Hackschooling
My friend Scott sent me this TED talk by a 13-year-old unschooler who is hacking his education.
It's worth 11 minutes of your time.
Also see:
My friend Scott sent me this TED talk by a 13-year-old unschooler who is hacking his education.
It's worth 11 minutes of your time.
Also see:
By Leo Babauta
I've had a number of parents of young kids (toddlers and preschool-aged) ask what age they should start unschooling -- when is too early? And some parents of older kids (middle school, high school) are also wondering if it's too late to start unschooling.
I'll do my best to answer those two questions in this post.
First -- what age is too early? When can you start, if you have a young child? The simple answer is that you're already doing it. You're unschooling.
Say what? Let me explain: unschooling isn't a specific method of learning. It's basically just living your life, exploring and playing and doing whatever you normally do -- outside of the artificial learning environment we call the classroom. Everyone does it, from adults to toddlers to yes, even kids who go to school. We all unschool.
By Leo Babauta
Learning is a beautiful thing. I've put together 8 quotes that inspire me to be self-educated:
By Leo Babauta
One of the hardest things, and the best things, about unschooling is that everything is uncertain.
You don't know if you're doing the right thing by unschooling. You don't know if you're learning anything useful, if you're going to be horribly ignorant as an adult, if you'll ever get a job, if anything you're doing is right.
Unschooling is rife with uncertainty.
Then again, so is everything else in life. Including going to regular school.
One of the top three questions I get when talking to people about unschooling is "How will he learn math?" I love this question. Being a number enthusiast myself, I get excited whenever I have an opportunity to point out how math is all around us. That's the pseudo answer. Math is all around us. But learning is a process. Realizing that our surroundings provide excellent opportunities to learn math is just the first step. Here's my three step learning process:
That's it! Once you get through with step 3, it could lead you to further research. A trip to the library or a google search for more examples and information could be the next steps. Or not. Maybe the 3 steps was enough to satisfy the math curiosity for this moment. Regardless, some learning happens.
But where is the math?
Chase loves to count things. He made me realize we could talk about numbers anywhere. The only thing holding back the math is our imagination. We count nuts and bolts, birds, parallel lines, marks on walls, shoes, vertical blinds, beans, people, cars, busses, you get the idea :) What fascinated me is how the simple concept of counting has lead to other math concepts. We now count sides on objects. That thing has 4 sides, its a square. Or a rectangle. This thing has 8 sides and he looks to me like, what is that?!? Octagon, I say. We went from basic counting to geometry. But it doesn't stop there.
By Leo Babauta
Whenever I have a question about unschooling -- motivation, how kids learn, how to learn math, etc. ... I ask myself one simple question:
How would I learn this or deal with this, as an adult?
Because the simple truth about unschooling is that it's no different from how adults live and learn, in the real world.
Let's take some examples, of school vs. adults vs. unschooling:
By Leo Babauta
Unschooling is a ton of fun if you can learn on your own, learn whatever you want, and basically play all day. But that's significantly harder if you can't read.
So how do you instill a love of reading in a child who isn't that interested?
My 7-year-old daughter Noelle started reading relatively late (I think, though actually I have no idea and don't care about this kind of thing) ... she just wasn't very interested. She didn't hate books, but they didn't excite her.
But just this year, not only did she learn to read small words (pig and dog, mom and dad), but really rapidly, she learned to read full sentences and now books. It's really amazing to see that kind of rapid learning. Now, I wouldn't say she's in love with reading, but she's much better at it, and I can see a love of reading slowly growing in her.
By Leo Babauta
This morning, someone left a great question in a comment on this blog:
This is a wonderful question. I've heard similar sentiments from other teachers. I'd like to share a few thoughts, and hope that others can join in with their own suggestions.
Here's what I'd suggest for teachers & professors looking to "unschool" their classroom:
By Leo Babauta
Whether you're just looking into unschooling, or you've been doing it but want to read more, blogs and books are a great place to explore, but there are so many. And for unschoolers looking for some cool online learning tools, the options can be overwhelming.
So I'll share a few resources we've found useful. This is far from a definitive guide -- I don't have the experience or knowledge to write that guide. Better people than I have written much more on the topic, and while I can't provide a comprehensive list, I will share some books and sites to get you started.
I would love it if others would share their favorite resources in the comments!
By Leo Babauta
This is one of the most common questions people have about unschooling. It seems that people think reading might be fun enough for an unschooler to do on her own, but math has to be forced.
And there might be something to this -- after all, in school, math isn't often a very loved subject. At least, not unless it comes easy to you and is fun.
So it's a legitimate question. Let's explore it a bit.
But let's start by asking you, my dear reader, a question: if you didn't know math now, as an adult, how would you learn it? If no one was forcing you to learn.