Successful unschooling

[Laura K (NC)]

http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/search?q=unschooling

That's a very interesting article about an unschooling family whose daughter has taken few formal classes, but who is very well educated by most standards.

I think it takes a special kind of family to unschool successfully. I admire this way of schooling very much, but I don't think it would work for us. Unschooling seems on the surface to be child-led, but I don't know... this article seems to indicate that a lot is required of the parent in an unconventional way.

[Charon]

One ingredient essential to the very idea of unschooling is openness to a fairly wide variety of activities or interests as being "educational". I'm just not -- not even in a normal sense. Things like being widely read or knowing a lot of specific details about history are the halmarks of an educated person not what makes them educated. There is a very short list of subjects that are acceptable to me. Anything else certainly isn't garbage or anything like that, but it isn't educaitonal, either. Not really.

That list basically boils down to learning how to prove theorems and learning Latin -- essentially Latin and Math where "Math" is interpretted to be math like Euclidean-style Geometry as opposed to calculation oriented math. Now, I do want to try to prepare my kids for the world, too. So, I don't just drop everything and do only these two in the most direct and natural way like there isn't even a world out there with SATs and colleges and so on.

Why Latin and Math? The Math I'm describing is actually kind of special and though requiring some explanation as to why it is special, it becomes clear once one appreciates why it is special as to why someone might think it is one of the subjects. The other subject is really philosophy, but informal philosophy is hard to teach formally. So, Latin is something that can be readily formally taught and becomes a proxy for being articulate that hits all these different things of practical value. (Is a second language, has bearing on English and grammar and so on.) Plus, it is the only second language I, myself, studied in high school and college -- maybe that has something to do with it, too. At any rate, it is the "verbal" component.

So everything else isn't bad. It's not like you don't become more articulate reading a lot of great literature, for instance. And, it isn't like you don't get anything out of studying history or science, by any means. But, it just isn't the same, frankly. You get something out of learning how to be handy with electronics, too -- not just specific practical skills and knowledge but also general analytical reasoning skills. I got a lot out of reading comic books when I was a teenager. There were some pretty wildly imaginative ideas expressed in them that truly exceeds a lot of things that are considered "literature". In fact, while we are doing useful and interesting things, maybe we can try to cultivate some auto mechanic interests, or how about interest in sweeping the floor?

The point is that as useful and/or intellectually challenging as some of these things can be, not just anything really counts, here, as being "educational". If I had a long list of things that I could enumerate and feel good about my child doing as much as they wanted of any one or all of them, then I would unschool. "You know, you might laugh, but you learn a lot of hand-eye coordination, analytical reasoning skills for that matter, ... from playing video games,...." That may be -- that may really be true. But, that's still just not what I am trying to do, here. So, I take more of a direct traditional approahc to teaching essentially the two subjects I want to teach and otherwise just doing the minimum to prepare them for life as an adult.

[Rosie_0801]

I think it involves the parent finding as many ways as possible to get the most learning out of the interest without actually killing it. Some people can do that, some can't. Some kids are receptive to that kind of interference, some aren't. I think that style has a place, but I wouldn't be comfortable being an unschooling family. I have read a few books on it. I'm naturally disposed to being authoritarian, so those sorts of ideas are good for my character.
:)
Rosie

[Michelle in MO]

I think unschooling can work for some families, but not for others. I know of a mom in our area----I wouldn't say her approach is exactly unschooling, but she definitely seems to follow the lead of her child's interests. Because her child is naturally inclined towards learning a wide variety of things, this approach works for their family. I'm not sure if it would work for ours. I don't try to ignore our daughters' interests, but I do recognize that certain subjects need to be covered, whether or not they "like" them! :)

[Nan in Mass]

This is why we don't unschool - too much work on my part. TWTM is much easier and more guarenteed.

[JennW in SoCal]

I let my children's interests lead me, and I never think of myself as "teaching" subjects like history or literature or even basic science. I'm a guide, a mentor, the person who makes sure their path through life is strewn with things of interest -- things of my choosing, so that they might be intrigued and want to find out more. And I make sure we talk about everything, follow up on topics or let them drop it, and I find different means to connect topics with their interests.

But I realized very early on that there is a set of skills that requires a more more formal approach. I don't have the ability to unschool math, for instance, though some may thing it can be done. Both basic computational math or the geometric proofs we are now doing require a systematic and steady approach. Same thing with foreign languages. Writing takes practice, and grammar and spelling rules need to be understood. Real, in depth, critical study requires more that a simple fancy in a topic.

So it is a blend for us. I do see great value in many mundane things, such as our accidental drive through Long Beach harbor last week, which gave my kids an impromptu lesson on world trade imbalances. I'm decidedly NOT an authoritarian at heart, LOL, and my kids have always had very specific interests and passions, so it works well for us.

[Laura K (NC)]

"Authoritarian" describes me too. I've got to have control or else I go crazy. My house might look a wreck -- in fact, right now it does. We've got a lot of projects going on at the same time, all the time, but I've got an idea of what's going on and I've got a plan for tomorrow and the next day. I don't know... maybe the ideology that accompanies unschooling just overwhelms some parents so that they are powerless to resist it.

I liked the way the author of that article described unschooling: throwing book after book at his kids, seeing which ones stick. To a certain extent I do that with my kids, especially with literature and history, but there's always a curriculum in the back of my mind, and gaps to fill and goals to meet.

Judging from the author's article, he controlled what his children read, too. It was a free-form control, but it definitely seemed like he and his wife had a definite shape in mind for the body of knowledge their children were taking in.

[Laura K (NC)]

After sticking up for classical education, it doesn't seem right to yearn for unschooling. I think playing devil's advocate is a helpful thing to sharpen my focus. :) I remember hearing about unschooling classical homeschoolers on the old WTM board, and that's what made me think about posting the blog entry.

I can definitely see a classical educator doing unschooling. The author said his kids were widely read, and could quote literature from an early age. He definitely directed his children to certain books, and they got most of their information from "real" books (as they say), not textbooks. While this may be somewhat inconsistent with WTM, I don't think it's necessarily inconsistent with classical education, except maybe with the disciplines of Latin or Greek or Logic. Apparently the girl taught herself math and some other subjects, so in the end her teen years doesn't seem so very much unlike classical education in its more broad definitions.

I will continue to read the fellow's blog until I can form a more clear picture of what his kids' education was like. The idea of successful unschooling is fascinating to me, even if I'm not able to handle it, myself.

[Nan in Mass]

I think that just might be sneaky homeschooling. I think real unschooling involves more. I think it involves creating an atmosphere within the home that makes the children decide for themselves that they want to learn those things that are hard work or rather unappealing at the beginning, and then helping them find ways to accomplish those things. It isn't necessarily a non-textbook thing, because sometimes textbooks are the most efficient way to learn something. It also isn't a non-taught thing, because sometimes direct teaching is the most efficient way to learn something. If the item wanting to be learned is the end in itself, then I think the child might choose a funner, longer, looser way to learn it than a textbook or teacher, but if the item one step towards learning something bigger, then he might well choose to use a textbook or a teacher. I think it also involves the parent helping the child find ways to go as far as they want to in an area of interest. This can involve a lot of guts, time, and expense. And almost harder on a daily level, the parent has to able to judge when to let things drop because the child's curiosity is satisfied and when a little nudge will help bolster their immature self-discipline and help them get to where they wanted to go. It involves a huge amount of faith that your child will indeed work hard at something when they want to, a family life that contains something other than academics with which to teach lessons like "working when you don't want to" and "keeping on working when you don't want to", and confidence that your child will always be able to learn somehting later (possibly even more easily and efficiently) when they need it if they don't learn it when they are the usual age.

All of this is easier and works better than "sneaky homeschooling", probably, but it is still very hard work for the parents and requires lots of faith and good judgement. The faith part I have, but the judgement part I wasn't sure I did. For example, for a few years now, I haven't been letting my son, who loves playing the piano, quit lessons. He is 13 now and he is still saying, "I've learned everything from piano lessons I need and want. Now I just want to work on it myself." Is now perhaps the time is right to quit and let him continue on his own? But that is a scary decision. In music discussions, I have had many adults tell me, "I wish my mother hadn't let me quit piano lessons." And in unschooling, you would have many, many things like that.

-Nan

[Rhesa]

[quote=Rosie_0801;110459 I'm naturally disposed to being authoritarian, so those sorts of ideas are good for my character.
Rosie[/quote]


Oh, exactly! I've never heard it put this way, but it discribes me to a T. I need to be exposed to other methods of learning/teaching, especially since my youngest is...well...not interested in being "led" by me. :glare:

[Rhesa]

Oops- just realized I posted in the high school board. Hope I didn't step on any toes here since I only have little ones...:leaving:

[Night Elf]

Unschooling is very misunderstood, even within the unschooling community. There are people who think they are unschooling because they allow their children to choose subjects, or follow interests at a particular time or day. If you are *really* interested in unschooling, you should begin with John Holt and perhaps seek out unschooling communities online. This forum is for classical schooling so you won't find a very fair representation or understanding of true unschooling here.

My family unschools. It doesn't mean child-led or non-parenting. It means helping my children learn about the world at their own pace and in their own way. It doesn't follow a scope and sequence because no one can possibly know what my children really need except my children. That scares alot of parents and I'm sure I'll receive the dreaded negative rep points on this board for having such a radical idea about children. But true unschooling is letting go of the traditional ideas of school. I was raised in a traditional school way and the very little I learned in those years that has helped me in real life could have easily be learned outside of school. I also have a different parenting philosophy. My job is not to prepare my kids for some planned path. They don't need to be drilled in schoolish subjects just in case they need them later. They learn just like I do, when I have a need for it.

As one small example, knowing the chronological order of presidents isn't something that is beneficial to my life but I remember having to memorize it for school. I absolutely hated having to learn that information and it killed any desire that I might have had if I had been left to decide for myself. The only bit I retain now is that George Washington was our first president. My kids, OTOH, have had a real interest in knowing about U.S. presidents so they learned about them and then stopped when they were done. They still retain that information. But honestly, that information is no more important than knowing when to plant tomatoes, solving quadratic formulas, or working our way through the submissions to reach the main goal of a video game.

If anyone is really interested, feel free to email me and I will direct you to some information where you can read for yourself.

And in case anyone wonders about our unschooling and the schoolish materials listed below, they are nothing but resources like our other books, games, movies, etc.