Unschooling NYC

It’s a well known fact that great change doesn’t happen without some risk of failure.   The people at the forefront of instituting change open themselves up to criticism and scrutiny. Because of this, it’s easier not to get involved and just continue doing our own thing, quietly and without causing a fuss.

Anonymity can be very enticing.

Real change only comes about when enough people demand it.  It’s a bottom up kind of thing.   People cannot demand what they don’t know about, which is why the first step toward any significant change is awareness.

And how to bring about awareness?  … Read more

Ever notice how fast you learn something when you’re interested in it?  Even if it takes practice, you practice more if it’s something you really want to do, and therefore learn it faster.   Learning really doesn’t require sitting in a classroom 8 hours a day, 5 days a week.   Or maybe it does if you are being force fed subjects about which you have no interest and which are served like dry toast.

Last week, while many kids were writing reports on obscure topics or memorizing math equations,  unschoolers were busy with other things.   In our house, for example, a … Read more

Lately I’ve been paying attention to the words people use when they talk about why they do things.   Why their kids take a particular class over another; why certain outings are embarked upon; why they do errands and chores.

And you know what?  Almost never does anyone say “We do it because it’s fun.”   I hear a lot of “We thought the kids should try it,”  or “We think it’s important,”  or “We hope they’ll learn something”; or when it comes to chores and errands, the inevitable “We have to…”   Sometimes people say, “She likes the class,” and every so … Read more

Ever wake up and feel like you are a species unto yourself – maybe a visitor from an alien planet?

That’s pretty much been my whole week.

I wasn’t even going to post tonight, since I’ve got more copy to write for my new website, but I have to vent to someone.

Lucky you.

More and more I find myself staring at people talking about what kids need to know, or reading articles about how best to educate our children or watching videos where high school kids are asked who the Vice President is and don’t know and I am … Read more

Did you know that Sylvan Learning Centers offer prizes for doing well in their courses (or sessions, or whatever they call them)?   Kids accumulate points for getting high scores – which Sylvan calls ‘learning’- on assignments or tests and can then trade those point in for stuff.   Someone we know who went there for a time said some of the items you could get were pretty substantial.   Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that an iPod was among them.  (I just looked on line, and nowhere is there mention of Sylvan rewarding kids with stuff. Could it be unique … Read more

Maya and I had a math discussion the other day.  She told me she’s ‘bad’ at math.  When gently pressed, I discovered that this means she can’t multiply numbers in her head as fast as some of her friends.   Friends who think it’s weird that she doesn’t know the times tables by rote.    We don’t learn math in terms of workbooks and times tables.

When Maya makes the statement that she isn’t as good at math as her friends I try not to preach about how much math she does know (can you say “counterproductive”?) even though I am silently … Read more

Yesterday a new reader of this blog (thank you Alicia) asked me if I’ve ever written about the differences between a childhood in the country and one in the city.  Which I don’t think I have, specifically. So here goes:

I grew up on a farm in Indiana, and there is no doubt I had a fun childhood.  Not perfect, not a utopian ideal to which no other childhood can compare, but very good.   I was a kid, I had a loving family, a dog and lots of cats. (But never a horse, which I always wanted.)   My friends and … Read more

You know how you’ll be going along, living your life, not thinking about any specific subject, and then a certain topic will be EVERYWHERE?   Every place you turn, someone is talking about it?

Right now that topic is teen rebellion.

It came across my radar for the first time about a week or so ago on one of the email lists to which I subscribe.  The headline was something like “Lack of rebellion in unschooling families”  (I am heavily paraphrasing, as I no longer have the email.)   I didn’t even read it, to be honest.

Then, a day or two … Read more

In case you don’t follow me or Michael Ellsberg on Twitter (shame on you!), here is a video of Sean Parker (Napster, Facebook) and Peter Thiel (Paypal, Thiel Fellowship) discussing higher education with Michael Ellsberg, author of “Education of Millionaires.”

This is what unschooling is all about.   It’s not just a wacky fringe idea about learning with K-12 age children; it’s has to do with higher education and life beyond as well.

Enjoy:

… Read more

Most of the families we know in New York City whose children learn outside of school are homeschooling, not unschooling.  (Unschoolers still make up only about 10% of all the homeschoolers in the country, give or take.)    And most of those families seem to be planning to send their kids to high school.

My opinions about this are colored by my own experiences in high school, which, while not horrible, were certainly nothing to shout about.   My Mom will attest that many was the time I would walk in the door and say, “I wish I could just go pick … Read more