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RE: LIVING IS LEARNING: Amazing Unschooled Babies Learn to Walk & Talk .... and more!
My 3 year old is learning to read and write by herself. Not because we are trying to teach her, but because she wants to. Guess what. We are unschoolers. There is no way on earth I'm sending her to school to have her love of learning replaced by drudgery.
We saw sandra dodds speak last year, and she was a great reminder of exactly why unschooling is the way forward if you want a kid to grow up with a natural inquisitiveness which will never be diluted by government indoctrination. Keep up the great work @canadian-coconut. We are right with you!
I agree entirely with the idea of unschooling, however I do think sometimes we all might be going to the extremes. Perhaps I was blessed with luck or ADD, but in many ways I did enjoy going to school. Let me explain why though. I didn't take school seriously, and so whenever I felt comfortable in a subject and if the subject was worthy of my attention, I would pay attention because I did want to learn about it. Whenever the subject was too boring my mind drifted. I was always rebellious in a silent way, I felt that if I needed to fail the subject then so be it. In general some of my teachers were cool but this has nothing to do with the main reason I liked school and that reason is that I had friends and was surrounded by others my age. I never had any problems being bullied, nor did I ever witness any of it, so like I said perhaps I was blessed. I was also well-protected from good friends. I can't help but remember that at the time the most important thing for me was to have fun, and I think that's ultimately what schools should do. They should provide a safe space for children to socialize and make friends, and probably do whatever they want. It should be free-flowing and kids should be able to choose what they want to learn. To not make this into a big essay, my point is that I do wish to see schooling reinvented in as many ways as possible. If we were to say open-source schooling, then we could all have a base to work on and improve, and it will constantly be improved over the years and this is how it Should be. Now with the internet, perhaps all schools need are computers and supervisors and the tools for kids to put what they learn on the internet into practice. Our public schooling system as it is is usually not that good, mine was ok and I enjoyed some of it though I wished I didn't waste time on things I didn't care for, but the point is we could be doing way better than we are doing now on so many different levels.
I think it's important for kids to socialize and have a place where they can always meet with their friends. Playing, in my opinion is also important because it will reflect how the mind prefers to develop and can signal important things about the children. This can help further guide them into a direction they will enjoy in their studying. If you were to have classrooms that taught X subject, and only kids who really wanted to study X subject attended it, then they might have an easier time making friends who are on a similar path with similar tastes etc. This might even make learning Subject X more enjoyable since they are surrounded by friends who enjoy the subject and could probably help each other
I don't think anyone is actually saying schooling is bad, but rather the way in which we are taught.
I think one of the things that people often think about unschooling is that the kids don't interact with and socialise with other kids. This is a massive misunderstanding. My daughter is brilliant with other kids, very emotionally stable and intelligent, and enjoys being with other kids on a daily basis. Unschooling is far from keeping them from other kids, more observing what interests them, and providing them with the resources for them to learn at their own pace the things that they are curious about in that moment.