'My wife wants to teach our kids herself. I enrolled them in school behind her back.'

If you've never heard the term "crunchy mum", allow us to acquaint you.

A "crunchy" mother is someone who "follows a natural lifestyle and incorporates it into their parenting", according to Dictionary.com. She's the person in your life who avoids modern medicine and technology, and favours granola and organic foods. A bit of a sexist term, if you ask us — there are plenty of crunchy dads out there, too, and crunchy non-parents.

But what happens if you have one "crunchy" parent and one, well, not so crunchy — and they can't decide on the best way to raise their children? This is the dilemma facing one 36-year-old dad of six-year-old twins. His wife, 28, has "gone full crunchy mum mode" (his words, not ours) — and he has concerns.

"She's all about essential oils, no processed foods, cloth [nappies] when they were babies, and she's absolutely against anything mainstream," he said. And while he was once on board with this 'healthy' lifestyle, now "things are starting to get way out of control".

"The latest issue is that my wife is dead set on homeschooling the twins," the man shared on the sub-reddit r/AmITheAsshole. "She's convinced that public schools are 'toxic' and that our kids won't thrive in a system that's 'designed to make them little robots'. She even has a few friends in her crunchy mum group who homeschool their kids and she's been talking nonstop about joining their co-op," he wrote, later adding that she had been looking into 'unschooling'.

Haven't heard of that one either? According to Rebecca English, who teaches in the School of Teacher Education and Leadership at Queensland University of Technology's (QUT) Faculty of Education, unschooling is a type of homeschooling that rejects institutionalised forms of learning. Speaking to Mamamia, English quoted the world expert in unschooling, Gina Riley, and defined it as "any form of living and learning that does away with formalised, teacher-centred, curriculum-focused instruction and assessment.

"Unschooling does not support compartmentalised, discipline-focused learning," she said. "It's a 'whole of life' approach to learning that is led by the young person and their interests. It's not 'no education', because it requires an attunement between parents and the young person to uncover what that young person is interested in, what they want to learn and how they want to learn."

Basically, the parents and children work together to figure out the best way for the kiddos to learn.

You may be rolling your eyes and dismissing this as a "crunchy mum" fad, but English points to research that backs it up. "When kids are stressed, or unhappy, or feel unsafe, they can't learn," she told us. "And we know that the best way for learning to happen is for it to be self-directed."

However, the problem — which the troubled husband brought up with his wife — is the time and commitment that comes with homeschooling. He recalled "expressing his concerns" to his wife about this, and reminded her that he works full-time, and suggested she might find it it difficult to manage teaching two young children.

English agreed that the main problem with homeschooling "tends to be economic".

"There is a requirement, particularly when it's a child who's younger, for a parent to stay home with them," she said. "That means either one parent, in a two-parent family, gives up work or both parents go part time."

But whenever the "crunchy mum's" husband suggests sending the children to public school, his wife "shut it down immediately".

"[She says] she doesn't want the twins to get bullied or that we'll lose control of what they're learning," he wrote. "[But] I just don't think homeschooling is realistic and I can't see how she'll keep them on any sort of consistent schedule.

"The kids are constantly bored, and I've seen them starting to fall behind."

That's when he took matters into his own hands.

"I'm not proud to admit it but I went behind her back and enrolled the twins in public school for [autumn]," he wrote. "I told her a few weeks before school started and she absolutely lost it. She accused me of betraying her and said I was undermining her role as a mother. She keeps saying I don't trust her to raise our kids, which isn't true. I just don't think she's prepared to handle homeschooling and I don't want the twins to suffer because of it."

During the twins' first week of school, his wife insisted they were "miserable" and that he had "ruined their childhoods by forcing them into the system".

"The thing is, as far as I can tell, the twins actually loved their first week of school," he continued. "They've made friends and like their teacher. But my wife keeps insisting they're just pretending to like it to make me happy."

Now, the mother is planning to pull them out mid-year and go ahead with her homeschooling plans. But the husband is "putting [his] foot down".

"I want the best for my kids, and I honestly think public school is the right choice for them right now. My wife is making me feel like I'm the bad guy for going behind her back and forcing them into something she was so against," he finished the post.

This couple is definitely not alone when it comes to schooling vs. homeschooling debate. According to English, it is an argument that "comes up in family court all the time".

"I think the couple has to work it out and often the decision will be made through school refusal, and other associated issues with distress and trauma," she explained.

"There are many benefits of homeschooling for the child that experiences it, although again, I'm at pains to say it's not for everyone. Those benefits, and the costs if they can be borne by the family, are what need to be considered."

To conclude his dilemma, the dad asked his fellow Reddit users if he should have handled the situation differently, and confessed that he had been feeling guilty about the impact his actions have had on his wife.

"Keeping kids away from other children isn't fair," one user wrote. "You don't just learn math, reading, and science in school, but you also learn social skills and how to interact with all sorts of different people who are from different backgrounds and walks of life."

English, however, disagrees. "There is no evidence that homeschooled — in any form — young people have trouble reintegrating into traditional school later on or higher education," she told Mamamia.

In fact, research shows that "homeschoolers experience positive outcomes from the educational approaches (academic, social, emotional and it does not affect their future learning), regardless of the curriculum approach taken, with the likely positive effect being the interventions of the parent".

While many commenters dismissed the "crunchy mum", others defended homeschooling as a concept.

"There are homeschool groups so kids can still get socialisation, programs through local places like YMCAs, extracurricular activities that the kids have more time for," one user wrote.

"It sounds like your wife was utterly unprepared, but plenty of people do it properly and their kids excel in academics and life because of it."

Feature image: Getty.