I would have written earlier if I weren’t trying to respond to a recent challenge at “Unschoolers Emporium” (www.theunschoolersemporium.com/) to write a blog entry and post it on their site about Unschooling. There are several topics to choose from, but I thought I would start at the beginning and chose, “What brought you to unschooling.” I have been wasting hours and days filing pages. All I have done is irritate myself by forcing something I have so much to say about without knowing where or when or if or how I should say it.
What I can do is post links. What I can say is that unschooling is definitely up for interpretation. One thing I notice is that some people seem to interpret child led learning, to mean that the child directs the adults lives. “ I personally don’t like guns, but I buy my kid toy guns because I am taking my child’s lead.” I guess if I were an unschooler in that train of thought, I should spend $150 a month so my kid can watch cable TV. Give me a break, let’s put ourselves through the perils of the rat race so we can spend our money on things we are morally against? Well, I guess we are all used to it, since we fund wars with our tax dollars all the time…So after day of writing why I came to unschooling, all I have to say is an insult?!
Unschooling to me is about change. Social Change doesn’t happen if people don’t change. The education system has been a site of struggle for years and it has only gotten worse; more standardized and more under the control of non-educators. Schooling is a form of coercion. The culture of school is about jumping through hoops, sorting children into haves and have-nots, manipulating people, working the system, and learning to conform and please others (non-conformists are skewered in high school). Otherwise we would only need knowledge and expertise to get jobs, not degrees. School says you learn in school, not the world.
Unschooling is a term that fit my philosophy on life. I hope that after this disjointed post I can go on with my blogging and leave this difficult time behind (sarcasm).
Or maybe I resent writing about unschooling because I am jealous of those who have the time and resources and connections that let them live their lives exactly how their ideals dictate...or maybe I'm just afraid I won't be able to pull it off.
'When we all request education and institutions where our children and young people can stay and learn, we close our eyes to the tragic social desert in which we live. They have no access to real opportunities to learn in freedom. In many cases, they can no longer learn with parents, uncles, grandparents—just talking to them, listening to their stories or observing them in their daily trade. Everybody is busy, going from one place to another. No one seems to have the patience any more to share with the new generation the wisdom accumulated in a culture. Instead of education, what we really need is conditions for decent living, a community.
“True learning,” Ivan Illich once said, “can only be the leisurely practice of free people.” '
Reclaiming Our Freedom to Learn
by Gustavo Esteva
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