frozenandcold

<Learning is certainly measurable. Johnny can read
or they can't.>

I disagree with this statement for a couple of reasons. My son is
10 and can't read, so does that mean that unschooling has been a
failure? No way!!! He is learning to read without the frustration
that kids in public school feel but he may not learn how to read
proficiently until 13, who knows. I guess if you are only looking
at adults then maybe you could measure some of it in some way but
not all of it.

It is kind of like when they test kids in school. Lets say they are
asking a question about a battle in the Civil War. Johnny might
remember the date the battle was fought, Betty might remember the
place the battle was fought. If the question was on the date then
Betty appears to not have learned as much, when in fact, she
probably knows a little more about the actual battle. So in that
way learning is not measurable.

The other thing to consider is what is the measure of success. Some
people might say a degree, others money..........there are so many
ways to measure success. I measure success by is the person happy?
Do they love what they do? Are they healthy, happy, and whole? To
put it in a nutshell. Some of the most "successful" people I know
would not be the ones that society deems as "smart" and they aren't
necessarily the ones that are making lots of money and have fancy
houses. That is how society measures success though.

Heidi

katherand2003

Heidi, I agree. I was an excellent reader in that I could rattle off
a page of words but it wasn't until I was in college that I had really
good comprehension or developed any writing skills to speak of. But I
tested well because of the question / answer format--- mostly multiple
choice. It was like a game of intuition where my pencil hovered on
what I felt was the correct answer. Might as well as sometimes the
questions weren't particularly well written or were perhaps
intentionally ambiguous.

My sister in law just tested her 9 year old homeschooler and I was
struck by how badly worded the tests were. Some of them made
absolutely no sense. ANYhoodle. But that's a thread I won't start.

Kathe



--- In [email protected], "frozenandcold"
<fivefreebirds@m...> wrote:
>
> <Learning is certainly measurable. Johnny can read
> or they can't.>
>
> I disagree with this statement for a couple of reasons. My son is
> 10 and can't read, so does that mean that unschooling has been a
> failure? No way!!! He is learning to read without the frustration
> that kids in public school feel but he may not learn how to read
> proficiently until 13, who knows. I guess if you are only looking
> at adults then maybe you could measure some of it in some way but
> not all of it.
>
> It is kind of like when they test kids in school. Lets say they are
> asking a question about a battle in the Civil War. Johnny might
> remember the date the battle was fought, Betty might remember the
> place the battle was fought. If the question was on the date then
> Betty appears to not have learned as much, when in fact, she
> probably knows a little more about the actual battle. So in that
> way learning is not measurable.
>
> The other thing to consider is what is the measure of success. Some
> people might say a degree, others money..........there are so many
> ways to measure success. I measure success by is the person happy?
> Do they love what they do? Are they healthy, happy, and whole? To
> put it in a nutshell. Some of the most "successful" people I know
> would not be the ones that society deems as "smart" and they aren't
> necessarily the ones that are making lots of money and have fancy
> houses. That is how society measures success though.
>
> Heidi
>