Love is all you need
"Many Australian families choose to educate their children at home. You don't need any special educational qualifications to teach your children at home. People from all backgrounds successfully teach their children -- people with university degrees, trade certificates, small business owners, factory workers, people working from home, mums, dads - everyone has the ability to teach their children at home!
The only qualification you need is LOVE for your children. Schools can't, and don't, love your children. They can care for them, look after them and even teach them, but the essential successful ingredient in home education is love"(Source).
There are many styles of homeschooling including:
Natural Learning or Unschooling (child-led, free learning)
Montessori Homeschooling
Steiner Homeschooling
Distance Education
Accelerated Christian Education (ACE)
Eclectic Homeschooling
Charlotte Mason Homeschooling
Other terms to describe homeschooling include:
‘School-at-home’ - when school is replicated in the home e.g. curriculum, timetables, testing.
‘Deschooling’ - this applies to children who have been pulled out of school and those teaching homeschoolers who were schooled in an institution. It involves developing a renewed perspective of life-long learning as opposed to ‘taught’ knowledge (Source: Samantha Pearson).
Unschooling
"Unschooling, also known as "independent learning" or "experience-based learning," differs from conventional homeschooling, where a student will generally follow a set curriculum.
Instead, unschooling students are encouraged to find the path that works best for them, and empowers them to choose their own intellectual destinies. Unschoolers agree with George Bernard Shaw when he said, "We want to see the child in pursuit of knowledge, not knowledge in pursuit of the child"(Source).
Websites
Education Choices
This site has information on the different styles of homeschooling.
Homeschool Australia
http://homeschoolaustralia.beverleypaine.com
Radical Unschooling
www.sandradodd.com/unschooling
Unschooling.com
www.unschooling.com/
An
excellent site on natural learning/unschooling with lots of
discussions, articles and links etc. While it is US based there
are plenty of Australians that use that site.
Online forums (Australian)
Australian Unschoolers
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/australianunschoolers/
This list is not strictly for Unschoolers. It has excellent information about home education in NSW, particularly the legal aspects.
"Are you new to 'home' education? Are you thinking about 'home' educating? Would you like to help others in need of your experience? This group welcomes all 'home' educators but focuses in particular on 'natural' - child controlled - learning and help with government 'requirements' for those living in N.S.W., Australia"(Source).
Homeschool Australia FAQ
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/HomeschoolAustraliaFAQ/
"'Homeschool Australia Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)’ is the sister group to ‘Homeschool Australia Newsletter’. You can post homeschooling questions on this site and Beverley Paine, homeschooling author and publisher with 19 years of home educating experience, as well as other list members, will do their best to answer them"(Source).
Australian Homeschool
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/australianhomeschool/
This ia a large list with good information.
Australian Homeschoolers
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/australianhomeschoolers/
This ia a smaller supportive list.
Natural Learning
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/learningnaturally/
A small list who aims to "widen
understanding of how learning occurs naturally in the home and
community, and to share advice, tips, trials and tribulations so that
we may all grow!"(Source).
Waldorf Inspired Homeschool Support
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/waldorfhomeschool/
Support groups ‘in real life’
The best way to learn about homeschooling is to get together with homeschoolers to observe and ask questions. People tend be grouped by:
-
special needs (learning disabled,; physical disability; gifted;
-
Muslim; Christian etc.)
-
learning style (natural learners/unschoolers; ACE (a Christian curriculum that you can buy etc.)
-
local area
Sydney Attachment Parenting Homeschoolers
Contact: Sam Pearson
Ph: 9944-0661
E-mail: earthslings@yahoo.com.au
Newsletter & Magazine
Education Choices Magazine
Homeschool Australia Newsletter
www.groups.yahoo.com/group/HomeschoolAustraliaNewsletter/
Regular newsletter by long-term home educator Beverley Paine featuring links to articles published on Homeschool Australia and other home education websites.
Associations
Home Education Association
The HEA was formed to promote the practice of home education in Australia and to provide members with benefits which would be difficult to obtain by individuals or smaller groups. Its website has articles, support groups and a forum.
Books
Beverly Paine
Getting Started with Homeschooling: Practical Considerations for School Aged Parents
An Australian resource.
John Holt
How Children Learn
Instead of Education
The Underachieving School
Escape from Childhood
Rue Kream
Parenting A Free Child: An Unschooled Life
John Taylor Gatto
John Taylor Gatto’s work is excellent. His writing appears in a number of books. Click here for a list.
Mary Griffith
The Unschooling Handbook
Grace Llewellyn
Guerrilla Learning: How to Give Your Kids a Real Education With or Without School
The Teenage Liberation Handbook
"This is a great book to prepare yourself for the world of home schooling and un-train yourself from what you learned in an institutional school setting" (Sam, mum to 3 unschooled kids)
Anna Keogh
Trust the Children
This is a great book to get started with home schooling a young child as it outlines everything you could teach a child and ideas on how to go about it" (Sam, mum to 3 unschooled kids)
Supplier
An Australian online bookstore that sells home education books.
Articles
Unschooling: Education that unleashes the creative spirit by Jeremiah Vandermeer
Vandermeer explains what unschooling is in comparison to homeschooling.
What is Unschooling? by Earl Stevens