Parents Forum

AmyL · 10-22-2007, 01:46 PM

Spit, I didn't say unschooling was being done in the public schools. Constructivism as a guiding philosophy has been used more and more over the past 100 years. The opposite of Constructivism, as it were, is Objectivism. Not in the Ayn Rand sense of the word. But Objectivism says there is an established set of things that should be learned, and that they should be learned in a certain order. Constructivism and math, for example...not such a good mix. Little difficult to let a child pursue calculus if they haven't learned to multiply. Extreme example, so forgive me for that.

Constructivism has shown up in such approaches as Cooperative Learning, the Whole Language approach, and more. Oh. Social Studies instead of History....MAJOR pet peeve for me.

What has happened that proven techniques - ones that have worked for hundreds of years - are being chucked overboard. Individuals like John Dewey were very influential in this regard. Unfortunately, so were groups like the Fabian Socialists. Feel free to look them up if you like.

Unschoolers take Constructivism a bit further than the schools do. Again, I believe that many parts of the philosophy are helpful. Making learning compelling, and encouraging a child's interest is paramount. I taught the older boys to make jewelry and they're selling it at craft shows. I hope to move into soldering and eventually welding and automotive repair. But they're too young for that yet, so we're doing starter skills working with metal. Sorry, wandered off point. What was it? Oh yeah. Unschoolers and Constructivism. It's totally fine to encourage the interest of the child, but I believe there are dangers in completely letting him/her choose what is learned and what is not. It's the extreme that concerns me, and unfortunately the writing I've seen from the unschooling community has emphasized extremes. Perhaps I have missed the more balanced stuff.

The writings that you referred to can be somewhat extreme when they start talking about damaging children by following a structured plan, etc.

In the for what it's worth department, I did list John Holt as a resource when I was doing my how-to guide.

I'm just saying that there's another side to the story, and people should look at the whole picture when considering the issue. Heck. They should look at the whole picture when considering any issue. But that's a rant for a different post. Lol.

Kaytee · 10-22-2007, 02:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AmyL

Kaytee, it's totally your choice and your family's. I have more than one friend who I've silently HOPED would not home school. It's not for everyone.

There is a school of thought that children shouldn't be pushed to read, and that waiting until they're 9 or 10 to learn that skill is the right thing to do. I'm not so sure on that one, but I really don't know either. Again, it depends on that particular situation. I know some families who've pushed it at 5, some who've waited until 10. Each believes they're doing the right thing. The only way to know is wait and see what they turn out like as adults. Those stakes are pretty high, but really as parents we all face them in one way or another.

Thats true, I am not sure how that would be, at 10, they should be reading something!! lol
I do agree in not "pusing" the child though. I am fairly confident that my child wil be an early reader because of what she knows now. At 21 months she loves to read. not little board books either, we read the books that are typically in the 5-6 year old range. She loves book that take about 5-10 minutes for me to read them to her. She just sits and listens and turns the pages. She knows her ABC's, not because i taught her really, but because we just sing them and she learned them. She is starting to recognize letters now. She doesn't know all of them or anything, but we are working on them. I just hope this love does not fade.

Kaytee · 10-22-2007, 02:05 PM

Quote:

It's totally fine to encourage the interest of the child, but I believe there are dangers in completely letting him/her choose what is learned and what is not.

I completely agree, somethings they may not want to learn but still should be taught

jenilouise · 10-22-2007, 02:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kaytee

Thats true, I am not sure how that would be, at 10, they should be reading something!! lol
I do agree in not "pusing" the child though. I am fairly confident that my child wil be an early reader because of what she knows now. At 21 months she loves to read. not little board books either, we read the books that are typically in the 5-6 year old range. She loves book that take about 5-10 minutes for me to read them to her. She just sits and listens and turns the pages. She knows her ABC's, not because i taught her really, but because we just sing them and she learned them. She is starting to recognize letters now. She doesn't know all of them or anything, but we are working on them. I just hope this love does not fade.

Sounds like you have the building blocks of an early reader!

Kaytee · 10-22-2007, 02:12 PM

I'm hoping, but then I also hope that if she is that I don't just assume my next one has to be that way. Each child learns different and I know that but it is still hard not to comapre

jenilouise · 10-22-2007, 02:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kaytee

I'm hoping, but then I also hope that if she is that I don't just assume my next one has to be that way. Each child learns different and I know that but it is still hard not to comapre

Very true but I have kind of the opposite thing. Isabella is deaf on her right side. We had to learn together. I had to learn how she processed information so I could be an effective teacher (this was BEFORE I made the decision to homeschool.) Talking did not come easily to her and for a while there Josephine (who is 14 months younger) was easier to understand. Everything has come so easily to Josephine though and Isabella had to fight for it. By Kindergarten Isabella was whereshe should be.

Kaytee · 10-22-2007, 02:34 PM

thats great that you were able to adapt to her needs though.

jenilouise · 10-22-2007, 02:38 PM

It was frustrating and not at all easy but when she reads to me or just says something understandable..... the joy is so worth it.

AmyL · 10-22-2007, 06:07 PM

My older boys were soooooo difficult to teach to read! They resisted learning on a massive scale. I of course was prepared to have genius children who would be conquering the world by kindergarten. Lol. Had to learn a few lessons, and then walk a careful line between encouraging strongly and operating at their frustration level. Which was very frustrating for me. I think there was a language acquisition difficulty in there, coupled with some very surprising notions they held that they couldn't possibly learn anything. It was a very tough battle and I know I made a lot of very big mistakes. Fortunately, we've all survived and our relationship is improving. We're all maturing and doing better over time.

And surprise surprise! They can read!! I knew they could.

In contrast, my younger boys picked up the alphabet just on the strength of watching videos on TV (thank God for LeapFrog videos lol) and watching big brothers. They're doing great and big brothers are polishing their skills as they 'help' littles learn. So you just never know what's going to happen.

PennQuaker09 · 10-23-2007, 12:55 AM

This is very interesting. My future career, will be in education. I've always loved learning. More than likely, I'm going to get my Ph.D. One day, I love the feeling of being in the classroom and that's one of the reasons why I decided that I wanted to be a teacher. As a teacher you can't reach every single student, but you may be able to teach the love of learning to one or two.

At this point, I'm going to be licensed to teach math, physics, and chemistry, but I think I'm going to take some more biology courses so I can teach all of the sciences. I'm not sure when it's going to happen, but one day I will be a high school teacher.

I believe that homeschooling can be good and at the same time it can be bad. And I will say right now, I'm not against religion, but I have some issues with people trying to teach kids "science or history from a biblical perspective."

I think for elementary aged children, homeschooling or private schooling is better. Personally, I don't think I could teach my children in their early years because I think it would be hard for me to teach them things at an elementary level. And I wouldn't want my expectations to hinder them. I want them to have a love of learning just like Nate and I.

I think that homeschooling really wouldn't be in the best interest of kids for the high school years. High school teachers have to be trained to teach specific subjects and I think it's best for an English teacher to teach English and so on and so forth. Because of our idiotic president's education law, he's made it harder for high school teachers to teach effectively, but hopefully we'll get a more educationally minded president the next go around.

For me, science and math education is extremely important. Truth be told, we (by we I mean Americans) are behind pretty much every other country in the western world when it comes to the understanding of science and mathematics. I'll be perfectly frank, evolution is no longer considered a theory. Pretty much all modern biologists believe this. And I don't mean to pick on you mamab, but it's much more complex than saying we are evolved from apes. And if your child goes on to college, evolution is no longer treated the way it is treated in your normal high school biology class. In the normal biology class, evolution is presented in manner so that students can make up their own mind about it. It really isn't even covered much because the religious right gets all up in arms about it. Would it not be better to have a generation of American trained scientists as opposed to getting them from other countries? Pretty much every university from Harvard to Texas to Ohio State to the community college in your city use the same standard college biology textbook, Biology By Neil Campbell, and in that book evolution is presented as a fact. This is not a mistake, there is a reason why this is the most widely adopted biology text on the market. Even high schools use this book for advanced students. Our society doesn't embrace science and math like it should, feelings get in the way far too much. This is why curriculum gets watered down and students are barely functioning when they graduate.

I think that most parents, even the liberal ones, have an issue with students being taught about homosexuality. Schools do not teach students that being gay is okay. Actually, since I went to school in the south, it wasn't brought up unless someone was getting made fun of. However, I think some schools try to teach kids tolerance. And that is something that isn't limited to sexuality, but also race and religion and what have you.

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