http://homeedmag.com/blog/articles-about-homeschooling/we-need-adventure-more-than-we-need-algebra-by-john-taylor-gatto/ all about unschooling and family life - from Home Education Magazine Wed, 15 May 2013 02:22:07 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 http://homeedmag.com/blog/articles-about-homeschooling/we-need-adventure-more-than-we-need-algebra-by-john-taylor-gatto/#comment-2321 Egomet Mon, 04 Mar 2013 02:12:25 +0000 http://homeedmag.com/test6/?p=5713#comment-2321 I worship Gatto — When, oh when, will Underground History be reprinted again? — but I’m puzzled by a central contradiction in his beliefs and main battle cry. It’s this: He looks to the Ten Schools for example and inspiration, the great American college-prep boarding schools — Groton, St. Paul’s, Exeter etc. — and more generally he’s crazy about the aristocratic model of steadily-ratcheting challenges for children to solve independently: Riding a horse, sailing alone etc. But the Ten Schools model is the most strictly-regimented pedagogy on planet Earth, what sociologists call “total institutions:” Four years of separation from family, 9pm lights out, 7am chapel and not a single quarter-hour of the workday left unscheduled, Saturdays included. Seems the polar opposite of unschooling to me — is Gatto trying to have it both ways?

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