Unschooling: DIY education for children. Your comments?

[elehhhhna]

In the link they suggest that up to 1-% of homeschooled children are 'unschooling"...


No school, no books, no teacher's dirty looks
By Traci Tamura and Thelma Gutierrez
CNN
(CNN) -- It's a child's dream. Wake up whenever you want, with nobody telling you what to do and when to do it. And here's the kicker: No school to rush off to.

Welcome to the world of "unschooling" -- an educational movement where kids, not parents, not teachers, decide what they will learn that day.

"I don't want to sound pompous, but I think I am learning a little bit more, because I can just do everything at my own pace," said Nailah Ellis, a 10-year-old from Marietta, Georgia, who has been unschooled for most of her life.

Nailah's day starts about 11 a.m., her typical wake-up time. She studies Chinese, reading, writing, piano and martial arts. But there's no set schedule. She works on what she wants, when she wants. She'll even watch some TV -- science documentaries are a favorite -- until her day comes to an end about 2 a.m.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/01/27/gutierrez.unschooing/index.html?section=cnn_us

[rzemanfl]

1. As soon as I saw this yesterday I sent the link to my 26 year-old

son, telling him that there was now a name for how he did Junior High and High School.

[madaboutharry]

2. And she will be so well prepared

for the real world. NOT!

[Matariki]

4. if by prepared you mean obedient, sure

i'll bet she'll do just fine. sounds like she's learned to be self motivated.

my ex-brother-in-law, a musician, homeschools his kids - in the sort of laid back way the article describes and both his kids are brilliant and self motivated. They actually LOVE learning instead of equating it with disciplinary action. I guess people's experiences will vary.

[madaboutharry]

12. Obedient was not what I was thinking.

n/t

[Matariki]

17. what were you thinking?

my impression of your post was that the person never had the public school experience and thus wouldn't be able to deal with a 9-5 job. did you mean something else?

[morningglory]

20. I am thinking bright children are bored to tears at school, go home and

play video games till they are all going to end up with tenonitis of the thumb. No one is prepared for a 9-5 job, it kills the human spirit.

[Matariki]

26. ah, we're in agreement then

i thought you were saying that the girls home education, where she get's to pick topics of study which interest her, wake at noon, study a few hours, travel as part of her education, would leave her ill equipted for 'the real world'.

guess i misunderstood.

[The2ndWheel]

41. And who created that world?

The people who created the schools to prepare the kids for it.

[Salviati]

3. IMO it can be fine...

but they should be held to the same standards as public schools.

If we are going to say that public schools are failing our students because they perform poorly on standardized tests, then these students should be held to the same standards. If they can't make the grade, then this method is obviously failing them...

(And I have no doubt that the vast majority of "unstudents" would do abysmally on any assessment of their learning, the rare autodidact out there notwithstanding...)

[Warpy]

9. Really? I was an autodidact who took up space in a classroom

but who vehemently refused to take part in the boring, plodding school work going on around me. Just leave me in the back with my stack of books and I'll be well behaved. Teachers who tried to force me to conform only tried it once.

I did very, very well on all the tests they threw at me.

It depends on the kid and yes, I'd have appreciated a little direction from time to time. However, I learned at a very early age that school was there to bring the biggest dunderhead in the class up to an acceptable level and that the process was sheer torture for me, since I was a kid who always wanted to race ahead.

My advice is to look at what kind of kid you've got. The kid in this story sounds a lot like me, interested in just about everything and willing to pursue it all. Unschooling would work very well for her. It did for me.

[Extend a Hand]

5. The Summerhill school - 'democratic school'

is often credited with starting the 'unschooling' idea.
It seems like the opportunities to explore areas with experts and
other interested students would be kind of limited in a home school environment.


I wish I could send my son to Sudbury Valley.

These links give good descriptions of the environment or typical day
at Sudbury Valley and Summerhill
http://www.sudval.org/01_abou_09.html

http://www.summerhillschool.co.uk/pages/about_summerhill.html

[LWolf]

15. I've always wanted to

WORK at a Sudbury School. My career in public ed has been spent, up to this point, in schools offering an alternative structure to "traditional." I like it that way. I can see kids benefitting. They'd benefit more if we could reduce the student-teacher ratio, and if there were more flexibility in curriculum. Acknowledging that not every person needs to learn the same set of skills, the same way, at the same pace, would be a good place for public ed to begin. Of course, the current "standards and accountability" movement is the antithesis of this, and another Orwellian label for destructive policies.

[LeftyMom]

6. We unschool.

It works for us. :) If it didn't, we'd try something else.

[GreenPartyVoter]

7. We do both in that our kids go to public school but we also

supplement at home by helping them learn more about whatever they are interested in at any given moment. Best of both worlds if you ask me. :)

[elehhhhna]

8. Same here.

[GreenPartyVoter]

10. I imagine that is the case in many families.

[proud2BlibKansan]

44. You sound like a very smart parent, Green!

:toast:

[GoddessOfGuinness]

11. I've seen schools that unschool...

They're called Sudbury model schools. Here's a link to the one I visited.
http://www.fairhavenschool.com/

I didn't see much point in spending big$$$ for something I could do at home. But that doesn't mean someone else's kids don't thrive in the environment better than anywhere else.

We all learn differently. I think it's exciting that there are so many options, and refuse to succumb to the "this or that method sucks" mindset.

[October]

13. We home school...and we're liberal..it's the newest trend perhaps

I looked into un-schooling, but settled instead on a curriculum that met our needs. I think I was a bit nervous about the whole "un schooling" thing.

Still, it's nice to have the freedom to add all kinds of enrichment to the core teachings, etc., so I guess there's a little bit of un-schooling with most home schooler families.

We're not religious -- we bought a secular curriculum.

We home school because our daughter is an aspiring ballerina and she dances more than 25 hours per week. Our young son is a Visual-spatial learner, and the school basically said "Maybe this isn't the right place for him." It's a small district, and they basically don't "accommodate" anyone outside the box. (He's happy as can be now! He plays 3 instruments, and he's only 8. He memorizes Mozart, Bach, Beethoven and Haydn piano pieces with ease. Honestly, I always thought he'd be like the perfect "school kid" and that he'd fit right in. WRONG. He was bored out of his mind in school. He's extremely outgoing, high IQ, but he's a divergent thinker -- non-linear.

Still, his one History course was awesome this year (3rd grade), covering Ancient Greece and Rome -- and the Middle Ages -- but it totally SKIPPED the Crusades! (I added a 3rd-grade level course on the subject because I thought this particular program, while it covered early Christianity as well as the beginnings of the Islamic religion, I thought it was a wee bit dishonest to jump over that part of history. But there we were starting into the Italian Renaissance with nary a word about the Crusades.)

I've never been against public (or private) schools, this is just what works for us.

We hired our high school math teacher to tutor our daughter in Algebra 2, because he's awesome and she deserves more than I can offer! She gets one-on-one tutoring with him, and is really getting a great math education! He is well paid, too!!! :) LOL (He deserves it!)

[Solo_in_MD]

19. Some home schooling to be incompatible with being progresive,

Stories like your show that it clearly not the case. Its not just for fundies anymore

[October]

25. Thanks for the support. I've explained our position often on DU

Admittedly, I was once one of those who thought home schooling was for religious fundie types only, but let's just say I got an education! :)

When you give it a little thought, you can see that it's a natural match for progressives.

[elehhhhna]

24. Sounds like you reallyl have it together--

the algebra tutor is a brilliant idea.

[LWolf]

14. I think

that if home environment and parent ed level were an equal playing field, this would work ok; as it is, kids with the right home environment can thrive, and a large majority would not.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

16. Sounds Cool. Anything Past 3rd Grade I Learned On My Own.

School did shit for me. I was a social promotion from high school and was on Dishonor roll every marking period. I never did homework and haven't done a book report in my life. Didn't need to. I learned what I needed to learn on my own and have done just fine. :) (course, i'm also a genius LOL)

[SmokingJacket]

18. I'm sure it depends of the family.

I'd go crazy if my kid was up til 2 am, though!!!!

I had a kind of crazy, disorganized home life, and I just **loved** the rituals and routines of school. I enjoyed my teachers and liked getting away from my mother. I'm very glad I wasn't unschooled -- I read constantly and learned outside of school anyway, still do...

[Kerrytravelers]

21. Good thing she doesn't have any processing or auditory disorders...

I'm a special ed teacher, I think about those things.

[lostnfound]

22. Almost finished reading 'Dumbing Us Down'; fascinating stuff.

I'm sure you've heard of it, if you are asking this question.

'Unschooling' is tempting, and a little frightening, too.

The author has many good points.

[RPM]

23. I did that....

just as soon as i came home from my real school.

[jazzjunkysue]

27. I'm only certified to teach my daughter music, so I let the public school

teach her everything else.

I think it's wonderful that so many parents are certified to teach literature, algebra, trig, calculus, geometry, physics, chemistry, biology, US history, Global history, physical education, art, sociology, french, italian, music, grammar, composition, and media/library skills.

I think it's just wonderful.

Can we employ all these multi-talented parents in the public schools, so all their wealth of knowlege and expertise can be shared with more than their 2.5 kids? It seems like such a waste.

I'd be willing to pay these people 5 times the regular salary, since they're able to teach every child every subject at every age, and prepare every child for work or college.

I hope they'll also share their secrets of their training so we can prepare all of our teachers to teach every subject to every child.

[LeftyMom]

28. The idea isn't to teach a child everything the need to know

the idea is to facilitate the acquisition of that knowledge by finding a tutor or mentor, books on the subject or whatever other instruction the child needs when their desire to learn surpasses the parent's ability to teach.

Interestingly, the homeschooled children of certified teachers do not do significantly better by any measure than those whose parents are not certified educators. Both groups do better than public school students by nearly every measure.

[jazzjunkysue]

29. Right. So, we'll just close all the school and fire all the teachers.

Great plan.

[LeftyMom]

30. Did you read a post I didn't type?

Unschooling is just another educational option, like mainstream public schools, alternative public schools, charters, parochial school, non-religious private schools...

I for one like that all those options are available to choose from (well I'm not so crazy about some of the charters around here, but that's another thread.) Do I think more families would benefit from the decision to homeschool and possibly to unschool? Absolutely. Do I think everybody or even most families should? No.

[jazzjunkysue]

32. So, your kid matches the median scores for the whole country.

That puts him/her in between Beverly Hills and the Kentucky mountains. Between ivy league kids and inner city/immigrants.

Those averages are really low, and mediocre. I didn't want to say that about your kid, but that's what they are.

Being as good as the national mean means your kid will likely not get into a good college or succeed in one.

If your own kids are an exception, that's great for them. But we should not accept the mediocre as good enough, when chances are, lots of home schooled kids have access to decent or good schools, but their parents deprive them of the opportunity to attend.

If your local schools are any good at all, I think it's criminal to keep your kids out of them. It's not fair to take it all away from them. They deserve access to their nation's schools and the programs and materials and social interaction they provide.


It's irresponsible to promote home schooling as "good enough."

[LeftyMom]

33. Pardon me, did you just call me criminal?

Fuck off. Really.

Homeschooled kids do better than publicly schooled kids on tests that public schooled kids are trained to take at the expense of the rest of their education. They interact with a broad cross-section of the community rather than a heterogeneous group of thirty kids of similar age and economic background from their subdivision. They are considered highly desirable students by good universities, have a higher business ownership rate than their publicly schooled peers and are more likely to get and stay married.

It's an enviable record of achievement. Clean up your own house and get back to me.

[jazzjunkysue]

36. Apparently, home schooling doesn't teach the golden rule:

At least in public schools, we don't allow bullying or profanity.

[denese]

37. Are you kidding me?

No bullying or profanity in your public school???
What part of Utopia are you in?

[jazzjunkysue]

40. I was insulted by the teacher, and that, we don't permit.

[LeftyMom]

46. Hey, I went to public schools

You may not allow them, but they certainly do happen.

[proud2BlibKansan]

45. LOL My sentiments exactly

[bumblebee1]

31. Whenever I hear the term Unschooling

I get the impression that the kid learns what they want when they damn well feel like it. My one question is: What happens when that kid gets out into the work world and finds out that everything will not be set up to suit his/her fancy?

[kath]

34. read up on the Sudbury Valley School and others like it - their grads

have done quite well over more than 30 years.

[electron_blue]

35. I think with the right parents, it could work fine. I don't expect that is

very often. Sounds like that student is doign fine, though.

[rman]

38. Not as a *replacement* of schooling,

but good to counter educational propaganda.

[countingbluecars]

39. I wish I could unjob.

Wake up whenever I want with nobody telling me what to do and when to do it.


But seriously, if this is what parents prefer for their children-fine-as long as those parents continue to pay taxes to fund public schools.

[Luminous Animal]

42. We unschooled our daughter.

She'll be 16 in a couple of weeks. She's been enrolled in community college the past 2 and half years taking 2 classes each semester, she has music lessons and practices an hour a day without prodding. She signs up for several workshops a week at two local youth writers workshops, (826 Valencia and Youth Speaks) and she takes art classes and the Academy of Art University. Also, she is in a band and she works 8 hours a week splitting her time between a graphic design office and an architect's office where she has learned to use Photoshop, InDesign and Quark.

The purpose of unschooling is to facilitate the exploration of a child's interests and passions... to aid them to become active seekers of knowledge.

[proud2BlibKansan]

43. Sounds like great training for adulthood

Wake up whenever you want, go to work and do whatever you want and then stay up as late as you want.

Everyone knows that is how all working stiffs live, right?