experience has been all encompassing and nurturing, being surrounded by their family that loves them almost all of the time, and having an understanding that learning is inspiring and interesting and exciting. 

When they go out into the world, they transition into being independant, and they are not rudely and sharply separated from their family, and the feeling of safety that that offers them.  The separation that happens does so gently over the years: time at classes with parents present, time at classes without parents present, time with friends, time at home alone, time walking to the shop,etc.  Each skill is built up gradually and gently and each separation is partly encouraged by Damien and I, and by our child.  In the early years, this can feel very slow, but in a larger family there are so many other activities happening that the later years of school travel past quite quickly and all of a sudden, home education is coming to an end, and new experiences past school are being planned and created.

One final note, in our family, one of the main occurrences during the years to keeping life happy and content, is to always resolve emotional disturbances and disharmonies on the spot.  Some days this has meant at home learning has gone out the window, as we sit and work out and sometimes have a good cry, about life and what has been going on.  But these times of disharmony, have always worked out in our favour, as we as a family, have learnt about emotions together and have language and skills to problem solve our feelings, and the problems that they can create.  For me pre-children this was the path that I was starting that lead us to this place, the path towards being able to find and create happiness, and be content most of the time.

So my question to anyone starting home education is...What is your goal for your family?

Some of our moments...
Coffee mornings with Damien have become a thing around here, after him missing us all in the mornings!  (We tend to be later risers) 

Hanging out at the playground with everyone...so nice to have teens that have fun with everyone, that like to chat with people, and to have a family of people that look out for each other.  (Little one has a way to go with this obviously!)

Things to do whilst waiting for your older siblings...."pop"...umbrella fun!

One of Arden's latest passions, photography.  Hot chocolate on a cold day!

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2025 

I had forgotten a few of the things I had referenced here- those illuminating moments when I realised what was going on for some children in their early years of education, as they become dulled and disillusioned and surrendered to the idea of being systemised.  I imagine now that more and more children are in childcare from almost birth, that this may be harder for modern parents to notice, and I am certainly glad to have had that experience of illumination.

As a family with 20 something children, a teen and a pre-teen we still have a lot of fun.  Willow lives out of home with her fiance, in the South- West of WA, and regularly comes to stay with us, and we get down to visit her too.

Our goal as a family has stayed consistent over the years; working out how to get along, and allow everyone to be themselves, and at times it has been easier to work this out than at other times.  Introducing regular computer usage brought  some challenges, and some of these boundaries are things we are still working out and exploring.

More Thoughts on Natural Learing

As we progress through our home education experience, we still continue to use structure and natural learning as a blend for our learning experiences.  Increasingly throughout my life, I've come to value balance- finding the middle view and how to bring that to life.  It seems to me, that so many things that humans do are out of balance; it seems to be an all or nothing approach, success or failure, healthy food or junk food, etc, etc.  As complex creatures we have the ability to be many faceted, to be able to define ourselves by our own rules and intuition, to honour our own voices and our own journey.

The longer I have home educated the more this is important, but so is belonging and fitting in and knowing when it's appropriate to break or bend the rules.  Individualism has been taken too far IMO, and has lead to people feeling isolated and lacking in connection.  Around here our main focus of home education has always been family, but I understand it as a goal more clearly now, than I did when starting out on this journey around 10years ago.  We regularly discuss how to be an individual whilst still being a part of the group; how to support family and still be oneself?  How to express one's inner ness and still be connected outwardly.  To me these are important components in creating a balanced home education experience, and that family must always be at the core.  So as part of that, each and every person in my family has value, no one or other greater than any individual.  As an example since I am the person that manages the education and the home, I have a need for a peaceful and tidy home.  I'm more relaxed and better at focusing on everyone when our home feels and looks tidy.  So this is a priority that needs to be achieved- everyone takes part in home loving day (this year on Fridays) so that as a group we have a more peaceful life because I feel supported with our home and keeping it tidy, and as individuals we need to learn how to take care of ourselves.  Various members of the family have jobs to do during the week to help maintain the comfort of our home, and make sure home loving day doesn't become too enormous.

The more I consider natural learning in this sense, part of me feels that as a society we lost our way over the last 60-100years.  Day in day out at home children would have once learnt all sorts of useful life skills from their parents taking care of the home.  Modern natural learning, seems to me to still be pre-occupied in many cases, that the parents cannot teach the children anything, and that everything must be about the child's interests without regard for the fact that there are some skills that the child must learn for a healthful and useful life.  Perhaps in the early 1900s everyone was totally overburdened with the level of tasks that needed to be done to survive, but we now have an alternative extreme where there are few too tasks to be done that have meaning, and it seems to me that a life without meaning is filled with disillusion.  For me the structure of home ed, balanced with natural learning and following a Steiner path returned meaning to my life.  Thus for me, a balanced approach is still both, some natural learning and some Steiner.

As my two oldest go through the high school years, we are taking a more unschooling approach; as I guide them towards fulfilling their dreams.  However for me I feel satisfied that they are capable young people who can care for themselves in the world, and without any structure in the early years, I feel certain that we would not have achieved that as a family.  Both Willow and Gabriel are able to cook lovely meals, competently clean the house, babysit, do a variety of crafts, as well as follow their own interests- for them both  there is a love of circus, Willow has a passion for writing and music and Gabriel has a passion for board-gaming and financial systems.  I feel like I have given them a solid basis as adults going out into the world, one where they have an understanding of how to support themselves, and how to look for support and guidance when it's needed, from that basis I feel that it's easier to then follow one's own interests, as the basics are covered.  I guess I see a lot of Steiner early education being on par with teaching a small child to use the toilet, be polite, eat a meal with the family.

With Arden I feel much more competent in regards to the journey, I know what's expected of Steiner education up through the primary years,and he's naturally guided towards various goals of the curriculum through our day to day life.  This year aged 7 1/2 he desired to have his own dinner night, as Willow and Gabriel do,  but due to our youngest , only being 2 1/2 I felt that I didn't have time to support that, but Dad (Damien) did.  In terms of Steiner education, this was perfect as we are approaching class 3- with it's focus on taking care of oneself- and it was linking naturally into life, because as a family we now have a solid base of understanding where we are going.  Something that was definitely absent in the early years of our home educating.

In case anyone's interested, these are some thoughts I had on natural learning, earlier through our home ed journey.

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2025

I feel I still pretty much agree with this.  We have varied how we do things a bit around here, now that we have adult children.  For instance, we aren't screen free in our home education any longer, but we are particular that the computers are used as tools for learning.