Grace Llewellyn's bio
Updated January 2004
(In the first
person, because I wrote it, as did most people whose bios are written in the
third person. If you are in need of a more normal--and shorter--bio, please hop
to the bottom of this page. Also there is a similar but slightly different
bio on the Lowry House Publishers website, here.)
I
live in Eugene, Oregon and my career since 1990 (after a 3-year
schoolteaching experiment) has mostly lumped together under the umbrella of
"unschooling advocate." I've written, co-written, and edited 4 books, spoken to groups
and conferences, given workshops, directed a resource center, produced a mail
order book catalog, published a newsletter, written articles, and run a summer
camp--all with the purpose of helping people (mostly teenagers) take more
control of their own lives and educations. I also perform and occasionally teach bellydance,
and though my dancing has taken a backseat to my other work, it's important to
me also.
So
far my biggest "achievement," and the reason for my fame in some pockets of
strange folk, is a book I wrote in 1991 when I was 26
and basically a teenager myself: The Teenage Liberation Handbook: how to quit
school and get a real life and education. (It's now available in a revised
and expanded international 1998 edition.) I've edited Real Lives: eleven teenagers who don't go to school
and
Freedom Challenge: African American Homeschoolers. And, I co-authored
(with Amy Silver) Guerrilla Learning: how to get your kids a real education
with or without school. .
One
of my biggest ongoing projects is Not Back to
School Camp, an exuberant and inspiring week-long camp for unschooled
teenagers. My therapist friend Taber Shadburne co-directs with me, and we hold two sessions (up to
around 100 campers each) in late August/early September, and a third session in West
Virginia in later September or October. It's awesome! Kids' and staffers' lives are
changed, and we sing and dance and swim and cry and carry on and learn and teach
each other all kinds of great stuff. Registration is now open for 2004--this
will be our 9th year.
I
also am available for bellydancing performances. And transformative, fun "performance magic" and
"dance magic" workshops for non-dancers and
dancers, male and female, kids and grownups--everybody. My workshops are
complementary additions to more cerebral or sedentary events; they are
emotionally challenging (i.e. scary), help people connect with each other
through the medium of their bodies, get all kinds of juices flowing, and are
lots of fun!
photo
taken in Jhunjhunu, Rajasthan, India, June 2004
For links to interviews with
me and articles about my work, click here.
This is me writing the Teenage Liberation Handbook, in 1990.
a
more normal bio
Grace Llewellyn taught school for three years before
unschooling herself and writing The
Teenage Liberation Handbook. She
has since edited Real Lives: eleven teenagers who don’t go to school
and Freedom Challenge: African American Homeschoolers, and written Guerrilla
Learning: How to Give Your Kids a Real Education With or Without School (with
co-author Amy Silver). She now directs the annual international Not
Back to School Camp for unschooled teenagers and gets her hands into
numerous other projects. An avid bellydance student, performer, and teacher, she
lives in Eugene, Oregon.
Photo
-- January 2004
There is also a slightly
different official bio of me on the Lowry House Publishers website, here.
