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08-31-2004 08:06 AM

There is no reason you should be going to school if you dislike being controled in a concrete cube 35 hours a week by authoritarian figures and at home 24/7 by "homework." There's no reason to pretend to be interested in the subjects being shoved down your throats if you'd rather be saving Tibet. There's no reason for you to live in anxiety due to grades which do not gauge your worth as a human being.
There's another way.
It's known as "unschooling" and is often confused with homeschooling. Homeschooling is the situation of a student being taught by their parents. All this achieves is making your own home into the concrete cube, metaphorically, and your parents into the same authoritarian figures you detseted at school.
Unschooling does not involve concrete. It does not involve curriculum. It does not involve authority or, nessisarily, your parents. You teach yourself what you want, when you want, at the speed you want, where you want.
Humans are designed for a world of sunlight and fresh air, which, needless to say, is not supplied by public education. We are each born with the instinct to love to learn, an instinct to be interested in our suroundings. It's the reasons babies can learn extremely complex things like speech so fast. School exponges this instinct from us partly by associating learning with feelings like embarrasment, rage, and guilt. However, it's possible to regain this passion for true education by not going to school.
Unschooling is legal in most states in the US and the whole of the UK. It's seen as homeschooling in the eyes of the government, but perfectly legal.
For more information, search the web, or go to your local library. One of the best books out there is Grace Llewellyn's "The Teenage Liberation Handbook."

08-31-2004 08:12 AM

P.S.
I wrote the above. Sorry--I wasn't logged in. Now you can contact me through my profile.

08-31-2004 08:15 AM

NOW I'm logged in. You can contact me through this...I hope.

09-13-2004 08:28 AM

It might be just me, but that all just seems like a euphemism for skipping class and sleeping in. Whats the success rate of this, anyway?
I doubt that anybody in MY school, if they were given the opportunity, would have the self-control to attempt to really "learn" things that are useful, and become a useless good for nothing human being.

...but still, it certainly sounds wonderful:razz:

**SoulRiser** · 09-14-2004 09:47 AM

Sadistic Masochistic Wrote:....and become a useless good for nothing human being.

...but still, it certainly sounds wonderful:razz:

so humans are "useless" unless they "contribute to society"? that sounds wonderful. we should print it on big banners and posters and stick it all over the cities to remind people to do stuff for... err, us... wait that includes them too. but they don't have a choice in the matter! Shy

09-16-2004 09:50 AM

Are you an unschooler? Any other resources that are helpful?

I know a shorter book by Wendy Priesnitz, "A Practical Guide to Unschooling for Teenagers" is a good one too -the negative stuff on school = straight to the point.

10-09-2004 10:26 AM

http://geocities.com/moonwindstarsky/unschooling

http://geocities.com/moonwindstarsky/unschoolingbooks

Links can help people get started.

Visit the books - too LONG to type them all out

Optik · 10-12-2004 07:35 AM

Unschooling sounds great, and it is something I've always desired to do. In fact, I'm considering doing so when my junior or senior year comes around. Yes, it is true that some students would take advantage of unschooling and just become lazy loungers. However, most will realize "Hey! I better start learning something if I want to do anything in life!" Also...The truth is, vacations and breaks are wonderful, but many become bored with things because soon, they've done everything, seen everything, browsed everything. Then, learning things, researching things, and building things become hobbies to pass the time, and then they learn from this.

I don't know exact success rates of unschoolers, but they say homeschoolers, deschoolers, and unschoolers are just as successful, if not more successful, than highschoolers.

10-30-2004 04:31 AM

You should; I wish I did when I found out about it earlier. If you need to find anything, the 2 links above are a great place to begin.

10-30-2004 04:32 AM

also had someone who dropped out Fr Yr and they had a discussion on it

10-30-2004 07:52 AM

Optik Wrote:Yes, it is true that some students would take advantage of unschooling and just become lazy loungers. However, most will realize "Hey! I better start learning something if I want to do anything in life!" Also...The truth is, vacations and breaks are wonderful, but many become bored with things because soon, they've done everything, seen everything, browsed everything. Then, learning things, researching things, and building things become hobbies to pass the time, and then they learn from this.

I don't know exact success rates of unschoolers, but they say homeschoolers, deschoolers, and unschoolers are just as successful, if not more successful, than highschoolers.

Deschooling takes place after someone leaves a system "cleansing" from that type of routine. This process is what many unschoolers and their parents call it, a break from the institution. Unschooling begins after it. HTH, you can directly ask parents, teens, kids about it who have unschooled [naturally learned] their whole lives.

11-01-2004 11:12 AM

look at the "age" section of unschooling groups at http://geocities.com/moonwindstarsky/unschoolingbooks

11-11-2004 02:25 PM

UNSCHOOLING?

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