The past few months I've been doing a lot of thinking, praying and reading about relaxed, unschoolish education ideas. I have decided we really aren't unschoolers. 10 years ago I might have used that term and been comfortable with it, but not anymore. I find that it carries too much baggage from unschooling gurus and other philosophies that have been attached to the idea, which was once a purely educational philosophy. Now it seems you can't call yourself an unschooler if you limit screen time, maintain parental authority, or use a text book at all. The unschool movement, once a movement in educational freedom, has become a movement rich in it's own dogmatic ideals, full of contradiction and judgment of those who do not agree. The only unschool place where I have found that this does not happen is the Christian Unschooling Facebook Group. This group has been very helpful to me!
I think the best name for what we are doing is Hackschooling or Hackademics. What I mean by this is that we do what works. We set goals based on interests and talents, not standards. We use what best suites us to reach those goals. Anything that works is good; books, classes, clubs, internships, even text books. We think less and less within the context of school subjects and think more and more in the terms of life goals and purpose. This is a true education to me! Below is a talk given by a 13 year old young man that really explains it well. Enjoy it!
