Category: Natural Learning

Posted on

Top Posts of 2018

It’s been a long year here.

As with all years, there are good and bad things that happened; Some big and minor crises, and so many adventures and misadventures. 2018 has been a wild ride. 

One of the massive good things has been my fellowship with Writers Victoria. It’s been fantastic to work with the wonderful people there in the Write-Ability team, and I am thoroughly enjoying it – with the usual caveats for my own anxiety, imposter syndrome and general ADHD-ness which always adds interesting flavours to anything.

So, there has been, as usual, a lot of work happening behind the scenes, which I will hopefully I be able to share with you all soon.

In the meantime, here are the top posts at Yellow Readis for the year.

Continue reading “Top Posts of 2018”
Posted on

Homeschool Writing Problems and Solutions:

Image: Pencil and sharpener resting on white notebook. Text: Homeschool Writing: Problems and Solutions

Writing can be hard. Encouraging kids to write can some days feel like pulling teeth out with tweezers. But often in these situations, it’s good to remember that kids will do well if they can – and often the reason they can’t is that something is getting in the way of creating those awesome you-have-to-listen-to-this-mum stories that kids seem to always have  bubbling away in their heads. 

Continue reading “Homeschool Writing Problems and Solutions:”

Posted on

Teaching a Child Who Won’t Be Taught

Text: "Teaching a Child Who Won't Be Taught" "yellowreadis.com" Pictures: Boy in blue shorts and top lying on wooden bridge, minecraft pig on a white rock, pea pod on vine, young child in striped top playing with a tablet

How to educate a child who won’t be taught? It’s not a question I thought I’d ever need to answer, but life (and my daughter) decided this was the path we needed to follow.

Today, I’m going to talk about a few of the strategies I use to create a welcoming learning environment that steers my kids in the direction they need to go, without explicitly ‘teaching’ them.

Continue reading “Teaching a Child Who Won’t Be Taught”

Posted on

Unschooling Ain’t The Boogie Man

Unschooling Ain't The Boogie Man, yellowreadis.com Image: Kids lying on pier playing in water

Every now and then, usually when news is a little slow, prominent papers like to do little fluff pieces on the edges of the educational world. One week might be about lambasting ‘pushy parents,’. Another week an angry remonstrance on the horrors of alternative education.

Personally, I find it deeply amusing that, depending on the flavour of the month, our little family can be both academically pushing and overly restrictive tiger-parents, and laissez-faire, academically neglectful parents at the same time.

In July, it was Mamamia’s turn to have-a-go at the punch-the-alternative-education bandwagon.

The topic this time around? Unschooling.

So what is unschooling? And why does it raise so many hackles?
Continue reading “Unschooling Ain’t The Boogie Man”

Posted on

Record Keeping With a Natural Learner

Record Keeping with a Natural Learner, yellowreadis.com Image: Child playing with Lego

I know one of the things I really struggle with when I let my kids take the lead is dealing with my own fear. Are they learning everything they need to learn? Are we ‘keeping up’ with whatever imaginary goals I have set – whether that’s state curriculum outlines, or some hybrid of that and what I think they are ready and able to learn? But in reality, it is my fear, not their progress that is really getting in the way.

This post is about how I manage my record-keeping, which I have found to be one of the most important ways to calm down the nagging fear that we aren’t doing ‘enough’, whatever nebulous form that ‘enough’ takes.
Continue reading “Record Keeping With a Natural Learner”