Re: A possible arguement against unschooling (was Re: When even a Republican can see it....)

On Sun, 24 Jun 2007 11:15:38 -0700, David Friedman
<ddfr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

In article <eots73liqgqoa9t32b22edm8ngju4amh2i@xxxxxxx>,
Joyce Reynolds-Ward <jrw@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I don't call that impressing people, or necessarily showing off bogus
knowledge.

Were you "pretending to knowledge you don't have?" If not, why do you
think my comment applies to it?

Because I don't necessarily see picking up knowledge you're not
necessarily using as picking it up to pretend to knowledge you don't
have. My impression is that you see it as a bigger problem than I do.

Where did I object to picking up knowledge "you're not necessarily
using?" You were the one who introduced the "utilitarian" label to the
discussion, I was the one who objected to it. My objection was to making
kids study things that they did not find interesting or useful,
presumably on the theory that having been "exposed to" something makes
you educated, whether or not the exposure took.

I think we're at a stalemate here, because my take on it is that we
don't necessarily know what a person--kid or adult--will later find
interesting or useful.

And I do think that even a slight exposure does have an effect. But
I'm also one of those sorts who would have enjoyed St. John's
College's Great Books program--if we could have afforded it, on the
grounds that I would have gotten a very good generalist education, to
build on later with more specialized study. Even in math, which I
don't care for (and now understand is a function of the way my brain
is wired, not necessarily a function of how I was taught).





Now if you want to write that off as "bogus," then I guess I can feel
free to write off your impression that all it is is "impressing people
with bogus knowledge" as sheer arrogance and lack of empathy with
others.

A description that might better apply to what you have just done--first
applying my comment to something to which, by its plain language, it
doesn't apply, and then hypothetically attacking me for being so wicked
as to hold the view you have just invented for me.

David, by implication, you previously did the same thing to me.
Perhaps that was not your intent. But you seem to feel that acquiring
generalist information is done for the purpose of arbitrarily
attempting to impress people, and as such, is bogus.

I don't see how you can get that from what I posted on the subject, let
alone from the more general pattern of my posts. We aren't talking about
people who choose to "acquire generalist information" but about people
compelled to spend time being taught about things whether or not they
have any interest in them.

Again, we're going to need to agree to disagree, David, because I do
think that these things will have a use later on.

I've had this discussion with students--one, a very bright young lady
struggling with algebra, who also has a strong interest in science,
for one. Her grasp of the concepts is erratic, but I've found that I
could talk her through to understanding (at times by playing the
dimwit teacher that she had to explain the process to). Part of that
was a confidence issue--as her math teacher told me, she's more able
than she gives herself credit for.

Social studies is a constant groaner. Surprisingly to me, one of the
biggest areas of complaints is about reading maps (the geography part
of it). That's a useful skill for anyone; especially many of these
kids who are involved in outdoor activities. I hear comments like
"but I can use a GPS instead!"

Umm--not always. I've been places where it's hard to get the
satellites lined up, and where these kids live is one of those places
where it's difficult.



I learned the names of various composers and terms such as renaissance
and baroque, but I don't see the point of knowing those things if I
don't end up actually better understanding and appreciating the music
those composers produced. I suppose that information is worth something,
but very little compared to what I would have learned in the same time
if applied to something I did like and understand.

And see? That's the attitude I was talking about.

Now, let's say that you are, for some reason, deciding to write a
piece of fiction about a particular period of time that encompasses
the era where one or more of those composers wrote. Knowing the role
that a composer might have played in the court of a Renaissance royal,
for example, might give your writing a bit more nuance than it would
have otherwise. The differences in musical style between Renaissance
music and Baroque music are also somewhat reflective of the cultural
differences of the eras. Looking at the relationships between the
composers and their patrons might give you an idea of political and
economic relationships of the era.

But I guess you don't seem to find that information useful.

Dialing a phone number at random might get you a pizza parlor, but if
you want to order pizza it's not a very good strategy. If I want to
acquire lots of historical knowledge, for writing or other purposes,
reading things I find interesting--Casanova's memoirs, Boswell's
memoirs, Usamah ibn Munqidh's memoirs, the Rehla of Ibn Battuta,
al-Tanukhi's anecdotes, to take some real examples--is a lot more fun
and teaches me a lot more than trying to study something of no interest
to me in the hope that the knowledge might some day come in useful.

For me, studying the overall history and then later adding in the
specifics is much more effective.

That seems to be a pattern common to others, as well.



There's a book about Sudbury Valley School itself which has figures on
what happened to the kids who graduated--how many went to college, or
started firms, or whatever. I think I mentioned that earlier. I don't
know of anything similar that covers all the schools that follow that
model. I don't know what the literature is on outcomes from Summerhill,
which was an earlier and rather different experiment along free school
lines.

And that is--ancedotal or a formal study?

It's data--total numbers of students who ended up doing various things.

Is this a complete record or a self-report?

I believe it is, or says it is, a complete count--I don't know for how
many years. But I read the book years ago. The title is "Free at Last:
The Sudbury Valley School," the author is Daniel Greenberg.

He's one of the founders, as I recall. I think I've read some reviews
of it long ago, when I was reading _Mothering_ magazine regularly.


Also, it only discusses the successes--those who graduated. Good data
to have (and compare) to the public system would be that of all
students who entered the system, whether they graduated or left at
some point before finishing.

Yes. But some data is better than none. And the point I was making was
simply that the unschooling approach works for a broader range of kids
than just kids like mine with parents like me and my wife.

I don't know how much more I can contribute to the discussion, at
least today. Besides barn chores (my weekend for barn duty), I'm
suffering from a flareup of a painful facial syndrome and I suspect
that much of the rest of my day will be spent medicating it. Whether
I can contribute usefully or not will be a question--and, besides, I
have a new computer that I need to configure and work with to find out
the bells and whistles (transition from PC to Mac), and it would be
nice to spend non-painful thinking time dealing with that.

Good luck. At least it's from PC to Mac and not the other way.

My younger son (14) got a new MacBook for his birthday to replace his
old iBook, which was intermittently failing, and wanted to use it to run
a Windows game using Boot Camp. Neither he nor I could figure out how to
configure Windows to connect the machine to our network. So Friday we
had dinner with my adult son and his wife, which gave me a chance to
play with my grandson and my son a chance to use his older brother's
expertise to solve the problem.

In this case, I defer to my 20 year old son (who was telling his
kindergarten teachers how to run the Apple IIs they had). I have
banged around computers for a long time, specifically DOS computers,
but Windows is getting to the point where the intuitive part no longer
works (and I never have worked much with networks). The son, on the
other hand, would network the entire dang house to a much more
elaborate system than we need, given the chance. Some of that's stuff
he learned in school (he didn't major in computers in high school, but
radio broadcasting, and had been invited/recruited to major in the
electronic section of high school, where some of this stuff was
covered).

jrw
.

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