Ilaria - Canberra, ACT / Ngunnawal Country
"My biggest regret is not starting sooner.”
Italy may be Ilaria’s country of origin but she well and truly calls our nations capital home. She and her husband (who fatefully met on the day she arrived in Australia over 23 years ago) are raising their two daughters (ages 14 and 8) on a small farm, that she lovingly describes as a geriatric retirement home for animals. Their unschooling experiment began during the covid pandemic lockdowns and they haven’t looked back.
This is Episode 31 of the Australian Homeschool Stories Podcast - Ilaria’s Story:
Summary:
Ilaria grew up in the ancient university town of Bologna, Italy.
She liked school and, like a lot of kids, had no idea there was an alternative anyway. Her parents always described it as that school was her job. They went to work, she went to school. Her duty was to make the most of it and do a good job and she did.
She received a scholarship to complete her final two years of high school in Singapore, studying in English, which was her second language. The experience of living there and being in a boarding school was a magical experience that she is grateful for.
However, her academic success came with stress and pressure that still haunt her subconscious to this day.
“For decades after, I mean, I think I haven't had one of those dreams or nightmares for a while, but I literally had them well into my adulthood. I would have these nightmares of being in an exam or being interrogated at school and not having the answer.”
On returning to Italy she studied agriculture science at university. Ironically she felt she felt she learned absolutely nothing there.
“I learned way more in 10 years on the land.”
Another scholarship offer to work in a lab for 4 months was the catalyst for her travelling to Australia where unbeknownst to her she would end up staying for 20+ years.
Her family now share their home with four cats and a dog and then share the land with a million kangaroos, lots of wombats, a billion rabbits, llamas, goats, bees and chickens.
“I was really good at the game of schooling. I knew how to be a good student and how to be a people pleaser. Boy, did I learn how to be a people pleaser. But in terms of actual notions, I don't think I learned an awful lot… which is why homeschooling and unschooling resonated with me when I discovered them.”
Originally, Ilaria didn’t think twice about sending her eldest daughter to school and her education began with pre-school at three and a half, which in hindsight she believes was too young.
“I don't know if you can talk about academics in preschool, but I guess she was ready from that point of view. She wasn't really ready socially. So we went through six months of her crying like crazy at drop-off, which, of course, was gut-wrenching.”
The idea of homeschooling began as a joke when Ilaria was deciding on which school to send her daughter to and none of the local options were overly impressive. But it took the pandemic school shutdowns to really open her eyes to the possibility of adopting an unschooling lifestyle.
“I started seeing when my daughter, who was in year four and then year five during lockdown, what the school was sending home and it was really underwhelming, like really underwhelming.”
“At that time is when I first heard about unschooling. My first thought, of course, was these people are insane. Why would you ever do that? Famous last words.”
Because her kids were home, she started really observing them and thinking. It seemed like the ideal time to put her scientific mind to work and test out a hypothesis - if she let them do whatever they want, what would they actually learn?
“Lockdown allowed me to kind of do a trial run in a way and see, actually, this may be something that may have some merit and might not be as insane as it looked at first.”
Remote learning didn’t work for their family so Ilaria knew doing school at home wouldn’t work for her children either. Once she saw first hand that they were naturally ticking off the curriculum, they began their unschooling adventure in earnest.
“The whole idea that we were discussing as we were transitioning was, we can do this thing called unschooling and you can follow your passions, which is really exciting in theory. But then, of course, the flip side of it is you need to know what your passions are and if you've been busy sitting at school, you may not necessarily know what they are.”
For anything academic, Ilaria was quite happy to do things that looked nothing like what the majority were doing but because they were no longer in a school environment, so too friendships are going to look different. Social connections, just like learning, are different in this lifestyle.
“I think navigating teen friendships has been the greatest challenge for us, which in a way is a good thing because I think it's the only real big challenge. Everything else, it's been such a joy.”
Ilaria loves that her kids ask a tonne of really amazing, left field questions as she herself remembers never asking questions in class because she was so terrified of saying the wrong thing. Not only are her children figuring out what to learn, how to learn and when to learn but they are critically analysing information and data.
“What's amazing is that she's learning that thing of not just taking things at face value, but let me just check, or what's the bias of this person? And that's something that's really strong in our family. Scientific literacy is really high on our agenda.”
“There's been so much joy and I'm having a great time learning too. For the first time in my life, I'm learning because I want to. You know, I think maybe that's secretly the best part of it.
I'm going through all my schooling again but with enthusiasm and agency to study what I want, when I want to, to the point that sometimes if they're not interested in something, I'm like, okay, well, I'm just going to do it myself. I obviously secretly hope they'll join in and yes, most of the time they will eventually get curious enough to ask about it. But sometimes they won't. And I'm like, well, who cares? I'm having a great time.”
“I do have hobbies. Like I love to sew and I make soap and all of that. But really, at the moment, my main hobby is homeschooling my kids. It sounds pretty, I don't know, weird. But I'm having a ball doing it.”
Ilaria and her family are a tech family, if they are not out and about in the world they tend to be on screens at home.
“We have no rules over tech, so free for all. So in terms of physical resources, certainly iPads, computers and phones are top of the list.”
Other resources that contribute to unschooling for their family are Chat GPT, the wildlife sanctuary where her daughter volunteers, musical theatre, boardgames, science kits, podcasts, audiobooks and social media.
Last year Ilaria organised a Homeschool Open Day for families in the Canberra region much along the lines of how schools run open days, to provide an opportunity for people who are considering homeschooling or just starting to meet current homeschooling families in their area and ask all the questions they like.
The next Canberra Homeschool Open Day will be held on May 20th 2024 and you can find out more information about it via this website.
“You know, I'm not an expert, but I'm certainly very passionate. I've done a tonne of research and I'm happy to share what I know and what works for us in the hope that something will resonate with others as well.”
“Don't wait, just do it. You can't figure it all out beforehand because life throws different opportunities and different challenges as you go. Your children and you will change as you go. So you're going to have to figure it out on the run anyway. You might as well just jump in there and start.
My biggest regret is not starting sooner.”
Inspiration
Unschooling Mom2Mom podcast
Connect
Instagram - @unschooling_adventure
Canberra Homeschool Open Day website - homeschoolopendaycanberra.weebly.com
Facebook - Canberra Homeschool Excursions, Activities and Support group
Food for thought
Here are some homeschooling related reads I’ve enjoyed this past week that you may too:
This podcast is recorded on the lands of the Bunurong people of the Kulin nation. I pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging and acknowledge that sovereignty was never ceded. This always was, always will be aboriginal land.
Original Music by Daniel Garrood @garroodcomposer
Listen on Spotify here