Blog
S2E8 | The Math Myth: How Do Unschooled Kids Learn Math?
Cecilie, Sandra, and Sue examine the widespread belief that children can’t learn math without formal instruction — and explain why that belief doesn’t hold up.
Sometimes life is funky: Berlin May 2025
A funky morning of poetry, light and thoughts just outside of Berlin.
Behind and Beyond the Smartphone-Free Childhood
Is the smartphone really ruining the lives of tweens and teens? Do we need to protect them by keeping them away from the tool? The movement out there is big and it is fed frequently by the repetition of fearful statements.
Let me just remind us all, that fear is never a wise teacher. In the best of cases, fear is a signal to stay alert and to use our humanity: our cognition as well as our intuitive wisdom.
Let me just remind us all, that fear is never a wise teacher. In the best of cases, fear is a signal to stay alert and to use our humanity: our cognition as well as our intuitive wisdom.
S2E7 | Unschooling is Carried by Conversations
Dinner tables, car rides, bedtime chats, café corners—this episode dives into the real places where unschooling lives and grows. Cecilie Conrad, Sandra Dodd, and Sue Elvis examine how conversations—often unscheduled, informal, and unplanned—become the central structure of a learning life.
How we just LOVE life, and Live Love - Budapest April 2025
A morning reflection from Budapest on trusting life’s intensity, receiving what we need, and surrendering to the beauty hidden in challenges.
S2E6 | The Role of Repetition in Learning, Unschooling, and Shaping Identity
What’s the value of doing the same thing more than once? In this episode, Cecilie Conrad talks with Sandra Dodd and Sue Elvis about repetition in learning, parenting, and unschooling. From kids rewatching the same movie to adults collecting books or music, this conversation explores how revisiting familiar things supports understanding, comfort, and connection. The episode also looks at the role of repetition in games, art, and everyday routines—and how these patterns shape identity and shared f…
S2E5 | Sandra Dodd, Sue Elvis & Cecilie Conrad on Learning to Read & Trusting Unschooling
Sandra Dodd, Sue Elvis, and Cecilie Conrad come together to discuss their personal journeys into unschooling, focusing on natural learning, curiosity, and redefining educational expectations.
S2E4 | Unschooling: Trusting the Process and Letting Go of Control
Unschooling challenges the need for tests and timelines. Cecilie Conrad, Sue Elvis, and Sandra Dodd explore trust, natural learning, and letting go of control.
When it is All Mindset - March 2025 in Barcelona
Barcelona wasn’t sunsets and music. It was rain—21 out of 23 days of it. It was getting sick, the dogs getting sick, and working on personal projects. It was also a marathon we didn’t run but felt deeply, long stubbern walks instead of Ubers and the metro, culinary adventures in a kitchen with a holy view.
It was working with what is, and enjoying the process. It was Real Life in the Dreamlife.
It was working with what is, and enjoying the process. It was Real Life in the Dreamlife.
Barcelona Street Art - March 2025 in Barcelona
Street art is such a bold and brave form, throwing it up there in the shared space, creating a comment or a decoration or a critique or a combination for the shared culture, the shared commute, the shared conversation. Vulnerable and free, open for everyone to enjoy or hate, ready for whatever.Â
S2E3 | Unschooling and Connections: How Learning Is All About Creating a Web of Understanding
How kids learn math naturally through games, daily life, and problem-solving—without textbooks or worksheets. A deep dive into unschooling and real-world learning.
Video Games: Fear, Curiosity, and the Art of Listening
Most parents struggle with video games in one way or another. I hear this question all the time. Video games and "screen time" are some of the most talked-about themes in parenting conversations. Now, I am doing something about it. This is the first in a series on the subject. Join me for some basic thoughts and strategies on the subject.
The Snapshots we don't take and the impressions they leave - March 2025 in Barcelona
Barcelona wasn’t sunsets and music. It was rain—21 out of 23 days of it. It was getting sick, the dogs getting sick, and working on personal projects. It was also a marathon we didn’t run but felt deeply, long stubbern walks instead of Ubers and the metro, culinary adventures in a kitchen with a holy view.
It was working with what is, and enjoying the process. It was Real Life in the Dreamlife.
It was working with what is, and enjoying the process. It was Real Life in the Dreamlife.
Wrapping up the Focus Month - February 2025 in Southern France
A simple travel journal about how life is, and how it was exactly when we did a focus month in France.
S2E2 | Unschooling: Trust, Autonomy, and the Realities of Learning
What is unschooling? What is it not? And why defining it is so difficult? Sand Dodd, Sue Elvis and Cecilie Conrad explore how unschooling is not just about rejecting school but fundamentally shifting how families approach learning, trust, and daily life.
The Price of Unfreedom: How Managerialism Shapes Work, Childhood, and Life
What is the price of unfreedom? How does managerialism control our work, childhood, and daily lives? Inspired by our conversation with Dennis Nørmark, this reflection explores the impact of rigid structures on creativity, trust, and true freedom.
Rewriting Motherhood: Do We Need New Stories?
We live by the stories, we can imagine, we understand through the lens of eyes of heroes and victims and witches and kings and everyone else from the world of stories, we absorb through our lives. And I just realised, we REALLY need some new stories, or to re-tell some old ones. Do you know a good one?
Finhan and Montauban: Focus in France February 2025
In Finhan, where we live in February 2025, not much is happening. The church in the square strikes its hour, funnily enough, twice, so if you didn't quite remember to count the first time, you get another chance. Pretty nice. Pretty peaceful. Not even that to stress about. The pigeons take off poetically from the open bell tower, audibly flapping their wings across the usually completely blue sky, in the silence their shared wingbeats are a whisper of presence.
It's nice to just be.
It's nice to just be.
S2E1 | Unschooling: A Lifestyle of Curiosity, Flexibility, and Trust with Sandra Dodd and Sue Elvis
In this first episode of season two of The Ladies Fixing the World, we explore the philosophy and practicalities of unschooling and showcase its transformative impact on families. Together, we examine the deeper aspects of learning, the importance of trust, and the joy of nurturing curiosity without the constraints of conventional education.
The Truth of the North: Winter Blues Denmark January 2025
How did we end up in Scandinavia mid-winter, and why did we need to see that contrast? How life crashes suddenly, like hitting a tree on the side of the road while driving on a beautiful journey - just because of the quality of life. What we learned, and why we leave.
Where are we now?
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Hi, I'm Cecilie Conrad
Cancer-surviving psychologist, former single-parent; co-sleeping, yogi, gluten-free, primarily plant-eating; happily married, stay-at-home, organic barefooted hippie and mother of four, living in a bus, knitting teddy bears and learning languages, counseling and enjoying sunsets.
Coaching: Do You Need My Help?
I advise personally and from the heart, present and releasing. I know the way out of the darkness and the frustrations, the way to your true self, the way you must go to live an amazing life.
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