Category Archives: Education

Mom & Pop Coffee Shop

Unschooled and free-schooled kids, required at an earlier age than most to start charting their own life course (at least in terms of educational direction), tend to become more entrepreneurial as adults and less inclined to work for “the man” as they say. I have not seen statistics proving that out, but certainly a lot of anecdotal evidence. It certainly seems to be playing out in my own kids’ lives (both unschooled during normally high school years), with my 23-year-old son Eric a year into a small business venture, and my 19-year-old daughter Emma two years out from finding her first job at a small woman-owned café in the neighborhood. Continue reading →

Balderdash & Circles of Equals

It is rare in our culture when any activity can capture the interest of and entertain both youth and adults, as I believe is the case in this very sophisticated game of obfuscation, divination, and the opportunity to share a laugh or two as well. The game “Balderdash”, the trademarked version of the game I first played as “Dictionary”, is just such an activity, a simple parlor game yet a very sophisticated exercise in word-smithing in the context of cultural awareness. Given that, it is still a game that a sharp pre-teen or older youth can master and go toe to toe with adults. My thirteen-year-old niece insists that we play the game at every family party, and with seven to ten of us participating, we have had a number of memorable sessions. Continue reading →

Developing Those 21st Century Work Skills

So much of our society’s concern and discussion about “reforming” or “transforming” our education system is focused on giving our youth the skills to participate successfully in the 21st Century workforce so our country can successfully compete in the world economy. A lot of alternative educators might make a good argument against this kind of grand social engineering, and say that an education system in a democracy like ours should instead be focused on creating an enriched environment for learning. We should then rely on the innate learning drive in our youth and the internal compasses of them and their families, to chart a course to best realize their unique skills. Continue reading →

Thoughts on National Education Standards

There has recently been a movement among national and state-level public education leaders towards creating and adopting national standards for English language arts and mathematics. Concern comes from the fact that American school youth don’t test as well on standardized language (English in our case) and math tests as their European and Asian peers. Even President Obama has jumped on that bandwagon. Continue reading →

Conditional Respect & the Struggle for Self Esteem

In 2003, after three years in a humanistic alternative public charter middle school, our daughter Emma decided to experience attending a large conventional public high school, with nearly 4000 students, for her ninth grade year. One day, early in the semester, one of the vice-principals was a “guest lecturer” for a couple hundred of the Ninth graders, including Emma, that were spending their PE period waiting because they had not yet been assigned to a specific physical education class. He welcomed them to the school and reminded them that their teachers deserved the students’ respect, but the students would have to earn their teachers’ respect. Emma was now duly welcomed and warned that she was now a participant in a large public institution for youth, where she would presumably have to behave and perform to gain the conditional respect of the adult staff of the school. Continue reading →

The Triumph of the Homework Police

I think parents helping with, managing, or even doing their kids homework is a big untold story of how many families cope today with keeping their kids “in the game” of conventional school. So when it at times crosses the line from parents helping to parents doing, is that cheating or is it just what you have to do sometimes to help your stressed out kid survive and navigate the institution? And doesn’t what seems to be a fairly common practice (at least around the circle of parents that I know) favor the kids who have parents that are academically talented, have the time to spend their evenings assisting their kids, and are driven by one reason or another to have their kids be judged as successful (rather than necessarily be successful) at school? Continue reading →

Leonard Turton on Democracy & Education

Here is a provocative quote on democracy and schools, which I believe to be on the mark, from a person named Leonard Turton who I exchanged emails with on the AERO (Alternative Education Revolution Organization) listserv back several years ago. If you consider yourself a progressive person and you believe that our country should embody democratic principles, I think you need think long and hard about what he is saying, and if you can rationalize our current education system with those democratic principles… Continue reading →

An Argument for Many Paths

This is a piece I wrote for Alternative Education Resource Organization magazine last fall that I realized I had never shared on my blog. From my experience with Unitarian-Universalist principles and world-view, there is an argument made that it is important to acknowledge that there are many valid spiritual paths in the world that should be honored inclusively. In this piece, I have applied that idea of “Many Paths” to youth development and education….

From our son Eric’s experience, the experience of many other families and youth we know or have read about, and the sobering statistic that up to 50% of our youth in our big city public school districts (including our son Eric) are not graduating from high school, I have come to the conclusion that the ubiquitous, “one size fits all” conventional instructional school does not, and cannot work for every youth, no matter how fully it is funded or how much it is “reformed”. Yet I have talked to plenty of youth who go to conventional schools, do very well, and enjoy going to school each day. I have attended John Lofton’s excellent workshops at AERO conferences where he makes a compelling case that many people in the African-American community believe strongly in the conventional instructional school, if fairly resourced, to be the best shot for their youth to have a chance to succeed. Continue reading →

Camps, “Cons” & Compasses

I continue with my unschooling theme and my quest to convince people who are skeptical that this is a valid learning path for some as an alternative primary educational “engine” to formal schooling. Just to recap, our son Eric left school in the middle of eighth grade and our daughter Emma after ninth. Eric has had no “formal” schooling since then. Emma has taken several French courses at community college along with a six-week French language immersion school in Montreal, Canada. The many things they have learned since then have been in the context of “real life” and some tutors that Emma has hooked up with along the way to help her learn dance, piano, art, and now continue her study of French.

Anyway… on with the post! Continue reading →