I’m a Headteacher of a mainstream secondary school. I have been one for nearly 8 years.

I’m also a parent of AUDHD twins, one who is starting to find her way, after many bumps in the road, in her own secondary school, where her needs are understood enough for her to be able to attend lessons and learn.

Her twin sister, has been so damaged by the trauma of her experience in the school system that I doubt she will ever set foot in a school again. We are now unschooling her. It’s a slow process. But the amazing enlightenment around the ‘process of learning’ as an unschooled child is challenging EVERYTHING I ever thought about our education system.

For me, given the day job, this is pretty existential stuff.

Twin paths diverged in a wood, one took the tough road, still learning what the other road will turn out to be, but it’s definitely the path less travelled.

Treading these contrasting learning paths alongside my daughters will be the focus of our next few years, as they transition into adulthood. I intend to learn everything I can as an educator from this. And I’ll be writing about it in time.

For now, I’m just excited to share with you all the philosophies around unschooling from my own learning.