Pat Farenga Reviews Unschooling Dads

John Holt’s successor and homeschooling/unschooling advocate Pat Farenga reviews my book, Unschooling Dads:

This collection of first-person accounts by new and experienced dads who unschool their children is a welcome addition to the discussion about living and learning with your children instead of sending them to school: Why would any father not force their kids to go to school? What sorts of dads are attracted to unschooling? What do dads do all day if they’re home with the kids?

Thank goodness the men in this book faced that first question head on rather than just go with the crowd; their general response is that good fathers care more about what is happening to their children than about what other fathers think of them. These dads are skeptical—some due to their own experiences of school—of the standard claim that the sooner children get the grit to get through school with high grades the better off they’ll be as adults.

Just like parents everywhere, unschooling families want what is best for their children, but they don’t see school as the best and only place for their children to get a quality education. These dads see the value of play, real work, and patience as the basis for living and learning with children, not lectures, homework, and competition for grades and honors.

The full review is available here.

Skyler.

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Founder and editor of Everything-Voluntary.com and UnschoolingDads.com, Skyler is a husband and unschooling father of three beautiful children. His writings include the column series “One Voluntaryist’s Perspective” and “One Improved Unit,” and blog series “Two Cents“. Skyler also wrote the books No Hitting! and Toward a Free Society, and edited the books Everything Voluntary and Unschooling Dads. You can hear Skyler chatting away on his podcasts, Everything Voluntary and Thinking & Doing.