by Trenna Sue Hiler

Created on: May 16, 2008   Last Updated: January 15, 2009

So what is unschooling and is it for you? It could be. Much depends on how you approach life and learning and how you want your children to approach the situation.

Unschooling puts the student in charge of what they want to learn, when they want to learn, and how they want to learn. The job of the parent/teacher is to make sure there are tools and safe comfortable environment for learning. If a child shows interest in a subject or idea we encourage their explorations and provide for what they need.

There are ways of a creative teacher to slide other things into theri chosen interest. If they are interesting in music and want to play the french horn, how does the math get done? How much does it cost to purchase or rent the instrument? How many hours are spent practicing? There are ways.

What are the true benefits of unschooling?

~ Finding one's niche in life ~

Many believe that people have innate talents and interests in life for a reason. Intuition and exposure will bring us to those things we are suppose to do and learn about in life. If this premise is correct children will gravitate toward their natural talents and interests. They will not be forces to struggle with subjects that have no relevance to them. It allows them to follow their hearts and instincts.

~ Learn without pressures of time tables ~

By this age and this grade you must be able to do things before learning any other information. When you see it written out like this it does seem a little ridiculous, however if you think about it that what traditional schooling encourages. You may repeat a whole grade with the same information because you were unable to pass a reading test. Unschooling eliminates these barriers.

For example, Albert Einstein, clearly a brilliant man did not fit well in a typical school situation. He didn't even begin to speak until he was three years of age and couldn't speak fluently until he was nine. Imagine how that may have affected the communication between him and his educators.

Gifted children tend to excel in some, but not all areas. Should lack of math skills curb their great ability to write and read? Unschooling centers on the child learning in their own time and way.

~ Encourage alternate theories and free thinking ~

If you want to raise independent, creative, and dependable adults they can learn much of this in the unschooling method of education. The children don't go undisciplined, but they can choose their own path. They are responsible to develop in a manner that pleases them. Does this mean that sometimes they are hard to manage? Probably and most parents who participate in unschooling believe it is worth the hard times.

Perhaps John Holt expresses the whole theory and benefit in this short statement. "Birds fly, fish swim, man thinks and learns."

Further Lisa Wood offers this sage advice. "What we need to do, and all we need to do, is bring as much of the world as we can into the school and classroom (in our case, into their lives); give children as much help and guidance as they ask for; listen respectfully when they feel like talking; and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do the rest."

Reference:

www.borntoexplore.org

www.unschooling .com

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