We often think of tidying as a skill that must be drilled into children—another responsibility for parents to enforce alongside table manners and bedtime routines. Yet what if tidying is less about constant reminders and more something absorbed through experience, modelling, and natural curiosity? Much like learning to read, children don’t necessarily need pressure to “perform” tidiness; they need an environment that makes it visible, meaningful, and available to them when they’re ready. In this post, I want to explore what it looks like to treat tidying as part of a child’s organic learning process—mess and all—and why trusting the slow, sometimes chaotic unfolding of this skill might be one of the most surprising gifts we can offer.
Tidying Up as a Kind of Literacy
It struck me that tidying, like reading, is something we often imagine must be taught. Most of us grew up with tidying being directed by adults—“Put that away, clear the table, tidy your room.” It’s easy to assume that if we don’t push it, children won’t learn it.
But what if tidying is more like reading? What if our job isn’t to enforce it, but to surround our children with opportunities—to let them see us do it, to feel the satisfaction of a freshly cleared surface, and to watch tidying being a natural part of the rhythm of life?
Just as with books, sometimes they want to explore and sometimes they don’t. And just as children eventually learn to read because it opens the world for them, I suspect many children eventually choose tidiness because it serves them.
The Whirlwind Child
Our six-year-old has always been the mess-maker of the family. If I asked him to tidy, he’d only resist harder. So we chose not to ask. And then, surprisingly, he became the very child who occasionally launches himself into full-scale cleaning missions. I’ll turn around and he’s scrubbing dishes, or rearranging the fridge, or happily hoovering with true dedication. He doesn’t see it as “my job” or as “a chore”—it’s just something real and purposeful that he’s chosen to do.
And when it comes from him, it isn’t begrudging or resentful. It’s wholehearted and joyful.
Living in the Mess Together
I won’t pretend that living with three whirlwinds is easy. Our home is almost always in a state of creative chaos, and sometimes that really tests our patience. It can feel like I’m endlessly swimming against the tide. But alongside that daily challenge, I notice something deeper growing: our children are slowly gaining their own sense of when and why order matters.
One day, when they have their own spaces, they’ll get to decide what “tidy” means to them. And I suspect, like most of us, they’ll find their own balance—because living in clutter only feels fun for so long.
Trusting the Process
So, for now, I’m choosing to lean into trust. Trust that tidiness, like reading, will come in its own time. Trust that by setting an example, creating a relaxed atmosphere, and leaving space for choice, our children are already learning.
It won’t look like a perfectly kept home. In fact, it mostly looks like a bomb site at our house. The typical day includes art supplies everywhere, sticky fingerprints on the windows, and an array of toys on every floor and surface. But beneath that surface, something more lasting is being built: the freedom to choose, the security of not being pressured, and the knowledge that every skill—even the “mundane” ones—can be joyfully discovered instead of painfully drilled.
The Balance Between Parental Guidance and Child Autonomy
Radical unschooling often gets framed as “children run the show.” In reality, it’s more nuanced. Parents still play a deeply active role—not as enforcers, but as guides, role models, and trusted companions. When it comes to tidying, that means showing our children what order looks like, why it matters to us, and how it can make life flow more smoothly. But instead of demanding tidiness on our timetable, we trust them to try it on for size when they’re ready.
It’s a dance: we quietly model what’s meaningful, they experiment with it in their own way. What grows out of that is not compliance, but a genuine sense of autonomy paired with respect for the shared space we live in.
Distinguishing Radical Unschooling from Unparenting
One of the common pushbacks to radical unschooling is the assumption that it means “anything goes”—that parents check out entirely. But in practice, it’s almost the opposite. Radical unschooling requires parents to be more present, more observant, more attuned to their children’s needs. The difference is that the guidance comes through relationship rather than rules, through trust rather than control.
When it comes to tidying, this looks like recognizing that children notice our rhythms far more than our reminders. They don’t grow up in a vacuum; they grow up immersed in a culture of family life. Our job isn’t to force order, but to steadily offer the experience of it.
How Unconditional Trust can Lead to Natural Development of Life Skills
Many of us hesitate at the idea of “trusting” children with something as practical as tidying. What if they never learn? What if they always resist? But time and again, unschooling shows how, given space, children usually reach their own healthy balance.
When children reach for tidying on their own terms, it’s no longer a hollow rule kept for someone else—it becomes a skill they value because they’ve felt its real purpose. Just the other day, my daughters insisted that I stay out of their bedrooms until they called me in. I’ll admit, I felt a wave of anxiety. That very morning, the dining table had been buried under a “magical concoction” of food and non-food creations, most of it spilling onto the floor. I braced myself, imagining they simply didn’t want me to see the chaos they were about to unleash in their bedrooms.
But in the end, they never did call me in—because they forgot. Later, I discovered that instead of making a mess, they had both tidied and even vacuumed their bedrooms together. Wanting to acknowledge their effort without turning it into a performance for praise, I simply noted that I’d seen what they’d done. That opened the door for conversation, and my youngest, just six years old, smiled and said she had actually enjoyed it.
Messy Moments, Honest Conversations
Of course, it isn’t always easy. There are days when the house feels overwhelming, when exhaustion makes flexibility harder, or when guests are coming and order suddenly matters more urgently. In those moments, I often wrestle with the temptation to lapse into commands. And sometimes, yes, I do step in and tidy more forcefully than I’d like.
The challenge is finding a way to preserve the heart of unschooling even when structure feels necessary—by explaining my own needs openly (“I really need the kitchen clear to cook dinner”) instead of masking them as rules (“You must clear this because I said so”). Messy as it is, these negotiations are where children see honesty, empathy, and responsibility in action.
Comparing Radical Unschooling to Gentle Parenting Principles
Radical unschooling and gentle parenting share a foundational respect for children. Both approaches resist using fear or punishment as teaching tools, and instead emphasise connection, modelling, and partnership over authority.
The key difference lies in structure. Gentle parenting often maintains certain rhythms—like set bedtimes or regular clean-up routines—while radical unschooling leans further into freedom, trusting children to find their own balance.
In our family, we fall closer to the gentle parenting side when it comes to bedtimes. As parents of three, we need the predictability of knowing when our children will be asleep so we have time to rest ourselves. But when it comes to tidying and cleaning, we lean more toward the radical unschooling perspective. We trust that our children will gradually take on these responsibilities when they’re ready, and that as they grow into their own homes, they will naturally want their spaces to feel clean and comfortable.
This distinction is most visible around tidying: gentle parenting might encourage a daily “tidy-up together” routine, while radical unschooling leaves tidiness to ebb and flow organically, in self-directed bursts. Both styles are rooted in respect, but they diverge in how much daily structure they see as necessary.
The Role of the Home Environment in Unschooling
A home that practices radical unschooling is often visibly lived-in. The mess can be a natural byproduct of active, curious children exploring. But the environment also plays a quiet role in shaping attitudes toward tidiness. Clear shelves, baskets, or inviting “landing spots” for toys and projects can make tidying easier without turning it into a rule.
What matters is that the environment communicates possibility, not pressure—a sense that order is always available, waiting like an open book on the table. Over time, children come to see tidiness not as imposed from outside, but as one of the many rhythms of family life they can freely step into.
How children internalise tidying skills without direct instruction
Most of us didn’t learn to tidy because someone lectured us; we learned it because we lived alongside it. Children naturally absorb patterns of behaviour: the way someone always wipes the counter after making tea, or how the table gets cleared before dinner. These small rituals make an impression, even when no words are spoken.
I’ve seen how, after cleaning the fridge, my son was fascinated with why I would do that. Soon after, he cleaned the fridge twice in one week. Not because I told him to, but because he felt the subtle pull of order, and wanted to experiment with it himself. That’s the hidden power of learning by observation: skills seep in sideways, quietly, until children choose to pick them up.
Moving Home: Your Own Garden Space & Your Own Home Space
As we look forward to moving, I keep returning to Gordon Neufeld’s memory—how tending his own garden plot brought a joy and sense of ownership that chores inside the house rarely did. That gift of real responsibility with real freedom is something I want to carry into our new home.
When our children step into their new bedrooms and sections of the garden, we’ll offer them the same invitation: “This is yours. Care for it in your way.” My hope is that by giving them space to claim ownership without pressure, tidiness will cease feeling like something imposed from the outside, but instead like the natural extension of loving and living in their own space.
Perhaps, years from now, they’ll look around their homes—their gardens, their desks, their kitchens—and feel the same joy Gordon felt in his garden, not because they were drilled into tidying, but because somewhere along the way, tidiness became part of who they are.
Gentle Parent 