Unschooling school

The more I unschool, the more I realize how senseless it is to require children to spend countless hours of their valuable childhood memorizing trivia stored on the web and practicing drills which any calculator can mimic.
Instead, children should spend time with a knowledgeable adult or peer learning how to access information on the web, in books and periodicals, and by interviewing knowledgeable people in person, on the phone, by email, or by chatting online. The access of knowledge, once gained, should then be taught in the context of applying that knowledge to making wise decisions.
Job skills which were once deemed to be invaluable in job search are now becoming obsolete more quickly than they can be taught at the educational institutions. Rather than teaching job skills, schools should be teaching skill acclimation, acceleration, and adaptation.
Gone are the days of job security at an assembly-line mass production plant.
In its place are multi-level small businesses and business giants whose goals are to acquire employees with versatile backgrounds who are capable of adjusting to any requirement.
The new skills are multi-tasking, adaptability, computer literacy, and web-savvy. Set the children free to learn what they will need for their future. Give them a keyboard, a gamestick, and a wi-fi connection, and turn them loose. They will suck up knowledge like a hungry bear. They will acquire skills pertinent to their world.

Scrapbook of Life

Every summer I go through all the papers and memorabilia I’ve collected all year and make a scapbook of Josiah’s unschooling year. This is always an enlightening event, not to mention time consuming. It’s nothing fancy, just a looseleaf notebook with protector sheets stuffed with pages of game talleys, trip plans, artwork, letters and cards written and received, songs and poems penned, and other scrapbook novelties like ski-lift tags, subway tickets, and baseball cards.

I also try to keep lists of books and videos we borrow and rent so I can keep track of what all he’s imbibed mentally. I’m sure it’s nowhere near exhaustive. He comes across stuff I’m not even aware of.

I also try to list all the new skills he’s learned, equipment he’s learned how to operate, games he’s played, events he’s participated in, groups he’s been a part of, places he’s performed, and lessons he’s taken. Whew!

He’s a busy boy. There’s not much to show paper-wise—he rarely picks up a pencil. But he sure does cram his brain (and his laptop) with data.

I pray the Lord will guide him in the paths he should go and will help me to facilitate his walking those paths.

Unschooling Quotes

I browse the Radical Christian Unschoolers discussion board so you don’t have to.
Here’s some favorite quotes from recent discussions:

‘ I think for some reason when we begin to *homeschool*, that whole word carries connotations of forcing our kids into perfect little *homeschool* molds, so the world will applaud and praise our “products”, which I’ve begun to see is steeped in pride and pleasing man. ‘

‘Date: Wed, 08 Mar 2006 23:28:22 -0000 From: “Lynn Coalson” <lynnatbeach@bellsouth.net> Subject: I am getting it!
Hi Everybody, Well, you all know from the rather long intro I wrote several weeks ago, that we are transitioning from unit studies into Unschooling. I am SO excited I just want to share this with someone who really “Gets It!” OK, so while we’ve been deschooling from a unit study co-op, I have been in the reading and researching mode, which gave Jenny time to just breathe, and be.And play!I was so busy schooling her she didn’t have time to just play!Even though our homeschool was a fun and happy experience most of the time, we were too busy for play. The Lord showed me a long time ago that Jenny works through her life lessons through play.Oh Lord- I repent for all the times I have interrupted the serious work of her play to do some frivolous school stuff!I cringe when i think of all the times I missed it, because of my busy agenda. ouch! Well, God opened the eyes of my heart and guess what I saw?? He showed me how Jenny is developing her own ways of dealing with
the challenges of dyslexia- through play. Her own ways-ie His way. I mentioned before that she has been on this roller blade choreography thing lately.Well, she was recently put into a more advanced ballet class. This means she has to execute longer combinations of choreography.This is a big challenge for her. While cleaning up the yard one evening, after a day of roller blade “performances”, I came upon the white board and markers she left next to a tree . On the white board she had drawn a diagram of our street where she rollerblades, complete with trees, storm drains, and other landmarks. By each landmark was a picture and a word like twirl, arabesque, etc. She had drawn her choreography in pictures. She drew it in the way her brain sees it ; in the way she can best learn it! By playing, she was developing ways to memorize longer sequences.Cool huh! There’s more! I set aside the math book where she’d been “learning” fractions fractions and more fractions. ugh She’s been playing with a wooden geometric puzzle where you arrange little colored triangles into a quilt like pattern-there is no one way to do this-you can make countless patterns. She has also been playing with magnetix -litle magnetic bars and marbles you connect to make shapes.And baking! Measuring and reducing the recipies because there are only 3 of us home now. Yesterday- she decided she wanted to complete her math book. So she wrote out daily assignments for herself, for the entire month. My first thought was “Oh no, we just failed unschooling” Or could it be that maybe, all the “playing” with parts of a whole, and connecting those little magnetix , attached a new meaning and connection to the math book fractions? My prayer is and hopefully will remain”Oh Lord, keep me diligent and alert-don’t let me miss your plan, by being too busy with my plan!”
Lynn ‘