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Meredith
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| Posted: Sept 16 2005 at 10:40am | IP Logged
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Well, I've been thinking long and hard about all these unschooling discussions and I am finding that maybe we are more unschoolish than I had first thought. That being said, I have a few more questions for you seasoned unschoolers.
1) Is it ever necessary to REQUIRE that our children do anything like math, grammar, spelling, writing - or do you just go with the flow and see if there will ever be any interest there?? I know this is where the "guidance" concept really strikes me as necessary.
2) Once they *get* the 3 R's is the rest of their schooling pretty much carte blanche for self-direction?
3) Is there ever any continuity or is there anlways a tangent that one is on until learned and then on to the next area of interest? I know there will be overlaps for ALL kinds of learning, but is it ever necessary to insist on some constancy like for math, history, etc??
I'm sorry if some of these are redundant and alas, "stupid questions", I am just trying to really wrap myself around this whole unschooling ideology because I believe this may be where we are heading. It seems so wholesome and natural, and real.
I also wanted to share this from my CM reading I was doing recently that really struck me as an "unschoolish" idea:
"What is education? The answer we accept is that Education is the Science of Relations. We do not use this phrase in the Herbartian sense, that things or thoughts are related to each other and that teachers must be careful to pack the right things, in together, so that, having got into the pupil's brain, each may fasten on its kind, and, together, make a strong clique or apperception mass.
What concerns us personally is the fact that we have relations with what there is in the present and with what there has been in the past, with what is above us, and about us; and that fulness of living and serviceableness depend for each of us upon how many of them we lay hold of. Every child is heir to an enormous patrimony. The question is, what are the formalities necessary to put him in possession of that which is his?" Vol. 3, School Education, pg. 217-218
Could this be a precept to unschooling philosophy? Just musing here, love to hear thoughts 
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Cindy
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Hi Meredith!
I don't know if I'm a seasoned unschooler, but I'm pretty old.. does that count? 
I like your questions. They are the same ones I have been asking myself over the years. There are some good posts already in this forum which may help, too. And I love the CM quote you put up there. I need to start reading Cm original writings again. There is so much treasure there, and she certainly keys in on how learning must be a relationship from all angles. Relationship between person and God, person and others and person and knowledge.
I also like when she says you can bring the feast of ideas to the child but you cannot force the connection to be made.
happyheartsmom wrote:
| 1) Is it ever necessary to REQUIRE that our children do anything like math, grammar, spelling, writing - or do you just go with the flow and see if there will ever be any interest there?? I know this is where the "guidance" concept really strikes me as necessary. |
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I have required over the years, though ala Cm with short lessons and highest quality living materials I could find. As my kids got older and I embaced self-directed learning more I required less and less. Don't know how much was due to their ages or simply my change in tact.
But, I found that my boys picked up grammar, spelling and writing with out formal curriculum. That is not to say I was not purposeful in bringing things in.. we used Mad Libs when they were younger to introduce the abstract idea of parts of speech for instance. We have used bits and pieces of grammar programs. We did Latin for a few years and saw lots of grammar there. But I am convinced if we had done none of the curriculum, and continued to focus our atmosphere on reading and wrting, then we would have found resources to teach them the labels for grammar when they got that far.
I read once that you could pretty much leave grammar alone until the child is 13 or so and they can learn it all in few days.
I think my boys like reading and writing in part due to the CM background we had-- books everywhere, reading aloud, all sorts of materials, modelling by mom and dad, etc.
They learned spelling through Spellcheck when writing in Word.
As for math.. I have one 'mathy' kids who picks up things so fast he could have probably learned up to Alg I with no curriculum. But I used MUS and Miquon on an off over the years. The other is very NON mathy and curriculum is a struggle. I think kids can learn much of the elemetary math through life. But, it takes an effort to bring the ideas in, but I guess that is our job! In later years, I will probably continue with curriculum. But my plan now is to let them have as much say as possible in when and how they learn it and give them information on why they might need it. I hope this will someday become their goal and not simply mine to push.
In the meantime I have to decide how much to ask of them now so they are not playing too much catch up later. Any thoughts?
I also do 'require' they explore new areas that they normally would not venture. This is relatively painless-- assigned reading, read aloud, etc. To help bring the 'feast' to them, as Charlotte says. I will suggest things-- just try it-- like the Bravewriter courses. But try to ask them for things that fit their style.... 
To me, this *is* guidance. I don't see unschooling (at least our brand of self-directed learning) as giving up guiding and mentoring my kids. In fact I feel I am tuned into them more than I was when I spent the bulk of my time researching and then executing the curriculum plan. Then I felt I had little energy left to really 'guide' them. The difference is, I guess, that now I try to respect how they learn and their interests. I try to introduce things that might light their fires and let things go that don't. And if I see an area of weakness, I try to build it up through their other areas of strengths. Or maybe think about how important that 'weakness' is and maybe just focus more on strenghts. To me all this is guidance. It certainly keeps me busy!
happyheartsmom wrote:
| <2) Once they *get* the 3 R's is the rest of their schooling pretty much carte blanche for self-direction? >. |
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I don't neccesarily think the 3 R's must be covered *before* you can start unschooling.. but it develops as their interests develop. They learn the skills in tandem with exploring their interests. For example, my boys love writing walk-throughs and FAQs for their video games. All the time they are honing and refining their spelling and grammar and getting more confident and complex in thought. And it makes the other writing they do easier and better. Does that make sense?
happyheartsmom wrote:
| <3) Is there ever any continuity or is there anlways a tangent that one is on until learned and then on to the next area of interest? I know there will be overlaps for ALL kinds of learning, but is it ever necessary to insist on some constancy like for math, history, etc?? >. |
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With (required) math we usually do on for a while, then off for a while, but follow the program throgh. But I try to be open to non-curriculum math we see in the world, which happens all around us. Ex: one day at tennis lessons, the teacher was trying to calucate the court width so asked the kids to use Pythgoreum's theorum.
I have some broad areas that I would like my boys to know in history. That is my framework in the back of my mind (and on paper in my notebook) When I am in research mode, I will look up sources, or keep my eye open for ideas that deal with them. Books, lectures, articles, newspaper.... current events that lead to discussion. If nothing appears I may assign some reading. IMO I don't worry about going in order. When kids get older they catch onto the timeline of history easily and the pieces can be put in order. To me it is most important that they make a real connection with a piece of history. For ex my dh loves to read about the Civil War and will describe it to the boys, etc.
There are some areas I am still thinking about how much to require and if it might be easier to use a curriculum. For example Apologia in Science. But again, I hope to bring my boys into this. Perhaps ask them to pick an area to explore and offer curriculum, living books, courses, etc.
Put it as much in their hands as possible and me become a mentor/facilitator/fellow learner as my role.
But as they get older I am finding learning to be very organic. We will talk about the election, for example in the fall of 2004.. and not speak of govt again for months. But when we do, they remember and add back on right where we left off... make any sense?
Just some ramblings and hope to hear your ideas and others' too!
Cindy
ds 15 and ds 11
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Willa
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Cindy wrote:
| But, I found that my boys picked up grammar, spelling and writing with out formal curriculum. That is not to say I was not purposeful in bringing things in.. |
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That's what I notice when reading unschooling accounts, especially ones from the earlier days of homeschooling. It wasn't that the parents gave up on goals or purpose, quite the opposite. Rather, they looked for ways to accomplish things in a "non-schooly" way and to recognize the kind of learning that takes place outside the box.
I've been thinking recently that learning is rather like an iceberg. A huge amount is under the surface; even the learner himself is not aware of it consciously. So the bit of formal stuff we do as "teachers" with the kids is often just showing US explicitly what the kids are able to do, and perhaps, a bit, helping the kids themselves to focus on a specific skill.
Eg I spend some time "teaching" my kids to read when they turn 6 but not until they are almost all the way there, themselves -- they've listened to many read alouds, they can identify shapes, they can focus -- so many skills that they've developed informally, environmentally, without my conscious "teaching". 90% or more is there already, and the rest is just helping them organize, and making the commitment to spend regular time on that reading lesson. But I know a lot of unschooling kids learn to read on their own, with NO focused and structured help.
The unschooling books and articles I have been reading talk about the value of "whole" experiences, where a bunch of types of skills and knowledge are brought into play. So they look actively for ways to bring that type of thing into their kids' lives. It's a bit like what CM says about living books and handicrafts rather than "horse in a mill" type facts that are soon stocked away in the dusty attics of our minds and never really lived or used....
One example is the way the Colfax boys, who went to Harvard, were brought up working hard for many hours a day in the CA wilderness -- they built their own homestead with their parents, raised and bred and sold goats and sheep, studied a couple of hours a day by kerosene lamp. Those experiences required all KINDS of integrated abilities, like keeping account books, etc so the 3Rs developed easily -- the foundation or the invisible 9/10ths of the iceberg was already there, and they already could work hard and focus well, so mastering ANY topic was doable for them.
I worry about this a bit when I'm thinking of how my kids are being educated because they don't have all that variety of work opportunity, at least not now, but I can see that there are probably lots of ways to do this and I can see the sense for unschoolers in emphasizing the "underwater" aspect of the iceberg; I think probably many more "structured" homeschoolers include this type of thing naturally as part of their child-raising vocation, so that may be one reason why homeschoolers who "succeed" seem to come from all across the spectrum.
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Willa
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Cindy
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WJFR wrote:
I worry about this a bit when I'm thinking of how my kids are being educated because they don't have all that variety of work opportunity, at least not now, but I can see that there are probably lots of ways to do this and I can see the sense for unschoolers in emphasizing the "underwater" aspect of the iceberg;um. |
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Hi Willa!
I think there are so many ways to be a family and to learn in a family. One might live in a big city and have access to great museums while others have a Colfax-type experience with lots of hands-on outdoor work. Your family has the great outdoors as a palatte. Others are involved in a home business, etc.
I often lamented our hum-drum suburbs.. but you know I think it fits us and my boys would not want to live anywhere else.. and we do love our Barnes and Noble nearby.
We have had to work on things though.. like making sure they work/pull their weight as our survival does not really depend on what they do- since we are not self-sufficeint but depend on dh's paycheck.
I don't know if this is where your thought were leading, but for me I have had to let go of what I *thought* our family lifestyle or even the boy's personalities and/or interests would be. Once I let go of that, it is becoming easier for me to embrace what we do do well and enjoy and learn in our own way. As beloved JPII said.. Families be who you are!
I love your iceberg analogy..
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juliecinci
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Suburban learning.
I have worried about this at times too. We are non-sciency folks and I wonder if our kids will have enough exposure to things like hiking, identifying trees, fishing and so on. One of my sciency unschooling friends has a daughter who bred fish in their creek, raised organiz vegetables with a compost pile and built natural shelters in her backyard all through high school! I had this girl as a writing student. She was one cool kid! A an adult, she's working with Habitat for Humanity! She used Mother Jones back issues to help her learn about eco-friendly low cost housing. Amazing.
This stuff impresses. We are in awe. We wonder when our boys will build canoes in the basement! (Like in Rascal).
I've had to rethink what we do to see it in a different light.
My kids (all of them now) have ushered at our local Shakesperean theater where we are now such staples tha the newspaper interviewed us as that "family of ushers." My oldest is looking into interning there and the oldest three have participated in their summer camp programs for years now.
We did Vintage Dance one year complete with attending a ball in authentic period attire.
One of my sons has his own cookie business where he's sold cookies in our neighborhood for the last three years and has earned well over $2000 in the process, paying his own way to space camp.
My daughter wrote two novellas in her fourteenth year of 100 pages a piece.
My three oldest have been on the teen library board where they discuss literature monthly and plan activities for high schoolers including an annual poetry night with jazz music and original poetry readings.
We are regulars at our local art museum.
We've attended lectures at the observatory, at Xavier university, at the AIDS center in downtown, at the zoo, at the playhouse... We try to take advantage of any that are free but are happy to pay if need be as well.
We've been to all kinds of concerts from symphonies to rock shows, and a variety of theater experiences.
This year we took the family to Italy to expand their horizons.
Certainly computer proficiency, video game mastery, TV sitcoms and the telephone figure prominently into our lives of modernity.
But I can say that through our suburban lives, we have managed to do some wonderful things that we couldn't do had we been in the country on a farm. It just takes looking at things from a different angle.
Just some stuff to throw out for consideration.
Julie
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Willa
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Cindy wrote:
I don't know if this is where your thought were leading, but for me I have had to let go of what I *thought* our family lifestyle or even the boy's personalities and/or interests would be. Once I let go of that, it is becoming easier for me to embrace what we do do well and enjoy and learn in our own way. As beloved JPII said.. Families be who you are!
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Ha, Cindy, and I love this and practically paraphrased it on the college thread without realizing it. Funny how we think in the same ways and struggle with the same balance!
Julie, your list of suburban learning experiences is so impressive! I realized this morning that so many of the things I have asked God for have come to pass without me even realizing it or being properly grateful. I spent years agonizing about my second son, my reluctant writer, who had lots of trouble with syntax and mechanics and hated to set pen to paper, or even fingers to keyboard. Then when he started writing his own science-fiction newspaper with very nice choice of words and correct punctuation, and then went on to write a 600 page novel (which he is now revising), I never really sat back even for a moment to just glow and be happy about it. No, now I worry about his math 
The same thing happened when my daughter got interested in music -- living WAAAY up here with no music teachers within driving distance. One, she started teaching herself; two, a violinist moved within five miles of our house and offered lessons, and she has been a wonderful friend and inspiration for my daughter as well as a learning resource.
So I guess I need to hand my wishes and hopes over to God. I think just articulating where we feel we lack, and then waiting actively, sometimes helps us seize the moment when it comes, and He does provide; He seems to want our kids to do OK
I also notice that looking out for opportunities and resources and being flexible about finding them is actually a growing and learning experience in itself. Maybe one of the best ones. But I find it hard to do, personally; hard to wait, hard to keep creative and open, hard to keep a joyful spirit.
I'm sorry I'm pulling this a bit off your original question, Meredith. I suppose I do think that "requiring" is sometimes part of leadership but it usually is a relatively small part, if you think about it -- most "real" leaders inspire, guide, motivate and work hard to facilitate for their followers and unschoolers probably see that as the majority of their role. Even when I think of parenting per se, we probably order and rebuke a LOT less than we guide and teach by the living conditions we set up and by our expectations and what we model for our kids.
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Cindy
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juliecinci wrote:
Suburban learning.
But I can say that through our suburban lives, we have managed to do some wonderful things that we couldn't do had we been in the country on a farm. It just takes looking at things from a different angle.
Just some stuff to throw out for consideration.
Julie
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Whooo Hooo! Go you Bogarts! I love hearing this and am cheering you on!
Suburbanites Rule! LOL
I will add to my list that my suburbanite writers have taken 3 Bravewriter courses and can write a mean letter to customer service when they need to! (not BW, but others...)
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Meredith
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Thank you everyone for your responses. I've printed them out to mull over a bit before replying back. I WAS beginning to feel a little silly after posting because nobody replied right away I knew someone would come through though, God bless you. I almost deleted the post after the weekend  Anyway appreciate ALL your perspectives!!
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Leonie
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Meredith,
I don't know if we are unschoolers or not - I tend to say we like CM and natural learning.
Anyway, I have skirted around your question all week because - we don't *require* schoolwork ( or anything!) but we also don't NOT require stuff.
Clear as mud?
I guess there are less requirements and more asking/talking/negotiating over things like chores, written work, bedtimes. This has evolved over the years and with a lot of time, patience and modelling.
I am big on CM's idea of atmosphere and I find that often the atmosphere creates the discipline ( Education as an atmopshere, a discipline, a life.) .
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Becky Parker
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Perhaps this is a thread all by itself, but Leonie, could you talk a little more about what you do to create that atmosphere that creates the discipline?
Becky
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Meredith
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Leonie wrote:
I am big on CM's idea of atmosphere and I find that often the atmosphere creates the discipline ( Education as an atmopshere, a discipline, a life.) .
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I think this is where I get hung up, because like you I don't know that I could ever qualify as an unschooler by the *original* definition of the word (was it Holt that started the movement). Anyway, I guess that's why I keep coming back to CM's writings and I probably don't qualify for this thread, but you touched on the key for me which is Atomosphere. No matter WHAT kind of method we choose, if the atmosphere stinks how can anyone learn well, or be encouraged to learn and love it. I feel we have maybe accomplished a bit of this atmosphere as the natural learning does seem to be shining through most days. I guess that's a good thing and what makes home schooling, unschooling or living with our children constantly around us the BEST part of our job
I feel as though I've babbled on a bit here, but thanks for all the thoughtful replies and windows into to all of your worlds. I have learned so much 
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Leonie
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Meredith,
I think you explained it well - "No matter WHAT kind of method we choose, if the atmosphere stinks how can anyone learn well, or be encouraged to learn and love it".
Becky,
I don't think there is any *one thing that leads to an amnosphere that encourages discipline - it is all the little things that happen, day after day. The things Elizabeth mentions in her book, Real Learning - listening to the child, teaching and living our Faith, setting up for an orderly home where everyone participates, encouraging and modelling a spirit of co-operation and not an adversarial relationship ( the Faber and Mazlish books have helped me here). Sharing living books and good examples in history and literature. Using routines. Messing up and saying we are sorry.
Pope John Paul II described this in the encyclical Familiaris Consortio -
"The Christian family is also called to experience a new and original communion which confirms and perfects natural and human communion. In fact the grace of Jesus Christ, "the first-born among many brethren "(56) is by its nature and interior dynamism "a grace of brotherhood," as St. Thomas Aquinas calls it.(57) The Holy Spirit, who is poured forth in the celebration of the sacraments, is the living source and inexhaustible sustenance of the supernatural communion that gathers believers and links them with Christ and with each other in the unity of the Church of God. The Christian family constitutes a specific revelation and realization of ecclesial communion, and for this reason too it can and should be called "the domestic Church."(58)
All members of the family, each according to his or her own gift, have the grace and responsibility of building, day by day, the communion of persons, making the family "a school of deeper humanity"(59): this happens where there is care and love for the little ones, the sick, the aged; where there is mutual service every day; when there is a sharing of goods, of joys and of sorrows.
A fundamental opportunity for building such a communion is constituted by the educational exchange between parents and children,(60) in which each gives and receives. By means of love, respect and obedience towards their parents, children offer their specific and irreplaceable contribution to the construction of an authentically human and Christian family.(61) They will be aided in this if parents exercise their unrenounceable authority as a true and proper "ministry," that is, as a service to the human and Christian well-being of their children, and in particular as a service aimed at helping them acquire a truly responsible freedom, and if parents maintain a living awareness of the "gift" they continually receive from their children.
Family communion can only be preserved and perfected through a great spirit of sacrifice. It requires, in fact, a ready and generous openness of each and all to understanding, to forbearance, to pardon, to reconciliation. There is no family that does not know how selfishness, discord, tension and conflict violently attack and at times mortally wound its own communion: hence there arise the many and varied forms of division in family life. But, at the same time, every family is called by the God of peace to have the joyous and renewing experience of "reconciliation," that is, communion reestablished, unity restored. In particular, participation in the sacrament of Reconciliation and in the banquet of the one Body of Christ offers to the Christian family the grace and the responsibility of overcoming every division and of moving towards the fullness of communion willed by God, responding in this way to the ardent desire of the Lord: "that they may be one."(62) "
For me, this is applying the principle rather than a rule and thus will look different in each family.
I feel that I am sinking here with my nebulous explanation. Help! 
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Meredith
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Leonie, that was awesome! Thanks for bringing the Pope's works into this as it is SO right on. I have been meaning to read this encyclical (a little embarassed that I haven't read this one yet ) and it just brings it right home for us and shows us once again how our beautiful faith works in our families. And your explanation was Not nebulous
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4Real Forums : Living Learning
Topic: Do you *REQUIRE* school as an Unschooler?
