Unschooling works when we help our children recognise their larger self-identities, much beyond school. The cookie-cutter approach taken by many (but not all) public schools in North America does not help holistic development. But for children to see that and to allow them to take charge of their education, they must first be able to see themselves holistically. And we, as parents and educators, must help them do that.

School is an “Anchor” experience

Every week, I participate in a Zoom meeting of experienced educators and parents. Unschooling School founded by educator and parent Heather McTaggart, is a group of people who have come together to drive the cause of embedding self-directed learning, within the public school system and beyond. Now, you would imagine that putting a learner in-charge of her own learning so that her needs are primary would be welcome, especially by our children. …

A couple of years back, I attended a fascinating conference in Toronto about the applications of artificial intelligence (AI) in business. Delivering the keynote was Dr. Geoffrey West, an eminent physicist and author of the thought-provoking book “Scale.”

He explained that innovation takes place in waves. Moreover, across human history, subsequent waves of innovation have occurred at exponentially faster rates. While all this progress is exciting, the flip side is that newer innovations tend to replace previous technologies at a supersonic speed too.

In other words, the pace of evolution and that of the resulting extinction is the same.

So, why didn’t such a prospect of technologies becoming obsolete quicker and quicker, bother us before? It worries us now because this time, the technology at the risk of extinction is none other than our biological intelligence. The very essence that makes us homo sapiens. This time, the technology that will become obsolete is us. …

A few years back, I began noticing an interesting trend. Every once in a while, new ideas spontaneously came to my mind — an app, a social cause, the perfect message some public figure needs to hear, or even a new angle to write about.

Sometimes I’d let them simmer. At other times, I’d let them go because I had other priorities. Most often though, I’d push them aside out of sheer self-doubt.

If it were such a brilliant idea, someone would have thought of it before.

Someone had. Years later, I would come across either someone else who brought up a similar perspective in conversation or an article written from a very similar angle or someone else in another place who went out and implemented precisely the same thing. …

The days I wake up feeling beautiful turn out to be the most joyous of days, much more than the others.

Although I don’t work in the beauty industry or create art for a living, the pursuit of beauty is the undertone in so many decisions I make throughout the day.

Whether it's crafting that perfect title for a poem, building a watertight argument, decorating a little corner in my house, or even choosing to add a little bouquet to my grocery basket. Beauty is central to human pursuits.

I’ve also observed that most people pursue beauty in some form, knowingly or unknowingly. It’s human nature. However, we know very little about our reasons for doing so or what beauty even is. …

Dear Sanaa and Samaa,

Build your friendships before you drive a fancy car.

Your daddy and I have driven a Tesla Model S for the last five years. We drove across the continent for seventeen days in it, and she kept all of us warm, cosy and luxuriously entertained. I could not be more grateful for her! People have come up to compliment us or to share their own experience with the same model throughout our journeys. These were welcome niceties on our long road trip, for sure.

…she kept all of us warm, cosy and luxuriously entertained. I could not be more grateful for her! …

My husband and I are both in love with Istanbul. Home to some of our best friends, it is our favorite city in the world! Our love for the city, her people and her culture is enduring, despite not being able to speak any Turkish. As they say, language is no barrier for love.

Until the turmoil in the region and its aftermath, my husband and I had been visiting Turkey almost every year, stopping in Istanbul each time. It was almost a pilgrimage, but for fun.

On one such visit, long before we had kids, we had an evening to ourselves and no specific plans. We had just finished dinner with some friends and then we decided to stroll back to our hotel, perhaps a 20-minute walk. …

When we began to plan our year of travel unschooling, an experiment for curating educational travel was born. First came a curated five-week-long, thematic trip. The overarching idea was to travel so our daughters, who were 4 and 2 years old then, could interact with a wide variety of wildlife, flora and fauna in its natural habitat.

The themes we chose were based on what already interested our daughters at that point. For example, Tahiti was a search for the real Moana and her grandmother, who swam with stingrays in the Disney movie. Melbourne and Phillip Island were a quest for the fabled “black” sheep who features in baa-baa black sheep the nursery rhyme and whose wool keeps us warm in the Canadian winters. They witnessed the very origin of our gloves by taking part in sheep shearing, themselves. …

Over the last month or so, I have become part of a five-writer writing critique group. I initially tried it out as an experiment, because I had never been part of one in my two decade long writing life. I have done all the other things such as writing a variety of genres, taking a creative writing course in university, publishing, self-publishing, blogging and of course, Medium. To my surprise, the one thing that has contributed most significantly to my craft is my writing critique group.

The Structure and How it Works

We are a group of five writers, each with their own genre and style. We have one business writer, a fiction writer, a memoirist, a historical fiction writer and a poet. We meet weekly, and critique one member’s work each week over Zoom— with candour, tough love, and giggles. We also have a Discord channel where we chat about things unrelated to writing and share resources that may help each other. …