Written by John Taylor Gatto, as published at The Link. Almost all Americans have had an intense school experience which occupied their entire youth, an experience during which they were drilled thoroughly in the culture and economy of the well-schooled greater society, in which individuals have been rendered helpless to do much of anything except…
Category: Unschooling
Everybody Does It
Written by Mark Davis for Strike The Root. The good old “argumentum ad populum” or “appeal to the people” is a logical fallacy that has been used by countless children the world over for time immemorial. Unfortunately, the equally old lesson traditionally imparted by parents to children who use this appeal “Would you jump off…
Doing Something Different: Growing Without Schooling
Written by Susannah Sheffer for The Natural Child Project. I’m sitting with three teenagers who have recently left school to begin learning at home and in the wider world. On the table in front of us lie notes about possibilities – ideas, wishes, plans for further investigation. I’ve scribbled down, “Call homeless shelter; find out…
Deschooling a Parent: Learning to Trust
Written by Jan Hunt for The Natural Child Project. It’s only natural for parents to feel uneasy and uncertain when contemplating a path for their children other than the one they themselves traveled. Those of us who decide to unschool – even when we are convinced that this is the best option for our child…
Changing Our Educational Paradigm
Written by Kelvin Silva for The Voluntaryist Reader. The problem of education today lies in its control by the State. The State conceived education in the late 18th and early 19th century; primarily in the economic times of the industrial revolution, and the intellectual mindset of the Enlightenment. The current paradigm was meant for a…
Can You Measure an Education? Define Life’s Meaning?
Written by Peter Gray for Psychology Today. We, in America and many other modern nations, are obsessed with measurement. Our motto seems to be, “If you can’t count it, it doesn’t count.” We’re especially obsessed with measuring children’s education, and, with No Child Left Behind, we’ve run amok with that obsession. Our children have become…
Why I Hate School But Love Education
Made by sulibreezy.
Do You Know a Child Who Wants To Start a Business?
Written by Marsha Friedman for LewRockwell.com. Mark, a hugely successful businessman by any measure, got his start at just 9 years old. He earned enough money to buy his own clothes, his bicycles and, eventually, to pay his way through college. He says that kind of success is available to any creative, industrious child today.…
I Let My Children Do Whatever They Want
Guest post by Dayna Martin. No school, no exams, no bed time, no meal times, and certainly no rules. It sounds like every child’s wildest dream, but for Dayna Martin’s four children – Devin, 13, Tiffany, 11, Ivy, seven, and Orion, four – it’s a daily reality. The controversial 39-year-old mum and her husband Joe,…
The Unschooled Life
Guest post by Astra Taylor.