“I told him one evening that I was unable to read a book to him because of a headache. He said, “Well, you just rest and I’ll read a book to you.” He proceeded to read an entire book flawlessly, at a level of more difficulty than I would have guessed he had been able to read. Thus it sometimes happens in the natural course of living with a child that we receive more direct and specific information about his progress.”

A recent article in the UK Guardian cites successful unschoolers, but the overall tone is that children are being harmed or neglected because of unschooling. Unschooling isn’t just about leaving your child alone to figure things out, as these stories show.