Misty Meadows Wellspring, Dargle

When Children Lead | Alliance for Self-Directed Education What I’ve learned from letting go in education

We love this quote so much!

/ Anais Nin /

"Tranquility is contagious, peace is contagious. One only thinks of the contagiousness of illness, but there is the contagion of serenity and joy."

"Angela Anaïs Juana Antolina Rosa Edelmira Nin y Culmell was a French-born American diarist, essayist, novelist, and writer of short stories and erotica. Born to Cuban parents in France, Nin was the daughter of the composer Joaquín Nin and the classically trained singer Rosa Culmell. Nin spent her early years in Spain and Cuba, about sixteen years in Paris, and the remaining half of her life in the United States, where she became an established author. Nin wrote journals prolifically from age eleven until her death. Her journals, many of which were published during her lifetime, detail her private thoughts and personal relationships. Her journals also describe her marriages to Hugh Parker Guiler and Rupert Pole, in addition to her numerous affairs, including those with psychoanalyst Otto Rank and writer Henry Miller, both of whom profoundly influenced Nin and her writing."
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Born: Angela Anaïs Juana Antolina Rosa Edelmira Nin y Culmell, February 21, 1903, Neuilly-sur-Seine, France
Died: January 14, 1977, Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation: Author

"The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume Two (1934-1939)". Book by Anais Nin, 1970.

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When children are truly free to walk away from school, then schools will have to become child-friendly places in order to survive. Children love to learn, but, like all of us, they hate to be coerced, micromanaged, and continuously judged. They love to learn in their own ways, not in ways that others force on them. Schools, like all institutions, will become moral institutions only when the people they serve are no longer inmates. When students are free to quit, schools will have to grant them other basic human rights, such as the right to have a voice in decisions that affect them, the right to free speech, the right to free assembly, and the right to choose their own paths to happiness. Such schools would look nothing at all like the dreary institutions we call “school” today.

~ Peter Gray

Unschooling is a choice.
It is not what you're doing when you take a break from homeschooling.
It's not what you call having a 'lazy day'.
It's not what you do on the weekends or holidays.
It's not what you do when you're out of energy.
It's not what you do when you're feeling unmotivated.
It's not what you do for all other subjects except the 'important' ones.

Unschooling is not the absence of effort.
It is not giving up.
It is not lowering your expectations.
It is not choosing to ignore education.

It is a deliberate decision to trust that children learn best when they are free to live in the world, follow their curiosity, and take ownership of their own education. And it comes with a ton of adult involvement, encouragement, and support.

It means choosing relationship over control.
Autonomy over compliance.
Real life over forced lessons.
And it means valuing education, just choosing a different way than the majority.

It means building an environment rich with ideas, experiences, conversations, books, projects, and opportunities.

If you're simply taking a break from school at home, that's fine. But that isn't the same thing as unschooling.

Unschooling is a fundamentally different way of understanding children, learning, and education itself. And it's a considered choice, not an afterthought.

Unschooling parents are intentionally educating their children. It just looks different to what you expect.

Learning isn’t just about TEACHING. It’s about living. Modeling. Discovering things together.

The hardest work is letting go of the beliefs the system has made you think are true.

At Bridge Academy, we know that’s the hardest part, so we make sure our parents are fully supported and have all the knowledge needed to provide a self-directed learning journey for their child that everyone feels confident in.

I just filmed a new Open House video to share all about how Bridge operates and what’s coming in the future. Comment BRIDGE and I’ll send it to you 👇