unschooling

[tink_lover]

Not trying to be argumentative, but how do you know her kids are not learning what they should?and who says what they "should" learn and "when" they should learn it?

so if they don't learn to add and subtract by 1st grade, they learn by second, what is the harm? just using that as an example.
but you could substitute any subject any grade into that sentence.

yes, if a child is college bound yes they will need to prepare for sat's etc in high school, and they can do that.

but what if a child is gifted in something that doesn't necessarily need a college degree?

and you are assuming that child led means the child will choose nothing. that is not the case, at least in my experience.
and many many others that I know of that unschool.

like I said I can't call myself an unschooler traditionally because we have a math curriculum that we use, but we use it because the kids love it, its fun for them, I wouldn't use it otherwise.

we also do unit studies which the kids pick the topic, right now its astronomy/earth science, and I incorporate everything into it.........
its fun for the kids, they are learning, and having a great time doing it.
its not forced.

I know a lot of radical unschoolers around here, and the ones I am close too have bright kids, who are learning, not playing video games all day long
but thats my experience.

There is no structure with these kid's learning. They would be very similar to the family shown on the GMA show. Eat whatever, sleep whenever, get tattoos and piercing at whatever age THEY choose to do it. I have seen their writing and it is probably 2 grade levels behind where it should be - perhaps even more. There is no structured learning in their house. Again, there is a difference between parents who are actively teaching their children and those who choose not to do anything. Listen, you would think my SIL would get it - she laments all the time that she can't get a job - and that she should have gone to college. What are these kids going to do to support themselves as adults?

 

[golfgal]

Unschooling= the ultimate in lazy parenting

 

[sasywtch]

I just went to some of the unschooling sites and in my opinion, it's setting those kids up for failure down the road. Let kids be kids, learn what interests them, etc etc....That sounds all fine and dandy but when real life calls when they aren't kids any longer and the boss says you have to do this, I think this will start to cause problems. School taught me that I needed to be responsible, to learn things that I didn't really want to. It taught me what my interests were and what I would later go on to want to study. It taught me some new interests that I didn't know I was interested in.
If kids are leading the way and you are following what they are interested in, how does that encourage a child to pick up new interests? I would never have thought I would have been interested in political science had I not been made to take it in school. On the other hand, I was made to take geometry which I hate however, I did it. Do I do anything with geometry today? No however, there are projects my boss gives me that I don't want to do but I do them because that is what I was taught.

 

[quasar4legs]

My son was in a traditional school from K to Yr 5 when we decided to homeschool.
While I wouldn't describe us as unschoolers, we were very unstructured homeschoolers I would say that we were 'child led' in our approach.

Our goal was to encourage our son to be a passionate, life long learner and we allowed him to study what he found interesting.
We organised tutors whenever he wanted to further his knowledge in a specific area e.g. Latin, French, Creative Writing, Maths and Trombone/Trumpet lessons.

My son and I attended adult education classes at a local university in Science, Native American History, The crusades etc. (topics all selected by him)

Some days he would spend a whole day reading or maybe sleeping after a night of astronomy. At one point he was interested in bird watching and we spent quite a bit of time hiking. For several months he monitored our local river and tested the water quality everyday at various points. When writing was a passion he would spend large slabs of time working on his 'novel' or current play.

At our son's request he participated in various group classes in Art, surfing, basketball, golf, chess, archery and tennis. From 12 onwards he took university subjects (distance education) in Critical thinking and WW2 History. At 15 he started attending Uni part-time and has been full-time since 16 and is still having French and Latin lessons in his spare time.

I think the most important thing for parents is to find an education system that works for their child. There is no one system that will work for everyone. Many of our family were very concerned for our son but natural learning (unschooling) worked for us.


"Education is not the filling of a bucket but the lighting of a fire"

 

[xoprincessmomxo]

I volunteer with an after school program for children grades 1-6. We have an unschooler. He's in 5th grade and while he can't read at grade level, he can tell you exactly how to beat each and every video game he plays. His writing is not legible. But then, whe I compare it to some of the other children who are going to our public schools who have very little parent involvement, it stacks up about the same.

I think that there are most likely advanatages and disadvantages to all forms of education. But, the key to a child's learning ALWAYS begins at home. Parental guidance and encouragement is an absolute must.

My major problem with unschooling is the sense of entitlement that it gives the child. Once they go out into real life and the world doesn't revolve around them, they will be in for a real shock.

 

[npmommie]

I volunteer with an after school program for children grades 1-6. We have an unschooler. He's in 5th grade and while he can't read at grade level, he can tell you exactly how to beat each and every video game he plays. His writing is not legible. But then, whe I compare it to some of the other children who are going to our public schools who have very little parent involvement, it stacks up about the same.

I think that there are most likely advanatages and disadvantages to all forms of education. But, the key to a child's learning ALWAYS begins at home. Parental guidance and encouragement is an absolute must.

My major problem with unschooling is the sense of entitlement that it gives the child. Once they go out into real life and the world doesn't revolve around them, they will be in for a real shock.

I absolutely think you hit the key right there. it does begin at home whether public, private, homeschool, or unschool.
you will find kids in all of those settings with poor handwriting, poor reading skills, etc etc.
parental involvement is key to success, and in the case of unschooling, its the ultimate key, because you have to facilitate, provide the means to light the fire so to speak.

for me its easier to pull out the math curriculum, and the language arts curriculum.
but for other things, its hard work, but fun as heck!!

 

[Planogirl]

I agree. My lazy kid would love to be unschooled. Of course if that happened, all of his education will be learned from South Park.

Our son's major teacher would be the XBox 360. Ummm, no.

 

[kirbsam]

home schooling has nothing to do with unschooling. i admire and respect those of you who home school. and as far as the mdc forums, you have got to be kidding about learning anything from that place. there are more whack jobs per square byte there than anywhere else on the internet.

 

[Deb in IA]

and as far as the mdc forums, you have got to be kidding about learning anything from that place. there are more whack jobs per square byte there than anywhere else on the internet.