By Rachel Tennenbaum
Imagine waking up on a Monday and driving up to Berkeley to check out a new art gallery opening. That night you play some video games and crack open a book before hitting the hay. Think this sounds like a day off for a college student? It’s actually the school day of a 9-year-old. No, it’s not a fantasy Ferris Bueller-style: It’s a daily reality for thousands of young learners who call themselves “unschoolers.”
Unschooling. Some call it a counter-culture, but others just call it natural learning. It’s an offshoot of homeschooling coined by educational philosopher John Holt, but it varies from traditional homeschooling in the sense that there is no curriculum. None. No math, no English, no science, no history. You just live.
This article is a fun read, and I know several of the people named and quoted, so it was especially interesting for me. I'm glad the author didn't leave it at "You just live," because that alone would be wrong and misleading. "Just" is such a dismissive little word...
But read the rest. Unschoolers don't "just live." They live large. They live expansively, and richly and joyfully. Those are the things that make it work.
http://www.cityonahillpress.com/article.php?id=1037
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