Unschooling: Learning through Life and Adventure
icture this: It’s Tuesday morning. You and your children get out of bed and eat a hearty breakfast. You all get showered and dress, and prepare to learn. One child pops in the Lord of the Rings – Return of the King for the 5th time, looking to see how closely Peter Jackson has matched the movie to the book of the same title that they’ve just finished reading. Another child has decided to go outside and tend to their garden – they are growing some vegetables that are in season, and want to make sure that all is well in their patch. Yet one more child sits comfortably with you, in your lap, while you read every Dr. Seuss book that there is to find in your home. Welcome to the world of unschooling.
But wait! Where are the textbooks? And not a mention of a workbook! While there are some unschoolers who do supplement their child’s learning with a textbook or workbook from time to time, unschooling (sometimes called ‘child-centered’ or ‘self-directed’ learning), for the most part, takes place through living. It is a method of homeschooling in which a child is allowed to pursue their interests, and the parent helps to guide those interests and cultivate them. For those of you who may be concerned that unschooling means you learn “absolutely nothing”, think again. A trip to the grocery store can become a lesson in math and economics, as well as media and advertising, health, public relations, and manners (you try navigating children through a crowded supermarket!). Driving from home to swimming/gymnastics/music classes involves math (mileage and speed) and map-making. And if your child is a budding politician, your driving can lead to discussions about foreign affairs and politics via the rising (or, one hopes, lowering) price of gasoline. With unschooling the paths of learning are limitless. Every situation is an opportunity to gain knowledge and expand one’s horizons.
After reading the article about unit studies you make think that unit studies and unschooling sound identical. Although unschooling is similar in many ways to unit studies (flexibility being one of them), there are differences. For example: with unit studies your child may read the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and then write a paper comparing and contrasting the growth of the characters as the story progresses. If your child were being unschooled, they would simply enjoy reading the story, and if you ask them they could tell you all about the growth of each character, and how the journey from their homes to Mordor changed each one of them. The child who is gardening may have a unit study that incorporates a history of botany. For the unschooled child the joy is in the planting and sowing of their crops, and in doing so, they discover the history of botany on their own, and become fascinated by it.
Many unschoolers will tell you their goal is not to ‘teach’ their child. They don’t want to ‘fill’ their child with chunks of information. Rather, the goal is to help the child develop a sense of self, and to see learning as a natural process that happens throughout life - not just during a few hours a day. If you’re worried about whether or not a child can succeed and be unschooled, here’s a very short list of famous people who were unschooled:
George Washington Carver - scientist
John Quincy Adams – former President
Agatha Christie - author
Hans Christian Anderson – children’s author
Winston Churchill – Prime Minister of England
Tamara McKinley – 1983-84 World Cup Skier
Franklin D. Roosevelt – former President
For more information on unschooling, check out the following books from your library, or visit the websites listed below.
Books to read:
Anything by John Holt
Anything by John Taylor Gatto
The Unschooled Mind by Howard Gardner
The Unschooling Handbook: How to Use the Whole World As Your Child’s Classroom by Mary Griffith
Websites to assist with unschooling your child:
http://www.afamunschool.com/
http://www.unschooling.org/
http://www.unschooling.com/
http://www.borntoexplore.org/unschool/index.html
http://www.home-educate.com/unschooling/index.shtml
http://www.carschooling.com/
http://www.livefreelearnfree.com/
http://www.lifelearningmagazine.com/
You may reach Maisha Khalfani at maisha@mommytoo.com.
Maisha Khalfani is a homeschooling mom and helpmate to Jabari. She is the founder of the Capital Area Homeschooling Community, a member of the National African American Homeschooling Alliance www.naaha.com, and moderator of several online homeschooling groups.
Copyright 2004, Maisha Khalfani
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