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Schooling, Homeschooling, and Now, "Unschooling"
ciaohound writes "The Baltimore Sun has a story about 'unschooling,' which is like homeschooling except, well, without the schooling. '...unschooling incorporates every facet of a child's life into the education process, allowing a child to follow his passions and learn at his own pace, year-round. And it assumes that an outing at the park — or even hours spent playing a video game — can be just as valuable a teaching resource as Hooked on Phonics.' If you have ever been forced to sit in a classroom where no learning was taking place, you may understand the appeal. A driving force behind the movement is parents' dissatisfaction with regular schools, and presumably with homeschooling as well. Yet few researchers are even aware of unschooling and little research exists on its effectiveness. Any Slashdotters who have experience with 'unschooling?'"
Sounds like a fancy name for goofing off, skiving and truancy.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Old fashioned good parenting. At dinner time, I'd make a game of learning, with Q&A, and they loved it. It's taking the time to answer your kids' questions and satisfy their innate curiosity, rather than stifling it like the public school system does. A walk in the park CAN be a learning experience.
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These parents are in for a nasty shock when their precious snowflakes head off to university and can't get in. What you will discover, and many homeschooling parents have already found out, is that they don't care how good a job you think you did or how proud you are. You pass their various admissions tests, or you go somewhere else. They are not at all interested in your ideas of how education should be. Your reading comprehension, writing, and math skills had better be up to spec or you are sent packing.
The kid is only in school for 6 hours in the day. Use the other 8-10 of their non-sleep hours to do this stuff. School isn't a substitute for parenting, and it shouldn't be their only source of learning.
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If children don't spend hour after endless hour sitting behind a desk in the classroom, how are they going to adapt to spending hour after endless hour sitting behind a desk in the cubicle?
"Unschooling: For those kids who aspire to be the dish washers of the future"
But seriously, is there any less way to be prepared for higher education (higher, meaning anything from 3rd grade on up)?
Given the number of children in the current system that aren't remotely prepared...?
Good parents would do well with this, poor parents terribly. If only there were a way to decide who gets to do this.... but then who gets to decide? We can't, that's who.
I've taught before, I know there are both kinds of parents out there. If you're pessimistic about this you probably had the bad parents, optimistic you probably had the good ones.
Think of how the kid feels - learning what's needed and being interested in what's being learned. The only fear I have is that lots of kids are forced to take certain classes, learn that they actually like it, and have a happy and successful career. We just need a guarantee that the students will be exposed to more than just their interests, and then I won't have a problem with this.
actively use everything as a teaching tool, then fine, otherwise it's just creating a steaming pile of ignorant burger flippers.
Of course, if they were already doing that, then the school system would be fine.
Most homeschoolers I know are people who aren't sociable and just don't want to deal with the daily social 'grind' of dealing with people. Also they ahve some fear the child will be exposed to something outside there own beliefs. Political or theological.
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The trouble is "guidance". I agree that a committed, competent, organized parent could probably pull this off, and end up with a very well-rounded and well-educated child. After all, the parent-teacher ratio is fantastic, and there are no discipline problems with "you're not my Mom, I don't have to do what you tell me to".
But, to succeed (at either college admissions or finding a desirable non-college job), a student has to have a balance of useful skills. If the parent lacks those skills, lacks the tools, or lacks the commitment to teach and promote those skills within their child, this could turn out really badly for the child.
There are lots of parents who are smart and organized enough to do this. There are a bunch who are ambitious enough to do it. There are some that are even committed enough to see it through. There are a few that have the time to do it. Unfortunately, there are just a small number with all four traits. We pay for Waldorf school for our daughter because I feel the method of education is worth the cost. I don't think we could take on this kind of task ourselves, though, which is why we chose what we feel is the best method then "hired experts" to do the heavy lifting.
I'm not saying home/non-schooling should be disallowed, but it's in society's best interests to educate as many kids as we can to the highest level we can reasonably achieve. So if a parent wants to do this, I'd say they should have to demonstrate the skills and commitment, then they can receive support, assistance, and above all constructive progress monitoring and feedback.
After all, if a parent succeeds, they've saved the school district a significant amount of money. It's well worth taking the parents who are willing and able to do this and supporting them as a volunteer force to take care of their own kids.
But if they fail, they cost society an even more significant sum. So the overarching priority is - is the parent accomplishing the task they have taken on? If they start faltering, intervene with assistance and constructive advice. If they start having real trouble, then the child should go to school.
But, I guess if there is a state-established guideline and monitoring, it becomes "home schooling" again, doesn't it?
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what Mark Twain said - "I have never let my schooling interfere with my education".
Schools theses days are about indoctrinating and conforming to useless standards, not about learning. If you want to learn, you have to do it outside of school.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
This is fucking ludicrous. A large part of the failure of school is because the parents don't get involved. Studies have consistently shown that schools with high parent involvement produce better-educated children, and parents who engage their children outside of school produce better-educated children.
If parents aren't getting involved in education when the bulk of the burden is on someone else, why would they take any more time to do the whole thing themselves?
Schools are necessary. Very few parents have the necessary knowledge or experience to properly educate a child. If there is a problem with the school system here in the states, it's up to us to fix it.
I certainly don't want a society full of uneducated twits. We have enough of those now.
I knew our society was starting to distrust intelligence and education, and making ignorance a virtue, but this is fucking ridiculous.
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Sounds like 'uneducation' to me. The problem with learning at your own pace is that not all students are naturally curious, and even those who are are most likely not naturally curious about every subject that needs to be taught in the world. Learning should be fun whenever possible, but not all things are pleasant, and children need to learn that some things require work and discipline. Outside of research labs, very few individuals in life are able to do or think about just what they want to do.
From a cynical point of view, it sounds an awful lot like the people I know whose parents had them home schooled but then didn't actually spend any time teaching them anything. They didn't end up learning anything and now aren't really prepared to get a job that pays the rent.
I don't think it's impossible to make it work well, and for a certain kind of kid I think it would be fantastic. Unschooling would require a lot of involvement from parents, though, probably a lot more than public school would, and I expect that some portion of parents aren't willing to provide that involvement. I'd worry that those parents will latch onto unschooling as a way to justify letting their kids do whatever they want without any supervision.
You forgot that most of high school teachers cannot answer these questions either. Outside of the things there were taught, they tend to be like your average slightly more educated person on general knowledge
Don't you know it is now both immoral and criminal to think beyond the next quarterly report?
I have heard about unschooling, and there are some aspects of it that I find appealing. The appeal has to do with my philosophy about the role of education.
Our schools are presently designed to help kids be successful in the context of economy (as we understand economy today). American schools are beginning to fall behind in this aspect, but the point is that they are designed to produce kids who work well together as managers, employees, businessmen, etc. We want our kids to get good jobs, be competitive, and become wealthy (or "successful"). This kind of system was imported from Europe, where it continues to enjoy good success toward these ends. There are a lot of amazing things that can be accomplished when people work together this way, there is no doubt about it.
On the other hand, people like me don't buy into the economic argument for schooling. I'm interested more in the educational, or intellectual aspect that Thomas Jefferson advocated. Schools should seek to build character and create men and women who are suitable for democracy, because they know how to think as individuals and follow their own, unique paths through life. Perhaps there is more emphasis on argument than on cooperation -- I don't know. We do not seek to bend to other people as employees, citizens, etc. Schools should engender the love of learning and help students discover their passion and life's work. The hope is that students will be able to find whatever it is that calls them to action, and then master it. We believe that talent is naturally profuse and must be developed outside of a strict format. This isn't facilitated by the "factory" style public schooling that is operated from the top down. It is more of a ground-up approach, but it could still work as a public system (in my opinion). True, it may not produce massive economic wealth or compete favorably in a capitalistic society, but I am convinced that it can contribute greatly to personal satisfaction and fulfillment.
What I find is that all my kids are autodidacts. I don't remember actively "teaching" the subject of reading, yet we read together all the time and my son quickly became the best reader of his peer group. On the other hand, some areas that he is not interested in still lag behind his friends because we don't force him to improve in those areas. We expect that he will eventually see a need to develop them. Under such circumstances, it appears to take far less time to learn the subjects that traditionally waste years of our time in formal schools. There, everyone must progress at more or less the same pace; not so with homeschool.
I realize that people who step outside of the accepted social norm, like I have done with homeschooling, can be feared by others. What if we are too dumb to raise our own kids? For instance, I am lucky to have a high-school diploma, yet I teach my own children. To some, that sounds like madness. What if we ruin the social commons by producing dysfunctional adults? Shouldn't our government protect us from that?
It's true that sometimes the plans that other people make for us are superior to our own plans for ourselves and our children. Maybe it can be argued that others really do know better, based on some official standard. What I worry about is the ability of these true believers, some who have posted to this story right here on Slashdot, to eliminate the sovereignty of parents over their families. In America, at least, I believe we still subscribe to the idea that regular human beings are fit to guide their own destinies. For me, that is the appeal of homeschool.