Christine

Hey ladies,

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I just started unschooling this
year. We've been homeschooling now for going on 4 years and have
found by far that this has been the most successful method for giving
our children an education. I have insisted that my children continue
to use our workbooks for their math, but have allowed them to explore
their own interests in all other areas.

So my question is this: Under an unschooling philosophy, do you
require your children to continue their education using "standard"
measures in some subjects? Take math for example. We are using a text
book method, but I would be interested in pursuing a less traditional
approach if it gave my children the tools they needed for their life
goals.


Thanks!

Christine

Joyce Fetteroll

On Dec 14, 2008, at 8:48 PM, Christine wrote:

> We've been homeschooling now for going on 4 years and have
> found by far that this has been the most successful method for giving
> our children an education.

This is a good opportunity to say that the goal of unschooling is
different and why it's hard for people new to the idea of unschooling
to grasp why we do certain things and not do certain other things.

The goal of unschooling is to create a supportive environment for our
kids to explore the world. In the process of exploring they learn.

Even that's not totally clear since "explore the world" and "learn"
mean something different in school.

To an unschooler "explore the world" has two parts: One part is what
the child is immediately interested in. The other part is what the
parents keep moving through their kids lives so the kids have easy
access to new interests when they need them.

"Giving an education" is a phrase that is useful to examine.

Society talks about giving the gift of education. But examine that
concept of gift and giving. The expectation of a Birthday gift is
that it's something (we hope) the receiver wants. It's also something
that *should* come with no strings attached. Giving someone a Model T
car that requires hours of maintenance and many dollars worth of work
to someone who wanted a new Honda that needed dropped off for
maintenance once a year isn't much of a gift.

Which is the "gift" parents give of education. It's a gift that takes
over their children's childhood. It's something that brings them to
tears and grief often.

The expectation is that it prepares them to be anything they want.
Anything that torturous better be good we come to believe. (As kids
we have to believe it's all worth it or we'll go crazy. And some kids
who can't accept it, do go crazy in the form of rebellion.)

But is it? Obviously many kids go onto college and become self
supporting. So we assume school is responsible. But many kids don't.
Some kids take a different route to fulfillment. Some kids don't
become successes at all. So there must be something else that's
creating self-supporting, fulfilled people but we can't see it
because essentially everyone goes to school.

That's why scientists have control groups. A group where you do
everything except what you're testing for. Unschooled kids are the
control group. They aren't doing anything that resembles school and
yet they prepare themselves to be what they want to be by *being*
what they want to be.


> I have insisted that my children continue
> to use our workbooks for their math, but have allowed them to explore
> their own interests in all other areas.

Reading and math are probably the hardest for new-to-unschooling
parents to let go of. That's because the methods schools use are so
inefficient and difficult to learn from that we've come to believe
that the subjects themselves are difficult.

Learning math as a side effect of using math looks nothing like
school math. It takes minutes a week as opposed to hours. Until you
see kids absorbing the concepts from using them in context it's
pretty much impossible to have confidence that that's enough for them
to build a foundation from.

The way schools teach math is like teaching kids formal grammar and
vocabulary and sentence structure of a language they have no
immediate use for and expecting kids to learn the language that way.
Unless kids have a natural bent for that type of math (structured
math is like fun math puzzles for many kids, as it was for me), the
outcome is kids who either feel they're stupid for not getting it or
that math is stupid.

The truth is that school math provides lots of formula practice for
kids with a bent for formulas. The other kids are left scratching
their heads. *Some* kids -- and not even all the ones who get good
grades in math -- do figure out *as a side effect* of school math,
how numbers work. Lots of kids don't.

The effect of school type math when it works for a child is getting
kids to do school type math. That really has little to do with
understanding what's actually going on with numbers. Kids can easily
learn how to write out the answers to percentage problems without
understanding what a percentage is.

School math is all taught backwards. Formal notation before
understanding the concepts. That's because it's easy to test an
understanding of formal notation and really hard to teach and test
the understanding of concepts. And schools must show that kids are
"improving" so they need methods that can be tested. It's not what
educators want, but it's what they're stuck with.

Real math is learned by using the concepts. Then later, formal
notation can be learned fairly quickly. It's just a way of writing
what someone already understands (rather than trying to make them
write and work through what they don't understand with the hope that
they'll understand.)

Real math learning looks like video games and art programs and
cooking and programming DVRs and figuring out how many days until
Christmas. It looks very much how kids learned to speak English: by
using it as a tool to get what they want, by playing with it, by
trying this out to see how they work. It takes minutes a week. (Or at
least minutes that we might consciously note as math. There's way
more going on that we wouldn't notice.)

There's more at:

http://joyfullyrejoycing.com/
down the left hand side.

and at:

http://sandradodd.com/math/


> So my question is this: Under an unschooling philosophy, do you
> require your children to continue their education using "standard"
> measures in some subjects?

This is one of those cases where some might think it's "just
semantics" but the way you've phrased this shows you're thinking
about learning in schoolish ways so unschooling will make less sense.

"require": No to requiring academics. We might in a way require our
kids to be polite, but require even in that context looks different
than the conventional parenting definition of require.

"continue their education": A better view of unschooling is opening
the doors to the world and accompanying them as they explore.
Occasionally we might point something out that we think they might
like. We answer their questions.

"using "standard" measures": Once you've stepped back away from
school, the less meaning standard measures has. School is like
leading kids on a predetermined path through the zoo. They will read
and observe what someone else has decided is important. They will go
in the prescribed order because they must all stay together with
their class. Unschooling is exploring the zoo on their own schedule,
going where they want to go, going to places the parents says "Hey, I
think you'll like this!" (and moving on when it doesn't grab them),
doubling back to see the "good parts". While all 3rd grades may do
lions, and any 3rd grader who can't answer the standard questions
about lions then is a failure, that measure is meaningless to
unschoolers.

Order is only meaningful when something doesn't work. School type
thinking will say kids can't learn multiplication before addition. In
some ways that true, but the way it's phrased is what blocks thinking
about how people really learn. In real life we don't learn addition
and multiplication in isolation. We'll be exposed to both as well as
lots of other concepts. We'll absorb and play around with what's
meaningful and useful, and learn more and more about how they work.
So for unschoolers addition won't be isolated from multiplication or
percentages or decimals. It's all there to play with and pull meaning
from as they use it.

"subjects": In unschooling the world isn't broken into subjects.
Everything is interconnected. This is one of the harder concepts to
let go of! The works of English Literature is clearly separate from
astronomy. I think the problem comes from believing there is some
value in acquiring a body of knowledge that can be labeled "English
Literature" or "astronomy". But what's valuable is being exposed in a
delightful way and then being free to explore, to drop, to come back
when it strikes someone again.

Anyone who will absorb what's valuable about English Literature can't
be stopped in an unschooling life. They'll suck it in because it
interests them. And they'll learn *way* more than someone who is
required to study it without the danger of being turned off to a
whole lot of writing because someone made someone read and analyze a
book they hated. (I still have bad feelings about Silas Marner and
anything that feels connected to it.)

The beauty, though, is that no one can escape English Literature in
an unschooling life. English Literature and the authors and the
politics of the world and "timeless themes" and the world that
brought it about are referenced in video games and movies and jokes
and cartoons. There is probably no one thing that has done more
damage to Shakespeare than requiring kids to slog through reading and
analyzing it. But real life can create a curiosity and good feelings
about Shakespeare. There are modern versions of his plays as movies.
He pops up in cartoons. He and his characters are the subjects of
jokes. The end result of a life that has good encounters with
Shakespeare is creating a foundation for a child to explore him at
various points through out their lives in a free and unpressured way.
(And a child who will love him and go on to be a Shakespeare scholar,
won't be stopped by lack of required study ;-) They'll create their
own way of pulling him in.)

> Take math for example. We are using a text
> book method, but I would be interested in pursuing a less traditional
> approach if it gave my children the tools they needed for their life
> goals.

"if it gave my children the tools they needed for their life goals."

It does -- and yet the above phrase needs examined because it's
something schools claim that they do but they're really providing
something else. So if you're expecting unschooling to provide what
schools do, you'll be frustrated when you don't see it happening.

The original goal of public school in the US was to raise the minimum
level of education of the masses cheaply. The US had a huge influx of
immigrants who were basically unemployable so the goal was to get as
many as possible up to speed on math and reading. They structured
schools like an assembly line. This was back when assembly lines were
an astounding boon to manufacturing: cheap, efficient. They turned
out more and better quality products for way less money. When the
goal was simply to raise the minimum level of education, they seemed
like a boon to society.

Why is that important? It's important because we still use that same
model but call on it to do something it was never designed to do: to
prepare kids to go onto college. (Obviously school fails at that, but
ever since the 50's and the Russians beat us into space with Sputnik,
schools have been pressured (and seen) as a place to prepare kids to
move into technical education and jobs.)

The problem is that people don't naturally learn the way schools
present information. Schools worked okay when the goals were simple:
math and reading and a bit about the world. But now that we want to
get a massive amount of information into kids to *supposedly* prepare
them for anything they want to be, the flaws are glaring.

Humans naturally learn by doing. We learn by using tools to do what
interests us. We get better at what interests us because we're
motivated to do that thing. In the process, we use tools and, as a
side effect, we get better at using the tools. And as a side effect
we learn things that connect with what interests us.

Unschooling is like looking back on our lives and just doing all the
things that lead us to where we enjoy being and cutting out all the
dull stuff that we never used. That scares people because we imagine
we would shut ourselves off from the subjects we hated like math or
history. So how could kids prepare themselves if they shut those out.
But unschoolers can't shut themselves out. All those are part of our
world. Unschoolers encounter bits of everything but without the bad
taste of being forced.

Joyce

Joyce

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Jodi Bezzola

Joyce, thank GOD you're on this list!  This response is going into my permanant "Important Read Again" unschooling file.
 
I wish I had responses at my fingertips like this for my in-laws next week when they arrive for Xmas!  I still get pretty tongue tied and unsure when they ask questions.  It's not all that pointed yet because my girls are only 4, but I'm already getting flack for not having them in preschool.
 
I'm completely confident in our decision to live as if school doesn't exist, I just get nervous about how to best answer their questions.  On the other hand, I could just use some of the suggestions I've heard here, like: "That's interesting; please pass the bean dip".  Thanks for that one, Kelly :).  I always have liked the one where I just keep asking "why?", but it could be a little inflamatory and I'm not sure I have the nerve with my father-in-law.  He can be pretty intimidating.
 
Jodi
 
What is real?  What is unreal?  What lifts the corners of your mouth...trust that.
~Hafiz~

--- On Mon, 12/15/08, Joyce Fetteroll <jfetteroll@...> wrote:

From: Joyce Fetteroll <jfetteroll@...>
Subject: Re: [unschoolingbasics] question about core subjects
To: [email protected]
Date: Monday, December 15, 2008, 3:32 AM







On Dec 14, 2008, at 8:48 PM, Christine wrote:

> We've been homeschooling now for going on 4 years and have
> found by far that this has been the most successful method for giving
> our children an education.

This is a good opportunity to say that the goal of unschooling is
different and why it's hard for people new to the idea of unschooling
to grasp why we do certain things and not do certain other things.

The goal of unschooling is to create a supportive environment for our
kids to explore the world. In the process of exploring they learn.

Even that's not totally clear since "explore the world" and "learn"
mean something different in school.

To an unschooler "explore the world" has two parts: One part is what
the child is immediately interested in. The other part is what the
parents keep moving through their kids lives so the kids have easy
access to new interests when they need them.

"Giving an education" is a phrase that is useful to examine.

Society talks about giving the gift of education. But examine that
concept of gift and giving. The expectation of a Birthday gift is
that it's something (we hope) the receiver wants. It's also something
that *should* come with no strings attached. Giving someone a Model T
car that requires hours of maintenance and many dollars worth of work
to someone who wanted a new Honda that needed dropped off for
maintenance once a year isn't much of a gift.

Which is the "gift" parents give of education. It's a gift that takes
over their children's childhood. It's something that brings them to
tears and grief often.

The expectation is that it prepares them to be anything they want.
Anything that torturous better be good we come to believe. (As kids
we have to believe it's all worth it or we'll go crazy. And some kids
who can't accept it, do go crazy in the form of rebellion.)

But is it? Obviously many kids go onto college and become self
supporting. So we assume school is responsible. But many kids don't.
Some kids take a different route to fulfillment. Some kids don't
become successes at all. So there must be something else that's
creating self-supporting, fulfilled people but we can't see it
because essentially everyone goes to school.

That's why scientists have control groups. A group where you do
everything except what you're testing for. Unschooled kids are the
control group. They aren't doing anything that resembles school and
yet they prepare themselves to be what they want to be by *being*
what they want to be.

> I have insisted that my children continue
> to use our workbooks for their math, but have allowed them to explore
> their own interests in all other areas.

Reading and math are probably the hardest for new-to-unschooling
parents to let go of. That's because the methods schools use are so
inefficient and difficult to learn from that we've come to believe
that the subjects themselves are difficult.

Learning math as a side effect of using math looks nothing like
school math. It takes minutes a week as opposed to hours. Until you
see kids absorbing the concepts from using them in context it's
pretty much impossible to have confidence that that's enough for them
to build a foundation from.

The way schools teach math is like teaching kids formal grammar and
vocabulary and sentence structure of a language they have no
immediate use for and expecting kids to learn the language that way.
Unless kids have a natural bent for that type of math (structured
math is like fun math puzzles for many kids, as it was for me), the
outcome is kids who either feel they're stupid for not getting it or
that math is stupid.

The truth is that school math provides lots of formula practice for
kids with a bent for formulas. The other kids are left scratching
their heads. *Some* kids -- and not even all the ones who get good
grades in math -- do figure out *as a side effect* of school math,
how numbers work. Lots of kids don't.

The effect of school type math when it works for a child is getting
kids to do school type math. That really has little to do with
understanding what's actually going on with numbers. Kids can easily
learn how to write out the answers to percentage problems without
understanding what a percentage is.

School math is all taught backwards. Formal notation before
understanding the concepts. That's because it's easy to test an
understanding of formal notation and really hard to teach and test
the understanding of concepts. And schools must show that kids are
"improving" so they need methods that can be tested. It's not what
educators want, but it's what they're stuck with.

Real math is learned by using the concepts. Then later, formal
notation can be learned fairly quickly. It's just a way of writing
what someone already understands (rather than trying to make them
write and work through what they don't understand with the hope that
they'll understand.)

Real math learning looks like video games and art programs and
cooking and programming DVRs and figuring out how many days until
Christmas. It looks very much how kids learned to speak English: by
using it as a tool to get what they want, by playing with it, by
trying this out to see how they work. It takes minutes a week. (Or at
least minutes that we might consciously note as math. There's way
more going on that we wouldn't notice.)

There's more at:

http://joyfullyrejo ycing.com/
down the left hand side.

and at:

http://sandradodd. com/math/

> So my question is this: Under an unschooling philosophy, do you
> require your children to continue their education using "standard"
> measures in some subjects?

This is one of those cases where some might think it's "just
semantics" but the way you've phrased this shows you're thinking
about learning in schoolish ways so unschooling will make less sense.

"require": No to requiring academics. We might in a way require our
kids to be polite, but require even in that context looks different
than the conventional parenting definition of require.

"continue their education": A better view of unschooling is opening
the doors to the world and accompanying them as they explore.
Occasionally we might point something out that we think they might
like. We answer their questions.

"using "standard" measures": Once you've stepped back away from
school, the less meaning standard measures has. School is like
leading kids on a predetermined path through the zoo. They will read
and observe what someone else has decided is important. They will go
in the prescribed order because they must all stay together with
their class. Unschooling is exploring the zoo on their own schedule,
going where they want to go, going to places the parents says "Hey, I
think you'll like this!" (and moving on when it doesn't grab them),
doubling back to see the "good parts". While all 3rd grades may do
lions, and any 3rd grader who can't answer the standard questions
about lions then is a failure, that measure is meaningless to
unschoolers.

Order is only meaningful when something doesn't work. School type
thinking will say kids can't learn multiplication before addition. In
some ways that true, but the way it's phrased is what blocks thinking
about how people really learn. In real life we don't learn addition
and multiplication in isolation. We'll be exposed to both as well as
lots of other concepts. We'll absorb and play around with what's
meaningful and useful, and learn more and more about how they work.
So for unschoolers addition won't be isolated from multiplication or
percentages or decimals. It's all there to play with and pull meaning
from as they use it.

"subjects": In unschooling the world isn't broken into subjects.
Everything is interconnected. This is one of the harder concepts to
let go of! The works of English Literature is clearly separate from
astronomy. I think the problem comes from believing there is some
value in acquiring a body of knowledge that can be labeled "English
Literature" or "astronomy". But what's valuable is being exposed in a
delightful way and then being free to explore, to drop, to come back
when it strikes someone again.

Anyone who will absorb what's valuable about English Literature can't
be stopped in an unschooling life. They'll suck it in because it
interests them. And they'll learn *way* more than someone who is
required to study it without the danger of being turned off to a
whole lot of writing because someone made someone read and analyze a
book they hated. (I still have bad feelings about Silas Marner and
anything that feels connected to it.)

The beauty, though, is that no one can escape English Literature in
an unschooling life. English Literature and the authors and the
politics of the world and "timeless themes" and the world that
brought it about are referenced in video games and movies and jokes
and cartoons. There is probably no one thing that has done more
damage to Shakespeare than requiring kids to slog through reading and
analyzing it. But real life can create a curiosity and good feelings
about Shakespeare. There are modern versions of his plays as movies.
He pops up in cartoons. He and his characters are the subjects of
jokes. The end result of a life that has good encounters with
Shakespeare is creating a foundation for a child to explore him at
various points through out their lives in a free and unpressured way.
(And a child who will love him and go on to be a Shakespeare scholar,
won't be stopped by lack of required study ;-) They'll create their
own way of pulling him in.)

> Take math for example. We are using a text
> book method, but I would be interested in pursuing a less traditional
> approach if it gave my children the tools they needed for their life
> goals.

"if it gave my children the tools they needed for their life goals."

It does -- and yet the above phrase needs examined because it's
something schools claim that they do but they're really providing
something else. So if you're expecting unschooling to provide what
schools do, you'll be frustrated when you don't see it happening.

The original goal of public school in the US was to raise the minimum
level of education of the masses cheaply. The US had a huge influx of
immigrants who were basically unemployable so the goal was to get as
many as possible up to speed on math and reading. They structured
schools like an assembly line. This was back when assembly lines were
an astounding boon to manufacturing: cheap, efficient. They turned
out more and better quality products for way less money. When the
goal was simply to raise the minimum level of education, they seemed
like a boon to society.

Why is that important? It's important because we still use that same
model but call on it to do something it was never designed to do: to
prepare kids to go onto college. (Obviously school fails at that, but
ever since the 50's and the Russians beat us into space with Sputnik,
schools have been pressured (and seen) as a place to prepare kids to
move into technical education and jobs.)

The problem is that people don't naturally learn the way schools
present information. Schools worked okay when the goals were simple:
math and reading and a bit about the world. But now that we want to
get a massive amount of information into kids to *supposedly* prepare
them for anything they want to be, the flaws are glaring.

Humans naturally learn by doing. We learn by using tools to do what
interests us. We get better at what interests us because we're
motivated to do that thing. In the process, we use tools and, as a
side effect, we get better at using the tools. And as a side effect
we learn things that connect with what interests us.

Unschooling is like looking back on our lives and just doing all the
things that lead us to where we enjoy being and cutting out all the
dull stuff that we never used. That scares people because we imagine
we would shut ourselves off from the subjects we hated like math or
history. So how could kids prepare themselves if they shut those out.
But unschoolers can't shut themselves out. All those are part of our
world. Unschoolers encounter bits of everything but without the bad
taste of being forced.

Joyce

Joyce

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]


















[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Betj

I don't understand putting kids in pre-school just because. Why shouldn't kids be home if a parent is home?
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

-----Original Message-----
From: Jodi Bezzola <jodibezzola@...>

Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2008 08:25:27
To: <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [unschoolingbasics] question about core subjects


Joyce, thank GOD you're on this list!� This response is going into my permanant "Important Read Again" unschooling file.
�
I wish I had responses at my fingertips like this for my in-laws next week when they arrive for Xmas!� I still get pretty tongue tied and unsure when they ask questions.� It's not all that pointed yet because my girls are only 4, but I'm already getting flack for not having them in preschool.
�
I'm completely confident in our decision to live as if school doesn't exist, I just get nervous about how to best answer their questions.� On the other hand, I could just use some of the suggestions I've heard here, like: "That's interesting; please pass the bean dip".� Thanks for that one, Kelly :).� I always have liked the one where I just keep asking "why?", but it could be a little inflamatory and I'm not sure I have the nerve with my father-in-law.� He can be�pretty intimidating.
�
Jodi
�
What is real?� What is unreal?� What lifts the corners of your mouth...trust that.
~Hafiz~

Erin

That was a truly awesome post, Joyce! I am saving that one to use
for explaining things to people in my life that are less than
supportive of unschooling! You really made it make sense--explaining
how they're teaching math in the schools in a way that isn't truly
teaching the kids math...just a way to measure that
they're "progressing".

And, no, I didn't consider the points you made "just semantics"!

--- In [email protected], Joyce Fetteroll
<jfetteroll@...> wrote:
>
>
> On Dec 14, 2008, at 8:48 PM, Christine wrote:
>
> > We've been homeschooling now for going on 4 years and have
> > found by far that this has been the most successful method for
giving
> > our children an education.
>
> This is a good opportunity to say that the goal of unschooling is
> different and why it's hard for people new to the idea of
unschooling
> to grasp why we do certain things and not do certain other things.
>
> The goal of unschooling is to create a supportive environment for
our
> kids to explore the world. In the process of exploring they learn.
>
> Even that's not totally clear since "explore the world"
and "learn"
> mean something different in school.
>
> To an unschooler "explore the world" has two parts: One part is
what
> the child is immediately interested in. The other part is what the
> parents keep moving through their kids lives so the kids have easy
> access to new interests when they need them.
>
> "Giving an education" is a phrase that is useful to examine.
>
> Society talks about giving the gift of education. But examine that
> concept of gift and giving. The expectation of a Birthday gift is
> that it's something (we hope) the receiver wants. It's also
something
> that *should* come with no strings attached. Giving someone a Model
T
> car that requires hours of maintenance and many dollars worth of
work
> to someone who wanted a new Honda that needed dropped off for
> maintenance once a year isn't much of a gift.
>
> Which is the "gift" parents give of education. It's a gift that
takes
> over their children's childhood. It's something that brings them
to
> tears and grief often.
>
> The expectation is that it prepares them to be anything they want.
> Anything that torturous better be good we come to believe. (As
kids
> we have to believe it's all worth it or we'll go crazy. And some
kids
> who can't accept it, do go crazy in the form of rebellion.)
>
> But is it? Obviously many kids go onto college and become self
> supporting. So we assume school is responsible. But many kids
don't.
> Some kids take a different route to fulfillment. Some kids don't
> become successes at all. So there must be something else that's
> creating self-supporting, fulfilled people but we can't see it
> because essentially everyone goes to school.
>
> That's why scientists have control groups. A group where you do
> everything except what you're testing for. Unschooled kids are the
> control group. They aren't doing anything that resembles school
and
> yet they prepare themselves to be what they want to be by *being*
> what they want to be.
>
>
> > I have insisted that my children continue
> > to use our workbooks for their math, but have allowed them to
explore
> > their own interests in all other areas.
>
> Reading and math are probably the hardest for new-to-unschooling
> parents to let go of. That's because the methods schools use are
so
> inefficient and difficult to learn from that we've come to believe
> that the subjects themselves are difficult.
>
> Learning math as a side effect of using math looks nothing like
> school math. It takes minutes a week as opposed to hours. Until
you
> see kids absorbing the concepts from using them in context it's
> pretty much impossible to have confidence that that's enough for
them
> to build a foundation from.
>
> The way schools teach math is like teaching kids formal grammar
and
> vocabulary and sentence structure of a language they have no
> immediate use for and expecting kids to learn the language that
way.
> Unless kids have a natural bent for that type of math (structured
> math is like fun math puzzles for many kids, as it was for me),
the
> outcome is kids who either feel they're stupid for not getting it
or
> that math is stupid.
>
> The truth is that school math provides lots of formula practice
for
> kids with a bent for formulas. The other kids are left scratching
> their heads. *Some* kids -- and not even all the ones who get good
> grades in math -- do figure out *as a side effect* of school math,
> how numbers work. Lots of kids don't.
>
> The effect of school type math when it works for a child is
getting
> kids to do school type math. That really has little to do with
> understanding what's actually going on with numbers. Kids can
easily
> learn how to write out the answers to percentage problems without
> understanding what a percentage is.
>
> School math is all taught backwards. Formal notation before
> understanding the concepts. That's because it's easy to test an
> understanding of formal notation and really hard to teach and test
> the understanding of concepts. And schools must show that kids are
> "improving" so they need methods that can be tested. It's not what
> educators want, but it's what they're stuck with.
>
> Real math is learned by using the concepts. Then later, formal
> notation can be learned fairly quickly. It's just a way of writing
> what someone already understands (rather than trying to make them
> write and work through what they don't understand with the hope
that
> they'll understand.)
>
> Real math learning looks like video games and art programs and
> cooking and programming DVRs and figuring out how many days until
> Christmas. It looks very much how kids learned to speak English:
by
> using it as a tool to get what they want, by playing with it, by
> trying this out to see how they work. It takes minutes a week. (Or
at
> least minutes that we might consciously note as math. There's way
> more going on that we wouldn't notice.)
>
> There's more at:
>
> http://joyfullyrejoycing.com/
> down the left hand side.
>
> and at:
>
> http://sandradodd.com/math/
>
>
> > So my question is this: Under an unschooling philosophy, do you
> > require your children to continue their education using "standard"
> > measures in some subjects?
>
> This is one of those cases where some might think it's "just
> semantics" but the way you've phrased this shows you're thinking
> about learning in schoolish ways so unschooling will make less
sense.
>
> "require": No to requiring academics. We might in a way require
our
> kids to be polite, but require even in that context looks
different
> than the conventional parenting definition of require.
>
> "continue their education": A better view of unschooling is
opening
> the doors to the world and accompanying them as they explore.
> Occasionally we might point something out that we think they might
> like. We answer their questions.
>
> "using "standard" measures": Once you've stepped back away from
> school, the less meaning standard measures has. School is like
> leading kids on a predetermined path through the zoo. They will
read
> and observe what someone else has decided is important. They will
go
> in the prescribed order because they must all stay together with
> their class. Unschooling is exploring the zoo on their own
schedule,
> going where they want to go, going to places the parents says "Hey,
I
> think you'll like this!" (and moving on when it doesn't grab
them),
> doubling back to see the "good parts". While all 3rd grades may do
> lions, and any 3rd grader who can't answer the standard questions
> about lions then is a failure, that measure is meaningless to
> unschoolers.
>
> Order is only meaningful when something doesn't work. School type
> thinking will say kids can't learn multiplication before addition.
In
> some ways that true, but the way it's phrased is what blocks
thinking
> about how people really learn. In real life we don't learn
addition
> and multiplication in isolation. We'll be exposed to both as well
as
> lots of other concepts. We'll absorb and play around with what's
> meaningful and useful, and learn more and more about how they
work.
> So for unschoolers addition won't be isolated from multiplication
or
> percentages or decimals. It's all there to play with and pull
meaning
> from as they use it.
>
> "subjects": In unschooling the world isn't broken into subjects.
> Everything is interconnected. This is one of the harder concepts
to
> let go of! The works of English Literature is clearly separate
from
> astronomy. I think the problem comes from believing there is some
> value in acquiring a body of knowledge that can be
labeled "English
> Literature" or "astronomy". But what's valuable is being exposed in
a
> delightful way and then being free to explore, to drop, to come
back
> when it strikes someone again.
>
> Anyone who will absorb what's valuable about English Literature
can't
> be stopped in an unschooling life. They'll suck it in because it
> interests them. And they'll learn *way* more than someone who is
> required to study it without the danger of being turned off to a
> whole lot of writing because someone made someone read and analyze
a
> book they hated. (I still have bad feelings about Silas Marner and
> anything that feels connected to it.)
>
> The beauty, though, is that no one can escape English Literature
in
> an unschooling life. English Literature and the authors and the
> politics of the world and "timeless themes" and the world that
> brought it about are referenced in video games and movies and
jokes
> and cartoons. There is probably no one thing that has done more
> damage to Shakespeare than requiring kids to slog through reading
and
> analyzing it. But real life can create a curiosity and good
feelings
> about Shakespeare. There are modern versions of his plays as
movies.
> He pops up in cartoons. He and his characters are the subjects of
> jokes. The end result of a life that has good encounters with
> Shakespeare is creating a foundation for a child to explore him at
> various points through out their lives in a free and unpressured
way.
> (And a child who will love him and go on to be a Shakespeare
scholar,
> won't be stopped by lack of required study ;-) They'll create
their
> own way of pulling him in.)
>
> > Take math for example. We are using a text
> > book method, but I would be interested in pursuing a less
traditional
> > approach if it gave my children the tools they needed for their
life
> > goals.
>
> "if it gave my children the tools they needed for their life goals."
>
> It does -- and yet the above phrase needs examined because it's
> something schools claim that they do but they're really providing
> something else. So if you're expecting unschooling to provide what
> schools do, you'll be frustrated when you don't see it happening.
>
> The original goal of public school in the US was to raise the
minimum
> level of education of the masses cheaply. The US had a huge influx
of
> immigrants who were basically unemployable so the goal was to get
as
> many as possible up to speed on math and reading. They structured
> schools like an assembly line. This was back when assembly lines
were
> an astounding boon to manufacturing: cheap, efficient. They turned
> out more and better quality products for way less money. When the
> goal was simply to raise the minimum level of education, they
seemed
> like a boon to society.
>
> Why is that important? It's important because we still use that
same
> model but call on it to do something it was never designed to do:
to
> prepare kids to go onto college. (Obviously school fails at that,
but
> ever since the 50's and the Russians beat us into space with
Sputnik,
> schools have been pressured (and seen) as a place to prepare kids
to
> move into technical education and jobs.)
>
> The problem is that people don't naturally learn the way schools
> present information. Schools worked okay when the goals were
simple:
> math and reading and a bit about the world. But now that we want
to
> get a massive amount of information into kids to *supposedly*
prepare
> them for anything they want to be, the flaws are glaring.
>
> Humans naturally learn by doing. We learn by using tools to do
what
> interests us. We get better at what interests us because we're
> motivated to do that thing. In the process, we use tools and, as a
> side effect, we get better at using the tools. And as a side
effect
> we learn things that connect with what interests us.
>
> Unschooling is like looking back on our lives and just doing all
the
> things that lead us to where we enjoy being and cutting out all
the
> dull stuff that we never used. That scares people because we
imagine
> we would shut ourselves off from the subjects we hated like math
or
> history. So how could kids prepare themselves if they shut those
out.
> But unschoolers can't shut themselves out. All those are part of
our
> world. Unschoolers encounter bits of everything but without the
bad
> taste of being forced.
>
> Joyce
>
> Joyce
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>

Christine

"Giving an education" is a phrase that is useful to examine.

I guess my verbage would come across as programmed by the PS system, but for lack of a better term it is the one I chose. As my child's teacher, leader, parent or whatever role I am in at the time and whatever hat I wear, it is my responsibility to lead them to what they want to achieve in life. It is the reason I hung up my "me lifestyle" and placed it on hold. I don't want to live my own life through my children, rather I want to help them find the happiness I have found. Therefore, I see everything I do or don't do as a decision to assist them in finding that fulfillment and I worry as a parent if what I am doing is justified by that...not whether or not I am fulfilling a defined public code of whatever. I often analyze myself and actions with a very critical eye to see if I am doing what I need to be doing for them.

Which is the "gift" parents give of education. It's a gift that takes
over their children's childhood. It's something that brings them to
tears and grief often

This is the reason I pulled my children out of public school and brought them home to teach. It is also the reason I have switched my teaching methods and style to what it currently is now. While there were no tears with home teaching with textbooks, I didn't see that little light in their eyes of eagerness to learn and explore. I always felt that exploring our world and finding our own interests and niche what what education should be all about. I guess that is why I never found mine in school as my heartfelt desire was to be a parent first and have a career later. I now have both and couldn't be happier. My life took unexpected turns and I ended up being a factory worker...all that education for naught in the eyes of some...and I absolutely love it. I don't want my children to necessarily avoid those pitfalls because if it weren't for some of them, I wouldn't be where I am now and what a pity that would be!

Obviously many kids go onto college and become self
supporting. So we assume school is responsible

I got a good snicker out of this one. I am self educated...I never went to college. In fact, I didn't graduate High School. I took my GED later-breezed through it. I never had a problem with learning, just a problem with the institution and mind set as a whole. It makes me wonder what ever possessed me to put my children into a cess pot I fought so hard to escape from.

Learning math as a side effect of using math looks nothing like
school math. It takes minutes a week as opposed to hours. Until you
see kids absorbing the concepts from using them in context it's
pretty much impossible to have confidence that that's enough for them
to build a foundation from

In my situation, math does not come easy. I have found ways to cope with it, and have my own strange work-arounds that always come out right, but it boggles my husband's mind. In my own field of work, nothing more than simple mathematics and the ability to balance the checkbook, along with my trusty calculator are all that are needed. It works for me. However, my husband, the engineer, uses math constantly and these areas are ones my children are beginning to explore and find deep interest in. Should they decide to pursue a field such as this, they are going to need to be able to use these forms of math. Hence the reason for my question. Should the need arise, and should they desire it, what route would be best to take to fit their needs...I suppose this is just something that is individual to the child and will need to be addressed when the need arises and not prior to it.

This is one of those cases where some might think it's "just
semantics" but the way you've phrased this shows you're thinking
about learning in schoolish ways so unschooling will make less sense.

Actually in this case it really was a case of semantics. I have been a lurker on this list for a while now and I've seen this issue pop up already. Being sensitive to that and hoping to steer away from it, I have just made it worse apparently. I used the quotes to indicate that I was using PS verbage not my own feelings and without knowing the jargon...I was unsure how to express myself without reverting to it. You have answered some of my questions, and intensified others with your responses. I will do some 'net surfing to find what I need.

Thanks for your lengthly reply. I do appreciate the info you've given me.

Christine

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

da Slinky

I can see how unschooling covers basic math such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, percentages even algebra and geomotry. What about the higher maths such as calculus and trig? I never took these courses as I am not in a life path that would require them. I can see how for many they would not even be something to worry about but what if your kid wants to be in a career that would require this knowledge? Does unschooling math give them enough of a foundation in math concepts that they would be able to, I don't know, pick up a class in it or something? Are these higher math concepts covered in just living life? Would they be able to pass a math entrance exame for collage if they decided they wanted to go to collage?

I worry that if my child decides at say age 17 or 18 that they want to be a doctor or a scientist or any number of careers that I screwed their chances of being one by not sending them to school.




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Kelly Lovejoy

I want you to STOP...THINK---think really, REALLY hard. REALLY HARD.



A child who is interested in a higher math career path---what would *naturally* INTEREST him?




 A lot of higher math concepts *are* covered by just living life. It's the names and notations that aren't so readily available. But if a child is *naturally* interested in mathematics, he'll *naturally* gravitate to math wherever he can find it.




In the average urban lifestyle, how often does a child come in contact with horses? If your child *were* interested in horses, what would *you*, the parent, do to make it possible to encourage and meet his interest in horses? Buying a skateboard wouldn't be your first step, right? <g>




FEED the passion. If a child IS interested in math, increase his exposure to mathematicians and mathematics.
If he's not, why waste his time?




~Kelly

-----Original Message-----
From: da Slinky <lady_slinky@...>







I can see how unschooling covers basic math such as addition, subtraction,
multiplication, division, percentages even algebra and geomotry. What about the
higher maths such as calculus and trig? I never took these courses as I am not
in a life path that would require them. I can see how for many they would not
even be something to worry about but what if your kid wants to be in a career
that would require this knowledge? Does unschooling math give them enough of a
foundation in math concepts that they would be able to, I don't know,=2
0pick up a
class in it or something? Are these higher math concepts covered in just living
life? Would they be able to pass a math entrance exame for collage if they
decided they wanted to go to collage?

I worry that if my child decides at say age 17 or 18 that they want to be a
doctor or a scientist or any number of careers that I screwed their chances of
being one by not sending them to school.












[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Faith Void

My dh needed these higher maths for a project he was working on, he is a
graphic designer. He simply taught himself. In a matter of days he learned
what is taught in school over several years. He learned because he
wanted/needed to and it applied directly to his life. I on the other hand
have never needed any of that in my life (I am a doula and aspiring midwife)
so I will likely choose not to learn it. I surely do not miss it in my daily
life.

Another quick math story. My dd took her test for the state requirements (we
are in PA and she chose to comply). She has neve done "math" though we live
and use numbers and various mathematical concepts on a regular basis. I
showed her a quick 5 minute "math lesson" on what the symbology was and a
concept she didn't recognize. She only missed 2 questions. A schooled kid
had spent about 1000 hours having someone explain those same concepts. I
think that it is possible (probable even) that most kids actually learn most
of things out sides of school but school gets credit. I like to give kids
credit.

Faith

On Mon, Dec 15, 2008 at 4:00 PM, da Slinky <lady_slinky@...> wrote:

> I can see how unschooling covers basic math such as addition,
> subtraction, multiplication, division, percentages even algebra and
> geomotry. What about the higher maths such as calculus and trig? I never
> took these courses as I am not in a life path that would require them. I can
> see how for many they would not even be something to worry about but what if
> your kid wants to be in a career that would require this knowledge? Does
> unschooling math give them enough of a foundation in math concepts that they
> would be able to, I don't know, pick up a class in it or something? Are
> these higher math concepts covered in just living life? Would they be able
> to pass a math entrance exame for collage if they decided they wanted to go
> to collage?
>
> I worry that if my child decides at say age 17 or 18 that they want to be a
> doctor or a scientist or any number of careers that I screwed their chances
> of being one by not sending them to school.
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>



--
http://faithvoid.blogspot.com/
www.bearthmama.com


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Pamela Sorooshian

On Dec 15, 2008, at 11:07 AM, Christine wrote:

> However, my husband, the engineer, uses math constantly and these
> areas are ones my children are beginning to explore and find deep
> interest in. Should they decide to pursue a field such as this, they
> are going to need to be able to use these forms of math. Hence the
> reason for my question. Should the need arise, and should they
> desire it, what route would be best to take to fit their needs...


If and when they choose to pursue a field that requires more formal
math, it is very possible for them to learn it as needed.

Arithmetic comes up in living a rich and stimulating experience-filled
life - you might remember that it was invented by real people for real
(and practical) reasons. If you can avoid creating math avoidance/math
anxiety/math phobia in your kids, arithmetic will not be an issue.
Have fun with it, don't avoid it, don't force it. Treat it exactly as
you would treat reading - cuddle up and count things, sort things,
make patters, draw designs. Use the terminology casually and
appropriate - triangles, rectangles, pounds, inches, divide, multiply.

Don't worry about them learning math on schedule - it is okay for them
to learn to divide when they are 7 or 17.

The one caveat I'd add would be to be sure your kids, themselves,
understand what you are doing - that you are allowing them to learn on
their own schedule, as it happens to come up in their own lives.
Sometimes kids get the wrong impression that they "missed" learning
something if their schooled friends know it and they don't. I've heard
stories (don't know of this happening, personally) of kids who are
resentful because they find out they are "behind" when they are
teenagers. My kids know better than to even consider that concept -
"behind" versus "ahead" - they know we're not doing school and that
school schedules of when things ought to be learned mean nothing to us.

Each of my kids has chosen to study more formal math, starting at
about 17 to 20 years old. They've taken college math courses, starting
with remedial classes - gotten good grades - been the one other
students asked for help.

So - "what they need" may be something different than what you think
they need - maybe what they need is freedom to play and explore and
develop their own sense of space and pattern and number and logic - in
their own way - without any paper and pencil math at all.

-pam

Meredith

--- In [email protected], "Christine"
<homeschoolmom@...> wrote:
>> So my question is this: Under an unschooling philosophy, do you
> require your children to continue their education using "standard"
> measures in some subjects?

We're full-blown "radical unschoolers" at my house - we don't
require, don't educate, and don't measure. What we do is help our
kids persue their interests. We do have to do a certain amount of
reporting, although in our case its more to my stepson's bio mom than
to the state, and in the process of compiling that information I show
how Ray (15) is learning some of the same sorts of things he would in
school. I say some, bc frankly I think he's learning vastly more than
he would be learning in school, but bc its not the exact same
information in the same order, its sometimes hard to compare.

Math's a good example. The kind of math he's learning noodling around
in our woodshop, futzing around with jewelry making with friends,
jamming on drums and bass with his dad and other musicians, working
odd jobs, comparative shopping for the best deals on electronics and
juggling gear - that's real world math. Its Not school math. Its
exactly the math he needs right now to persue his life goals. And by
learning it the way many adults learn the same things (hey, how do
you figure thas out? what's this tool for? how much did you pay for
that?), he's gaining confidence in his ability to learn whatever else
he'll need to know later on in life.

Unschooling differs from "educating our children" in that it has to
do with supporting the Processes by which learning takes place,
rather than managing learning, itself. Those processes are complex
and subtle and have a big emotional component, so a big focus of
radical unschooling, especially, is on the relationships within a
family. That can seem baffling at first!

One of the things that helped me wrap my mind around some of the core
concepts of unschooling, early on, was to think about the kinds of
life skills that people benefit from having regardless of what they
may be doing in life. That's a useful question to ask yourself - what
kinds of skills and attributes are helpful to Anyone, regardless of
his or her life path? After all, we don't really know what our kids
will be doing in 20yrs. So "preparing" them ultimately has less to do
with specific subject matter like fractions or the periodic table,
and more to do with things like "enthusiasm for learning" and "self-
awareness" and "communication skills". Those are the "core subjects"
if you will, of unschooling. And since it isn't really possible to
teach someone to be enthusiastic or aware or communicative, the
methods of unschooling can seem strange and puzzling for awhile.

With that in mind, something else I found useful in the beginning of
my own unschooling journey was simply reading the stories of
unschoolers lives. Even a random story about a kid ordering a new
food in a restaurant for the first time can be rich in the details of
what all this subtle, complex stuff looks like in real life.

Here's a link to some "typical unschooling days" stories to get you
started:

http://sandradodd.com/typical

---Meredith (Mo 7, Ray 15)

Ren Allen

~~As my child's teacher, leader,
parent or whatever role I am in at the time and whatever hat I wear,
it is myresponsibility to lead them to what they want to achieve in
life.~~

I completely disagree though.
I'm not their teacher. They learn through everything, including from
me and other people around them but I am not their teacher.

It is not my responsibility to lead them into anything. It is my
pleasure to create an environment in which they can choose what they
want to achieve and know they have support for that.

It's not just "semantics" to talk about teaching or the idea that you
still sit down to do math work. What you're describing is not about
self-initiated learning. If it was, why the sit-down time? If the
children are deeply interested in math, it will happen naturally or at
their asking. Keep reading. I am positive this is not about semantics
or wording at all, but about a totally different mindset.

Ren

Ren Allen

~~
I can see how unschooling covers basic math such as addition,
subtraction, multiplication, division, percentages even algebra and
geomotry. What about the higher maths such as calculus and trig? ~~

The question to ask oneself is "is this something that is a "basic"?"

If yes, then it will be picked up naturally, by living a full and rich
life. If no, then it isn't important unless an individual decides it's
important. If an individual decides something is important/useful they
can learn it at ANY time in life.

One does not "turn out" at 17 or 18. You can choose to be a doctor or
engineer when you're 35 or 40. There are no limits except what we
place on ourselves.

I'm working with a man right now who went to eight years of medical
school. He became a doctor and decided he couldn't be a doctor. Guess
what he does now? He's an artist/photographer and fashion designer.
Well known.

You can't possibly know what your child will need for their life path.
Nobody would have thought to send me to makeup artistry school, or to
teach me about fashion/modeling and makeup. But my career path is
exactly that. I love it and it's something I'm good at.Who could have
predicted that passion and given me what I needed?

What would have been the best help for me in order to gain a footing
in my chosen career, is responsive adults that took my interests
seriously. That's what we all need.

Ren

Sarah

Pam,
Could you please elaborate on the following paragraph? I guess I would
like to hear more about conversations I can have with my kids to help
ensure that they will not be resentful down the road. Maybe some
examples?? Thanks!

Sarah


--- In [email protected], Pamela Sorooshian
<pamsoroosh@...> wrote:
> The one caveat I'd add would be to be sure your kids, themselves,
> understand what you are doing - that you are allowing them to learn
on
> their own schedule, as it happens to come up in their own lives.
> Sometimes kids get the wrong impression that they "missed" learning
> something if their schooled friends know it and they don't. I've
heard
> stories (don't know of this happening, personally) of kids who are
> resentful because they find out they are "behind" when they are
> teenagers. My kids know better than to even consider that concept -
> "behind" versus "ahead" - they know we're not doing school and that
> school schedules of when things ought to be learned mean nothing to
us.
>

Joyce Fetteroll

On Dec 15, 2008, at 2:07 PM, Christine wrote:

> I guess my verbage would come across as programmed by the PS
> system, but for lack of a better term it is the one I chose.

First, I think it's helpful to keep in mind that a post doesn't
merely ask a question for the initial poster. It causes some readers
to realize they wanted to ask that same question.

The words may mean something nonstandard to you, but the images the
words create for others are likely to be standard school images. If
it's a question *worded* from a school point of view, it's going to
create school images for others.

Second, *I believe*, if someone can't think of an unschooling mindset
way to phrase something, then their mind isn't yet clear about
unschooling.

That may not be true of everyone, but it's true enough that it's why
list owners of unschooling discussion lists (at least of the ones I'm
on) are adamant about ideas not being phrased in ambiguous language.
A good unschooling idea that's phrased in ambiguous language and
makes some people see the idea in schoolish ways is not as useful as
an idea that turns people's thinking around and helps them not even
look at school.

> it is my responsibility to lead them to what they want to achieve
> in life.

A good example of what might be an unschooling idea but creates
strong school images.

"Lead" is the first problematic word that gets in the way of
unschooling. We open doors for them. We point things out they may not
see that we think they'd like. We lead bits of the greater world into
their world that we think might interest them. We support them in
their exploration. We create an environment that nurtures their need
to explore.

"achieve in life" is another phrase that will get in the way of
unschooling. It's focusing too far into the future. Life! That's the
next 80 or so years! It's impossible to give anyone a standard
foundation of knowledge to prepare for it. There will be jobs in the
future that don't even exist now. If a parent does want to help their
kids achieve what the kids want in life, the parent can live the
philosophy "You can achieve anything you set your mind to do."
Because that's really the only preparation that works for whatever
twists and turns life will throw at them over the next 8 decades.

But really look at the phrase "lead them to what they want to achieve
in life." Life goals change throughout our lives. Very few people
have the same goals at the end of their lives as they had as teens.
But even if you meant helping them work towards a career that
interests them, most people, especially today, don't have just one
career. It used to be people went into, say, banking out of school
and died as bankers. My father started work as an engineer at one
company and retired as a senior engineer with the same company.
Stability was important.

I think it's a lot more freeing, helps people reach for happiness a
lot easier, to see initial careers as just that: initial careers.
They may explore many diverse jobs throughout their lives. (Or might
not!) We can't prepare them for that. But what we *can* do is help
them explore the interests they have right now because that's the
most likely foundation that their future explorations will spring from.

Just ask Kelly Lovejoy! :-)

My husband began as a supervisor and worked upward. Then quit and
went back to college to coach and manage athletics. He's done some of
that, but took a side track into running two sports programs through
the college and teaching math as an adjunct. He would still like to
do athletic management of some sort and has his eye out for those
types of jobs. The jobs he's had (and wants) have a foundation in his
interests. No parent could have prepared him to do all that, or "lead
him to achieve his life goals". No parent could have foreseen where
he'd end up. *He* couldn't have foreseen that. But his parents *did*
support his love of sports in school. He did have the ability to take
math classes (but, as I've said, I think there are much better ways
to learn math.*)

(* Interestingly, when he teaches a new math course, he goes through
the book and understands it well enough to get the kids through the
class, but it isn't until he's taught it three or four times that he
really gets the concepts. But *again* he's learning textbook math.
When there's a homework problem he's having a tough time figuring out
if his answer's wrong or the book is wrong he asks me because I can
often see the problem in a totally different way. My vision isn't
blocked by the formula the book is trying to teach.)

(I have a degree in electrical engineering, by the way. Textbook math
was easy for me but I didn't really understand how it all worked. I
could identify what type of problem it was and apply the solution we
were "supposed" to. It wasn't until years later, just by living life
since I only worked as a software engineer for four years, that I was
able to get a holistic picture of what the math was trying to
describe. It wasn't until I could see my daughter playing around with
numbers and making them give the answer she needed, that I understood
how math described the world rather than being a separate entity.
Observing the world and thinking about it in new ways is better
preparation for higher math than going through lower math textbooks.)

> rather I want to help them find the happiness I have found.

Again, this will seem like semantics, but the above is ambiguous.

Clearer is: helping kids achieve their own happiness.

I have heard parents say that they got so much pleasure from reading
that they want that gift for their kids too and are worried that
their kids aren't reading so are missing out. What will help those
parents is to see how their kids are already happy and help them get
more of that.

For some parents, financial security is important and they want to
help their kids find ways to get that form of happiness. The
temptation will be to help them tone down risky dreams and see life
more practically. Eg, get a stable job and be a writer on your off
hours. But what will help is supporting kids in their dreams. *Part*
of exploring those dreams will be the reality of how others achieved
their goals. (Often by working a mundane job and working on their
dream at night! ;-) Factory jobs are excellent for this since the
brain is free to work on other things while the body earns the money ;-)

Whether you mean one of those two or not is not as important as how
readers interpret your words and what images they create for them.

> Therefore, I see everything I do or don't do as a decision to
> assist them in finding that fulfillment

And what if fulfillment at the moment is playing World of Warcraft?

That's the mindset that will help unschooling. The more we focus on
activities that look like practical life goals, the easier it is to
get in our kids way and easier to miss what they're learning the most
from. It's too easy to see them learning when it looks like school.
What helps unschoolers is cultivating an ability to see that they're
learning when they're engaged, regardless of how it doesn't look like
school.

None of that may apply to you. Responses (as well as the questions!)
are for everyone reading, who may be forming different images than
are in your life, different than what you intended to create.


> and I worry as a parent if what I am doing is justified by
> that...not whether or not I am fulfilling a defined public code of
> whatever.

"Worry" may be semantics again but it does call up particular images
for most people. (And, of course, some people are relieved, saying
"Good, I'm glad I'm not the only one worried!")

Worry is a good indicator that something's off. But if worry becomes
a constant response to life that's not useful. It's spinning the
wheels. usually because someone feels they have no control over the
situation.

With unschooling some lack of control is a given! We can't control
which doors our kids will choose to explore.

School gives us the *illlusion* that we can control the out come. And
allows us to blame the child for not trying hard enough when that
outcome doesn't come to pass.

Worries are normal. For some worries we need to find techniques to
help us worry less and trust more. For some the list is a good resource.


>> Obviously many kids go onto college and become self
>> supporting. So we assume school is responsible
>
>
> I got a good snicker out of this one. I am self educated...I never
> went to college. In fact, I didn't graduate High School. I took my
> GED later-breezed through it.

GEDs being a breeze is useful for people to know :-)

But school being unnecessary is also not the mindset of many. Most
people *do* see school as responsible for getting kids into college
and into stable careers. When ideas are phrased in a way that paints
that picture, it doesn't matter that the writer has a different
experience. No one can know what has gone on in the writer's life.
They can only form pictures from the words they're given.

> I have found ways to cope with it, and have my own strange work-
> arounds that always come out right, but it boggles my husband's mind.

Well, yes, because he was trained to see particular solutions to
particular problems. People are taught efficient ways to tackle
standard problems rather than how to look at problems. (Because
teaching how to tackle problems is *hard* and difficult to test.)

But in real life, there isn't just one way to look at a problem.
Whatever ways work and makes things understandable is useful.


> I suppose this is just something that is individual to the child
> and will need to be addressed when the need arises and not prior to
> it.

Yes. They could change their minds and the preparation will have been
time that could have been spent on more meaningful things.

They could get turned off of math or things to do with math because
someone is preparing them rather than them choosing to do the
preparation themselves.

> However, my husband, the engineer, uses math constantly and these
> areas are ones my children are beginning to explore and find deep
> interest in.

Interest is good. My husband teaches college math and my daughter
decided to take his college statistics class for fun when she was 14.
She did very well. (Obviously she had him there available to answer
questions but she did the tests all on her own.) She took several
more math classes for fun.

Since she is more art oriented, she doesn't need the math, but the
one college she was interested in had a basic math course the first
semester. She could skip it if she took calculus in high school.
(Obviously just a way of setting the bar so high that most kids had
to take the math course! ;-) When he started pressuring her to take
pre-calculus and calculus as a way to give her the opportunity to
take something else, she started losing interest in math. It became
about jumping through hoops rather than about exploring something
that fascinated her.

Joyce

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Joyce Fetteroll

On Dec 15, 2008, at 4:00 PM, da Slinky wrote:

> I can see how for many they would not even be something to worry
> about but what if your kid wants to be in a career that would
> require this knowledge?

Then they would be exploring concepts that give them a window on the
math. They not only see the math describing what they understand,
they gain a greater understanding of what's being described. The math
can later help them see the problem in new ways, but seeing and
getting a holistic understanding of the world is more important.

If math you're learning describes something you don't understand,
then the math is pretty useless. Which is why it's *really* hard to
learn math out of context as the schools teach it. Unless you have
something you want to know more about, the math isn't doing much
other than throwing numbers at you.

> Does unschooling math give them enough of a foundation in math
> concepts that they would be able to, I don't know, pick up a class
> in it or something?

It depends on the child.

If a child is math or science oriented, their brains will think
mathematically. The formal notation will just be an addition to what
they already understand conceptually.

If a child is interested in the softer sciences or business, they'd
probably make it easier on themselves by taking a couple of community
college classes before applying to a four year college, unless the
college has basic math.

(Note, the kids in the basic math courses *had* 12 previous years of
math and obviously it didn't work.)

It doesn't take 12 years to learn the math needed for college.

> Are these higher math concepts covered in just living life?

To some extent. Math is a way of describing the world (and imagining
other worlds too! :-) Thinking about the world in various ways is
more important than getting lost in the numbers of something someone
doesn't have a good grasp of. When they understand the world better,
math can make it clearer.

> Would they be able to pass a math entrance exame for collage if
> they decided they wanted to go to collage?

Again, depends on the child.

> I worry that if my child decides at say age 17 or 18 that they want
> to be a doctor or a scientist or any number of careers that I
> screwed their chances of being one by not sending them to school.

Why do you think they wouldn't be able to learn math at 17 or 18?

Do realize that the people who avoid math, who are certain they're no
good at math, have been pressured to do math for 10+ years. Without
that pressure, with pleasant encounters with math through video games
and buying things and so on, kids don't enter into their first math
course with all that baggage of how hard math supposedly is. It's
just something new to learn.

Joyce

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Joyce Fetteroll

On Dec 15, 2008, at 11:25 AM, Jodi Bezzola wrote:

> Joyce, thank GOD you're on this list! This response is going into
> my permanant "Important Read Again" unschooling file.

I'm glad it's helpful :-)

Figures it's one of the few I just clicked send on without rereading
to clean it up! It just took so long, I ran out of time. I'm sure
there's some awkward phrases and some "it"s and "they"s that it's not
clear what they're referring to. (And even some "there"s that should
be "their" or "they're" -- my most common slip!)

So I'm glad people were able to read around them!

Joyce

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Debra Rossing

It doesn't take 13 years of curriculum (figuring age 5 to age 18) to
learn algebra...everything K-12 can be learned in a matter of months if
one so desires. And, too, consider: virtually EVERY college/university
has some form of remedial program for math. Now, consider that
homeschooling in general (and unschooling in particular) have only been
really growing for maybe 25 years or so. Now then, why did the colleges
have remedial programs 30some years ago when I was in school and
virtually everyone went to either public or private school? If going to
school or using school methods are necessary to learn "enough" math to
get into college, why do colleges have remedial programs for math? And,
too, how many adults are out there learning new things they never
planned to learn when they were younger either because they're changing
careers (by choice or layoff) or because they are simply curious? Kids
are no different. When they decide to pursue something, they can learn
what they need when/as they need it and it'll likely be easier because
they'll see the reasons for it. It's your job to help them, as
requested/needed/desired, to get the resources but it's not your job to
decide what and when and how something happens. For instance, it's not
your job to decide that a 10 year old must learn multiplication. It is
your job to help your 10 yr old find the resources to learn
multiplication if they want to explore it.

Deb R


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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Debra Rossing

> Unschooling differs from "educating our children" in that it has to do
with supporting the Processes by which learning takes place, rather than
managing learning, itself.

To borrow from that philosophical gem, Tae Kwon Leep/Boot to the Head by
the Frantics: Unschooling "is not a road to a door but a path leading
ever on toward the horizon"

There is no deadline whereby we have to pump x amount of information
into our kids or it's lost. Learning can and does happen, hopefully, for
an entire lifetime. There are things I know that DH didn't and vice
versa. He knew how to make a basic motor from magnets and copper wire. I
know a lot more about the Civil War. He has a spatial ability to pack a
moving truck with minimal wasted space. I still remember some of the
calculus I took in high school and college. He started college at age 27
and was the top student in Biblical Greek while he was there (graduated
with a 3.99 GPA after 4 years). I can handle simple basic words and
phrases in French and Spanish. He taught himself how to make awesome
fresh bagels. I make the best cookies on earth (according to DS LOL). My
DS at 10 can switch between the DVD player, cable TV, and videogame
systems, I still have to think and sometimes call him if the TV gets
left set to the videogame system and I want to watch a movie. As was
noted, there's no way to know what our kids will need 10 or 20 years
from now (the current school curriculum is not all that much changed
from the original public school system from the turn of the 20th century
- it's designed for the Industrial Age, not the Technology Age).

Deb R


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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Kelly Lovejoy

-----Original Message-----


From: Debra Rossing <debra.rossing@...>




As was noted, there's no way to know what our kids will need 10 or 20 years

from now (the current school curriculum is not all that much changed

from the original public school system from the turn of the 20th century

- it's designed for the Industrial Age, not the Technology Age).

-==-=-=-

I don't remember  where I heard it---some movie/tv show, I guess. Probably a comedy. <g> But someone said that her four years of liberal arts college quite adequately prepared her for life in the 17th century.


<g>




~Kelly









[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Kelly Lovejoy

Joyce wrote: 




I think it's a lot more freeing, helps people reach for happiness a
lot easier, to see initial careers as just that: initial careers.
They may explore many diverse jobs throughout their lives. (Or might
not!) We can't prepare them for that. But what we *can* do is help
them explore the interests they have right now because that's the
most likely foundation that their future explorations will spring from.

Just ask Kelly Lovejoy! :-)





************************************



Why is everyone picking on *me* today? <bwg>



I'm not sure whether Joyce is referring to ME or my son! The whole, long post is a keeper!




I certainly have a lot to say about interests and exploration and passions and jobs and such! <g>




I've changed jobs a LOT! I've changed interests a LOT. They all "bleed" into each other though---and I can bring a different perspective because of knowledge of or interest in something completely different.




We've worked really hard to support our boys' interests. And they've morphed---the interests, not the boys! <g> Cameron's interest in skateboarding morphed into film-making, which back-tracked to his interest in magic, which morphed into drumming which didn't morph at all, but rather jumped headlong into back-packing and exploring nature and foreign countries and travel. Cooking enters in there somewhere. <g> Oh---and art: he's started painting.




We have NO idea where this will all lead. We're guessing he will b
e moving out this next year. He's started talking about it. We figure he'll move to Charleston to be with the girlfriend. He's made some inquiries into working in a kitchen with a chef. He may find THAT is his love, and it may become his career. He may just learn a LOT, leave to pursue something else, and be an excellent home cook. <g> It's all good. I mean---who doesn't like a good cook in the house?? <g>




He certainly has what it takes---talent and tenacity---to be a top magician, but we think he'll just perform small sleights for little kids. <G> He's has a wonderful eye behind a camera---or so we're told. It's no longer an over-riding passion, but he *does* see things differently than most. He was never all that great at skating, but NEVER did I think my sling-head-skater-dude son would become Nature Boy! Who'da thunk?? He was always happy in the kitchen, even as a toddler---so yeah, I figured that would be something he would pursue---but not as a career---just at home.





We could be completely wrong: Cameron might end up as an insurance salesman and wind up spending evenings and weekends watching football and baseball in his easy chair. <G> I *expect* not, but we don't know. He may combine all---or several of---his talents/passions to come up with a completely new concept---OR he may decide he wants to do something completely new and different that he's never tried before. Uh...stranger things have happened already! <G>





It's just that you NEVER know what your c
hild "will become." Playing computer games all day every day as a 10-15 year old *may* "produce" the next "Blizzard Wizard"---but it may not. It may simply enable a cool dad to be a great playmate for his own son---as well as a thoughtful, logical, strategic, planner. <BWG>




We gain incredible knowledge and skills doing what we love. It doesn't have to lead anywhere. But chances ARE that it will connect *some* piece of something in our brains to some piece of something *else* in our brains. THAT's what's magical!



~Kelly












[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

da Slinky

It isn't that I do not think they could learn it at 17 or 18 it is more I worry that they will want to do something that will require that they already had so many years of xyz in order to do the thing they want. My kids seem to swap interests at the drop of a hat. I just don't want to be closing doors for them.




________________________________
From: Joyce Fetteroll <jfetteroll@...>
To: [email protected]
Sent: Tuesday, December 16, 2008 4:37:23 AM
Subject: Re: [unschoolingbasics] question about core subjects




Why do you think they wouldn't be able to learn math at 17 or 18?

Do realize that the people who avoid math, who are certain they're no
good at math, have been pressured to do math for 10+ years. Without
that pressure, with pleasant encounters with math through video games
and buying things and so on, kids don't enter into their first math
course with all that baggage of how hard math supposedly is. It's
just something new to learn.

Joyce

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]






[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Kelly Lovejoy

It isn't that I do not think they could learn it at 17 or 18 it is more I worry
that they will want to do something that will require that they already had so
many years of xyz in order to do the thing they want. My kids seem to swap
interests at the drop of a hat. I just don't want to be closing doors for them.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-




If you really think it is necessary, do it. By law, you have that right.




I don't ANYthing requires "so many years of xyz." But having "so many years" of something doesn't guarantee that it is learned. Having "only three months of xyz" doesn't mean that it isn't thoroughly absorbed.




I have a child who swaps interests at the drop of a hat. Seemingly unrelated things. All the time. But he seems, at 21 next month, to be able to confidently acquire what he needs when he needs it.




*MY* job is to open doors. Even ones he closed years and years ago.





~Kelly




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Debra Rossing

> It's just that you NEVER know what your child "will become." Playing
computer games all day every day as a 10-15 year old *may* "produce" the
next "Blizzard Wizard"---but it may not. It may simply enable a cool dad
to be a great playmate for his own son---as well as a thoughtful,
logical, strategic, planner. <BWG>

Had to LOL a bit...DH was on the early adopter end of the old Atari and
NES systems way back when. Now he's an excellent playmate for DS - they
help each other work through difficult areas of games. Currently, DS
(yes that's son) is helping DH through Roblox games and DH is exploring
the Lua scripting language that Roblox uses to make custom stuff. DH
will build something and "publish" it then DS will go in and test it out
(kid after my own heart LOL - FYI I do software testing professionally,
working for a CAD/CAM software company - been in this field for the
better part of 18 years now).

> I mean---who doesn't like a good cook in the house??

LOL again - I was reading this as I was eating one of DH's fresh (made
yesterday afternoon) whole wheat bagels...my advice to all the young
ladies out there is find yourself a guy who can cook in the kitchen and
you'll have yourself a treasure who can "heat things up" elsewhere <BWG>



Deb R


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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

BRIAN POLIKOWSKY

Wow Deb how cool! My son would have loved to met your ds and dh and see what they do on Roblox. My son is a Roblox craze!
His main character ( the one he plays the most) is mario555555 send a friend request! He would love to "meet" your son.
 
Alex Polikowsky
http://polykow.blogspot.com/

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/unschoolingmn/
 




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Meredith

--- In [email protected], "Sarah" <wee_wah@...> wrote:
>I guess I would
> like to hear more about conversations I can have with my kids to
help
> ensure that they will not be resentful down the road.

I think the biggest thing is to work to stay in touch with your kids'
questions and concerns. How that happens is going to depend a lot on
family particulars. They might be sparked by watching a tv show, or a
question from grandma, or someone in the family musing out
loud "however do people learn to do that?" Often, in unschooling
homes, there aren't so much conversations where the parents say "this
is why we do it this way" as a series of small interactions strung
over a few days or weeks.

The time to have big Conversations are at transition points -
stopping school or homeschool, for example. But even then... we don't
really have those sorts of Talks in my house. I say things like "this
is a problem I see, and this is a possible solution I'd like to try -
would you be willing to try it for awhile and see what happens?" I
also like to ask questions like "am I making sense?" and "do you have
any ideas?"

Personally, I think its important to let our kids know that we
parents don't always know what's "best". From an unschooling
standpoint, its a way of modelling what adult learning and problem
solving looks like. Its also a way of inviting kids to become part of
the process.

---Meredith (Mo 7, Ray 15)

Meredith

--- In [email protected], da Slinky <lady_slinky@...>
wrote:
>
> It isn't that I do not think they could learn it at 17 or 18 it is
more I worry that they will want to do something that will require
that they already had so many years of xyz in order to do the thing
they want. My kids seem to swap interests at the drop of a hat. I
just don't want to be closing doors for them.
******************************

I sometimes find myself thinking that if only I'd started studying
art sooner, I'd have more of the skills I need right now. There's
just this one problem, though, I was good at "core subjects". I was
good at math and english and sciences - what teacher in her right
mind would have encouraged a child good in those areas that
spell "lots of potential for good paying jobs" to back off on all
that stuff and spend more time drawing? To learn to paint and sculpt?
To learn to juggle and ride a unicycle? Why would any sane parent
encourage a bright school kid to daydream and knit? And so I
sometimes feel like I'm peering through a half-barred door, trying to
wedge my way through.

Its impossible to know what doors our children will go through later
in life. The good new is, we don't have to be the force that opens
and shuts doors - we can offer our kids that power For Themselves by
taking them seriously Now, supporting their interests Now (even the
passing fancies!), helping them achieve their goals Now. Doing that
helps them to develop the ability to take themselves seriously, to
know their own abilities, to know how to ask for help and how to find
it, too! Those will all open far more doors than any academic subject
ever could.

---Meredith (Mo 7, Ray 15)

Linda and Keith

Wow! This thread has been absolutely fantastic for me! I have learned so
much from it all. I have been unschooling since the middle of this year,
and still have so many doubts and worries, but this discussion has
encouraged me so much, and convinced me that I AM doing the right thing.
So this reply is to say a big thank you to all of you who have put your
thoughts and feelings out there- there must be many, many people like me
who are just 'lurkers', but who are benefiting immensely from these
discussions.

Kelly Lovejoy

You are sooo right! It helps when folks can understand that, as soon as it's "out there." it's no longer about the original poster. We don't know most of you. But the *idea* that gets tossed around can help sooo many other people---those "lurkers" who have no idea how or what to post---and who sometimes don't even know they have an "issue" with something until it's discussed here---they're often the ones who benefit *more* than the OP!



I'm glad it helped you, Linda!


~Kelly



-----Original Message-----
From: Linda and Keith <wolrablk@...>








Wow! This thread has been absolutely fantastic for me! I have learned so
much from it all. I have been unschooling since the middle of this year,
and still have so many doubts and worries, but this discussion has
encouraged me so much, and convinced me that I AM doing the right thing.
So this reply is to say a big thank you to all of you who have put your
thoughts and feelings out there- there must be many, many people like me
who are just 'lurkers', but who are benefiting immensely from these
discussions.











[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]