Unschoolers (May 2018)

Shot on 35mm

In 2018, I spent a week photographing an unschooling family in the small town of Wiarton, Ontario. Jennie and Luke have chosen to unschool their three children, Judah, Neve, and Wilder, letting them learn through play. The children are given the freedom to explore interests that appeal to them, instead of following a curriculum or a schedule. The kids enjoy making art, cooking, dancing, building forts, card games, identifying plants and animals, reading and visiting the library, and playing outside.

While there is a larger focus on religious homeschooling families, home educating their children is a choice that non-religious parents sometimes make due to a lack of faith in the school system.

There are two main types of home education: homeschooling, which is more structured and may involve textbooks and assignments; and unschooling, which is unstructured and not as comparable to formal schooling.

While all home education tends to encourage children to nurture their passions, unschooling is based on the evidence that children learn best through play. Unschooling parents believe that it’s beneficial to the child to let them lead when it comes to learning, and that there should be no schedule for learning or rules for how to learn.

Organically cultivating a love for learning has its academic benefits. An 2016 study by the National Home Education Research Institute indicated that home-educated individuals scored 15-30 percentage points higher on standardized academic achievement tests.

LAURA PROCTOR