April 19, 2010
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Unschool or Homeschool
There is a growing movement in our country to “unschool” children. The basic idea is that there are “not textbooks, no tests and no formal education.”
Children are left to make their own decisions and rules. A parent suggested it was about trusting your kids.
One of the unschool parents said that the found that their kids “don’t need a whole lot of rules.” Here is the link: Link
Do kids need a whole lot of rules?
Comments (216)
o this is a fabulous idea..i see great rewards from it…
I’m not nearly old enough to have the slightest idea.
YES
Hmm do kids need rules… yes. Because rules are meant to be broken, so if there are no rules to break what kind of humans are you creating?
they need rules as much as adults need rules. The question is: What are the extent of the rules they need.
**almost made an offended homeschooler comment**
Letting the kid take one or two liberties with what direction they want to take a certain subject (learning math in the later grades by planning a fake event or business plan, for instance) is one version of homeschooling that I like; letting the kid decide that he hates doing any kind of tangible schoolwork and basically never teaching him to read —not so much.
Well, all I can say is that un’schooling can be grossly misrepresented.
Oh yes they do.
Too little guidance leads to too many problems.
All I know is most homeschoolers creep me the FUCK out.
No, children don’t need a “whole lot of rules” They do need standards and high expectations. I’ve seen families that let the children “do what comes naturally” it isn’t a pretty sight.
Homskoolers ar unedumcated and not cool! ;)
i’ve read a lot of this “unschooling” movement, i have no problem with homeschooling…but kids DO need structure and rules and boundaries. Unschooling is load a crap.
I’m going to homeschool my kids.
@tsh44 - Agreed.
The pic says it all. LAWL!
@Drakonskyr - It’s ok. you have the same effect on other people.
Unschooling sounds like a cool idea, but I don’t think I’d last.
I’m scared…College is the place where people don’t have many rules. Some excel but the large amount fail and don’t get anywhere.
i’m all for homeschooling, but not letting children educate themselves. MAYBE it’d be okay during the teen years, with a lot of regulations on it. maybe.
kids absolutely need rules, especially as youngin’s.
The unschooling movement scares the crap out of me. Imagine unschooled children in combination with parents that want to give their kids everything they did not have. SCARY SCARY SCARY.
Children do not need rules, they need structure and guidance. They need to be provided with a reason as to why things are the way they are.
Haha, Kids need rules.
Children need structure and to be trained to respect authority. Unschooling is a crock. The Bible says that foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child. We are all foolish and we all are given parents to learn how to submit to authority.
so if they want to go have sex without condoms behind a dumpster at 711 that’s all good w/ Mommy and Daddy?
Wait, what do no rules have to do with no textbooks? If you can teach
without textbooks…go right ahead. As long as your children learn what
they need to to be able to start pretty much any career path they want
(that’s why we learn subjects we’re not all interested in, just in case
it sparks your interest) and can think critically, than go right ahead.
There are homeschool parents who can do that (though they tend to need
some help). But I’m sure they at least have their family rules that help
them keep their children controlled enough to actually learn. Letting
them do whatever they want does not teach them how to live in society at
all. Unschooling will only create creepy loners.
I totally don’t understand this post.
@WordFlyerJosh - Thank god for that.
/cackles and resumes teaching ducks opera
Omg. That is pretty much the worst idea I’ve ever heard.
I was too busy gawking in horror at the pic to read anything. Sorry.
@Drakonskyr - Lol! What?!
@rafi09 - My understanding of ‘unschool’ is not the lack of rules. Leaving children to themselves with no rules is a great way to raise selfish, self-centered adults who do no one any good. Children with rules become adults who understand cooperation.
On the other hand, allowing children to pursue their interests with hands on leaning instead of someone’s predetermined idea of what they should be doing instead is what unschooling really is.
Ah yeah
Fail.
@Alatariel40 - thank you for informing them! That is exactly what unschooled is, and I don’t think it is a bad idea. Honestly I think we need to take a more unstandardized approach to education. We live in a society where we push our kids to do a lot of things they are not ready for, or we label kids when they don’t compare to average. Learning should always be developmentally appropriate, and developmentally appropriate can vary widely between kids!
Parenting is a balancing act between rules and boundaries, and exploration and independence. Too much or too little and your kid will probably eventually end up in jail. This is why we parents get gray hair and high blood pressure.
There is a whole spectrum of beliefs and methods when it comes to homeschooling. Unschooling lies at one end while highly structured homeschooling using curriculum and materials provided by the local public or private school is at the other. It just parallels what type of lifestyle the parents will be raising their children up in anyway.
@AmyDoo - do you homeschool? I’ve been doing it with two children since 2002. My children are articulate, knowledgeable, and responsible, and maintain active social lives. My 16 year old teaches karate and will soon take duel-credit classes at the local community college — and that’s without the benefit of formal schedules and standardized tests. My ADHD 11 yo has been successful and happy without the aid of drugs, which would have been required in public school.
For us, homeschool works well, but we must acknowledge that it isn’t for everyone. That’s the importance of freedom, and freedom of choice.
They need rules but not to the point of being overbearing. They need boundaries and guides to show them their way through.
I needed regulations. I was homeschooled, and pretty much taught myself from third grade (with textbooks), but only with major oversight, checked homework, tests, etc. Creative teaching can be great, but to allow children to “make their own decisions and rules”, outside the case of an EXTREMELY mature child would seem to me to be rather completely foolish. In most homeschooling or unschooling situations, kids have to take standardized tests for the state to make sure they’re learning to at least some degree, so, even if unschooling became more popular, it would be regulated to make sure the kids were learning in a lot of situations. Still in my opinion a rather bad idea.
I’m an education major, so I’d kind of like a job…
I was homeschooled throughout elementary school. Well, kind of. I went to a school where we attended classes on Monday and Wednesday and did homework off a lesson plan at home the other three days. We had a pretty heavy homework load most days, with a boatload of reading. It definitely didn’t hurt me at all. Of course, that’s because we still had professional teachers telling us what to do.
Rules??????? Most kids don’t even know what rules are anyways.
Golly gee! That article really makes the unschoolers look really foolish and stuff, doesn’t it? I’ve read enough from Big Media to know when I’m being sold a viewpoint, and that writer sounds like they really like cookie-cutter education.
It sounds like something that might work really well for some people, but is not for everyone. Like @saintvi says, raising children is a balancing act between providing boundaries and showing kids what they must do, and exploration and giving them the opportunity to practice decision making. This more unstructured approach to schooling might work spectacularly for certain kids and certain families and be a disaster for others.
We will be homeschooling, but I am not a big advocate of the whole unschooling movement. I do believe in creativity and letting children explore their interests, but I also believe in balance and structure. I will definitely NOT be doing the unschooling thing.
Homeschooling deprives the children of social interaction, and a lack of rules and trusting your kids to developmentally guide themselves is a bit like congress. We all should learn something, but we don’t.
Uhhhh… they’re children. It is the duty of their parents (and other adults in authority) to educate them and teach them how to live properly. We can’t just expect them to learn it all on their own. Rules are in place to teach us things, so that when we’re out on our own, we live the right way, even though we don’t have parents forcing rules upon us anymore.
Unschooling is a bad idea. That’s just setting the poor kids up for failure in their future. Even if, by some miracle, they do actually educate themselves, they are still bound to have issues. They will not know what to expect when they’re placed in the workplace, or college, or anything outside of their home, for that matter.
No, I find open ended threats work better than boring old rules…
@Alatariel40 - I don’t even have kids, but I’m a teacher and I grew up around a lot of homeschoolers (my boyfriend was homeschooled).
And I completely agree with you that it isn’t for everyone, and you have to know what you’re doing. However, if I had a kid that I felt could benefit from homeschooling, I absolutely would.
i’m doing a research paper on juvenile delinquency, and it turns out the less structure and rules that can be provided for a child, the more of a risk they are of becoming delinquent. now we don’t want that, do we?
pretty sure this is illegal, and those children can be seized by child services.
@imTHEmeowMIXcat - Why must you make fun of me? I can’t help that I look like that.
@Alatariel40 - I was going off of the quote used in the blog. With the exception of that quote, unschooling simply sounded like homeschooling. Even the website for unschooling says that they have to follow guidelines set by the states. These are basically rules that the parents need to make sure they meet essentially to ensure that the children are learning and being given opportunities still. They’re not the same as what a teacher would need, but they’re still there, hence why I took the quote the way I did.
Plus, this still sounds like homeschooling to me. I know people who were homeschooled until high school (they’re parents didn’t feel qualified to teach them anymore) and some of them were taught with as much hands-on and experienced based learning as possible. So if the “no-rules” thing really isn’t a part of unschooling, then sure this is fine. People are already doing it. That one parent though probably needs to word the quote better though.
sort of like hyper-religious home schooling?!? @colonialgrl - duh
@travelerblue - ”no rules” = “hyper-religious” ?
that’s an interesting conclusion.
I don’t necessarily think they need a lot of them, but they should have basic rules for how they act and such. And these rules should be enforced.
@bakersdozen2 - My kids are every smart, My 4 year old is already reading.
Unschooling I am still not 100% sure about it. I have not done much reseach on it.
Speaking as a teen, I need structure.
I take a few courses out of block, online format, I struggle to keep up-to-date in these. I rely on deadlines and structure to learn.
Hell yes. I had an incredible amount of rules, and I’m a pretty awesome kid. My parents were the best.
But on the homeschool note, I think that socialization of kids is very important. I once dated a guy who was homeschooled all the way through high school, and he had VERY poor social skills. Smart as hell, but couldn’t stand being in a room with more than five people.
@johnny_hopkins - I went to school and so did my husband and we hate being around people. So how did normal school help with that?
@NightCometh - Have to agree with you!
Kids need rules, its a Bible given command, those that want kids to make the decisions will end up with a country full of welfare scumbags that are in and out of jail with no respect for authority.
Unschooling? Really? Having the kids have total control of the rules would be a totally backwards move, considering there ARE rules in the real world, like deadlines and paperwork.
If you want to learn without books, more power to ya. But if you can’t enter college (or most careers) because you’re illiterate, then you have a problem. Homeschool in that aspect is supposed to function like regular school; doesn’t matter HOW you learn the subjects your peers are, it matters that you KNOW the material.
@opster25@momaroo - Well, I think it’s situational. Young kids who aren’t around a lot of people sometimes have trouble adjusting to average groups within a society. Some people are just naturally reclusive. That could be it with you and your husband. My ex is still learning to adjust now that we’ve been in college for a couple of years. Maybe “normal school” didn’t help you, but I do believe it makes it easier for most people to properly function in their adult lives when they have been properly socialized from young ages. Also, lots of kids who are homeschooled attend many family and church functions, and attend group meetings for children who are homeschooled as a form of socializing.
Unschooling =/= zero rules. It’s finding out what your child is interested in and running with that. For instance, if your child is interested in trains, you can focus on how trains work, photographs (art) containing trains, etc. Then you teach them about subjects related to something they’re interested in. Back in the day when I was an English teacher, I found that some of my students were very interested in Harry Potter. I found other fantasy novels for them to read based on that interest.
@colonialgrl - so many rules that the kids become either robots or blank – i’ve seen both
@johnny_hopkins - We actaully do not atend any group meeting or church, but we do take our children out in public alot. They are very socialized.
@opster25@momaroo - Sorry, I was being facetious. I’m a homeschooling Mom and know the benefits, but often times people cling to the view they’re comfortable with. (like the poster above)
But I got to tell you after doing this for nearly 20 years, homeschoolers are totally NOT “cool”. The thing is…. my kids don’t care about cool. And what’s considered “cool” these days,
just ain’t……
So ironically, the kids at college think they’re cool.They don’t realize; it’s just self-confidence.
@bakersdozen2 - O ok.. I tend to be very up tight over it. We are the only ones in our family who homeschool and are looked down on like out kids are stupid cause they are homeschooled. My daugthers friends think it is the coolest thing that she is homeschooled but only cause she can go to bed late and play as long as her school work gets done. We are relaxed homeschoolers but not unschoolers.
that isn’t the same as homeschooling. also, it’s stupid. we definitely need rules. not a whole bunch that will suffocate us, but they’re really essential.
@bakersdozen2 - Horse-crap. My kid’s home schooled and an ‘A’ student. Our program is vastly more challenging than the pathetic standards of the public school system, and our home-based school beat the test scores of the local public school district by more than 20% this year.
You don’t know what you’re talking about.
they fail to understand that a big part of schooling is to learn self disipline and responsibility. not “if he needs to learn algebra, he can google that shit”….. how ignorant.
@opster25@momaroo - That’s alright… Yes, I know there are differing opinions out there and I can honestly see positives and negatives of both. Overall though, I’m totally with home schooling. We have a “relaxed” structure as well. I don’t know too many people who are extreme type A’s but I haven’t met any “unschoolers” yet either. :)
@JosephParsons - Relax, Joseph. I was kidding. See above comment.
@JosephParsons - what program do you use?
@bakersdozen2 - So I see. Too many pricks out there slamming home-schoolers… sorry to say I get hot quick on that particular issue. I withdraw my outrage
@opster25@momaroo - Connections Academy. It’s one of the best, but not the only good one by any means.
@JosephParsons - thanks I am expolering new programs for 3rd grade.
@JosephParsons - Not a problem, Friend.
I home school my children and I have found it to be in their best interest. I also believe in rules and boundries. I have never been a fan of allowing children to do whatever the hell they want to do.
@opster25@momaroo - Check and see if it’s available in your state. We are exceedingly happy with the results. I will put you in touch with someone if it’s available in your area. Message me and I’ll put you in touch.
I’m a junior in HS and believe me, YES. They DO. haha.
They don’t need to be taught certain things merely for the Regents tests, they need to be taught things that will actually HELP them in life, that’s where school are at fault.
But yes we do need quite a few on maybe uh RESPECT for one another? Hmm.
I was born to soon it seems, why I could have studied beerolgy
@JosephParsons - I did check and it is but only if we pay for it. I know it is coming in almost all states so I hope by the time they get into highschool we can ither a.) afford it , or B.) it is in our state for free education.
@opster25@momaroo - That’s odd… in my state it’s public. What state are you in, if you don’t mind my asking?
@JosephParsons - That is ok.. No problem we are in KY. If you can find a public program let me know.
I have been looking. O we are moving to TN, Although we are going to be close to the border so if I have to I can stay in KY.
@opster25@momaroo - I’ll take look.
@opster25@momaroo - Since you’re moving to TN, That’s where I looked:
Connections Academy is private there (which means they’re working on it).
In the mean time, there’s Home Life Academy. Doesn’t look as structured as Connections, but if you push your kid like we push ours, he’ll do fine, and Connections will be there soon if they have a private option. There’s probably either economic or political barriers to be overcome. In my state, the public schools are crying like babies because Connections produces better students for less money… the teachers’ unions here are having a problem with the idea of producing results.
I’m sure there’s more. That’s at a glance.
@JosephParsons - Thankyou so much.. I will keep a eye out for Connections Academy and as soon as it is ready we will be one of the first ones to apply..
@opster25@momaroo - Tomorrow I’ll see what the status for Connections Academy in TN is from our rep. I’ll message you in a day or two and let you know what I find out.
According to developmental psychology, there are four different styles of parenting. Among them are authoritarian parenting (many rules are set without explanation, along with many expectations for the child), indulgent-permissive parenting (letting the kid do whatever he wants without punishment), neglectful parenting (not caring at all about the child; leaving the child to his own devices), and authoritative parenting (setting boundaries for the child, explaining those boundaries, but also allowing the kid some amount of freedom). I don’t think this is about homeschooling so much as it is about child-rearing in that some people think children are better off with many rules while others believe the contrary.
The ideal form of child-rearing is the authoritative style, which doesn’t translate to having many rules so much as sensible rules that have meaning. To restrict kids from doing anything (as in a authoritarian style of parenting) can lead them to become resentful of their caretakers and potentially rebellious. Children who have no boundaries are likely to engage in high-risk behavior. I don’t think it matters whether or not a child is homeschooled, so long as the parent or teacher knows the consequences of certain child-rearing styles.
As someone with a teaching degree, who is now homeschooling her own children….I cannot get behind unschooling. I never thought I would ever homeschool my children either, but with such great curriculum and support out there, most parents can do a fabulous job at it. Especially with the low teacher/student ratio most homeschoolers get the privileged of experiencing. There are so many options with Academies, Public Charter schools (which we participate in allowing the kids to attend classes and be assessed by teachers, go on field trips, etc). But unschooling in my professional opinion doesn’t ready children for the real world. There are some advantages to the unschooling philosophies in letting children explore subjects they are interested them, but continuing to provide them with learning opportunities within certain structure is important.
@trunthepaige - Sure, you could have gone on all the field trips to the Budweiser brewery and gotten your little sample cup as they threaded you and all the other little kiddies out the door.
Those were always the highest attendance days for the Father’s.
Please. For most teens, their innate curiosity is overshadowed by their desire for socializing and sleeping. It’s one thing to allow them a bit more choice in HOW they learn… but to let them sit on a computer or watch tv because you trust them to learn on their own time, you are being way overly optimistic about your child`s interests. Most teens would never accomplish what they do in 4 years of high school if it wasn’t for a bit of structure and pressure.
@trunthepaige - I was born to soon it seems, why I could have studied beerolgy
Chemical Engineering for the processing of Beer. Bioengineering for their genetic manipulation. Economics for the small-buisness side. ^_^
@HappyLemming - SC Davis has a great commercial brewing program, so there is a career available
@steph843 - And a tazer helps a lot
If these people are worried about their kids growing up to be unthinking automatons, then maybe they should teach them critical thinking. But kids generally aren’t wise enough to decide what actions to take, so they do need some direction. But the idea that home schooling is somehow going to make your kid stupid is either said out of ignorance or out of the attempt to evade reality.
I don’t think that “no rules” and “no boundaries” are the same thing, just as learning doesn’t only happen with tests and curricula. When you give a child the tools to live a better life- when you show them the proper way to behave and interact with your fellow man, things go from there. You don’t have rebellion issues when you’re not pinning your child down, you don’t have frustration fits when your child can’t complete the demands from school in a timely fashion, and you allow your kids to learn the natural consequences of how poor behavior affects relationships. I think it obviously depends on each child- but I know that I learned more from my personal interactions with my peers than I ever did from my parents’ rules. The unnatural consequences they bequeathed on me never resolved whatever issue I had like the natural consequences did.
Lord of the Flies, redux. We tried this Koolaid in the 1970′s. Jean Carmel and others were badly burned when the kids turned out to be floaters, and they had to backtrack and impose adult rules- for things like drug experimentation, sexual experimentation by pre-teens, bullying, etc.
A child who is not guided feels ignored.
I home school myself.
I’m pretty much unschooled. I’m not stupid. I don’t do drugs, curse, or have sex. I clean house and I learn about things that I’m interested in. I plan on attending college next year and making something of myself. I believe that the family on that show is a very poor example of unschooling. As far as rules go, if you trust your children, they usually don’t do anything to not deserve that trust. I’m not saying that I haven’t made mistakes. I have done things wrong in my life, but I have learned from my mistakes and become a better person from the experiences that I was allowed to have. I think that unschooling is perfectly acceptable if done at the right age. Before 9th grade is just too young.
actually,, its irrelevant,, kids have always schooled themselves as they saw fit..
a heavy hand at a school controlled by the government creates nothing but criminals. a heavy hand at home creates nothing but criminals… if you want to call rebellion a crime..
anyone who feels they can show otherwise,, feel free to do so.
if a supposed majority of americans feel they should be taken care of by the government,,,
hahahahaha,,, schools have failed miserably,,, maybe it is time to try something different..
WOW, IS IT REALLY LIKE THIS IN AMERIKA?
Do kids really need to know tons of pointless facts at age 8? They forget it all anyways, and it just makes them sour towards learning…
I was homeschooled until age 14, and for those of you who think homeschoolers “creep you out”, you would never be able to tell with me. I am 100% normal.
I had rules, sure: I couldn’t get away with being disrespectful, throwing fits, and I was pretty innocent to the horrible things that kids even as young as 6th graders in public school have to face. But my childlike imagination had a lot more freedom. We had a few acres, I had a sister I was close with, a stay-at-home mom, and a few pets. I would have become miserable in regular school. I was energetic with an untamable imagination. If I had been forced to sit in a desk and listen to mindless droning for 7 hours a day, I would have become sour, rude, rebellious, and resistant towards learning. They probably would have made me take Riddlin and told me I had ADD. Which I don’t. I loved reading, and instead of being forced to read and having that love stripped away, I was allowed to explore. I read historical fiction, mythology, autobiographies. I took the homeschooling standardized tests and got in the 99th percentile every time. I did my math and geography when I had to, but I probably spent an hour or two a day MAX with schooling. The rest was spent outside or lost in a book. I would also spend days thinking and then talking with my Mom about extremely deep topics for a kid my age. I built forts, climbed trees, picked berries, ran around like a pretend horsey. When I entered a challenging private school in 8th grade, I didn’t know any of the mindless chants the other kids knew. But I know how to observe, memorize, learn, be creative, take charge, communicate with adults. In a short amount of time, I was top of the class, all with almost no formal education up until then.
Young kids can be so impressionable, and in elementary schools they are often more concerned with social pressure and fitting in, even if it means losing their individuality, than with learning. ”Unschooling” does sound fishy, though I didn’t read the article in depth. Homeschooling CAN be amazing though, if done right. Sure, hillboy joe and his prairie muffin wife who never went to college are probably going to fail in that aspect. But really, did their kids have any hope anyways? Either way though, you don’t need to be a genius to teach young kids all they need to know. Any one of us can do hopefully do math and have the reading skills of a 5th grader. Learning how to learn and how to think is much more useful at that age.
I’d rather have an apprenticeship rather than a public education.
Hahaha. Yes, of course.
Yes, kids need rules. We all need rules. Life is a never-ending process. We live to learn.
Yep, they sure do.
That said I’m all for public school. I had a very positive experience there. It was in a small town and I soon formed friendships with anyone I came in contact with and learned about social interaction. All the while I was an ‘A’ student who read as much as she breathed. I loved reading and public school never killed that, in fact it provided an entire library for me to wander about in. The teachers encouraged this and when my teacher found I was also strong in math gave me a workbook to do at my own leisure over the summer break.
However, if the schools aren’t providing what they should be I’d home school any future children I might have.
But unschooling? Never.
As a home educating mother (who has done so for the past 11 years), I am quite open to the Unschooling way of education. We personally don’t subscribe to it, but having done a lot of reading about it lately, I am becoming more and more open to the idea.
I particularly like what Sandra Dodd says about rules.
She talks a lot about living by principles rather than rules.
I like this, as a Christian I believe this is what Jesus taught. All of his rules where based on the principle of loving Him and loving others as you love yourself.
Catch his principles, live out of grace and truth and one doesn’t really need rules, because one ‘lives out’ His words every day, by respecting others, and living a life of love.
x
I’ve four cousins who were homeschooled, in a fashion, in what is now termed, “Unschooling”.
The eldest is now a professor at a university, who has taken her students to archeological digs and who has sampled native cultures around the world.
The second eldest has traveled to Japan in his college years, self-funded, to learn the culture, customs, arts, history, and, yes, anime.
The second youngest has a simple handyman job, but is as well traveled as his siblings.
The youngest is still in high school years, is somewhat smart-alecky, but shows strong interest in collegiate-level mathematics and an insane ability in mechanics.
So…having textbooks available for questions, while having continuous family interactions as the kids are performing daily life-skill tasks, and having open discussions in mathematics, history, mechanics, carpentry, physics, astronomy, architecture, theism and politics – but without rigid homework assignments - isn’t as bad as all that, is it?
Goodness knows, I attended a military school, then a Catholic school, before [reluctantly] being allowed to attend public school [which I later dropped out of]…
I had to boomerang back, pick up my G.E.D., work crap jobs…
Make another return-trip to begin college, only to drop out, yet again – couldn’t afford continuation…
…and now, I’m in a job that any number of people can replace me at [or I can find my line of work shipped overseas...], while my cousins are more educated, more solidified in the workforce, and diversified in language skills.
Yeeeeeahhhhh……can’t keep allowing kids to get too much education, can we? /snark
If I were a bit more solidly educated, and if I were a bit more financially stable, I would have homeschooled my sons, too…under the “unschool” method, more likely than not.
It turns out, in fact, that homeschooled kids are being sought out by most major universities these days, specifically because they have had a more rounded education than their public-schooled counterparts.
There’s a bit of mental fodder to chew on…
Everything I learned in school, I could have learned just as easily online
Education should be a privately- sought thing.
I think they do, but maybe not as many as some schools impose.
One interesting thing, though, this reminded me of a school I once read about. I can’t remember the name of the school, but basically, the school pretty much had no rules. The students had no obligation to even go to the classrooms. There was a play room, and children could decide where they wanted to go. The interesting thing is, as you would expect, most, if not all, of the children spent the first week or so of the school year in the play room. However, after that, they were just getting bored of playing. I think they knew that they felt useless/pointless. The children actually started to go to the classroom. And promptly. And all the time. And because they knew and felt that it was their own decision to enter that classroom, they were learning so much better, because they knew that they wanted to. It was really interesting to read, and I think the school was opened for about 4 years, though I’m not sure, but it was really successful.
A similar story. There was a company whose director (was probably rich enough to do this, haha) decided to let the employees determine their own salary. Again, you had people claiming great sums of money, but with time, they started to realise that it can’t work that way, and each employee was actually sort of calculating his own worth, and claiming a much lower salary than before.
The point is, maybe not no rules, but sometimes, if you put more in the hands of those not in charge, it can work really well.
Sounds like they stole the idea from Big Daddy.
I saw this on the news and I must say parents get lazier and lazier. Lord help our uneducated country with a bunch of illiterate adults that this trend will likely produce. How does America compete in the future with kids just doing as they please? Try telling an employer, hey, I Never had to do this before. Of all the dumb trends, this one tops the cake now.
a) yes, children need structure. there’s definitely a point where your rules are going overboard, but not having any rules, or having rules and not enforcing them, is just going to spoil the kid
b) i’m far more disturbed about the idea that they aren’t getting any form of formal education. that child is basically pre-destined to get no better than a GED because they can’t go to college having no knowledge of science, math, literature and history. all the other children will be miles ahead of them
I am so sorry, but that article is wrong. I am a home-school child, that is very well educated. Did you know that the home-school population is growing more and more? Also the Egyptians use to home-school children, the wealthy did. Home-school has always been available it just was not talked about as much as it is now. The group of friends that I have are wonderful amazing, well rounded people. They know stuff, we can entertain ourselves, with out parents having to do some form of game. We have more free time to go on family vacations, I have been all over the world pretty much, and I love it! So please, do not start rumors about something you know nothing about. Unless you ask a home-schoo kid yourself. home schoolers also have to prove themselves to the state, that they do the work, so they have to do better than kids in school. It’s a lot harder than you think, but also it has it’s moments, when you get close to your family and friends. I could go on and on, I have been home-schooled for 7 years, and do not have to worry about all that crap that goes on in schools these days, and I have good friends, that I love with all my heart. So it’s your perspective, but you may have it wrong. Home schooling is not bad, it’s always been around, just now people have conventions and my graduation class is over a couple 100 + more home-schooled kids. Need more info please email me. Home school is taking over the schooling system just you wait and see
It actually works, depending on the kid.
I feel sorry for those kids. Not necessarily for the homeschoolers, but the “un-home schoolers”.
Wow, people just can’t get any more stupid.
I’m homeschooled and had nice SAT and ACT scores, got admitted with distinction into my college of choice, and recieved the presidential scholarship for academics, as well as 17,000 a year for golf (Because that’s what I do.)
My mom has always guided me and set up my schoolwork. She does allow my input on some of what I do… like, I wanted to take marine biology junior year and wait until senior year to take chemistry. I took writing courses because I LOVE to write. And I also read a lot. I have tons of extra credits because of all the work I’ve done.. and I am SO glad I was home schooled. However, this new unschooling thing seems EXTREMELY dangerous. Most kids do not want to do school work. I mean, who likes school? These kids are either going to be complete nerds and get really motivated and learn something (let’s guess a tenth of 1%) or they’re going to be dumb as rocks and watch tv and play board games.
This is NOT a good idea.
Is that even legal?
I don’t think it’s a good idea – the kids in that video on the page you linked to might seem happy and content right now, but I would love to see a report on them in 10 years, as a 23 and 25 year old. How will they ever function in society as adults? I bet they never move out of their parents house.
Yeah they do, I wish I had more rules growing up. i think if i did then i would be a much more stable person.
So let me get this straight. The American school system up until the point of college is already one of the most relaxed systems in the world and there are people who feel it should be even EASIER? Kids need rules. Kids need to be challenged. Cutting them off from formal education cuts them off from social education as well. You not only learn algebra, history, biology, you learn skills to cooperate with others and how to cope with a diverse work environment. Taking all this away is a load of bull.
@NightCometh - I believe learning to submit to authority is part of the problem. Sometimes schools focus too much on managing children and teaching them to always follow authority and to conform to exactly what the norm is (which is not always beneficial to them, or to anyone for that matter.) I would much rather learning and knowledge and experience be taught in school so that a child develops a passion for something early on and the ability to seek out new knowledge and to communicate with others, respecting all people and not just those with power. Structure is usually a very good thing in moderation because it teaches self control and drive, but I personally believe that children should learn to respect each other and learn that they are each unique and can provide a necessary skill or personality for the collective whole.
I know a family of ‘unschoolers’.
They let the kids try public education until about age 8 and they had the choice to continue or not.
I personally think that it makes kids more free spirited, however from what I’ve noticed they have difficulty
reading and doing mathematics. They have a lot of outside knowledge about the world, but that wouldn’t look great
on a job application which is the major problem.
I’m in favor of homeschooling but not so much unschooling. There are certain things you need to know to get by in life.
From having been a kid once, I’d def. say yes. Maybe not a “whole lot”, but a decent amount. That sounds ridiculous. haha If I get the chance to homeschool my children one day, many books and text books will be involved.
I plan to have rules and structure. (By the time I have kids, though, that’ll probably be forbidden by law or some such crap though (rules/structure)… Anywho!) Haha. Oh well.
@obscenecrayonxx - Agreed.
I’m being ‘unschooled’, if you want to call it that, and I have a better education than everyone I know who goes to a public school.
i don’t know if i would put homeschooling and unschooling together. unschooling just sounds like there are no rules at all. at least, there are some rules, structure and supervision in homeschooling. i think homeschoolers are a socially awkward group of people, but at least they’re more well-mannered and i much rather put up with a socially awkward group of people than the group of trouble makers from unschooling.
I like “free”-homeschooling better. Un-schooling for a year or so while traveling europe, or something equally educational for a short period, okay. But permanently? In my opinion, no. I do see that it is beneficial to let them learn at slower or faster paces in subjects depending on their needs, but they do need a bit of encouragement/pressing. There are some things they have to know, and unschooling does not emphasize the need as much as I would like.
Unschooling= A generation of complete and total dumbass people.
YES! Kids need structure!
I was homeschooled for 5 years (late elementary through middle school, thank goodness. I hated middle school.), and I thought even we had a pretty relaxed system–but I still had text books, national standardized tests to take and prepare for, classroom time with Mom–but then I heard about unschooling. Scary stuff. I heard an unschooling parent say that making lasagna counted as a math lesson because there are fractions on the measuring cups. Unbelievable.
Wow thats ridiculous, there is an extent as to which parents should let their kids learn how the real world works, but homeschool them and then apply that… I was home schooled and I am way more mature than all my old friends in high school who think life is all about parties and drinking and who they’re going to be dating next, oh and which college is going to have the best parties and events… thats not all life is about. They’re setting up for a great future! …. hmm nope
Also learning by experiences and going place is really great too, no textbooks, I’ve been a few places that taught me a lot and mostly because I didn’t have the stress of learning what a curriculum wanted me to learn. I took from it what I found most valuable…
This is not “home schooling.” These people are not “home schoolers.” True home schooling involves the realities of what life is really like. And life contains rules!!
The issue with lack of organized schooling or homeschooling is that kids don’t have an opportunity or as much opportunity to learn social norms from peers and teachers, so regardless of what education they may obtain in homeschooling they will have more difficulty assimilating into the rest of society afterwards.
One of my friends home schools both his children. Not himself, though, he hires a tutor. By the time she was ten, his daughter was more knowledgeable and more mature than pretty much all the high school kids I’ve ever known. It’s amazing what kids can become when theyu don’t have the horrid social pressures of school dumped on them.
Most of life is about doing things for which you show no aptitude and no interest. Â Suggesting to children that life should only be about what you find interesting is setting them up for failure as an adult. Â I think of unschooling as the educational equivalent of letting kids eat whatever the hell they want- do you let them gorge on candy all day, and just hope that they’ll show an interest in vegetables eventually? Â I think not. Â You’d wind up with overweight diabetic malnourished kids who have no idea how the problem started.
I say this as an outdoor science educator. Â My “classroom” is pretty loose. Â There are no textbooks. Â I have come across thousands of traditionally-educated students, possibly a hundred homeschooled students, a handful of well-educated homeschooled students, and at least three unschooled students. Â The unschooled kids were unable to read, unable to focus on anything for more than a few seconds, and damn near unteachable. Â Their kids may have an interest in a subject, sure- but they have no framework to learn about it. Â You can’t learn with your ten-year-old peers, because the kindergardeners are ahead of you. Â Sorry, parents, you hamstrung your kids.
The whole “unschooling” thing is rather ridiculous. It assumes that children have a huge amount of discipline and focus and sheer will-power to go after what they want. Someone suggested that it’s like college; you can do almost anything you want, and the majority of people fail when faced with that choice. Now, “unschoolers” might say that they prepare their kids for college because they’ve BEEN doing anything they want and can “handle” it, but the truth is…to succeed in such a framework a person would have to be INSANELY disciplined, intelligent, and strong. Kids just don’t have that focus…If you start unschooling them as kindergartners, they will never achieve that focus. The whole point of school is to learn how to succeed in frameworks that make you uncomfortable, or that you darn well absolutely hate. If you only do what you want all the time, not only will you grow up to be incredibly spoiled, but at the first glimpse of adversity, these kids will have no idea how to cope…Because they haven’t had a chance to gain learning experiences in a place (school) that doesn’t count as much as, say, your job. If you go through life believing that you are the ultimate authority on everything, what happens when you get a job, and your boss asks you to do something you don’t want to do? “Unschoolers” might say that their kids will know what they need to do, and do it, but I doubt it…That takes a huge amount of discipline, and the whole “unschooling” movement is absolutely barren of any form of discipline. They’re setting their kids up unfairly: expecting discipline, but not instilling it in any way, shape, or form.
Yes, kids do need rules. But not arbitrary ones. I believe that if a kid asks you why you made a rule you should be able to give a logical answer therefor making the rule worth following. “Because I said so” is NOT a logical reason.
As for unschooling, I believe it is a great way to raise your kids. It doesnt just mean you let your kid run free. It means lots of trips to the library, art museums, topiary parks and conservatories, zoos, art clubs, free classes. The kid isn’t cut off from society. Things like sports groups and classes can get them into groups with other kids. It also gives the parent a chance to meet others doing the same and form co-ops and collective childcare groups.
I, luckily, live in a city where all of this is possible, and not very expensive. I plan on unschooling my son. At any point if he decides he wants to try going to a public school that’s up to him.
Unfortunately, from the tone of the comments I see the whole idea has a really bad reputation based on a lot of misunderstanding. Itss sad.
lol @ the pic. Not that I have anything against homeschoolers – IF they have a college degree. Teaching your kids without even having a two year degree yourself is ridiculous.
*ducks and runs for cover*
This is a joke, right?
they need to be guided
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that comic got me laughing!
@Drakonskyr - lolsys
@tishtok - i wish i had that college
0.o
TT_TT
To Dan…That Picture…really…you had no other choices??????
to me the whole comment section turned into a to assimilate or not to assimilate remarks.
No Assimilation for me THANK YOU!
To address some things I read-
You can have awkward ppl no matter their rearing environment, but often ppl Assume that the majority of awkward ppl are homeschooled, that statement is Far far from the truth.
Colleges seek out homeschoolers with scholarships because students such as these are well rounded instead of having the stunted awkward education that public schools at large provide(minus the good ones).
@bbytwistitx3 - down here in the south you get alot of like hard-core-Christianshomeschooling their kids so they don’t have to learn science
so yeah
i totally understand people getting freaked out about it
Hell *I* get freaked out about it
i think Maayyybbbeee if you don’t live in the bible belt maayyybbbbeeee if you went to college and maybe if you had a legit major in college (ie you weren’t a party hard bushiness major at an engineering school or a kinese major or something equally bs like you graduated from a crap ass skool.
but we get ALOT of that down here
Depends on how you want kids to turn out. By the most universal definition of what is socially acceptable, successful kids “happen” when there are rules that enforced/created in such a way which gives children input and also responsibility i.e. kids choose to follow them based on what they understand the consequences to be instead of just being yelled at.
As for textbooks/no textbooks unschooling etc, formal school environments aren’t the most productive environments for every single student. I think that our schooling system needs to change in order to reach more kids and let them be the best they can be, but you have to start somewhere, you need to have certain basic skills and you need to learn how to operate in a structured social environment to have a chance at operating in our society. Because realistically, that’s what it comes down to; we’d love to sit and think that if we reach some sort of Thoreau-ean transcendental state that life is perfect, but at the end of the day, we need to operate in our society.
@Ana_R_Kissed - I really agree with most of what you said. I still think there are benefits to public schooling, but it’s really far from perfect.
unschooling isn’t something i could handle, as a parent.
My largely (non-radical) unschooled 13 yo thinks your captioned pic is hilarious!
As far as most kids go, I think not. My mom stopped teaching me when I was in second grade. I knew the rules of life by then, and I knew that if I didn’t do my school, I was on me later on in life. I did my work, I asked my brothers when I needed help, and I pulled my own weight.
I graduated this year, and I’m looking forward to taking my G.E.D this fall.
@rafi09 - Ouch. I was unschooled from second grade up. I’m not creepy and I have a lot of friends. Actually, no one can even tell I wasn’t public schooled my entire life.
Being home schooled (after expulsion) I am of the opinion that schools only exist to be burned down…
yes, they need rules.
i support homeschool for some kids, but this “unschooling” sound like a bunch of gobbledegok.
I guess this goes into the bin with bribing children to do schoolwork with money.
I understand how this could be a useful tool with dealing with children who go without and have interesting relations thus, but I don’t think Sally Sue needs anymore than she has, and she’s going to quit once she gets enough to do absolutely nothing forever and enslave everybody else due to her lack of understandings.
I didn’t have any rules growing up, but I spent most of my time grounded so that I could do chores and stuff for free or suffering for things I didn’t do at my other house. It’s kind’of like laws in this country. They only apply to some people sometimes.
I was actually really disciplined growing up by fear of natural consequence, but I’ve loosened up so that you could blame the prior or anything else. Now there were a lot of social rules that naturally apply whether a parent actively engages in helping his or her child adapt or not or defends offspring ever.
I was told I was a retard, so school didn’t matter that much anyway. It won’t get me anywhere because I’m past that age of falling into place or getting anywhere in general – if I were part of the 4 or so percent that can even. Not that 3% of that 4% is anything since they don’t track, so it’s not fair or as challenging because everybody is reading the same book so the book has to be for everyone. That 3% just has the right ties and funding.
I think the lack of education is more of a justification due to the huge gap that’s growing between social classes. Usually one will say something then forward it through popular media, and we’ll all agree because we know something to agree on, so… We’ve already lost our place in the world, so fuck it. Bring back the factories, even them out between China as us, and let’s get back to being the drones we are. We’ll take the moon images as our scientific accomplishment to keep kids dreaming as well as Hollywood’s plaster, perhaps this will continue. The US is very entertaining.
Do what you do well.
the whole point of this article is to make people think that “unschooling” is the same as “homeschooling” …IT’S NOT… there are so many homeschooled kids out there who are working their butts off and getting articles like these put out there and having to deal with critisicm, whereas most of the public schooled kids aren’t doing nearly enough and they get support from teachers and parents…what is wrong with this?
I totally agree that the unschooling movement is wrong, DEAD WRONG. It’s another form of socialism and thats what people are trying to make America into is a socialistic nation…people keep raising their kids like that and we’ll have a bunch of murdering, theiving, lying poloticians on our hands …oh yea, we already do.
@colonialgrl - blaming the kid for something that’s out of its control is ludacris.
Like many other arguments, this makes no sense. It’s personalizing the argument to a subject that’s relative.
As foolish as it sounds to me, parents should have the freedom to educate their child as they wish. Whether that’s private school, public school, home school, or old school.
As foolish as it sounds to me, parents should have the freedom to educate their child as they wish. Whether that’
@Colorsofthenight - I wasn’t blaming the child : allowing the child to completely dictate what he wants to learn/not learn is ridiculous on the parents’ part.
I would comment about your own take on this issue—but I can’t seem to find a point in the whole rant. I guess we’re even.
I think the fact that such a large percentage of the homeschooling & unschooling movement are fundamentalist Christians really says a lot about the whole thing. The real truth is that they want to take away scientific and critical thinking education and have complete control over the information given to their children. They think the world is full of lies, and that their children will be corrupted. Trust, my ass. They trust no one and only seek ultimate control.
*I know some home schoolers, apart from the group I have described above, who do a great job at giving their kids a FULL education.
Homeschooled children grow up to be social retards. Most parents in this country are not qualified to teach.
It’s stupid to do unschooling. I predict that teens will be less and less educated in the future….
Homeschooling is great though, I’m homeschooled. Most of my friends are also homeschooled and they are very smart. I have no clue where the whole “homeschoolers are anti-socials” stereotype came from….
@splinter1591 - how come? isn’t that how most colleges work? Like, you’re not forced to do anything anymore because of the law.
I unschooled one of my kids for two years and he did amazingly well. We did have textbooks, though, he just did what he wanted, when he wanted. It worked wonders! He skipped two grade levels and learned to love learning. He is now in public school and is doing great.
I would never ever do this with my other kids. My one son is made out a completely different material than most people I know. He is extremely disciplined, has been since pre-school, and smarter than anyone I know. (His dad is pretty smart, too.) The structure came from his own personality, and it worked for him. I can’t imagine it actually working with his brothers.
We didn’t set out to unschool. It was going to be a temporary homeschooling situation. We just kind of ended up in a situation when my son was progressing faster at his own leading than when I was trying to teach him.
Unschool is going to produce a whole new generation of idiots and we already have enough of those running around.
look at what such thinking has done to our country :O
if you learn things on our own good for you, there are lots of self-taught successes, but also alot of failures in that group
it all just depends, i’m of the opinion schooling has a higher chance of success than failure
I think it’s important to note that homeschooling does NOT equal unschooling. It can if not managed well, but with good materials and being a student who can handle the responsibility, along with having a parent to help and teachers — you can get just as good as an education. I do a different type of public school however people consider me homeschooled. I do it by a computer, I have real teachers, real lectures online, it’s a ton of hard, advanced work but I am learning a ton of information. I’m ahead of the game already and make straight A’s and have a 4.0 GPA. So homeschooling can be done right, it just depends on what you do.
@colonialgrl - I responded to the wrong comment then went on about this post.
Your comment was logical.
**almost made an offended homeschooler comment**
Letting the kid take one or two liberties with what direction they want to take a certain subject (learning math in the later grades by planning a fake event or business plan, for instance) is one version of homeschooling that I like; letting the kid decide that he hates doing any kind of tangible schoolwork and basically never teaching him to read —not so much.
My entire lament, not directed at you - it seems we are equally confused about what is there, was that it’s complicated, and it has nothing to do with the kid. I often go on side tangents because nobody is listening anyway. I wasn’t talking to you there.
I was responding to another who was personalizing the argument basically with “kids need rules.”
Kids needing rules and
Kids going to school
are two subjects by themselves, and you hooked them well. Others won’t/ didn’t.
As far as the uneducated not having rules, that’s probably because their lives are setup so that there are constant rules. Just because somebody says something doesn’t mean that they mean it in that way. People will use that to say that their kids are better than poorer kids because their kids do the right thing.
I’m one of those kids who, in class, rather than asking the teacher about every fucking thing, I pick up a textbook and finger the Index. A lot. And as for your info, I’m doing very, very well. I have a 3.5+ GPA, easily. Rarely do i listen to the teacher, I figure it out on my own via textbook.
I think it depends on the child. However ditching tests then throwing your kid into a college system is just fucking ridiculous. My cousin was “uneducated” and when she tried to go to public school, they held her back a year. She’s very intelligent, but I’ll have you know that kids decide playing outside > learning. Any time of the day. At the same time, she also knows that public school is a load of horse shit.
Actually, no structured education is just bullshit. >> Your kid doesn’t have to be bogged down with rules, however, they’re going to fail at responsibility if you sit there and never teach them to read. There is a psychological point where they simply CAN’T read if you don’t teach them fast enough, rather like speaking.
I spend 8 hours in a classroom establishment, but I teach myself. A child can take on his or her own responsibilities, but relying on the child to take the jump is asking for trouble. They need a push, a set of guidelines, or they simply will never learn.
Wow…..
I can see why this would seem appealing. You know, trusting in your kids. Everyone wants to believe that their kids have the maturity or intelligence even to know when and what to do. But, they’re kids. Kids will learn what they need to do to get to the next level in their game. They’ll learn how to correctly apply eyeliner. I’m sure they’re not going to sit down and learn about the French Revolution or read Of Mice and Men.
I actually feel kind of bad for the kids.
I mean, I was an idiot and dropped out my senior year. And I regret it. Not going to prom, not graduating… all that is a thorn in my side. And I even regret being the kind of student I was! No friends so I wasn’t involved. I’m actually jealous of the kids who are still in school and do a bunch of activities and have friends. I didn’t get the normal school experience either, and it really kills me.
I don’t think they’ll feel either way about it now, but when they’re in their 20′s… I know they’re gonna look back and hate it. :/
The concept behind unschooling is great, real world practice is a whole different thing. But I believe children need structure and guidelines. And no textbooks? Both of my children were raised that way. Between waldorf and homeschooling, no textbooks were brought into the home or classroom unless it was a classic book to read and learn from. They created their own books from what they learned.
It can be done, if done properly.. whatever that means.
@ToxicSweetners - A lot of homeschoolers who are homeschooled by crap parents tend to be unsocial beings because they’re never tossed into a social setting. I know had I not gone to school when I was 5, I would literally never see anyone other than my parents and my brother. Granted, I’m still an unsocial person with no friends because of damage done pre-five years old. I have the socialisation skills of a dog who can say “hamburger” and nothing else. My cousin was homeschooled but never taken out of the house. She has social anxiety. That’s where the stigma comes from.
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@nanoJAM - I agree with you. Rules don’t do much for the whole learning aspect of it all… but when it comes to learning how to respect boundaries and guidelines, they’re necessary.
I also taught myself a lot when I was in school. Albeit, probably wrongly. XD You probably teach yourself about what you’re learning… I, on the other hand, taught myself what I wanted to learn. So, I failed algebra but learned level 1 Japanese. XD I know all there is to know about poetry and the early 19th century… but I don’t know anything about Chemistry or Geometry. *shrug*
I think the whole school experience is something necessary, though. Where else are they going to learn social skills?
And I know that bullying is a problem, and that’s a good reason to fear for your child’s wellbeing… but, just taking them out of the system isn’t going to do the trick. It’s not going to save every child.
Bullying has been around for ages. To me it seems like just now is it coming to the forefront so boldly. People talk a LOT more about teens having problems like that and suicide and cutting, so it just seems like it’s a new thing. But, it’s not. It’s not at all. I can vouch for that. But, instead of ignoring it and trying to shield your children from it… why don’t people try to fix it? People need to be more concerned about trying to find the reasons it happens and reach out to the kids who are bullies. Find out why they’re doing it and make them stop or something. In my opinion, they’ve probably got their own psychological issues that need dealing with. Like, home problems or something. I don’t know exactly. *o* But, just taking your kids out of the school system entirely will do more damage than help, in my opinion.
yes.. kids need rules, and more importantly guidance. most are too immature to make their own decisions.
No offense to anyone who does think that this unschooling is a good idea but frankly, I think it’s one of the stupidest ideas I’ve ever heard in my life!
What a pointless, one-sided post.
Theologians are supposed to be open-minded.
there’s absolutely no way that could work in america, or in any country of our size.
homeschooling/unschooling is in place for the few that don’t fit public education and are extremely self-motivated (the second more towards the unschooled)while most kids/adults hate the public education our country offers, there are few other options that would educate everyone.and yes, kids need guidelines & rules, of course. kids have to learn to rebel & obey – and if they don’t have rules, they can’t do either.
@nanoJAM - that’s not true. They say that crap to define their worthless world. They say that children pick up words from birth to like 8. I was nearly deaf until I was 5 from infections and screwed with without them ever testing me for anything prior. Invalid study.
They decided to do a lot of experiments on me, which was stupid because if they honestly thought I was retarded, they should have kept up with something solid.
It turns out that even by their hoop tests, I’m not retarded and even borderline gifted, so they eventually changed my disability to an organizational one, like how tidy you keep your desk. I was under constant attack from everyone, and I got a little ruffled man. Fuck it.
What they do is find centers in you and use them outwards.
They taught me to read by sight, not sound, which is weird because language is phonetic and then switched me districts and said I couldn’t read. Some of my family is slow and honed in on this, “she’s just like us!” Well, not quite. Not only that but I could read. I couldn’t say words aloud because few people spoke to me, I didn’t put one and one together, but I was a cautious kid. I wasn’t going to say something stupid and that was another problem because everyone thought I was shy.
My parents don’t care about me. My grandparents do, but my parents needed me to use against each other. Classic bullshit, right?
Anyway, I taught myself to read phonetically later, but I don’t spell that way. I mean, I can sound words out, but I don’t do it naturally; I read by sight, so it stresses my short-term memory to no end to remember every word in the English language. I can do it by sound but people aren’t helping me out here; do you know how few people pronounce words properly?
Also, I’ve never really had solid conversations with humans besides as an adult. It’s weird.
So, they used that to open up everything else and experimented on me over and over with stupider and stupider people. Don’t think the smart ones go into that field. I eventually got away but with less skills than everybody else.
I also, though I don’t know why with my lfie, became psychotic, so I speak in tongues sometimes. Basically, my diction turns into poetry meaning 100s of things at once. It’s so annoying.
@EdieUnderground - Teen suicide is up 300% in the past 50 years. That’s not enough to realise it’s on a high rise? I’m suicidal,
I’m
16 and I have an obsession with suicide. Most teens, of course,
don’t have an absolute asphyxiation with suicide, but about one in five
does or will at some point. Bullying has gotten worse, arguably with
the advance of the Internet (though I strongly believe that if you
can’t handle a few “meen wurdz” on the Internet, you’re screwed IRL)
but it has gotten worse. People are just more subtle about it now. It’s
less direct like Stephen King’s Carrie and more cutting and hidden.
If a parent is homeschooling their children correctly, the child will
get out for socialisation, be it the park, or if they’re young enough,
the McDonald’s playhouse. Then you have disasters where children don’t
get out for socialisation, and that’s when social skills fall through
the floor. Sometimes it doesn’t matter if one goes to school: their
socialisation is still crap. Like mine.
Rules and homework no, not necessarily. but standards, guidance, and expectations… YES!!!! I went to school but i have no clue how I graduated. I never learned anything. Without expectations and discipline kids just do the very least amount of work to get by. That was me anyway. My parents just “trusted me” and I wish they hadn’t, Now I know that I really needed more from them. I definitely think kids should have a say in things they want to learn about and should be encouraged to think more out of the box and learn in many different ways not normally found in schools… but unschooling sounds a lot like being lazy and hoping for the best.
Of course kids need some kind of system of rules. I’m not saying “Yay, strict parents!” but kids need some structure. Otherwise, they won’t learn to respect authority or how to follow rules in the future.
@nanoJAM - True, there are crappy parents out there that homeschool their kids. Homeschooling only really works if your parents actually teach you and spend time with you. Alot of parents just leave their kids with the book and expect them to teach themselves.
I am online schooled, so I have teachers to help me. That’s the only way I could do homeschooling since my parents are working.
That being said, I will always do homeschooling. I tried private school once and I wasn’t a fan of it.
@Colorsofthenight - Wooooah-oh-oh. Psychology always has exceptions. Chill, man. I realise this. there is always the exception. However, there is a definite majourity rule. The minourity is often left out.
I couldn’t read until I was seven, so I see where you’re going with it. Even now, reading aloud makes me stutter, and I often read until I can’t breathe. But there is still a cap where you’re simply screwed if you don’t learn before the cap. I’d assume it’s around the age of 25, though it could be lower.
@GrowinWild@revelife - Anyone who says one shouldn’t have homework needs to go and evaluate the reasons behind homework. It’s not used as a tool to screw your life over, it’s used for extended practice.
As a previously homeschooled individual, that pictures actually hilarious haha. But, most of the homeschoolers I met at the time were in that situation for religious reasons. As for children and rules, they need them. It’s not so much to fit them into behaving exactly as you want, it’s to instill the concept of discipline which is necessary in some degree to get anywhere in this world other than the next street corner.
@ nanojam. I am sure this will seem combative but I have to say it to preserve my sanity. I believe you meant to say absolute fixation not asphyxiation.
Seems like some parents need to think hard about what the point of getting an education was in the first place. Unschooling is like everyday being a Saturday.. =/ Kids need rules. They need structure and boundaries, and if they’re priveledged enough to have the opportunity to study and to be exposed to knowledge about science, music, literature, and etc. from trained professionals, then why let them miss out? HOw can a kid figure out what they want if they aren’t otherwise exposed to the subject material? Besides, schooling also improves social and communication skills by allowing children to work with others in a more professional setting, which will be essential in the long run. And parents saying they’re just learning how to trust their kids..? That’s a personal matter imo and unless they enlist the help of principles or teachers, it should be kept at home.
@smgcrossfire - You even said yourself though that you were taught the “rules of life”. You were given structure. I can bet you that there are people out there who aren’t actually giving their children rules and aren’t motivating their children to teach themselves. So I’m still not for unschooling. Homeschooling that’s incredibly hands-on, sure if the parent is qualified to teach their children about all kinds of subjects (we learn a lot of different subjects in school so that way we have a lot of opportunities to find what we love and not everyone will find it on their own). Encouraging kids to teach themselves as much in school as possible instead of relying on teachers, sure. Those two still have testing that ensures that the students are in fact learning. In fact that last one is what I did. I normally grasped concepts before the other kids because I was motivated to read my textbooks and to do research outside of school. But the other kids weren’t motivated and would rather play (games are good and all but a lot of the ones that kids love merely teach socialization and not educational concepts) and I can assure you that unless the child chooses unschooling, there will be children who aren’t motivated then. If they’re illiterate, they probably will become a loner even with rules because people aren’t often kind to people who don’t seem intelligent (note the word seem there). There may even be a kid who never learned that certain actions are considered creepy and who isn’t motivated to teach themselves and who then become illiterate (well if the unschooling begins before the person reaches literacy level). So just because you have a lot of friends and they don’t find you creepy and you don’t deem yourself creepy does not mean that there will not be creepy loners coming from unschooling.
Sorry it’s a bit of a rant there but I wanted to make sure this comment wasn’t taken wrong.
well maybe our experiences with homework are different and maybe I should have clarified a type of homework. I was referring to, because in my experience this is all homework was, worksheet after worksheet after worksheet of busy work that never taught me anything. The teachers I had only told me if something was right or wrong and never WHY and therefore in my opinion rendered USELESS. None of my teachers tried to make homework interesting or fun, something we would WANT to learn and enjoy. Learning should be fun.
@nanoJAM - woops, replied and forgot to tag you. see above.
@nanoJAM - Well maybe we wouldn’t have those numbers if the media wouldn’t glamorize it so much. :/ There are WAY more songs about depression, suicide, cutting…etc. More books. More people claim to have these problems that don’t. Not to say that you don’t, but I’m sure you’ve noticed how basically everyone and their brother claims to be a cutter. I’ve been a cutter since I was 12 and I’m 20 now. I mean, I never knew what cutting was when I started. No one talked about it. They didn’t mention it on TV. No one sang about it. But, what I’ve noticed, in the past few years more and more people have been bringing it to light. And kids always want to have everything in common with eachother, they want to know what that singer is singing about, so more kids have started doing it for whatever reasons. It actually does piss me off when people claim to do it when they don’t know the first thing about pain. Again, don’t be offended, I’m not talking about you. But I’m sure you’ve known of people like that. x_x And I get you on the suicide thing. I’ve been working on being less suicidal these past couple years… but I’ve tried it so many times I’ve lost count. So I get it.
The reason I said that it seems to be more than it is is mainly because no one talked about it. Everything was hush-hush. If your kid had a problem, you didn’t say that they did, it was swept under the rug. And I’m sure there were plenty of cases where a teen did kill themselves, but it was labeled a “swimming accident” or a “hunting accident”- things like that. I’m not talking about recently, more like the past 100s of years. You know, the grand scheme of things. It’s just more “acceptable” for the death to be ruled “suicide”. Not that it didn’t happen, you know?
I don’t know, maybe I’m just upset that it’s like just now that people are openly recognizing that kids have problems. :/ There’s so many front-page articles about kids killing themselves and cutting themselves, so many front pages on AOL news and stuff. It just bothers me that no one talked about it before- like it never happened.
But, the more something is brought into light, the more it’s bound to happen. The more kids read about it, if they have a problem and get tired of crying into their pillows and crying themselves to sleep, they’ll think of how that other kid cut themselves and it made them feel better, didn’t it? So they’ll try it, they’ll get addicted too.
And I’m not saying that all social skills are defined when one is in school. Like me, I have no social skills whatsoever. But, that’s not school’s fault. It’s my fault. All my problems and years of self-destruction and depression have robbed me of them. I can’t hang out with people without feeling like I’m a piece of shit in comparison. :/
I’m just saying that the majority of skills- like, learning how to go up to people and start a conversation. Learning how to compliment someone on something you like about them. Learning how to ask questions and not be embarrassed. Learning how to make friends. Stuff like that.
I missed out on a lot of that, too. Having no friends and being too caught up in “survival mode” with all of my problems, I never even thought to go up to someone and talk to them.
But that’s beside the point. School is just a vital part to growing up “normally”, you know?
Not saying that people who don’t go to school aren’t normal by any means. I just think it’s the best decision.
We unschool. And I absolutely REFUSE to raise my children without rules. That said, my 12 year old has reasonable expectations. Until she gives me a reason not to trust her, I do. We spot check, and as long as she is where she said she would be, with whom she said she would be, doing what she said she’d be doing, we’re good.
As far as unschooling goes, a lot of parents use it to be lazy. But we see unschooling as a supremely intense commitment. We have to spend every waking moment giving the children(there are 8 of them from 16 to 2 2 months) input and feedback. I have to make sure that I encourage a learning atmosphere. We have to take any opportunity to learn, ask questions, introduce new concepts, interact and communicate. An event as simpl as selling a goat turns into a learning opportunity. How many miles did we drive today? What did we spend in gas? How much did we spend for lunch? What did the goats sell for? How much did we feed them and what did it cost? What amount was your scholarship offer for from last year’s show that goat was in?(They are involved in 4-H and national shows wherein they can earn money and scholarships). Did you make a profit or loss? (In today’s case, they figured a loss of 350 dollars. Realistically, the loss was to the parents)
My oldest child is public schooled. She despises anything to do with learning. You say “Field trip” to her and she rolls her eyes and gets snarly. Say field trip to my other children and they pull out encyclopedias and turn on the computer to surf the net and garner information. To our family, unschooling is about igniting a fire that encourages learning from any event they participate in and becoming productive citizens. They may focus on one topic for a week or years. My 12 year old has been intrigued with volcanoes for 8 years. And the intrigue has not died at all. She’s begging for a trip to Iceland to see the volcano. Her sister flits from topic to topic, a Jane of all trades. Her brothers are very intrigued with the Three Muskateers,and all aspects of their life as it was. My 6 year old and 5 year old sons are reading the unabridged Dumas book with me.
And all 6 of the homeschooled children are very social, involved in many varied activities, from little league, ballet, church activities, violin and their own businesses. They are more social and involved than their oldest sister.
Unschooling is a serious, lifelong commitment. It’s the hardest thing I can ever imagine taking on as a parent.
I think kids do need rules. While it is good to give them some freedom to learn and make mistakes they still need rules. I think unschooling is one of those things that maybe sounds good in concept but in reality isn’t so great. Once you get into the world it is going to be a lot harder to get a good job or go to college without a high school degree. I can’t imagine a parent being okay with this for their child
@EdieUnderground - I don’t cut, surprisingly enough. Just not my cup of tea, I’ve always thought it was stupid/lame/whatever. No offense to cutters, but that’s what I’ve thought and it keeps me from doing it, so…
But I’m a bit torn. On one hand, I realise glamourisation, adolescent stupidity and industrialisation has a lot to do with it. By the middle one, I mean, I feel some people who commit suicide think they’ll be coming straight back, as if it’s not a big deal. When it is. >> Kinda like a surreal, they-don’t-think-it’ll-happen-then-it-does kinda deal. Stupid, but true. On the other, I don’t feel like that’s the key component in it.
Oh, I agree. Socialisation can be pushed by school, but it can go amiss. And I have to agree about the “shit in comparison” bit, because it’s definitely true. I feel that way, too.
I’ve seen unschoolers who do it well, and those who do it terribly and don’t prepare their kids for anything. Those who do it well are like “okay your interest du jour is dinosaurs, so we’ll check out everything the library has on dinosaurs for reading, study geology for science, learn to do arithmetic and estimation with large numbers so we can operate in the correct time increments” etc. That’s not giving kids no rules, its teaching them to discipline themselves.
They’ve done studies on this. Kids do better with boundaries. There are extremes to every issue though. Too many boundaries and rules though and you’ll stifle a kid’s creativity and they will be more likely to engage in risky behavior when they free from rules.
The key is balance.
Also people need to remember that unschoolers are completely different from homeschoolers.
Don’t confuse unschooling with homeschooling – they are completely different things. I was homeschooled and started taking college classes at 14. =-P
@GrowinWild@revelife - It’s not supposed to be fun, and it’s not supposed to teach you. Basically, the gist is this: it’s extra practice to go along with what you learnt in class that day. An extension of sorts. They tell you it’s right or wrong to allow you to resolve the ones you got wrong to see if the answer changes. did it not? Then ask about it. YOU have to take YOUR time to go meet up with YOUR teachers if you care about YOURSELF. They don’t have to spend their class time, for all 20-32 students, focusing on you in particular. YOU have to take yourself into your own hands. I figured by high school, people would know this, even if they’re in denial. Guess I was wrong.
I don’t know much about unschooling is. I have never heard of the word unschooling til recently.I would not know how to go about that if I wanted to unschool my kids.
@nanoJAM - there’s never a cap unless someone is unwilling or slow. It’s desire with things like that. Then again, I make the most ridiculous typos ever. This goes into the bin with never being with my mind. I don’t look at the keyboard or anything.
Anyway
I know what you mean with setbacks as well as things that exist with the life given. Unless I speak more than 50 words to people a day, I’m sure I’m going to sit here and ponder some things as well as nobody is an expert at everything and some people don’t want to. I can read aloud now as I have been since sixth grade when the guy I had a crush on called me a “stupid girl,” and so I taught myself with Mind Warp here and continued on in an alternative dimension of my own amusement because I related to being different, I suppose. They said I couldn’t read until sixth grade, but I was scoring on achievement tests and such, so I could. They definitely noticed the flush in ability though. I tended to be one of the higher achievers in their classes, well-behaved minus my hallpasses, and I was entertaining to a few. Maybe I did myself in.
This sounds strange, but my brain doesn’t even use words when I’m thinking. I see pictures and sounds and all sorts of things. I talk to myself often and I’ve found it helps me, though it annoys everyone else.
Yes, I have some issues too but not all, so I’ll go into something similar to song and poetry at times as well as laugh. I just spent 2 hours laughing. I wish I could stop, but at least, I feel a happy emotion, right? I just got my speaking ability back to something normal. I had issues for awhile beyond myself.
I guess I shouldn’t vomit my opinion all over you or lament in the personal realm, but I certainly don’t mind, and you don’t have to read.
It doesn’t matter anyway.
@nanoJAM - Yeah, I agree with the whole “they think they’ll be coming straight back” thing. That’s what I always thought. And it did make it seem like less of a big deal. And in the moment, you know, you don’t think of everyone else really- like how it’s going to affect people. But the next day, when you’re back in your almost-right mind, you realize the enormity of it.
Well that’s good you don’t cut. :3 I think the people who just claim to do it-that’s lame. :/ For me, anymore it’s just an addiction. x_x I don’t do it that often anymore, but when I do it sucks. *o* Not the whole pain thing, but how badly I “need” to. ugh. So yeah, I’m really really glad that you’ve got a reason not to! X3
I think that maybe if more parents, or adults who have a hand in how a child is raised, focused on instilling self-esteem in their kids instead of just expecting them to have sufficient self-esteem already it would help a LOT in the issue. If a kid were to like themselves, be comfortable in their own skin, and have a good amount of self-esteem and self-confidence, then I know bullying wouldn’t have such an intense effect. They’d be able to brush off the harsh words and realize they don’t matter. They’d be able to take everyday tragedies. :/
That would be -awesome-.
@CrunchyMountainMomma - Well you sound like you’re doing it very well! I think that, if parents unschooled like you described, it’d be a lot more beneficial than public school. I think they’d probably listen to their parents more than some random teacher. :] Also, if they’re with you every day, all day, then I think they’d wind up learning a lot more.
Reading that kind of made me wish I was unschooled. *o* I think I’d be a lot smarter~ I know I would’ve payed more attention. XD
You must be really dedicated too! 8 children? Wow. Props to you!
@girl_lost_in_the_dark - Any parent can issue a diploma. And you do not need a diploma from an accredited high school or learning center to get a job OR go to college. My 12 year old owns her own handy-girl business. She just bought her own cell phone, ipod nano and Nintendo DS. She also just hired her 9 year old sister to help her walk dogs. And she starts teaching ballet 1 classes in the fall-which will subsidize her own classes and give her a small monthly stipend. She’s been completely unschooled since day 1, with the exception of the 1000 dollar curriculum failed kindergarten year. She started screaming when you’d say “Time for school”. Now she adores learning..
Colleges look at things like that, as well as ACT and SAT scores.
@EdieUnderground - Thank you.
My kids rock.
@nanoJAM - Well as a child that was never disciplined or taught responsibility i don’t think you can expect every kid to just figure all that out and know what the consequences will be without being told. No one was there to give me that guidance. Only a few years ago when I dropped out of college did I realize how screwed up and irresponsible I was. Not everyone is so fortunate. That is why in my original comment i was stressing guidance and expectations- bc thats what I needed. And now i am an extremely dependent person always asking people to be patient with me and teach me step by step how to do things that I should have learned when I was younger. I mean, I understand what you are saying and I agree that I should have taken responsibility and tried harder but that wasn’t the example laid out before me and i didn’t know better. I did what was easiest.
@GrowinWild@revelife - No, I agree. Like I said, it depends on the child, and I know that modeling is super important. If you’re left on your own, and your parents are slackers [not saying your parents are] then you’ll grow up to be a slacker. If you don’t decide what you want in yourself at a young(ish) age, then you’ll either a) find out later and have a hard time being who you want to be or b) stay rather immature through life. I feel discipline is necessary for society as a whole, but there are, of course, children who are well on their own at a ripe age of, say, 7. It all depends.
In my opinion : public schooling + parent involvement = success
We need better teachers that aren’t doing it for a ‘job’.
@tishtok - not forced
but definetly stuctured classes
and they cant foorrrcccee you to do anythingbut they CAN kick you out
I went to public school and was totally ignored at home by my family. Im also a 40 yr old addict. So…… You tell me.
There are a number of unschool methodologies and a number of homeschooll methodologies, and unschool and homeschool are not synonymous. Such potent, erroneous premises confuses the question.
Montessori schools come in different forms (using different methodologies), too. Some use texts and some don’t; or rather texts are used for some students, and less or no texts are used for other students. It depends on the philosophy and resources of the administrators and teachers.
My exposure to “unschooling” related more to finding a way to undo the academic and social harm done by public schools. Public school social structure and behavior does not mimic real life. Public school mores are an idealized (for good or for bad or for both) distortion of outside-of-school mores.
“Homeschool” simply meant doing school at home. Some homeschooling families do indeed have college trained and/or certified teachers teaching them. The word “professional” is ambiguous and misleading in this context. In fact “college trained” is also. College trained in what - teaching? The teacher training comes in the classroom. Most of my college training dealt with non-teaching issues such as administration, discipline, language acquisition (which is hardly ever needed) but no emergency medical procedures (which one would think is more important than how to fill out forms or how the students acquired language at the age of one through three).
Extending “texts” to computers and internet, that’s where the stored information is. So it’s useful. For “professions,” it is absolutely required. For “jobs” it may or may not be required, a little or a lot. Rather than whether a child learns from reading, or listening, or mimicking, or interacting, or some other nontextual way, the more important question is, What is to be learned, how is its application to be taught, and what ethics shall apply?
imo
@Rionheart35 - wrote ”In my opinion : public schooling + parent involvement = success”
Likewise, homeschooling + public school cooperation = academic, moral, and social success.
@splinter1591 - exactly!
lol that’s why a lot of people fail, in my opinion. Yes, there are
structured classes, but 1. a lot of people are no longer living at
home, so they have no parents to force them to do work or check up on
them or tell them to do stuff, and 2. the law doesn’t mandate anything
at that point…and 3. they aren’t mature/responsible/disciplined
enough to do everything by themselves, so they drop out/are kicked
out…Or, they realize that college might not be the right place for
them and pursue other career paths. (In my opinion, anyways). Survival of the fittest! The disciplined survive!
Anyways…haha this conversation is neither here nor there…yay for randomness!
no offense, but that’s not at all what healthy homeschooling teacher does. I was homeschooled since second grade and i still had tons of rules and strictness from my mom. The idea behind homeschooling is for you to have the one on one help of a teacher and be able to find out in what way you learn best. The idea is to make learning hands-on and real, not something you sit in a class and listen to someone tell you facts. But giving children rules allows them to have respect for you and know that you love them, and without that part no matter how you try to teach them, you will fail. so, yes, children need rules, and no, you have the idea of homeschooling wrong, sry.
@tishtok - ^^
whateverwhat do i care if a few lazy butts drop out?but as you said that’s neither here nor there
@splinter1591 - heck yeah more drop-outs=shorter graduation! lol