Wendy Priesnitz writer, editor, changemaker

Writing About Education

• When We Make Children Struggle
  
  
• Because It Was the Right Thing to Do
  
  
• It's Hard to Lose Learning
  
  
• Living and Learning at the Edges
  
  
• Education Inspired by Nature
  
  
• Ready for a Changing World
  
  
• The Words We Use: Living As If School Doesn’t Exist
  
  
• Learning in the Real World
  
  
• Learning is Not Something That’s Done to You
  
  
• Defeating Adultism
  
  
• The Benefits of Boredom
  
  
• Learning from John Holt
  
  
• How Unschoolers Learn: The Principle of Productive Failure
  
  
• Taking Risks and Breaking Rules
  
  
• Power to Control
  
  
• Protecting the Spark of Curiosity
  
  
• What Education Means
  
  
• No Such Thing As Unschooling Failure
  
  
• The Whole World is a Learning Community
  
  
• Unschooling Lets Kids Control Their Own Minds and Environment
  
  
• Curiosity: Honoring, Encouraging, and Satisfying It
  
  
• The Principle of Productive Failure
  
  
• Motivation for Learning – and What Science Says
  
  
• Knowledge & the Cult of Experts
  
  
• Freedom or Control: Who Decides?
  
  
• Rules in a Life Learning Family
  
  
• Learning From a Mentor
  
  
• Make It & Mend It: Real Life Learning Opportunities
  
  
• A Life of Learning: Empowering and Trusting Children
  
  
• Understanding Life Learning / Unschooling
  
  
• Life Learning is About Process Over Content
  
  
• Taking Possession of Our Lives and Learning
  
  
• Willing to Try: Living Without Fear or Shame
  
  
• Parenting Digital Natives
  
  
• Don’t Let Your Children Learn!
  
  
• Guidance, Not Control
  
  
• It’s Not Important What School Reformers Think About Homeschooling
  
  
• Nurturing Creativity
  
  
• Life Learning Science
  
  
• Place-Based Education
  
  
• The Art of Inspiration: The Role Parents Play in Life Learning
  
  
• Risking to Learn
  
  
• What Fear Does
  
  
• How Do They Know That? (and why do they need to know?)
  
  
• Not Just for Children: Reframing Unschooling to Include Adults
  
  
• Defeating Adultism
  
  
• Challenging Assumptions in Education (book excerpt)
  
  
• Slow Learning
  
  
• Instinct to Learn
  
  
• The Dark Side of Competition
  
  
• Doing Our Best (When We Want To)
  
  
• Lazy Learning
  
  
• What is Socialization and What Kind Do We Want Our Life Learning Kids to Have?
  
  
• Finding Success – Life Learning Children Can Define it on Their Own
  
  
• Life Learning Changes Our View of Success
  
  
• Challenging Assumptions: Learning is Not Something That’s Done to You
  
  
• Exploring the Assumptions About Kids and Electronic Media
  
  
• A Sense of Wonder
  
  
• A Life Worth Living and a Job Worth Doing: Pat Farenga on John Holt
  
  
• The Life Learning Journey: Grown-Up Unschoolers
  
  
• Mindful Learning and Parenting
  
  
• Anarchy in Education? Life Learners Creating Change
  
  
• Scaling Up Life Learning
  
  
• A Space for Learning?
  
  
• Experiential Learning is Children's Work
  
  
• The Benefits of Self-Directed Time
  
  
• Coercion, Compulsory Attendance, and Adultism
  
  
• Compulsory Self-Directed Learning?
  
  
• Pushing Back Against What They Don't Understand
  
  
• Learning and the Power of Storytelling
  
  
• The Power of Authority
  
  
• Journaling: Writing to Learn and Learning to Write
  
  
• A Short History of the Home Education Movement in Canada
  
  

Writing about Green, Healthy Living

• Biomimicry: Inspiration From Nature to Solve the Problems People Have Created
  
  
• Counting Our Food Miles
  
  
• Learning Difficulties, Health, and the Environment
  
  
• The Real Dirt on Sewage Sludge
  
  
• Better Safe Than Sorry: The Precautionary Principle
  
  
• Seeking Nature-Inspired Solutions to Climate Change
  
  
• Air Fresheners or Air Pollutants?
  
  
• What’s Wrong With Peat Moss?
  
  
• Should We Eliminate Plastic?
  
  
• Are Wind Turbines Dangerous?
  
  
• What’s Wrong With Fabric Softener?
  
  
• Skin Deep: Are Cosmetics Safe?
  
  
• How Dangerous is Antibacterial Soap?
  
  
• How Green is My Diet?
  
  
• How Healthy and Safe are Soy Foods?
  
  
• Is Fluoride in Our Water Bad for Our Health?
  
  
• What’s the Dirt on Household Cleaners?
  
  
• What is Nanotechnology and Should We Be Concerned About it?
  
  
• Do Cellphones and Other Electronic Gadgets Affect Our Health?
  
  
• Can We Save Money by Going Solar?
  
  
• Shedding Light on Lightbulbs
  
  
• Soapnuts – An Inexpensive and Eco-Friendly Laundry Alternative
  
  
• Rewilding Ourselves and the Planet
  
  
• The Wonderful World of Trees and Treehugging
  
  
• Downsizing Your Home, Decluttering Your Life
  
  
• Taming the Power of Possessions
  
  
• Save Energy and Money While Living Sustainably and Healthily
  
  
• The Cooking Pot Dilemma
  
  
• Cooking with Deep Greens – Kale and Swiss Chard
  
  
• Seven Ways to Green Up Your Grocery Shopping
  
  
• Back to Basics Food Storage
  
  
• How to Reduce Kitchen Waste
  
  
• Living Without Single-Use Plastic
  
  
• Bicycle Culture: A New Cycling Revolution Takes Hold
  
  
• A Composting Primer
  
  
• Laugh and Be Well With Laughter Yoga
  
  
• Toxic Art & Art Making
  
  
• Candles: A Burning Indoor Air Quality Issue
  
  
• Stop That Noise! A Guide to Noise Pollution
  
  
• Eat Well & Protect Your Eyes
  
  
• Health in Your Eye - Understanding Iridology
  
  
• Spraying Yourself With Toxic Chemicals is Not Sexy
  
  
• Are You Dying to Lose Weight?
  
  
• It's Never Too Late to Be Fit
  
  
• Try a Raw Foods Diet
  
  
• Why We Should Soak Nuts, Grains, and Seeds
  
  
• The Seeds of Health
  
  
• Natural Dental Care
  
  
• What is Dental Floss Made Of?
  
  
• Avoiding Flu? Boost Your Immune System by Taking Good Care of Yourself
  
  
• Five Nasty Things They’re Doing to Our Food and Five Things We Can Do About It
  
  
• Sensitive to Sulfites
  
  
• Pollen Allergies: Are Unisex Trees Making Us Sick?
  
  
• What’s the Problem With GMOs?
  
  
• Earth Day: Ten Ways to Celebrate With Your Family
  
  
• Celebrate the Winter Solstice
  
  
• Five Ways to Simplify the Christmas Holidays
  
  
• Nature Offers Relief for Holiday Stress
  
  
• Making Your Life Simpler: Ten Tips for Making and Keeping Minimalist Resolutions
  
  
• Have a Green, Socially Responsible Valentine's Day
  
  
• How to Create Edible Landscaping for your Home
  
  
• A Straw-Clay House That’s Inspired by Nature
  
  
• Learning Straw-Clay Building
  
  
• A Sense of Place: Sustainability is More Than Solar Panels
  
  
• Zero Energy Homes
  
  
• Tiny Urban House Gets Net-Zero Reno
  
  
• Do You Know Where Your Wood Pallett Has Been?
  
  
• Interview with a Community Activist, Cob Builder, and Unschooling Mom
  
  
• Interview: Sustainable Country Living in an Earthship
  
  
• Interview: Living and Working Off-Grid
  
  
• Interview: A Woman Straw Bale Construction Pioneer
  
  
• Small Houses are Good for the Planet
  
  
• Tiny Houses, Tiny Neighborhoods
  
  
• Beyond the VW Van: the New Nomadics
  
  
• Yurts: Housing in the Round
  
  
• An Affordable, Sustainable House
  
  
• A Cold Climate Net-Zero Condo Duplex
  
  
• Wild Sage Cohousing Sets a Sustainability Standard
  
  
• Communal Food: The Community Kitchen Movement
  
  
• Cleaning Up a Moldy Home
  
  
• Breathing Lessons: How to Make Your Home a Clean-Air Haven
  
  
• Radon in Your Home
  
  
• Eight Ways to Create a Greener, Healthier Home
  
  
• Organic Pest Control for Your House and Garden
  
  
• Feng Shui Your Way to a Simpler Home
  
  
• Ten Steps to a Serene Bedroom
  
  
• Microfibers: How Your Clothes Could be Polluting the Oceans
  
  
• Organic Fibers: Dress Yourself and Your Home in Style with a Conscience
  
  
• Questioning Carbon Currency
  
  
• Companion Planting: Working Together in the Garden
  
  
• Creating a Wildflower Garden
  
  
• The Buzz About Backyard Bees
  
  
• Keep Your Pet Healthy the Natural Way
  
  
• The Problems With Leaf Blowers
  
  
• What's Wrong With Natural Living?
  
  
• Excerpt from Natural Life Magazine's Green and Healthy Homes
  
  
• Have a Sustainable, Healthy Summer
  
  
• Planning Your Green Vacation
  
  
• The Staycation: A Stress-Free, Green Family Vacation at Home
  
  
• Doing Good While Traveling? The Pros and Cons of Voluntourism
  
  
• The Power of Fun
  
  
• Dirty Cruises: Cleaning Up a Polluting Industry
  
  
• Respectful Whale Watching
  
  
• Catching a Green Wave: Geening Human-Powered Action Sports
  
  
• Letting It All Hang Out: Clotheslines Save Energy
  
  
• Natural Burials: The Ultimate in Recycling
  
  
• Parenting Our Parents: Finding Progressive End-of-Life Solutions
  
  
• Your Garden: The Planning Before the Planting
  
  
• Small is Beautiful...and Local, Sustainable, and Planet-Saving
  
  
• The Times They Are A-Changin'
  
  
• We All Have Green Work To Do
  
  
• The Glow is Coming Off Glitter
  
  
• The Toxic Consequences of Fireworks
  
  
• What Goes Up Must Come Down: The Problem With Balloons
  
  
• Companionship: Thriving Plants and Thriving People
  
  
• Stop Stacking Stones
  
  

Writing About Media and Media Literacy

• Corporate Spin is Harming Us
  
  
• Spin: How We Are Influenced
  
  
• Media Madness
  
  
• Follow the Money
  
  
• Greenwashing: When the green is just veneer
  
  
• Helping Kids Manage Their Media
  
  
• Exploring the Assumptions About Kids and Electronic Media
  
  
• Protecting our Kids from Commercialism
  
  

Writing About Play

• Playing in the Real World
  
  
• Do you Know What Your Child is Playing on?
  
  
• Playing Together: Cooperation, not Competition
  
  
• Where Does Spontaneity Go?
  
  
• Baby Couch Potatoes
  
  
• Skipping Rope – A Revived Street Game for all Ages
  
  
• The Value of Spontaneous Play
  
  

Writing about Conscious Parenting

• Keeping Ultrasound in its Place
  
  
• Eight Reasons Not to Swaddle Your Infant
  
  
• Baby-Led Weaning
  
  
• Good Nights: Bedtime Doesn’t Have to be Stressful
  
  
• Natural Play: Ditching Fancy Toys for Sticks and Mud
  
  
• Your [Dangerously] Wired Child
  
  
• When Clean Isn’t Always So Clean: The Case Against Antibacterial Soap
  
  
• Please Leave Your Shoes by the Door
  
  
• Baby Steps to a Green, Healthy Home
  
  
• Greening the Ghosts and the Ghoulies at Halloween
  
  
• Greening the Easter Bunny
  
  
• How to Have a Merry, Non-Commercial Christmas
  
  
• The Damage Spanking Does
  
  
• Learning to Trust and Love
  
  
• Traumatized Children, Traumatized World
  
  
• Kids in Community
  
  

Writing about Social Change

• The Hand That Rocks the Cradle Rocks the Boat
  
  
• Be Like a Butterfly
  
  
• On Pandemics as Portals to a New Way of Living
  
  
• It's Not About Growth: Alternative Economic Indicators
  
  
• Shop Small
  
  
• Embracing Slow
  
  
• Knitting for a Change
  
  
• Fair Trade is Shopping With a Conscience
  
  
• Buycotts and Boycotts - Can Ethical Consumerism Change Society?
  
  
• The Problem With Cheap Fashion
  
  
• A Fruitful Harvest - The Public Food Movement
  
  
• Cohousing – Creating a Sustainable Housing Solution
  
  
• Cohousing Comes to Canada
  
  
• Connections are the Solutions to Life and Learning
  
  
• A Time of Opportunity or One of Crisis?
  
  
• Grassroots Change - From the Ground Up
  
  
• Change Begins With the Children
  
  
• Instead of Efficiency
  
  
• The Clichés Might Have it Right
  
  
• Words Have Power
  
  
• Being Part of the Solution
  
  
• The Big Picture Looks Good
  
  
• Enough, Already
  
  
• OK Boomer
  
  
• Interview with Rolf Priesnitz, Publisher of Life Media
  
  

Writing about Business and Work

• Work: How We are Redefining it (and everything else in life)
  
  
• Start a Business and Change the World
  
  
• Mastering Home Office Spillover
  
  
• Unjobbing: A New Paradigm of Work and Life
  
  
• The Benefits of Coworking Spaces
  
  
• How to Handle Work-at-Home Isolation
  
  
• Starting a New Business During Hard Times
  
  
• Excerpt from Bringing it Home: A Home Business Start-Up Guide for You and Your Family
  
  

Personal and Memoir Writing

• A Potholder Hug
  
  
• Learning From the Robins
  
  
• Remembering the Ancestors
  
  
• More Than the Absence of School
  
  
• Providing Support While Letting Growth Happen
  
  
• Challenging Assumptions in Education and Pandemics
  
  
• A Life of Learning: Empowering and Entrusting Children
  
  
• Talking About Life Learning: An Interview
  
  
• Remembering What's Important
  
  
• When Activist Icons Undermine Their Causes
  
  
• Microchimerism
  
  
• Companionship: Thriving Plants and Thriving People
  
  
• Acceptance speech for leadership of Green Party of Canada
  
  
• Resignation letter from leadership of Green Party of Canada
  
  

Poetry

• Selected poems
  
  

Quotes

• Selected quotes from books and articles
  
  

Books

For a free PDF download of these books, go here.

• Beyond School: Living As If School Doesn’t Exist
• Natural Life Magazine’s Green & Healthy Homes
• Life Learning: Lessons From The Educational Frontier
• Challenging Assumptions in Education: From Institutionalized Education to a Learning Society

These books are now out of print:

• It Hasn't Shut Me Up - a memoir (2013)
• Bringing it Home: A Home Business Start-Up Guide for You and Your Family (1996)
• School Free: The Homeschooling Handbook (1987)
• Summer Love, Winter Fires (1976);
• North York – Realizing the Dream (1988);
• Markham: A Contemporary Portrait (1990);
• The Natural Life Cookbook (1992, with Heidi Priesnitz);
• A Kid’s Guide to Starting a Business at Home (1994);
• The House Where I Grew Up (1999)

These are some of the books I’ve contributed to:

• Recommendations for Action on Pollution and Education in Toronto for the Board of Education for the City of Toronto, with Bruce Small (1985);
• Metropolitan Toronto: Working Toward the Future, with R. White (1990);
• The Homeschooling Book of Answers, with Linda Dobson (1998);
• “Nurturing Self-directed Learning” in The Unofficial Guide to Unschooling, by Kathy Ishizuka (2000);
• “Education Can Lead the Way to a Sustainable Society” in Creating Learning Communities – Models, Resources, and New Ways of Thinking About Teaching and Learning, with Ron Miller (2000);
• “New Study Links Monsanto’s Roundup to Cancer” in Strategic Management, by Hanson et al. (2004);
• A Parent’s Guide to Home Schooling, with Tamra B. Orr (2002);
• “A Life of Learning: Empowering, Respecting, Trusting, Unschooling Children” in Turning Points: 27 Visionaries in Education Tell Their Own Stories, with Jerry Mintz & Carlo Ricci (2009);
• “There is Art in That Trash” in Global Viewpoints: Garbage and Recycling (2010);
• “Rooftop Power” in Leap Advanced, with Julia Williams (2013);
• The Legacy of John Holt, with Patrick Farenga (2013);
• A Path of their Own: Helping Children to Educate Themselves by Lael Whitehead (2014);
• Natural Born Learners: Unschooling and Autonomy in Education, with Beatrice Ekwa Ekoko (2014)

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