“American national unity has always been the central problem of American life. It was inherent in our synthetic beginnings and in the conquest of a continental landmass. . . . Somewhere around the time of the Civil War we began to try shortcuts to get the unity we wanted faster, by artificial means. Compulsory schooling … Read more
“Sixty-five years ago Bertrand Russell, probably the greatest mathematician of this century, its greatest philosopher, and a close relation of the King of England to boot, saw that mass-schooling in the United States had a profoundly anti-democratic intent, that it was a scheme to artificially deliver national unity by eliminating human variation and by eliminating … Read more
“The heart of a defense for the cherished American ideals of privacy, variety, and individuality lies in the way we bring up our young. Children learn what they live. Put kids in a class and they will live out their lives in an invisible cage, isolated from their chance at community; interrupt kids with bells … Read more
“Whatever an education is, it should make you a unique individual, not a conformist; it should furnish you with an original spirit with which to tackle the big challenges; it should allow you to find values which will be your road map through life; it should make you spiritually rich, a person who loves whatever … Read more
Learning Adventures blog just posted a list of books checked out from the library called “Library Shelf” here: http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/cudltot/14043 Great idea! Since we have so many of the books we need for our inventors study already in our home library, it looks like I won’t be going to the library as much as usual this … Read more
My friend Kerry over at LeadershipEducation posted an excerpt from Gatto’s acceptance speech for one of his teaching awards. Don’t miss this! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/LeadershipEducation/14044 Mary Jo
“Schools, I hear it argued, would make better sense and be better value as nine-to-five operations or even nine-to-nine ones, working year-round. We’re not a farming community anymore, I hear, that we need to give kids time off to tend the crops. This new-world-order schooling would serve dinner, provide evening recreation, offer therapy, medical attention, … Read more
“One thing I do know: most of us who’ve had a taste of loving families, even a little taste, want our kids to be part of one. One other thing I know is that eventually you have to come to be part of a place—part of its hills and streets and waters and people—or you … Read more
“Independent study, community service, adventures and experience, large doses of privacy and solitude, a thousand different apprenticeships, the one-day variety or longer—these are all powerful, cheap, and effective ways to start a real reform of schooling. But no large-scale reform is ever going to work to repair our damaged children and our damaged society until … Read more
“I’ve noticed a fascinating phenomenon in my twenty-five years of teaching: that schools and schooling are increasingly irrelevant to the great enterprises of the planet. No one believes anymore that scientists are trained in science classes or politicians in civics classes or poets in English classes. The truth is that schools don’t really teach anything … Read more