Should unschooling be illegal? - General

I am currently living in a hippie commune for the summer, and the adults here are proponents of the "unschooling method." They say a lot of things like "let the kids decide democratically what they want to learn" and all that, but ultimately it's a failure. Today I had to read books to an 8-year-old girl who cannot read yet, and cannot even do simple addition (since it goes past the number of fingers on both hands). Of course, if she means to live the rest of her life with hippies and continue living in the commune, that's fine, but she can't even function anywhere else. Perhaps some leniency and variety in terms of educational pursuits is commendable, but a core curriculum should definitely be established.

Was homeschooled for the first 2 months of grade 6. Learned more in 2 months than I would have learned over half or more of the year. That said, I really should have been enrolled in advanced classes but none were available at the time. Modern education is a touchy topic because we're stuck between 2 generations: the old one that believes the goal of education is to get a job, and the new one that believes the goal of education is to teach you how to think and learn. Guess which generation is currently in control of the schools? Schools are more like factories than places of learning atm.

[QUOTE=Michael haxz;41417847]unschooling don't sound like a valid form of education, it sounds like to me parents not wanting to teach their kids. You bet I would make it illegal in a heart beat. If the Gov didn't set the lines for required education then I would imagine that ye old merica would be a more shitty place due to the high amounts of uneducated people.[/QUOTE] That makes no sense. And coming from a person who cannot even type out a proper sentence? That's rather interesting.

[QUOTE=yumyumshisha;41450521]I am currently living in a hippie commune for the summer, and the adults here are proponents of the "unschooling method." They say a lot of things like "let the kids decide democratically what they want to learn" and all that, but ultimately it's a failure. Today I had to read books to an 8-year-old girl who cannot read yet, and cannot even do simple addition (since it goes past the number of fingers on both hands). Of course, if she means to live the rest of her life with hippies and continue living in the commune, that's fine, but she can't even function anywhere else. Perhaps some leniency and variety in terms of educational pursuits is commendable, but a core curriculum should definitely be established.[/QUOTE] Good Christ that sounds horrible. I thought giving education to your children was compulsory?

i've spent my whole life unschooled got my diploma through it i went to high school for 2 years, i seriously didn't learn anything useful besides random trivia given the choice, i'd unschool my kids just like i was granted, i was in a "commune" so to speak, so there were none of the stereotypical socialization issues that you always hear about from homeschoolers

[QUOTE=Emperorconor;41452920]Good Christ that sounds horrible. I thought giving education to your children was compulsory?[/QUOTE] This is really rural Hawaii we're talking about, there's like one shitty public school in the area but most of the schooling happens at the charter schools in the area. I think that a less rigid educational model (i.e. Montessori, MOOC, etc) show promise, and that the current system of standardization (i.e. AP, IB, SAT, ACT) doesn't really indicate academic success or competency. However, regardless of the method of schooling, there needs to be a concerted effort to teach children, and qualified instructors to do so. I'm not saying that people can't be homeschooled, I do know plenty of people who have gotten their GEDs without entering the public schooling system.

I was homeschooled for a year at an arguably critical point and suffered slightly in high school because of it. My self esteem was stupidly low and I was afraid I'd fall behind my classmates immediately. Granted my school was a sham but lacking those social skills and keeping up with the curriculum that was being used cost me for a few years. I got back on track rather quickly and I'm more than likely going to university next year, but not being able to keep up in critical subjects when I got into high school was awful for me overall. Unless your mom/dad/guardian/whoever is a teacher and a good one then it simply won't work for the most part. It ought to be illegal for the most part but allowed only in extreme circumstances with some form of guidance and help from the government or maybe even the local educational institutions.

In light of this issue, try Gatto's explanation of the background of formal public education: [url]http://johntaylorgatto.com/historytour/history1.htm[/url]

[QUOTE=monkeylove;41518378]In light of this issue, try Gatto's explanation of the background of formal public education: [url]http://johntaylorgatto.com/historytour/history1.htm[/url][/QUOTE] [quote]Men like these, and the brilliant efficiency expert Frederick W. Taylor, who inspired the entire "social efficiency" movement of the early twentieth century, along with providing the new Soviet Union its operating philosophy and doing the same job for Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany; men who dreamed bigger dreams than any had dreamed since Napoleon or Charlemagne, these were the makers of modern schooling.[/quote] Conspiracy theory bunk. Come in with a real argument.

[QUOTE=Laserbeams;41329515]Of course it should be, it's borderline child abuse. Homeschooling and unschooling deprive kids of communication with other kids, and parents can't possibly give kids as much knowledge as competent teachers can[/QUOTE] Go to my school and lets just say they aren't competent. Unschooling shouldn't be [I]illegal[/I] just frowned upon. Homeschooling is pretty bad already, if anything Unschooling sounds better because it teaches them good morals instead of filling their heads with stress and school work. If their parents think their kids should be raised that way, go nuts. Plus more educated jobs for me and others. In the USA, they can raise/teach their kids with any method they want. To add to my statement of filling their heads with stress and school work, in the real world and life people need to be able to deal with that. Obviously jobs will test their ability of doing that, but if their parents didn't want [U]their[/U] kids to go through that kind of life, so be it. Not my problem.

[QUOTE=cradboard;41547714]Plus more educated jobs for me and others.[/quote] This doesn't result in any more jobs or less jobs at all, so unschooling creating jobs for the educated doesn't work out.[/QUOTE]

A lot of the argument people used for unschooling is that not all children need the things they learn in school. But if you're unschooled from 5, how would you know what that is? And what if you wanted to become a doctor? Or, even if you did want to be something at 5, why would you base the entirety of the rest of your lives upon it. Unschooling is, if anything, more restricting than other schools. It's effectively forcing your child to become something that doesnt involve an education.

[QUOTE=TheKritter71;41329269]wife swap[/QUOTE] Reality T.V. shows don't always portray reality. [QUOTE=Laserbeams;41329515]Of course it should be, it's borderline child abuse. Homeschooling and unschooling deprive kids of communication with other kids, and parents can't possibly give kids as much knowledge as competent teachers can[/QUOTE] Four of my cousins were homeschooled. They're in college now and the oldest one has a degree. Homeschooling is not 'unschooling' and the assumption of parents being unable to give their children an education is too big a generalization. From what I know, it's illegal to neglect your kid from an education. At least where I live, and it's like that in UK according to this: [url]http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110123084041AAOWRQf[/url]

[QUOTE=cradboard;41547714]Go to my school and lets just say they aren't competent. Unschooling shouldn't be [I]illegal[/I] just frowned upon. Homeschooling is pretty bad already, if anything Unschooling sounds better because it teaches them good morals instead of filling their heads with stress and school work. If their parents think their kids should be raised that way, go nuts. Plus more educated jobs for me and others. In the USA, they can raise/teach their kids with any method they want. To add to my statement of filling their heads with stress and school work, in the real world and life people need to be able to deal with that. Obviously jobs will test their ability of doing that, but if their parents didn't want [U]their[/U] kids to go through that kind of life, so be it. Not my problem.[/QUOTE] The thing is, unschooling hurts children since it deprives children of education, and thus a future. Homeschooling is better, but still hurts children by taking away a big part of their social life. What I mean is that your rights should not go to the length of hurting another individual's future life. Also, the more educated people that get jobs, the more taxes will be paid to the government. Which will get the debt lower and the wealth of the country higher. Which directly affects you too.

[QUOTE=NightWig;41550057]The thing is, unschooling hurts children since it deprives children of education, and thus a future. Homeschooling is better, but still hurts children by taking away a big part of their social life. What I mean is that your rights should not go to the length of hurting another individual's future life. Also, the more educated people that get jobs, the more taxes will be paid to the government. Which will get the debt lower and the wealth of the country higher. Which directly affects you too.[/QUOTE] Education is not the same as going to school, in some cases public school can be more harmful to education than homeschooling (that word looks funny...) Social life in school CAN consist of isolation, in many cases bullying too. To force a child into such an environment by law is counter-productive, a happy child home-schooled will be more receptive to learning than a miserable child dreading the next day at school. Parents aren't trying to deprive their children of a future and those who ACTUALLY get their child on the road to independent study are doing them a huge favor in terms of the working world and higher-education. Regardless, to exert such control over a child's life, even when their parents think that the alternative is better, for the purpose of 'perhaps' increasing tax revenue is needlessly oppressive.

Here in the UK, the gov will pay for you to go to school if they have to. Homeschooling is really rather rare, and the large "social housing" estates ofteen have Education Cantres where they do "vocational courses" and get their qualifications through that. LA would take a shit if they knew of anyone being unschooled. They would pay for uniform (you heard me. uniform) Transport, meals and trips.

[QUOTE=Emperorconor;41547807]This doesn't result in any more jobs or less jobs at all, so unschooling creating jobs for the educated doesn't work out.[/QUOTE] Sorry, but I didn't clarify correctly. It's not such much they create more jobs for me, it's that there will be more jobs left from the current amount. Plus it was a slightly silly statement for me to say because realistically there are hardly and jobs in the first place. EDIT: Now thinking about it, I honestly believe the RSA video is on the right track. He definitely speaks the facts, reveals the truth about future education and today's current problems with education.

i'll just throw this in there the internet has bestowed upon me the wealth of knowledge that what makes me a very resourceful individual today - i learned nearly everything from it though unschooling should be illegal, it will just fuck up the kid

i mean i learned to read engrish from pokemon because i played it too damn much, i was reading the complete series of hitchhiker's guide when i was 12 and i read through "light" sci-fi books of around 400-500 pages (10 pt font) regularly so there is something to be said about unschooling in terms of picking up language, but you are not going to pickup calculus from real world experience, or much of the fundamentals of chemistry, sure you will learn to do x and y from this and that, but you won't know why something does that. unschooling really can only get one so far with most skills, language is probably the one skill that is the best to pickup out of school in the real world though [editline]26th July 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=WhatTheKlent;41551796]Education is not the same as going to school, in some cases public school can be more harmful to education than homeschooling (that word looks funny...) Social life in school CAN consist of isolation, in many cases bullying too. To force a child into such an environment by law is counter-productive, a happy child home-schooled will be more receptive to learning than a miserable child dreading the next day at school. Parents aren't trying to deprive their children of a future and those who ACTUALLY get their child on the road to independent study are doing them a huge favor in terms of the working world and higher-education. Regardless, to exert such control over a child's life, even when their parents think that the alternative is better, for the purpose of 'perhaps' increasing tax revenue is needlessly oppressive.[/QUOTE] but by forcing social situations like a typical highschool, children learn to get along with each other regardless, and they learn how to deal with differences of opinions which occure outside the confines of school and is probably the most important thing to working in groups. 99.9% of the time the child will be brused but will come out of it better off, you are saying the 1% of the time where the children get bullied and commit suicide is enough to say the entire system needs to be dismantled. [editline]26th July 2013[/editline] that being said i've not met many homeschooled children and the ones i have are probably the exceptions instead of the norms but they were all really messed up socially. one was unable to deal with differences of opinion or authority in general, the other was a hypocondriac that had every ailment in the book because she got a severe burn when she was 5, and one was so screwed up because his mother wouldn't keep him consistantly on his medication so he was either comming off of it or going on to it and always zonked out. still i take it they were the exceptions instead of the norms to homeschooling

[QUOTE=Laserbeams;41329515]Of course it should be, it's borderline child abuse. Homeschooling and unschooling deprive kids of communication with other kids, and parents can't possibly give kids as much knowledge as competent teachers can[/QUOTE] You don't communicate with other kids in public school. That's the first thing you get in trouble for. Other then at lunch, or recess, so there's like 30 minutes for you. Big deal. And when you do class projects, it's ALWAYS a castostrophic failure for everyone involved and you just end up hating each other. In homeschool you just make friends elsewhere, you still go places. In fact, teaching a child to be outgoing and hanging out with kids around the neighborhood is a lot better then sticking a bunch of kids in a room next to each other and calling that "socializing".

I think the term unschooling is stupid. Children should learn through both experience and education. If a child is taught solely through experience, then they won't understand things like complex arithmetic, literature, and discipline. If they're taught solely through education, then they'll lack important practical skills and how to think for themselves. I think the education system is pretty screwed either way.

the education system is too concerned with trying to teach students [I]what[/I] to think, instead of [I]how[/I] to think. teaching students [I]how[/I] to think could be, in essence, giving students the tools to come up with their own ideas, draw their own conclusions, criticize their ideas and the ideas of others, and make connections. schooling shouldn't just be about academia and completing low-level clerical work for marks, it should be about learning to be a functional human being that is capable of making his or her own decisions and thinking for themselves. it should promote individuality instead of enforcing conformity.

Since as I was previously home-schooled and as of recently become unschooled, it seems like it would be useful to everyone give a first-hand opinion on this topic. I am 16 and I was home-schooled up until now. My parents always gave me the option to go to school, but at the same time said that I'd definitely hate every last moment of it, so being young and gullible - I didn't really think about what it'd be like at all, I just believed everything they said and used their opinions as my own. Now, I'm not saying that my parents lied to me, but rather they exaggerated how bad it would be because they both did not like their experiences in school. When I grew up a little and started to think about things for myself and considered what the "outside-world" was like (I did obviously leave my home, but my closest town is 13 miles away from where I live and that is far from walking distance.) and started thinking of other people I started feeling very isolated, left-out and excluded, I did periodically attend groups and things that interested me and still do to this day but once a week for a couple hours isn't sufficient social interaction. That's my only problem with home-schooling and un-schooling, it's the lack of social lives that kids get. At the moment, I have really good friends that I talk with a lot, I don't have problems interacting with other people socially, though my lack of actual physical social interaction with other humans is slowly killing me from the inside, if I didn't have a really happy and self-entertaining personality I don't really see how someone would cope with this. On the educational side, most of the "hurr durr no school no knowledge" crap is wrong. One thing that I did learn is the ability to teach myself things, anything that interests me that I don't know I will read up on. Google is the source of pretty much all of my knowledge, I spend a lot of my spare time (which is pretty much all of my time) learning things. For the last 5 years I have been working on computing and software engineering (programming essentially) which is a very good place to be in considering the economy in my country. If anyone wants to ask me anything about my experiences, feel free to.

[QUOTE=Laserbeams;41329515]Of course it should be, it's borderline child abuse. Homeschooling and unschooling deprive kids of communication with other kids, and parents can't possibly give kids as much knowledge as competent teachers can[/QUOTE] One of my extremely close friends was homeschooled and is now in college. He is a very intelligent individual who interacts with people fine, albeit his social skills and etiquette aren't always the best. Going to public schools doesn't help you interact all the time. I went to public schools my whole life. I'm now in college, and I can't approach somebody and start a conversation if my life depended on it. It really depends on the person. Unschooling, however, sounds like a very bad idea for paranoid parents who think "the system is out to get me and my children" [editline]27th July 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=>>oubliette<<;41607365] ...though my lack of actual physical social interaction with other humans is slowly killing me from the inside, if I didn't have a really happy and self-entertaining personality I don't really see how someone would cope with this. [/QUOTE] This sentence describes me entirely.

I've been "unschooled" since the 9th Grade or rather self-taught. I'm not entirely aware of the whole "unschooling movement" but my belief is more-or-less that after the 8th Grade, what you learn from there onwards is usually stuff that can only be applied in certain areas. What kids need is practical experience within trades... We are wasting resources and money on kids who obviously don't want to learn shit after the 9th grade, and are only applying themselves because they want scholarships to get into the thing they wanted to be in the first place. So from that point it's just a matter of solving that problem... We need people who are trained in certain crafts or trades, but we need them to be educated to the necessary degree. This is why I believe the high school should be removed and replaced with something where people are trained into a certain craft, and local employers are given the "qualification" grade for these students to decide who they hire. This actually provides reason for going to school, and gives students the free choice of choosing where they wish to go in life. If they do well, it also gives them a chance to have a headstart in life with getting a job. Without needing to spend out your ass to get into a fancy college.

[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;41610105]I've been "unschooled" since the 9th Grade or rather self-taught. I'm not entirely aware of the whole "unschooling movement" but my belief is more-or-less that after the 8th Grade, what you learn from there onwards is usually stuff that can only be applied in certain areas. What kids need is practical experience within trades... We are wasting resources and money on kids who obviously don't want to learn shit after the 9th grade, and are only applying themselves because they want scholarships to get into the thing they wanted to be in the first place. So from that point it's just a matter of solving that problem... We need people who are trained in certain crafts or trades, but we need them to be educated to the necessary degree. This is why I believe the high school should be removed and replaced with something where people are trained into a certain craft, and local employers are given the "qualification" grade for these students to decide who they hire. This actually provides reason for going to school, and gives students the free choice of choosing where they wish to go in life. If they do well, it also gives them a chance to have a headstart in life with getting a job. Without needing to spend out your ass to get into a fancy college.[/QUOTE] So you basically want to go back to the 18th century with education? What you suggest would remove engineering, science, medicine and so forth. It would pull the population back. The education that comes from, mainly public school, is important for our society and for the person in question, because without proper education, we will not have engineers, scientists, doctors etc.

[QUOTE=NightWig;41610928]So you basically want to go back to the 18th century with education? What you suggest would remove engineering, science, medicine and so forth. It would pull the population back. The education that comes from, mainly public school, is important for our society and for the person in question, because without proper education, we will not have engineers, scientists, doctors etc.[/QUOTE] Removed and Replaced. Trade schools replace the current system of public education, with public trade and craft schools. Students go to learn a trade or craft(ie. scientist, engineers, and doctors), and become educated in the thing they wish to learn before they take on some higher education like college or university. This way people have job skills which they can apply before turning eighteen. In these trade or craft groups, you'll learn what you need to learn in order to be competent with your job, and related things so you can be flexible on the job.

[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;41611353]Removed and Replaced. Trade schools replace the current system of public education, with public trade and craft schools. Students go to learn a trade or craft(ie. scientist, engineers, and doctors), and become educated in the thing they wish to learn before they take on some higher education like college or university. This way people have job skills which they can apply before turning eighteen. In these trade or craft groups, you'll learn what you need to learn in order to be competent with your job, and related things so you can be flexible on the job.[/QUOTE] A lot of kids don't know what they want to do with their lives even up until they're out of school. Home-schooling or generally just the practice of teaching them how to learn for themselves and giving them the resources to learn for themselves, it won't work for everyone. Schooling reliably teaches them SOMETHING whereas home-schooling has the ability to fail catastrophically, it works in some cases and the cases that it does work, educationally the outcome is generally better, so it shouldn't be illegal, but I don't think it should be practised inside schools. That being said, the schooling systems would still benefit from a more flexible curriculum, I'm not sure what it's like in other countries but it's not very flexible where I live. Another thing is; I've heard of a lot of Christian families mostly in the US home-schooling their kids because they don't want them to learn about science and medicine as that contradicts the Christian religion. This is wrong and if that is what comes to mind to some people when the word "home-schooling" is thrown about, that is also wrong, that isn't home-schooling; that's borderline neglection of education.

You can be "Street Smart". But, that won't get you into a good college My personal goal is to get into Michigan State University with around a 3.0 GPA. It'll be tough, but ill try my best. It should be ILLEGAL.

[QUOTE=Emperorconor;41519356]Conspiracy theory bunk. Come in with a real argument.[/QUOTE] Conspiracy theory? It's a known fact that the public education system originated from that of Prussia: [url]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prussian_education_system[/url] As for connections between that, Taylor, and education, you'll find more in various entries in ERIC and other sources. For example, [url]http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/search/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED239247&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED239247[/url] Also, [url]http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-1-4020-6403-6_32[/url] Related: [url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U[/url] and more. In fact, the similarities between industries and formal schooling are painfully obvious: hierarchies, standardization, uniformity, quantification leading towards qualification and promotion, etc.