Hello! Guess lots of you have thought about this as well. So I ask you for your opinion. Unschooling, is that something that you can stand behind as a christian or not? And why? Or why not? I am just wondering ;-) And if you say 'yes, sure...why not' can you describe 'unschooling your way' than to me? Hope to hear from you! Not to judge, but to learn and to get order in my thoughts Patricia
I guess I kinda consider our way unschooling at times. It has nothing to do with being a christian. Which I am. It has to do with my child. My child is bipolar and at times we are not stable enough to do daily work. Really the last two years I would say we unschooled. And this year kinda but not. He is a lot more stable now so we are able to follow a stricter structure. I still make up my own curriculum and focus on his interests to try to teach him. Because right now it is what works. But we do math daily, science, history and writing 2 to 3 times a week. And throw home ec and auto shop in there every now and then. My son always has a project in mind and I help with to achieve his goals.
I think it depends on which definition of "unschooling" you are describing. There is un-schooling that is child-led learning where the basics are taught, but taught in the confines of a child's interest and passion. Where there are "must haves" like handwriting and Math - but taught in ways that the child would find pleasing and not confining. Where Bible is LIVED and learned. THAT I can get behind and have met some that are very intelligent, well-spoke, children. Now...the un-schooling that is more like un-parenting? THAT I don't agree with. Does that sound right???
I'm not an unschooler. It would drive me crazy. But, if it's done correctly, I don't see anything in it that would go against my Christian beliefs. Those that do it correctly do a magnificant job directing their kids' education.
I dont see where christianity would be a factor in the choice to unschool.. as Jackie said I also agree that if done correctly it works. I do not unschool but I do less of a school set up than I did in the begining. During the summers we do more unschooling and call it summer break but they are constantly looking up and learning about things they want toknow about. ITs pretty neat actually. Ds just decided to learn about how a flash light was working and ended up creating his own game from broken parts of a cell phone, game and flashlight, and a couple of tripple A batteries, electronic engineer hubby loved explainign the circuits to him and knows what he is getting for Christmas, Radio Shack here we come! This of course leads me to the question of would it work for me.. probably because I am good at encouraging my kids to continue finding something else to do and would not let them lay around all day like the tv shows show people doing. But even if I did it would not effect my Christian belief system, nor my relationship so there is no reason to even wonder about that aspect kwim?
I might be odd - but my beliefs aren't something I brought into my decision with homeschooling - so if I unschooled I don't think that would make a difference. This is the first year we brought our religion into school at all.
I don't see how anyone's religion matters in your choice to homeschool, unschool, or send your kids to ps or private schools! The choice comes down to what works best for your family!
I asked this questions because there is a difference between 'not doing a lot of schoolwork based on books' and unschooling. Unschooling is more. It's a way of thinking about a person. It's a wy of thinking about teaching. If I would call the 23 hours a day we do not use texbooks 'unschooling' than that is not unschooling. It's just 'not working with books' or so. Unschooling goes deeper. If it's really unschooling. It's like there are a lot of people saying 'I am a christian' but they never pray, don't go to church etc. Is that being a christian? If not using textbooks, is that being an unschooler? It's not....
You're right, it depends what the difinition of homeschooling is. Most bonafied Unschoolers have a method, and encourage their childrens' interests, and DO get books on what the child is interested in, as well as videos, movies, hands-on materials, etc. to encourage the interests and learning about them. Honestly, I think it's more people that don't Unschool or Homeschool that wouls say thing like what you were mentioning, mainly because they don't understand the method. There are people who say they're undschoolers, who probably really aren't. There are people who say they're homeschoolers, that probably really don't in the way most of us here do. But there are also kids in schools who are skipping school, or having a bad education, etc. No matter what educational method people choose, there are going to be kids and parents that do very well with that method, and those that do not.
