Can you partially "uncshool"?

[Kezia]

Just putting this out to get your input.

I have read quite a few examples of parents who claim that they follow a program Monday to Thursday and unschool on Fridays, or do a maths curriculum but unschool history and social science, and so on and so forth.

Do you think that this sort of arrangement is really feasible? Or is unschooling more of an all or nothing approach?

[Lis]

I'd like to know this too, so will be watching. I've been thinking of using a set maths curriculum, but unschooling everything else, I know DH will be more accepting of unschooling, if there was a set maths path (spot the nerd :lol )

[Laiste]

I kind of thought that unschooling was a natural approach with no "set" curriculum and just running with the interests of the child?

[Janet]

Sounds like they're doing a curriculum and having a day off. Natural learning/unschooling isn't really switched on and off like a tap, as I see it.

[bella]

I think you can have an eclectic style, and what we do is similar to what Laiste described. I am not so into labels. I think if there was a scale, we'd be more toward unschooling than school-at-home...

[Ayla]

Sounds like they're doing a curriculum and having a day off. Natural learning/unschooling isn't really switched on and off like a tap, as I see it.

Yeah that's how I see it. If learning is being structured, how do they undo that kind of thing on one day a week, yk? Unschooling/natural learning is an entire approach with an underlying philosophy that children are naturally curious and will follow their interests until they find something else they become interested in. That can only happen in an environment which nurtures that, and I can't see that happening where most of their week is following a structure/curriculum.

[Schuyler]

A big part of unschooling is trust. The trust is that learning happens and that children will acquire the skills that they need in a life that is rich and swirly with experiences and interactions and activities. If you decide to unschool everything but math, you've done a couple of interesting things. One is that you've said that all learning happens except for math. The other is that you've separated math out as a subject from the rest of life. Math and history don't overlap, in that scenario, math and language don't overlap, all that meter and rhyme in poetry and art with symmetry and geology which is so mathematic and demography and on and on and on, they lose the mathematical depth that they carry with them because math is a separate entity in an unschooling except for math curricullum. I guess third interesting thing is that you've just made math the hard subject. The rest of the stuff, reading and grammer and history and biology and animal husbandry and poetry and sculpture and physical education and anatomy and all of those things anyone can be trusted to learn in the course of a rich and engaging childhood, but math, now that's hard.

That said, if there are problems with unschooling for your partner it is important to address those problems. When Simon was 5 we got the computer game Asterix and Obelix. In Asterix and Obelix you knock out Romans by punching them. Obelix is very good at punching. Each Roman you knock out gives you points and you can multiply those points by a base order of 10 when you run over a multiplier bonus doohickey. Very quickly Simon could multiply by 10s and then by 100s and then by 1000s. I'm sure I pointed it out to David. Not because he was worried about it, but because I point out many, many things. If your partner is worried about math, maybe you could show him the math that you see unfolding in their lives without structure. Pam Sorooshian has put together pages of cool math games and ideas (http://homepage.mac.com/pamsoroosh/iblog/math/index.html). It isn't a curricullum, it's a bunch of games. You could print out some of them and see if any engage your children. She also has a nice description (http://sandradodd.com/math/pamgames) of what mathematicians really do. It might give you and your partner some perspective.

[~*heket*~]

This comes back to my q about maths and its importance in life vs it's importance at school. We have this emergency like drive for our children to learn maths, and I'm yet to learn for myself about the pace of natural driven mathematic studies in an unschooling environment, but it seems to me that mathematics is all too over emphasised in the institution.

This is our first week of homelearning and my previously anti maths daughter has SWAMPED herself in sudoku, attempted graph making, counting, and a few other things. Our ultimate goal is to unschool but I'm broaching it slowly with the child who has been institutionalised for 6 - and more years.

If anyone can tell me about the natural drive for maths I'd be interested to hear about it! But I stand by my statement that schools are too driven by maths teachers and their self importance.

[Lis]

I totally agree with the whole maths and it's real importance in life, and why we feel the need to actively teach so much about it. I'm all for the entire natural learning process, which includes the natural learning of maths, but I guess having a husband that is very maths driven, who works in a field where the knowledge of maths is important, it's harder for him to "get" the whole natural learning of maths, and how well it would be learnt and to what level etc...

It's definitely something that needs to be addressed and discussed, but I guess I was just trying to think of a slight compromise if he was unwilling to let go and embark on the natural learning process in it's full entirety.

[Kezia]

Natural learning/unschooling isn't really switched on and off like a tap, as I see it.


Unschooling/natural learning is an entire approach with an underlying philosophy that children are naturally curious and will follow their interests until they find something else they become interested in. That can only happen in an environment which nurtures that, and I can't see that happening where most of their week is following a structure/curriculum.


A big part of unschooling is trust. The trust is that learning happens and that children will acquire the skills that they need in a life that is rich and swirly with experiences and interactions and activities.

That's more or less the way my thinking was tending (well, today at least!). If I forced a particular subject to happen, that is basically saying I think it is absolutely essential, and I don't trust them to learn it without being made to.

Not sure about this thing with maths. (I was only mentioning it as an example of something I read, btw, not something I'm considering doing.) But I had an interesting convo with a friend - not a home schooler, but a father of young children - the other day. I was expressing my surprise that my son loves learning about numbers. A year ago I would have sworn that no sane person would ever voluntarily study maths, and now a have a child who bounces up to me and says things like "10x2=20, and 10x3=30, so that means 10x5 must be 50" or "There are 12 muffins, that means we can eat 4 each", and similar random things. I speculated that perhaps this was happening because he hasn't yet been taught that maths is boring and difficult. My friend pointed out that "difficult" is not a problem, if children are interested in something, they will be prepared to work hard and won't shy away just because it's challenging.

[breeze]

I honestly cant answer the original questions, but for what it's worth here is my 2 cents worth...I dont see a problem with curriculum or with structure in themselves (blame it on my teacher training if you will :)) To me the problem comes when: it is forced on to a child; when learning desisions are made without any imput from the child; when it is so ridged that there is no allowance for individuality in learning styles or personal areas of interest, (I could add more, but you get the jist).

Structure is merely the framework that the child learns in and that stucture can be fluid or ridged. Curriculum is simply what they learn. Our children learn in a very fluid manner. We totally go with the flow and my aim is to continue this. For example ds has shown an interest in plants and gardening (which has come from a number of areas of exposure) so we have started a vegie patch and a compost and our learning will grow as the garden does. He is 4 so he is learning about gardening at the cognitive level he is at. Eg: he has discovered that plants have roots and that's how plants drink water and food out of the ground. If he was 10, he would be able to take this concept further and we could learn about what foods plants need, how muchfod/water and there you have learning about ratios, measurements etc.

I think if you look at the interest areas your child has opportunities to learn maths will be in pretty much all of them. You just have to identify the opportunities and then make the most of them.

I know that "structure" and "curriculum" are dirty words here and I do understand why and I agree when they are under the unbrella of school. I think it is how those two things are applied is where the issue lies. The beauty of learning at home is that you get to create them with your child.

[Kezia]

Yep, I definitely have a problem with structure when it's used in that way, to standardise the learning experience and try to make all the children turn out the same. And I can see that a curriculum might be a lot better if the child took some responsibility for it.
Do you think that children will devise, or request, a structure themselves if they need it? Or do you think we need to control the structure / curriculum, but with lots of input from the children and taking all their individual needs / preferences into account?

I'm thinking that I'd quite like to have my own curriculum, not as some sort of checklist (must ensure we've done enough phonics this week), but just as a list of things we might want to present as a smorgasbord of options. I love the concept of a child being able to learn whatever interests them at the time, but they can't choose something if they have never seen / heard of it.

[gemi_ny]

I love the concept of a child being able to learn whatever interests them at the time, but they can't choose something if they have never seen / heard of it.

Yeah - that's what I was saying the other day. I like the idea of having flexibility to focus on the childs interests, but at the same time, introducing subjects/concepts that they might not otherwise come across.

It will be interesting to see what THEAC considers an acceptable curriculum.

[Blossomtime]

They have some unschooling books on their reccommended reading list, so they must have some understanding of it...

[Kezia]

um yeah but they also have a disclaimer saying that inclusion in the list is no indication of endorsement. and the board is 50% government appointed.

[Blossomtime]

mmmm... true. It will be interesting, but I reckon we can fudge it ;)

[~*heket*~]

If they've never seen or heard of something you can simply start a conversatoin about it! If they're interested GREAT, if not, try again later :lol

[bella]

Do you think that children will devise, or request, a structure themselves if they need it? Or do you think we need to control the structure / curriculum, but with lots of input from the children and taking all their individual needs / preferences into account?

Both here. My children have both devised and requested plans for their 'schoolwork' and their chores. At other times, I've controlled our daily routines (taking their needs and preferences into account) because I've deemed it the best thing for them/the family at the time.

Right now, Brit's 14 and doing Maths, writing, art, computer time, reading and music daily. Then science and history sometimes through the week. Theatre 2-3 times a week. She was doing Dance once a week, but isn't now (apart from at theatre). She's going to join my yoga class with me I think, from tomorrow. That looks quite structured, but the reality is that she does it all in her own time, by choice and has hours of free time each day (which she fills with art and writing, normally).

Immi and Abby are 12 and 11. They do Maths and writing daily. They also practice violin most days. They do theatre once a week, and art and craft most days with a fortnightly art 'class'. They're not doing much formal work with other 'subject areas' at the moment, but they are very busily exploring their own interests and they read often - a great variety of material.

Bryce is 9 and he does Maths most days and writing some days. Everything else is very unstructured for him right now but I'm thinking he might need a project (maybe 2 - one for rainy days, one for sunny days!) to get into because he seems bored too often... I'm going to chat with him about this and we'll see what we can find together.

Lily is 6 and does writing and maths most days, and art every day. She is the busiest kid I ever met - Little Miss Projects (and mess!)...

Heath is 4 and he just hangs out waiting for someone to play with. His passion of the moment is numbers, though, and this is all done orally (he adds, subtracts and multiplies numbers and checks with me that he's on track). :)

So they each have a curriculum of sorts, a course of study. Right now some are quite more structured than others. It ebbs and flows with their needs. They're all pretty good with time management, literate, numerate, hungry for knowledge, good with technology, fit, healthy, happy, imaginative, outgoing, friendly kids. Other than those descriptive words, labels don't matter. What we're doing works for us and if it's not technically 'unschooling' I don't care, and nor do they. We know we're free and we're loving it. :)

[SandraDodd]

-=-If anyone can tell me about the natural drive for maths I'd be interested to hear about it! -=-

Try not to think about it. Patterns and numbers and relationships and sizes and weights and money and percentages and cutting and measuring are all around you. Relax and ignore it, until you start to see it without trying to.