Unschooling and high school happen everyday. It is possible for an unschooler to “attend” high school too.
A lot of people wonder how you can unschool a high school aged child. Many of them would even appreciate knowing what the typical day looks like for such a child. This is because until you are actually an unschooler yourself you may find it difficult to see what a child would spend their day doing.
Common Concerns Amongst Parents About Unschooling
There are many parents who worry that their child won’t do anything but watch TV and spend their day surfing the Internet. They feel as their child wouldn’t be motivated enough to be a self-learner.
However, what they don’t realize is that time spent watching TV or surfing the Internet is not wasted time. Children need to have time to play, explore and try new things regardless of their age.
Sometimes as adults we don’t see the value of these things but it is definitely there, especially in high school when teens need to have time to try out new ideas, think about different careers and explore areas in which they are interested in order to see if these are areas that they may want to pursue for the rest of their time or just for a short while.
These are things that they won’t learn how to do for themselves if we direct their learning and set a schedule for them. They also won’t become internally motivated if someone beside themselves is continually setting a schedule for them.
A Typical Unschooling Day For Those In High School
It is difficult to describe what the typical day is like for a high school student who is unschooled. This is because everyday is different depending upon what activities are scheduled. Each year is always different every year as children pick up new interests and drop old ones. Dynamics also change as children mature.
Graduation For Unschoolers From High School
Unschoolers are able to graduate from high school and continue on to college without any problems. Of course, your child may also decide that college isn’t for them or that they’d rather attend a community college.
Regardless of their choice, they will be able to function just fine in life. All you have to do is make sure that they do well on their SAT’s and that you put together a good transcript for them.
Transcripts For Unschoolers In High School
There are a lot of ways in which you can put transcripts together even though you have chosen to unschool high school.
How you choose to go about it will depend upon your state’s homeschool regulations. If your state considers you a private school, simply translate your child’s activities into school subjects.
Some states will also allow you to join a church school that will then provide your child with their transcript or diploma based upon the information that you provide them with. There are also some “unschooling schools” (i.e. West River Academy) that will provide transcripts and diplomas, which can be quite reassuring.
In Conclusion To Unschooling High School Students
Clearly every child’s schedule will be different so every child’s education will be different. Unschoolers don’t believe that their children should have to learn subjects that they will never have any use for so they don’t require them to study or learn a lot of the traditional school subjects. Instead, they allow their child to follow their interests since that is most likely what they will do for a career anyhow.
They believe that this will allow their child to do better in and be happier with their career since it is something they have been able to take time to learn about early on.
Many unschooling parents will even go so far as to have their child “try on” the career, immerse themselves within it, find people who are making their living in this way, get an apprenticeship if possible and thus really discover if it is something that they actually want to do.
This way if this isn’t something they want to do they will be able to move on to another idea or interest. In this way they will eventually be able to narrow down their focus to the area in which their skills are the strongest, which will inevitably be an area that they will truly desire to work within. For unschoolers, this is what high school is really all about.