If you have a child who is learning things on their own simply because they are interested and not because you created them, then your child is engaged in pleasure-driven learning. This type of learning should go on your child’s transcript as wellalong with things they are studying formally with a text or something similar, even though they are not using any books!

To keep track of what your child has done and translate it into a course, keep a list of all their learning activities, group them together, label each group as a class, and then put that class on their transcript. That sounds big, so let’s break it down into smaller parts, using my sticky note strategy.

Divide a yellow sticky note into nine small boxes. For each, name an educational experience/activity your child has had that you are trying to figure out how to record.

Note the year his son did the activity. That gives you an idea of ​​what the end date was.

Estimate your range. Think about whether they completed that experience to your satisfaction.

Estimate credit value. Write the approximate number of hours they were doing it or the value of the credit if you know the value of the credit. If you know two hundred hours have passed on the swim team, that’s what you would put in that credits section.

Brainstorm the topic areas for the activity If ballet is the activity, maybe the course could be physical education or maybe fine arts. Maybe your child practices three different types of dance, such as ballet, hula, and swing dancing; she may be able to combine all of that into a class called Physical Education or Fine Arts.

Group activities together. Look for similarities and match things that are similar into groups. Put those groups together in a course, to form a full credit. Think about what kinds of things you could group under generic headings. Maybe your student is interested in home economics, so you put everything you do related to cooking, cleaning, or babysitting into one course. If your child seems to do a lot of art, bundle their sewing or craft activities for an art credit. Maybe they get paid for whatever they do or work for. In that case, that credit could be called ‘Occupational Education’. Sometimes you are not really sure what your child is learning, because he is speaking in foreign languages ​​like C++ or Java, and he doesn’t know what it means. In that case, you could call your courses ‘Technology’ or ‘Computer Class’.

Be sure to give your child credit for the learning they do on their own, not just the activities you assign them and test them on. Delight-led learning is real learning that has a place on your child’s transcript.