If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you will know that I am very passionate about Montessori education. But with some recent life changes, we left our beloved Montessori school and I was stuck deciding how to help my daughter with her education in the best way.

Now, I am someone who loves to organize and arrange things. So at first, I wanted to make a whole system of schedules and lesson plans. Except we definitely wouldn’t have followed it; it would have just been busy work for me.

Enter unschooling.

“Unschooling” is a term that can be very divisive. People read it and think of children languishing at home, sleeping until noon, watching television all day, and never learning to read. That couldn’t be further from the truth. One thing I’ve learned through the lens of Montessori is that children are naturally curious and if left to their own devices, will learn just from being allowed to explore.

Unschooling simply means you are letting your child learn naturally without a strict curriculum. But an unschooled kid could still do worksheets if that is what they want to do. You could get a math curriculum for them to follow if they are interested in it. They could also take classes in things that they are interested in. What makes it unschooling is that the child is taking the lead and the learning comes naturally.

When it comes to a preschooler, I do several things to help her learn without giving her a strict structure or making her sit to do the work I think she should do. Here is what unschooling a preschooler looks like, the similarities with Montessori education and how it is working for us.