Unschooling Teenagers
This page will help you learn about options for high school and college for teenagers who aren't enrolled in conventional school.
NOTE: Please send me suggestions for additions or corrections to all the listings you see. I appreciate your help!
Teens can continue to learn as they did when they were younger—by following their interests, developing their abilities through a variety of activities and experiences, and by engaging with adults, teachers, or peers in order to learn and grow. You don't have to acquiesce to the standard high school curriculum for your child to succeed as an adult. Businesses, colleges, and universities look favorably upon self-motivated people who want to learn and who make the most of the resources available to them, and unschooling provides the conditions for making this happen.
Here are a variety people recounting their experiences as teens and parents of teens learning outside of conventional schooling.
• The GWS Issue Archives contain many stories about teens, high school, college, and work that you will find useful. Take the time to search and learn from the experiences of many unschoolers over a 24-year period.
• Grown Homeschoolers Tell Their Stories About How They Learned and What They Do Now.
• Peter Kowalke's documentary Grown Without Schooling.
Real-World Places for Teens Besides High School and the Internet
North Star: Self-Directed Learning for Teens
Books About or with Good Chapters About Unschooling Teenagers
Albert, David. Homeschooling And the Voyage of Self-Discovery. Common Courage Press, 2003.
Boles, Blake. The Art of Self-Directed Learning. Tells Peak Press, 2014.
Cohen, Cafi. Homeschooling The Teen Years. Prima, 2000.
Colfax, David and Colfax, Micki. Homeschooling For Excellence. Warner, 1988.
——. Hard Times In Paradise: An American Family’s Struggle to Carve Out a Homestead in California’s Redwood Mountains. Warner, 1992.
Dobson, Linda. The Homeschooling Book of Answers. Prima, 2002.
——. Homeschooler’s Success Stories: 15 Adults and 12 Young People Share the Impact That Homeschooling Has Made on Their Lives. Prima, 2000.
Hailey, Kendall. The Day I Became An Autodidact. Delta, 1988.
Hern, Matt, ed. Deschooling Our Lives. New Society Publishers, 1996.
Llewellyn, Grace, and Silver, Amy. Guerilla Learning: How to give your kids a real education with or without school. John Wiley & Sons, 2001.
Llewellyn, Grace. Freedom Challenge: African-American Homeschoolers. Lowry House, 1996.
——. Real Lives: Eleven Teenagers Who Don’t Go To School Tell Their Own Stories. Lowry House, 1993.
——. The Teenage Liberation Handbook: How to quit school and get a real life and education. Lowry House, 1998
McKee, Alison. Homeschooling Our Children, Unschooling Ourselves. Bittersweet House, 2002.
Patterson, Sue. Homeschooled Teens. 2nd Tier Publishing, 2015.
