Teaching My Daughters to Love Learning — Without Tests or Grades

If you’ve read how I learned to surf with my four daughters here, or how we negotiate international travel plans without totally losing it here, or even how we made an agreement to try something new every month as a family here, then you already know: learning in our family doesn’t usually happen in a classroom. We are open to new things... always )

It happens in flour-dusted kitchens, under skatepark floodlights, in broken-Spanish conversations in tiny mountain towns, and in those beautifully messy, chaotic, curious moments of real life.

Because somewhere along the way, I realised something: the best kind of learning happens when no one is grading you. I with I know it before....

"Wait, This Counts As Learning?"

It started with banana bread. Actually, with bad banana bread. My second daughter, Lily, wanted to bake something "by herself" at age nine. She did, and it was... unique. Flat, dense, borderline inedible. But she was so proud of it. She made everyone eat it (we did, bravely), and then she asked, "How can I make it better?"

And just like that, she became a scientist.

The next week, she was watching YouTube videos about baking chemistry. She learned about baking soda vs. powder, about gluten and crumb structure, about oven hot spots. Suddenly, she was converting grams to ounces, calculating ratios, and talking about Maillard reactions.

"Wait," she said one afternoon, mid-measuring, "does this count as learning?"

"Are you kidding?" I said. "You're basically a pastry chemist!!"

No Homework, No Pressure, Just Curiosity

We started following their interests wherever they went. No pressure. No syllabus. Just a sense of "let's see where this leads."

One week, it was learning basic Arabic phrases before a trip to Morocco.

Another week, it was how to build a birdhouse out of reclaimed wood.

Then it was learning to sew buttons. Then programming a simple video game. Then hand-lettering. Then calligraphy. Then beatboxing.

Our dining table became a creative lab. You might find a loaf of sourdough proofing next to an origami zoo. There was the year we learned five new card games in five languages. The time we watched tutorials on how to fold clothes like Marie Kondo (they lasted one week neatly folded, but hey, we tried).

We built Lego robots. We started a herb garden in old paint cans. We made stop-motion animation films with an old iPad and paper cut-outs. It was really fun :)

There were no grades. Just stories.

"Remember when we accidentally planted cilantro instead of parsley and didn’t realize until it was in the salad?"

That’s a lesson. Maybe not the kind you’d find in a textbook, but a lesson all the same.

Surfing, Skateboards, and Stumbling Through Spanish

I used to think learning had to come with some kind of result. A certificate. A test. A polished product. But I changed my mind somewhere off the coast of Portugal, trying to stand up on a surfboard for the fifth time while my youngest yelled, "You almost had it, Dad!"

We weren’t there to win anything. We were there to try something. To fail forward. To laugh.

It was the same when two of my daughters took up skateboarding in San Diego. I signed them up for lessons through local skate school, and it quickly became one of the most empowering experiences they’ve ever had. There were no grades. Just concrete, scraped knees, high-fives, and tiny victories like "I landed it!" or "I only fell twice today!"

Skateboarding taught them persistence, balance, risk-taking. And more importantly, it taught them they could be beginners without being embarrassed.

"I Want to Learn That Too"

One of the most beautiful side effects of this no-grades approach is what I call the "contagious curiosity effect."

When one of them gets into something, the others start saying, "Hey, I want to learn that too."

Lily’s baking obsession led her younger sister, Zoe, to learn food photography. Suddenly, we had plated desserts and light reflectors made from tinfoil. When Ava started journaling in French (her new favorite language), her older sister joined Duolingo "just to beat her streak."

I never told them they had to learn those things. They just saw their sister having fun learning something, and they wanted in. And guess what? That’s exactly how adults work too.

We learn better when we’re inspired, not obligated.

What I’ve Learned (By Accident) As a Dad

I’ve been the student too. I started learning new languages again, one after another. I’m up to 11 now (some fluently, some "just enough to get into trouble"). And every time I practice, the girls are watching.

I started taking photos, writing little daily reflections, and saying "yes" to things I didn’t fully understand yet. Not because I wanted to be great at them. But because I wanted to stay open.

Learning without pressure has changed our whole family dynamic. It’s made us more collaborative. Less perfectionist. More playful.

We praise effort over outcome. We laugh at failures. We celebrate trying.

Our house is full of unfinished projects. That used to bother me. Now it feels like a sign of life.

No Tests, Just Trust

If there’s one takeaway from all this, it’s this: you don’t need a lesson plan to teach your kids how to love learning.

You just need to follow their lead, say "yes" more often than "no," and be willing to try weird things with them.

Let them see you fail. Let them teach you something. Let them explore without needing to get a gold star at the end.

Learning isn’t about getting it right.

It’s about getting curious.

And if you're lucky, it's about doing that with the people you love most.

Coming Up Next...

We’re currently learning about astronomy (we watched a lunar eclipse in pajamas at 3am) and sign language (thanks to a YouTube channel Lily found). No one’s grading us. No one’s testing us. But we’re learning. Together.

And isn’t that the point?

Tell me what do you think about it in comments :)