When my kids were young, we tried a lot of different approaches to learning in our homeschool.

But looking back, we actually ended up doing quite a bit of unschooling.

I know that word can be a bit intimidating or even confusing. 

(John Holt is the father of the unschooling movement, if you want to do a deep-dive.)

So for the purposes of this article, let’s define unschooling as interest-led or child-led learning that may or may not make use of traditional homeschool curriculum.

But … How exactly do you track that?! 

Don’t worry – it’s completely doable and your unschooled child can even end up getting accepted to their top college of choice. I promise!

Unschooling Doesn’t Mean You Don’t Keep Homeschool Records

Each state has specific rules for what kinds of records you need to keep as a homeschooler.

Just because you unschool, that doesn’t mean you don’t keep records of your child’s learning. In fact, I’d argue it may be even more important to keep records because your child’s learning might not look “traditional,” or fit into neat boxes.

That’s OK! You absolutely can keep records of your child’s unschooling with Homeschool Planet’s online homeschool planner.

The process just looks a little bit different.

Backwards Planning With Homeschool Planet

Many unschoolers or those who focus on child-led or interest-led learning as part of their homeschool use something called “backwards planning,” or “planning from behind.”

This just means that instead of planning out your curriculum in advance, you use your time differently. You focus more on helping your child pursue their interests, and THEN, you document what your child did.

Homeschool Planet’s online homeschool planner makes this easy.

First, you can have individual profiles for each of your kids, so it’s simple to keep track of what each child is doing without tons of notes or spreadsheets.

Older kids can even help track their own learning. With Homeschool Planet, students have access to only their own profiles, so this is a great way to help your family keep details straight.

Homeschool Planet also automatically allows you to classify each learning activity into subjects, so you can see at a glance that bases are getting covered and identify anywhere where you might want to encourage your child to explore a bit more.

It’s quick, efficient and helps kids gain independence.

Homeschool Planet Solves The Unschooling Dilemma: How Do I Keep Track Of Learning?

Homeschool Planet also offers built-in tools that finally help families solve the dilemma of how to keep track of unschooling.

I know it can feel a bit overwhelming when your child is studying Japanese one day, making a model biome the next, and reading about Abraham Lincoln the next.

But Homeschool Planet makes this a breeze:

• As you continue to track what your student works on each day, all of your student’s learning can be rolled into records that meet state requirements in just a few clicks
• Parents and students can easily see and keep track of learning over time
• Finally, many unschooling families worry a lot about creating homeschool transcripts. But the process is so simple with Homeschool Planet. There is a great tutorial here that walks you through it.

Try Homeschool Planet In Your Homeschool Today

It turns out that what made unschooling the method that “stuck” in our homeschool was that it gave us flexibility.

The only worry was how to make sure that flexible learning could be documented, so my kids could have clear records of their learning, and so we could easily create transcripts for college.

But Homeschool Planet set us up for success.

So whether you consider yourself an official unschooler, or whether you just practice “relaxed homeschooling,” child-led learning, or know your kids just learn best when they are exploring deep interests, give Homeschool Planet’s online homeschooler planner a try.

It’s FREE for 30-days, simple to set up, and will help you gain confidence as you and your kids learn YOUR way.