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Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 12:47:08 PM

pahunkboy

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http://www.unschooling.com/library/faq/index.shtml

I guess I don't get it.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 12:48:02 PM

mnottertail

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uncola....got that gimmick?

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 12:51:15 PM

MercTech

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Learning by peer pressure and osmosis. It was a fad in education in the 70s that proved not to work worth a hoot.

Some people continue to learn and study because they like it. Others wouldn't learn to wipe their bottom unless someone forced them to.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:11:34 PM

Aylee

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quote:

ORIGINAL: pahunkboy

http://www.unschooling.com/library/faq/index.shtml

I guess I don't get it.

It is home-schooling with a different name.

The premise is that the child should be in charge of their learning instead of the parent. If Johnny wants to play with clay instead of learning his multiplication tables, that should be allowed as to not "stifle" his creativity.

While I do agree that multiple subjects can be taught at the same time, for example, a history lesson can also include math, English, geography, biology, et cetera, I disagree with this free form catch as catch can style of learning and teaching.

Eventually this child is going to grow up and enter college or the work force. An interpretive dance is not going to go over well when designing a budget. Finger-painting cannot be substituted for production analysis.

Learning can indeed be fun. However it is also work. Hard work at times. Forgetting that point does a huge disservice to little Johnny.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:30:26 PM

pahunkboy

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Aylee

quote:

ORIGINAL: pahunkboy

http://www.unschooling.com/library/faq/index.shtml

I guess I don't get it.

It is home-schooling with a different name.

The premise is that the child should be in charge of their learning instead of the parent. If Johnny wants to play with clay instead of learning his multiplication tables, that should be allowed as to not "stifle" his creativity.

While I do agree that multiple subjects can be taught at the same time, for example, a history lesson can also include math, English, geography, biology, et cetera, I disagree with this free form catch as catch can style of learning and teaching.

Eventually this child is going to grow up and enter college or the work force. An interpretive dance is not going to go over well when designing a budget. Finger-painting cannot be substituted for production analysis.

Learning can indeed be fun. However it is also work. Hard work at times. Forgetting that point does a huge disservice to little Johnny.

Great analysis!

I ran into this idea on a yahoo group. It seemed lazy to me. I mean kids get play time already.

Then consider our school year is shorter then Japan-

The basics in life are a must.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:32:21 PM

DesFIP

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I'm used to them in the form of Sudbury schools. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudbury_school
Basically, the child picks what he wants to study. So if he's a baseball fanatic, you write about famous baseball players, read books about baseball, learn what is required in terms of carbon footprint to keep a pro field thriving, study math through baseball stats, focus on civil rights through baseball, religious tolerance with Sandy Koufax forcing MLB to consider other religion's holidays when they scheduled games and so on. You learn English, math, history, science and so on by using what the kid is interested in.

I home schooled 7th grade and this is how we addressed science. The rest of the stuff we stuck closer to the school curriculum but I don't understand science real well. She was and still is, horse mad. We showed up Monday mornings when the vet came, she shadowed him around his checks on all the horses at the stable, learned to do simple procedures. We read horse anatomy books, history of horse breeds, went to visit a place that had one of the earliest breeds with the line down the spine and so on. We also studied mood disorders since the reason she was home schooled is that she had socialization issues due to a diagnosis and the medication she is now on wasn't yet on the market. Since she was seeing a psychologist weekly, she asked her about things and we saw the psychiatrist monthly who was also willing to give a little teaching during the visits. We studied human psychology and equine biology.

Now a friend's son was still not reading came third grade. They got him interested in reading by buying him books on baseball. Dinner conversation tended to be boring as he would tell them all the stuff he found fascinating and nobody else did. But it worked, by gearing his books towards baseball he didn't need any extra help and was on track reading came fourth grade.

Actually my daughter in first grade had zero interest in reading until the school librarian found her a series of books written in the 30s about a boy named Billy and his pony, Blaze. They rescued a friend's pony when it was stolen by Gypsies. (Interject long discussions on the Romany, how they have been discriminated against and more) Found a child lost in the woods and so on. Must have been a couple dozen of these books and she read them all. Then moved up to Pony Pals, then the Misty books, and so on.

You gear learning to the child's interests, not the adult's. It's a lot more work because you can't use the same lesson plan year after year but it can work incredibly well if the teacher and parents are on board with it. It doesn't work if both the teachers and the parents aren't willing or able to devote this kind of attention.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:36:55 PM

pahunkboy

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Des,

what % of the population do you think would fit that?

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:41:33 PM

Aylee

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quote:

ORIGINAL: DesFIP

You gear learning to the child's interests, not the adult's. It's a lot more work because you can't use the same lesson plan year after year but it can work incredibly well if the teacher and parents are on board with it. It doesn't work if both the teachers and the parents aren't willing or able to devote this kind of attention.

I agree that this is a great idea. And it works. My point above was that you still need to learn the basics of a textbook education. You have to be able to use them.

The link that was provided by PA pretty muched trashed the idea of learning by textbook. It focused primarily on the ways to make learning fun. Especially using dancing, singing, and art crafts.

There is a place for those things. However, there is also a place for the hard work of learning.

I do agree that parents need to be highly involved in their children's learning. This can be done other ways than home-schooling. Even if I personally lean towards home-schooling.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:42:17 PM

DesFIP

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Damned few. But those who do this are passionate about learning. Now how many kids in a public school can that be said about?

And those who love what they do are more successful in life and happier. So for those of us who can and will do this for our children, we see them become productive and successful.

There is no reason that you should not be interested in what you're learning instead of memorizing it to spit back on the test the next day and then forgetting it all. In school and in life.

The arts stuff is how it's done in the first couple of years. Not as they get older.

< Message edited by DesFIP -- 9/17/2010 1:55:46 PM >

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:45:58 PM

xkittenx

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This is basically how I was educated as well. My mother spent several hours each day teaching and working with me. It was even more difficult for her since she quit school in the 8th grade herself but she was dedicated and we worked it out.

I have no idea what percentage of the population could get an education this way. Its not for everyone, thats for sure.

For me it was wonderful. I really thrived with the one on one attention I was getting.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:47:25 PM

DesFIP

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By the way, my self directed daughter is graduating with honors this year from a private university ranked 12th in the nation. Not doing interpretive dance although they do also have the nation's top ceramic arts program. She's going to graduate school in psychology, and toying with the idea of getting her PhD. Which is a far cry from finger painting!

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:54:38 PM

pahunkboy

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Congrats!

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 1:59:37 PM

DesFIP

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Aylee

quote:

ORIGINAL: DesFIP

You gear learning to the child's interests, not the adult's. It's a lot more work because you can't use the same lesson plan year after year but it can work incredibly well if the teacher and parents are on board with it. It doesn't work if both the teachers and the parents aren't willing or able to devote this kind of attention.

I agree that this is a great idea. And it works. My point above was that you still need to learn the basics of a textbook education. You have to be able to use them.

The link that was provided by PA pretty muched trashed the idea of learning by textbook. It focused primarily on the ways to make learning fun. Especially using dancing, singing, and art crafts.

There is a place for those things. However, there is also a place for the hard work of learning.

I do agree that parents need to be highly involved in their children's learning. This can be done other ways than home-schooling. Even if I personally lean towards home-schooling.

But that isn't how you do it in 8th grade, or even fifth. The arts stuff is how it works in pre-school, kindergarten, first, second and some of third. Go look at any Steiner style school and you'll see how they move on with the years.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 2:10:34 PM

Aylee

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quote:

ORIGINAL: DesFIP

By the way, my self directed daughter is graduating with honors this year from a private university ranked 12th in the nation. Not doing interpretive dance although they do also have the nation's top ceramic arts program. She's going to graduate school in psychology, and toying with the idea of getting her PhD. Which is a far cry from finger painting!

And I will bet you a batch of your cookies that parts of her university education were just plain old hard work. However, she is also seeing the rewards of that now and in the future. You did not let her run wily-nilly only concentrating on what was fun.

I have seen both bad and good home-schooling. But I still maintain that there are learning skills that are a must in order to be a productive member of society.

To use the horse example (and I hope that I am getting this correct): Riding the horse is fun. Brushing the horse and cleaning out the stable are work and not so fun. But it is necessary for the fun part of riding.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/17/2010 2:12:16 PM

Aylee

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quote:

ORIGINAL: DesFIP
But that isn't how you do it in 8th grade, or even fifth. The arts stuff is how it works in pre-school, kindergarten, first, second and some of third. Go look at any Steiner style school and you'll see how they move on with the years.

That is good to know. We are still on the pre-school stuff. Currently we are using a lot of Jump-Start material.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/18/2010 6:40:55 AM

KatyLied

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I think the style of education should fit the strengths and sensibilities of the child. My children learned and reacted in different ways. One has thrived in the regular public school setting. The other I sent to tech school because it was more of a group learning, cooperative setting, less structure, more hands-on, etc. It is the responsibility of the parent to seek out and secure the type of education that best suits his/her child. I think there is some value in allowing children to be children for a longer period of time. Life is stressful enough and I do not think it has to begin in first grade. I would not be negative about education that is out of the norm.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/18/2010 6:56:33 AM

DesFIP

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Obviously there's tons of hard work Aylee. But nothing easy is worthwhile. Riding isn't easy to do right. But since she loved it, she did the work. And that's really all this is at heart, using something they love as a gateway to introduce them to stuff they wouldn't love if they didn't see the relationship.

Now with this said, it doesn't work for my son unfortunately because he isn't a self directed kid. He is much more social and so does better in a group instead. So he's in public school with lots of sports.

< Message edited by DesFIP -- 9/18/2010 6:59:28 AM >

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/18/2010 7:54:59 AM

pahunkboy

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How many teachers have said- "some day you will thank me"

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/18/2010 9:00:10 AM

rulemylife

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Aylee

Learning can indeed be fun. However it is also work. Hard work at times. Forgetting that point does a huge disservice to little Johnny.

My little Johnny is a very hard worker.

He's almost always up in the morning before I am.

And he loves to learn new things.

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RE: Re: Unschooling ?? - 9/19/2010 10:19:27 AM

BeingChewsie

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Quick reply:

We are not unschoolers but we do homeschool. We have toyed with the unschooling idea but you have to -really- be an involved parent to be able to strew things in the child's path and really be on top of their passions. I think we are both a little more formal in our thinking. We require a pretty rigorous curriculum so he can get into a good undergrad program which will be followed by a good law school. He is free to pursue what he wants (right now that is veterinary medicine) but not until after he attends law school. So the unschooling looks incredible to us but wouldn't meet the goals we have set for him. We believe law school to be as fundamental as algebra after that he can go his own way. So until then we choose(with his input) the curriculum that will best meet those goals.

Here is a link to radical unschooling a site run by Sandra Dodd. We have seen her speak a few times and we love the idea but it wouldn't work for us.

http://sandradodd.com/unschooling

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