Unschooling or curriculum? Exploring the path to confident, self-directed learning
From the time our daughters were very young, Bob and I had an articulated educational goal for them: to be autodidactic, able to teach themselves. Along that path, we chose to homeschool, and once on that trajectory, the philosophy that we most intuitively embraced was unschooling, an educational theory that dispels with the conventional idea of lessons and curriculum, of coercion of the learner into the rote memorization of facts. In the unschooling home, the child charts their own course. The parent doesn’t direct learning; rather, he or she makes resources available to the child based on his or her interests. Unschooled children are typically have a great deal of control over their time and the subjects they choose to study, or even if they will choose to study. The philosophy suggests that, when it is important to the child to learn something, he or she will embrace the necessary learning with a voracious intellectual appetite. We’d read about articulate, well-educated children coming through this system of education, and we chose to embrace it.
We allowed the kids to watch movies in the evening that seemed educational; we made no demands on their time other than asking that they participate in the family farm and home. The only other personal agenda item I imposed was taking advantage of their love of bedtime stories. I chose those books. I refused to read Harry Potter (they could depend on their grandparents for that), and instead we read about King Arthur, Greek mythology, Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn, Narnia, Midsummer Night’s Dream, Anne of Green Gables and more.
Maybe my co-optation of story time was the first clue that unschooling wasn’t the best choice for our family. Further conflict with the philosophy arose in Bob and me when it came to allowing the kids unmitigated access to media. We began to observe that the kids would passively watch
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But it was Bob who began asking the bigger questions. He pointed out that Saoirse and Ula seemed to be learning a lot about what we knew…but if we didn’t suggest a broader field, and we didn’t push them to look farther beyond what we ourselves could imagine, did we stand the chance of raising successive generations of scholars who were increasingly myopic in their understanding of the world?
I brushed him off. We have a life that will expose them to many things: we travel, we meet many different people. Life was still the best classroom.
But then I started observing something in Saoirse that troubled me. She would read prolifically, but she couldn’t write to save her life. She relied on “kid writing,” sounding-out of words to express her ideas without worrying about spelling or grammar. I was comfortable with that at the age of 5. At the age of 8, it was beginning to make me grumpy. I would suggest the dictionary. I would suggest correcting words. I was rebuked by my own kid with my own earlier wisdom “it doesn’t matter, as long as you can understand it.” Unschooling suggests that a point in time might come when Saoirse would decide to care about spelling, grammar and the like, but as her primary audience, and a writer, I was growing increasingly uncomfortable with her willingness to dismiss the mechanics of good writing and communication.
I noted similar problems in math. If I sat her down to do sums, she could slowly plod through with sufficient accuracy. But in real life, I was witnessing greater problems. Saoirse lacked confidence in math. Our lives are filled with practical math: reading recipes, counting eggs, handling change, planning and creating new craft projects. She loved all these things, but I noticed that she would be prevented from moving herself forward independently with them; if she didn’t have the confidence in her math skills to complete a project, she would simply quit. Rather than taking an interest in learning what she needed in order to pursue her goals, she was abandoning projects as soon as they presented a challenge.
Unschoolers might argue that Saoirse, at the age of 8, is still young, and that these basic skills of math and writing would eventually come to her when she was ready to embrace them. I am inclined to agree. But part of me suspected that her inability to tackle things that were important to her (writing a decent, legible letter; tackling a new craft project) was partly sheer laziness. I feared laziness, if not addressed, could result in increasing insecurity about exploring new ideas. I began to consider using a curriculum.
As a homeschooling parent, I have been part of many conversations with other homeschoolers where we discuss how good education is “all about the child.” The failure to make it this way is, after all, one of our biggest complaints about the public school system. It forces children to adhere to an artificial schedule of learning that fails to accommodate for individual readiness. The unschooling philosophy is very in tune with this criticism.
In my investigation of homeschool curriculum, I was keenly aware of this criticism. And I realized that my interest in adopting curriculum wasn’t really about Saoirse. It was about me. Upon making that discovery, I promptly dismissed the idea as wrong, and we continued with our unschooling.
And I continued to grow annoyed at her dismissive attitude about writing, about her unwillingness to allow mathematics to enrich her life.
Maybe education is supposed to be about the child, but why is it that I, as the parent, should relinquish my own voice? I’ve been on this planet for 37 years, and while I think my 8 year old is pretty smart, to assume that children innately know best how or if they should learn is dismissive of the experience that I could bring to the table. Call me selfish, but damn it, I felt I deserved to try imposing a little of my own educational agenda.
So this fall, we began with a curriculum. To my shock and horror, the parent manuals suggested that we spend an appalling 5-6 hours a day on the core subjects of language arts, math, social studies and science, and then an additional two hours on music, physical education and art. That was just way too confining. We limited our involvement with formal curriculum to two hours per day. As many other homeschoolers- turned-unschoolers report, it wasn’t pretty. There were tears -- on her part, and mine. She called the work stupid. I told her that her current academic achievement was unacceptable, that it was keeping her from moving forward with the stuff she seemed to want to do.
We were miserable…but only for about 2 weeks. Then, something clicked. I’d come in to start homeschooling, and she would already be waiting at her place at the table. Our conversations deepened; she began writing terrific essays that she would read aloud with pride to anyone willing to listen. Saoirse began doing math in the kitchen, at dinner, on the farm. We took the language arts skills we were learning in the curriculum and began applying them to the literature we read together at night. Our 2 hour schooling sessions stretched into 4 hour sessions with lots of smiles, with afternoons free for independent pursuits.
I have not abandoned unschooling. I still believe life presents the greatest lessons. When the weather is cold and the skies are gray, sitting around the kitchen table with worksheets and notebooks and an abacus is fun. But we abandon the books when Saoirse wants to work on her new homemade dog biscuit business, when there’s a great place to go visit, when there is something pressing at the farm, when the growing season is in full swing, or when the weather is just too beautiful to stay indoors.
I think it is very possible that, had I continued exclusively on the unschooling path, Saoirse would turn out just fine. But it was also very possible that she would become insecure and self-limiting, reluctant to tackle new challenges. Maybe unschooling is all about the learner, but as the teacher, I am also an important part of the equation. I wasn’t liking what I was seeing, and that was interfering with my relationship with my kid. My choice to use a curriculum has improved our relationship, and has broadened our approach to education. I don’t know if we’ll stick with it forever, but for now, I really like it, and while Saoirse likes to poke fun at it, she seems to love the time we spend working on it together.
As a Radical Homemaker I know that my job is to challenge everything…and sometimes that means challenging our own radical ideas.
Shannon Hayes is the host of grassfedcooking.com and the author of The Farmer and the Grill and The Grassfed Gourmet and Radical Homemakers. She works with her family on Sap Bush Hollow Farm in Upstate New York. Her newest book, Long Way on a Little: An earth lovers’ companion for enjoying meats, pinching pennies and living deliciously is due out in September 2012.
Comments
We only spend about four hours a day on schoolwork, so there's lots of time for tangents.
I compare it to how much better I perform when I'm challenged by a deadline versus when there's none. I'd be content to give up or do a mediocre job if others were not counting on me.
BTW, which language arts curriculum are you using that has her writing essays?
p.s. Thanks for signing the oder slip form my cookbooks this summer- had I known YOU were mailing them I'd have asked for an autograph!
I am thrilled to have found your blog through Twitter. I just enrolled my son in Clearview Sudbury School this morning and am devouring all that I can about unschooling, homeschooling, non-coercive education, etc. I also just happen to be very interested in Paleo, growing my own food, and question cultural norms. All that to say that I will be a frequent reader, I'm sure!
This post reminds me that I cannot view unschooling as our "forever answer to education issues". Issues may arise and I need to continue to be flexible and pro-child while still being the leader of my little 2 person family.
Erin
http://www.inhotpursuitofgod.blogspot.com
Also, you say you limited media initially, which brings in many other viewpoints. My 13 yo always unschooled son often knows things I do not and brings interesting viewpoints to conversations because of his exposure to media.
My comfort level with his abilities at certain ages is not really relevant and while I also had serious internal conflicts when he was age 6 and 8, I did not impose them on him and by age 11, he was fluent in reading and writing for his age group (if that is important).
As long as he is able to do what he wants to do when he wants to do them, he will be successful. If he chooses not to do something because of his lack of ability at the time, I trust he will come around to the interest again or that it wasn't that pressing for him.
I strive to support him and while I strew, I do not force. My son is not a reader of books, but a consumer of media. So are most of his traditionally schooled (particularly male, but also some female) relatives. Despite my constant example of reading and his love of being read to when little, media wins in most cases.
Personally, I dislike media because I am impatient (and perhaps lazy) and since I can read through things swiftly, I can more quickly discern information through words, but he prefers to watch vidoes, both entertaining and informational.
I hope that things are working as best they can for your family, but I don't that unschooling would not have worked for your child.
It seems like unschooling works for every child, but not for every parent. And children have to live with those parents.