Autonomous Education - What's That?

It's recognising that your handwriting has improved during this last year but you're still not happy with some letter formations so you ask mommy to help you find a way to improve it

It's learning some tunes on your recorder because you thought you'd try some free on-line music video lessons mommy discovered.

It's wanting to learn about foreign countries because of the settings of your favourite movies ('Ponyo'=Japan, 'Night at the Museum'=USA, 'Kung Fu Panda'=China etc)

It's making all your own Birthday and Christmas cards for family and friends rather than buying them.

It's discussing religious beliefs and how they differ from factual discoveries about the world... then telling mommy you aren't a Buddhist like her, nor an atheist like daddy but maybe you're "...one of those people who believes in trees and Mother Nature, like they do in Ireland..."

It's playing a money addition game with a UK coin dice and a pile of play money and unwittingly showing mommy your can easily add up your totals without counting on your fingers or using paper.

It's discussing the possibility of the Tooth Fairy being real, of there being a Santa Claus or Jack Frost or Easter Bunny (yes, we went to see 'Rise of The Guardians'), of existence after death and consciousness beyond brain matter... and deciding that you can believe what you want and you'll let other people believe what they want.

It's reorganising the fridge with mommy so that you can make yourself a sandwich without asking for help (although you still, usually, ask mommy to make it).

It's playing with a Christmas Felt Set mommy got out of the attic and discussing why the children are all White when surely there should be some Black people in every play set that has White characters.

It's helping mommy defrost the deep freezer and discussing how ice forms, how we can't catch steam, how water gets through the smallest of gaps, how freezing inhibits food decay and how to examine ice crystals under a microscope without them melting, and yes, how to clean a deep freezer.

It's choosing to lie in bed late catching rainbows made by a crystal hanging at the window or grasping after the dust motes that dance in the bright winter sun.

It's feeding the cats, the squirrels and the birds every day and doing it out of love, not because it's a chore.

It's learning how to use a protractor and measure angles by reading a story book (thanks Sir Cumference) and then measuring angles around the kitchen with mommy.

It's remembering learning about dinosaurs with mommy at this time two years ago and smiling widely as you recount the memories.

It's waiting outside dance class with a friend who's struggling to read a school book and offering to help them with it in a completely judgement-free way.

It's getting so frustrated at the quality of some computer desktop images that you decide to design your own - you lay out your favourite Pokemon, take some photographs of them, then work with daddy to create a personalised computer desktop.

It's spending the coldest day of the year (so far) playing all day with one of your HE best friends.

It's doing coin rubbings after mommy finds an old farthing and a couple of sixpences in one of the boxes she's cleared from the attic... and then rounding up every purse, wallet and money box for all the coins you can find and identifying their dates, the images on them and the occasions some of them represent.

It's learning to use watercolour paints with mommy and loving it so much you spend nearly the whole day at the kitchen table humming and painting.

It's finding time to dance every day - in the kitchen, the living room, along the road, in malls, in shops...

It's carrying at least one cuddly toy with you wherever you go and whatever you do - and perching them to watch over you as you try out the new climbing structures at the playground or read a book at the library.

It's asking if we can resume learning Spanish because you're ready to learn more now.

It's visiting an archaeology museum and telling mommy which are the best exhibits and why, then asking to attend one of the museum's hands-on artefact sessions.

It's asking mommy to buy you 'Crazy Art' when you're at an art gallery (even though you have shelves of art books already) and then, when she does, justifying her expenditure by reading and discussing it, over and over again.

It's agreeing to do an on line math interactive if mommy will do one first (and reassuring mommy when she makes a mistake in her subtraction-with-borrowing).

It's asking to do more learning about some topics because you remember feeling proud to discover you were ahead of school-going peers at some subjects and you really liked how that felt.

It's insisting on doing a Khan academy session even though mommy says, "Are you sure you want to do more maths???"

It's asking mommy to make sure she doesn't get rid of any books, including her own, in another of her attempts at decluttering... because you might want to read them all one day.

It's trying honey on toast because Pooh Bear advised it and he knows more about honey than daddy.

It's discussing Zombie Tag (discovered courtesy of some school-going friends at dance class!) and the possibility of life regeneration and 'Frankenstein' and women authors and Dia de Los Muertos and decorated skulls and Brazilian festivals and the Rio Olympics and how we can choose not to read horror stories or watch horror films even if friends say they're sooooo cool.

It's asking mommy to keep boxes and boxes of early learning toys and books in the attic for you because you'll need them when you home educate your own children.


Our collection of art postcards