Homeschool News and Muse

A Homeschooling Win in California

2008-08-14T20:05:00.002-05:00

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1832485,00.html?xid=feed-yahoo-nation
Time Magazine, August 13, 2008

Pam Sorooshian is quoted at the end:

"[This ruling] gives us a lot more confidence and a lot more sense of freedom," says Pam Sorooshian, an uncredentialed teacher of her three daughters in Las Alamitas, Calif. "We can get back to educating our children and not be distracted."

(She didn't mention that she teaches college mathematics, but that's still not "credentialed" for elementary or secondary education.)

Tough school year? Check home schooling

2008-06-19T04:37:00.002-05:00

From the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard
Tough school year? Check home schooling
By Cynthia Whitfield
For The Register-Guard
Published: June 18, 2008 12:00AM

As the school year ends, many parents are thinking ahead to September and a new school year. If all has gone well, most parents expect next year will also work out.

However, parents of children who have struggled through the year may find themselves considering alternatives to public school. One of those alternatives is home schooling.

Summer is the perfect time to explore home schooling. This year, more than 1,600 Lane County children registered as home-schoolers. This number doesn’t include students who learn at home through online academies or correspondence courses, or students whose parents fail to register with the state. Conservative estimates put the total number of home-schoolers nationwide at more than 2 million.

Most parents feel a bit frightened when they first consider home schooling. At a time when a good education is deemed increasingly important, parents want to know they’re making the right choice for their kids. Fortunately, a look at the evolution of home schooling helps potential home-schoolers and the wider community understand the rationale for this growing movement.

This is listed as an opinion piece. It's a very clean history of homeschooling. It's level, and encouraging, with no negativity at all. For me, these two paragraphs were the most striking:

Blacks account for the fastest growing segment of home-schoolers today. Interestingly, while public schools worry about the achievement gap between blacks and whites, home-schooled black children score at the 87th percentile — just as high as home-schooled white children, and significantly higher than the average public school student.

Although parents choose home schooling for a variety of reasons, most home-schoolers believe children learn best at home in a loving environment where parents take into account each child’s strengths and weaknesses, likes and dislikes, learning styles and emotional makeup when designing a program of study. Children learn at their own rate, and they don’t have to wait for the rest of the class to catch up or feel rushed if they need more time on a topic.

This would be a good article to share with friends or relatives who could use simple, soothing information about unschooling.

Hey, Teacher, Leave My Kids Alone—Debating Issues Related to “Unschooling”

2008-06-07T07:23:00.002-05:00

nytimes.com has a section called "Daily Lesson Plan", under Learning Network, Teacher Connections. This one isn't new, but was just sent to me by Crystal Miller, an unschooling mom in Albuquerque.

Monday, November 27, 2006

Hey, Teacher, Leave My Kids Alone
Debating Issues Related to “Unschooling”

Authors:
Michelle Sale, The New York Times Learning Network
Tanya Yasmin Chin, The Bank Street College of Education in New York City

Grades: 6-8, 9-12

Subjects: Civics, Language Arts, Social Studies
Interdisciplinary Connections
Overview of Lesson Plan:In this lesson, students will gather opinions about unschooling and the value of learning inside the classroom and in the real world. They then conduct a debate and reflect on the value of unschooling for their own education.
Review the Academic Content Standards related to this lesson.

Sandra's first-pass comments:

This lesson plan can range from a one-hour in-class activity to a week or so of follow-up, if all the suggestions are used. On one end of the spectrum I envisioned as I read it all, it could help students see the learning they do outside of school, but at the other end it seemed aimed toward helping them see that unschooling should be illegal. As a civics class lesson plan, these future voters will have a whirlwind tour of reassurance that their own schooling was justified and other methods should be voted away. (It also could be a Language Arts or Social Studies lesson; it's an interdisciplinary-connections lesson plan, which is admirable.)

Another lesson in it all, unfortunately, is the self-supporting nature of the sources.
I asked _______________ people my question. The three most interesting answers I got were these: _______________; _______________; _______________. What I can conclude from all of the information is _______________.”
That is filled out after five minutes of interviewing other kids in the class. That's quite a limited survey, in time and scope, but it seems to reflect what I've seen of journalism's approach to unschooling, too. Find two or three people, ask them six or seven questions, write as though you know everything about the subject. Then interview two "experts" who know even less about unschooling than you've just learned, and use their most damning soundbites to "balance" your article.

If anyone who has used this lesson plan or been in a class where it was used comes by, I'd love to hear how it was implemented and steered.

The extended activities and further questions to be used if it went from single lesson to unit would open things up better, although the recommendations still seemed to lie mostly within the school system itself for opinions and information.

The article intended for use by teachers or students in this lesson unit is Home Schoolers Content to Take Children’s Lead By SUSAN SAULNY, NY Times, November 27, 2006

Otherwise Instructed

2008-06-01T19:00:00.001-05:00

Otherwise Instructed: Issues in Education

"My husband and I homeschooled our two children, now both in their twenties. I served on the boards of the Massachusetts Home Learning Association (mhla.org) and the National Home Education Network (nhen.org). Before homeschooling our children, I was a classroom teacher in both public and private schools. Since homeschooling, I have become even more interested in the process of learning and the role of schools in our society. The papers listed on this website are the result of two my research projects."

Nicky Hardenbergh had provided links to copies of two papers, one from this year and one from 2004, discussing homeschooling and testing.
One is Validity of high stakes standardized test requirements for homeschoolers: a psychometric analysis
and the other
Through the Lens of Homeschooling: A Response to Michael Apple and Rob Reich

Please see them both at her page, OtherwiseInstructed.com

Old News (newly available)

2008-06-01T17:49:00.002-05:00

Unschoolers say they Live, Learn
That 2000 article is also linked on this page, with 2006 articles from People Magazine and Elle Girl Magazine.
Articles on Unschooling

What kids just know (those with opportunity to learn)

2008-05-19T11:42:00.002-05:00

Katherine Anderson sent this link to the Unschooling Discussion list:

An article: Pro video game/comic books. Though not about unschooling, it's not anti-unschooling either. Also has an interesting comment on types of knowledge and the things you might be asked in the real world versus on a school test.

westpalmnews.com/commentary/vi080514.html

It's a May 12 column by Jim Mullen, called "You're damaging your brain with practical skills," but what it really addresses is how many truly practical skills young teens pick up from computer use. Here's the clincher moment, before he goes into a stream of great examples:

Dad stops typing and yells across the room to Billy, "What do you call those things that hold Web sites?"

Things that hold Web sites? Does he mean a bookmark? Does he mean an ISP? Does he mean a Web host?

"Server?" Billy guessed, not lifting his eyes from his IQ-draining game, which was wrecking his life.

I wonder how many professional basketball players and football players would have known the answer?

Video Games and Parenting, by an unschooled teen

2008-04-17T18:19:00.002-05:00

Zachary Sanders interviewed me recently, and has written up something extraordinary. For parents to write these things isn't bad, but it all comes to life from the point of view of one whose game time was once measured and monitored.

First, the intro by Zach's mom:

This two-part essay was written by my unschooled teen son for his Composition I college class. Zach has been radically unschooled for the past five years and relaxed homeschooled prior to that. He's never been to school except to play clarinet in a band and beginning this last January he decided he wanted to enroll in a writing course at our local community college. Video games are his number one passion with writing a close second.

In his essay, Zach writes about how it felt to be a child who wanted to please no one more than his mother but also a child who's passion I did not value or respect. Parts of Zach's essay were difficult for me to read but I knew the truth of it already and I knew that he had an important message to communicate to the mothers and fathers of the world. The sting of reading about the damage my old ways inflicted on my child were soothed in the knowledge that I've seen the error of my ways and have worked hard to repair our relationship I now know the beauty, peace, and extraordinary amount of learning, embracing his interests has brought to both of our lives. (http://zamunzo.blogspot.com/2008/04/problem-and-solution.html)

Zach's article is here: http://zajosa.blogspot.com/2008/04/problem-when-parents-think-childs.html

New in French and Spanish

2008-04-16T10:49:00.003-05:00

Sylvie Martin wrote:

Hello Sandra,

here is the presentation of the book : http://www.dgdiffusion.com/argumentaires/produits/20749.pdf
It's in librairies since yesterday !! I have mine !! I'm so excited !!!

In the presentation, I'm not responsible for the yellow square ! I'm NOT the best french specialist of the topic !! aarrgghh..

Sylvie (Eliott le Magicien (97), Tom le Héros (99), Lilou la Fée (02)
www.louves-online.com
www.yourtes-tipis.com
www.sculpture-rod.com

Sylvie, you might easily know more about unschooling than anyone else in Franch. Someone has to be first! From that page:
Sortie à 16 ans du système scolaire, Sylvie Martin-Rodriguez a
créé un site Internet (www.louves-online.com) où elle écrit et
traduit des articles sur le respect de la liberté des enfants dès leur
naissance, afin de lutter contre les idées reçues concernant les
chemins de l’enfance. and the photo to the right

Yesterday a Spanish translation of "How to Raise a Respected Child" was put online by Laura Mascaró, who says she might make a few changes after others read it who can translate better.

"Cómo criar a un niño con respeto" por Sandra Dodd...
http://fishtobirds.blogspot.com/2008/04/cmo-criar-un-nio-con-respeto-por-sandra.html

Los Angeles Times, April 3, 2008

2008-04-03T17:49:00.001-05:00

Defending home-style ABCs

Religious and secular families unite over legal battle on credentials
By Seema Mehta, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
April 3, 2008

Madison Browning, 8, spent a recent school day coloring, playing on swings at a park and whirling to Japanese string music at a cozy dance studio. Caedyn Curto, 13, studied biblical scripture at his family's kitchen table before tackling decimals, completing a biology test and revising a journalism essay.

The Browning and Curto families, both of whom live in the South Bay, have embraced very different styles of education. But they now find themselves on the same side of a battle to continue teaching their children at home in the face of an appellate court ruling that home schooling in California must be conducted by credentialed instructors. ...

"I love unschooled teens!" —Autodidact+Piano

2008-03-22T05:26:00.002-05:00

In the online newsletter of the Victoria Home Learning Network is an article on unschooled teens, featuring Abbi Traaseth's recent piano accomplishments. There's a video. Autodidact+Piano

A quote from the article:

My friend Abbi is 13 years old. When I sent her this post to review and approve, she wrote me back saying “I just wanted to say thank you for your beautiful words, and I hope they help to inspire other Unschooling parents to see the joys of their children learning what they like, and at their leisure.”

Links to the Victoria Home Learning Network:

Newsletter: vhln.blogspot.com
Website: VHLN.org

"Boy Saves Sister from Moose Attack with Skills Learned in Warcraft Video Game"

2008-03-15T20:54:00.004-05:00

Quoting two blogposts; follow links to read more!

Boy Saves Sister from Moose Attack with Skills Learned in Warcraft Video Game
Posted Dec 10th 2007 9:06AM by Terrence O'Brien
Filed under: Computers, Video Games
This 12 year-old Norwegian boy saved his sister and himself from a moose attack using skills he picked up in the online role playing game 'World of Warcraft.'

Hans Jørgen Olsen and his sister got into a spot of trouble when they encroached on the territory of one of these antlered cold weather staples (otherwise known as a moose). When the beast went on the offensive, Hans knew the first thing he had to do was taunt it so that it would leave his sister alone and she could run to safety. "Taunting" is a move one uses in World of Warcraft to get monsters off of the less-well-armored team members.

Once he was a target, Hans remember another skill he'd picked up at level 30 in 'World of Warcraft' -- he feigned death. The moose lost interest in the inanimate Hans and wandered off into the woods. When he was safely alone Hans ran back home to share his tale of video game-inspired survival.

Make fun of video games all you want, but if one can teach you a skill that saves your (and your sister's) life, then we'd say that was a video game worth playing.

From Internode Gaming Network

I might not have brought the whole article here, but it was already reported from another site and not quoted. Several interesting things are said, so I'm putting both.

World of Warcraft Skills Save Boy From Moose
By Chienne - Sat Dec 8, 2007 11:57am

All the anti-gaming activists, listen up. When people claim to "learn things" from video games, they're not just talking about a bit of extra hand-eye coordination from first-person shooters. They're not referring to gaining knowledge of economics from playing real-time strategies. They're not even suggesting the improved matching skills from all those Shockwave titles with the coloured dots.

They're talking about a 12 year old Norwegian boy, who survived a moose attack - using skills he learned in World of Warcraft.

Hans Jørgen Olsen and his sister were walking in the woods near their house when they were confronted by the antlered beast, who was a bit miffed at the invasion of his turf, so it attacked them. Olsen reacted quickly, with the sort of reflexes that only come after spending days in Azeroth.

His first task - protect his sister. How to do this? Taunt the beast! The boy yelled at the animal until it was distracted enough to leave his sister alone, so she could run and get help. Downside of this plan - the moose was now paying some grumpy attention to Hans. What was he to do?

Feign death. "Just like you learn at level 30 in World of Warcraft."

I kid you not. Beast, seeing that the boy was no longer interesting, wandered off to greener pastures and to do whatever moose do in Norway. Hans jumped up and ran home to join his sister and tell the whole world about his adventures.

Now - before you criticise a 12-year old for having spent enough time ingame to get to level 30, stop and think. Had he been a lower level, he just wouldn't have had the skillset to survive. Think about that, and maybe pop a copy of WoW on your Christmas list, if you live somewhere with an abundance of moose.

Both posts have lots of comments!

I have no reason to believe the kids are homeschooled, but for anyone thinking games aren't good for anything but "eye-hand coordination" should look again! (There are some recent links and lots of older ones here.)

City on a Hill Press

2008-02-15T11:11:00.003-06:00

Class Dismissed
By Rachel Tennenbaum

Imagine waking up on a Monday and driving up to Berkeley to check out a new art gallery opening. That night you play some video games and crack open a book before hitting the hay. Think this sounds like a day off for a college student? It’s actually the school day of a 9-year-old. No, it’s not a fantasy Ferris Bueller-style: It’s a daily reality for thousands of young learners who call themselves “unschoolers.”

Unschooling. Some call it a counter-culture, but others just call it natural learning. It’s an offshoot of homeschooling coined by educational philosopher John Holt, but it varies from traditional homeschooling in the sense that there is no curriculum. None. No math, no English, no science, no history. You just live.

This article is a fun read, and I know several of the people named and quoted, so it was especially interesting for me. I'm glad the author didn't leave it at "You just live," because that alone would be wrong and misleading. "Just" is such a dismissive little word...

But read the rest. Unschoolers don't "just live." They live large. They live expansively, and richly and joyfully. Those are the things that make it work.

http://www.cityonahillpress.com/article.php?id=1037

France: Sylvie Martin-Rodriguez's book will be out soon

2008-02-10T08:10:00.000-06:00

Sylvie Martin-Rodriguez, an unschooling mom, lives with her family in the small town of Mijoux, in the Jura mountains near Switzerland. She and her friend Jeanine Barbé have been translating unschooling articles from English and corresponding with some of us here for a few years. Their website is here: Chroniques de Louves.

Sylvie's book will be published this Spring (exact date not yet known).

If you have friends, relatives, or contacts in France, please consider passing on this news!

'Unschooling' lets children lead their own education

2008-01-22T16:11:00.000-06:00

http://www.herald-review.com/articles/2004/12/05/news/local_news/1004373.txt

Herald & Review.com
Central Illinois
Saturday, December 4, 2004 11:49 PM CST

'Unschooling' lets children lead their own education

This article isn't new, but it quotes Richard Prystowsky, and because of that I'd like to have it here where others can find it.

Here's that part of the article, but the whole thing is brief and good.

Professor Richard Prystowsky, department chairman of math, science and engineering at College of the Redwoods in Eureka, Calif., has written several articles on homeschooling, and he and his wife homeschooled their two younger children. Because they had chosen a family-centered lifestyle, neither felt comfortable in sending their children to strangers to be educated in what he calls an "impersonal" system.

"I am not opposed to public education," he said. "I am opposed to the systemic nature of public education. That's a crucial difference."

The current system of schooling, he said, developed with the industrial revolution and is too autocratic. If teachers and children had the freedom to be creative, to let students take the initiative, and if standardized tests and curriculum were abolished, public schools could better serve students' needs.

He's especially critical of segregating students by age and expecting small children to sit at desks and all learn the same thing.

"What in the world could be further from the real world?" he said. "People talk about socialization, but is that how you want to train somebody, segregate them by rank and age and pay attention to one thing for 42 minutes at a time? What professional do you know who spends his days like that?"

School reform, he said, must begin with completely changing the current system.

"Reform that does not address the systemic nature of the problem is not going to address the problem," Prystowsky said. "I want to see teachers in public education free and creative to do the work they need to do. I want to see students free to help direct their own learning path."

If all children weren't expected to learn the same material at the same rate and could instead pursue subjects they were truly interested in at their own pace, he said, there would be far fewer discipline problems.

"In my tradition, the Jewish tradition, we have an important teacher, Rabbi Hillel," Prystowsky said. "He used to teach that you begin with the learner, where the learner is. You go to the learner and you start (teaching) from there."

a new film, short and very sweet

2007-11-12T15:48:00.000-06:00

Different Take Films

Human Development and Learning

2007-10-23T17:07:00.000-05:00

This was posted to an unschooling list. The same principles holds throughout life!

In the course of researching an article about crawling (of all things), I can across some absolutely beautiful words by Dr. Alan Green, pediatrician:

"This is our goal: to provide a nurturing environment where a child can develop at his optimum pace. We don't want to hurry him; we do want to encourage him. We also want to identify anything that may be an obstacle in his path."

He then advises a concerned grandmother to "observe your grandson's spontaneous play. This will give you the best clues to the developmental tasks that are important for him to learn next. Children tend to be most excited about skills they are on the brink of mastering. If you try to engage him in an activity that is beneath his developmental level, he will quickly get bored. If you try to interest him in something that he is not yet ready for, he will become upset. (Note: babies don't tend to cry when they fail, but rather when the activity isn't at the right developmental level)...Provide situations where he can teach himself through playful exploration. Forced teaching hinders development."

(source: www.drgreene.org/body.cfm?id=21&action=detail&ref=354)

I know he wasn't talking about unschooling, but the words seem so, so applicable!

Jenny

New article on Fraser Insitute Report

2007-10-08T10:51:00.000-05:00

The Fraser Institute: Home Schooling Improves Academic Performance and Reduces Impact of Socio-Economic Factors
http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release.do?id=777310

Home schooling appears to improve the academic performance of children from families with low levels of education, according to a report on home schooling released today by independent research organization The Fraser Institute.

This is my favorite part, though there are lots of good parts:

"Poorly educated parents who choose to teach their children at home produce better academic results for their children than public schools do. One study we reviewed found that students taught at home by mothers who never finished high school scored a full 55 percentage points higher than public school students from families with comparable education levels."

The report is from 2001 and can be dowloaded free or for $5 here:
http://www.fraserinstitute.org/commerce.web/publication_details.aspx?pubID=2592

"Un-School Days," in Tulsa KIds

2007-10-04T08:57:00.000-05:00

http://www.tulsakids.com/editors-choice/2007/oct-1.html

Un-School Days
by Cindy Webb

For a kid who never went to school, Matt Moyer is doing pretty well. Matt is currently a junior at the University of Tulsa on a full academic scholarship (a result of earning a 33 on the ACT) and has already received an offer from TU for a scholarship to complete his master’s degree. His future plans include moving to Washington D.C. so he can pursue a career in computer security with an intelligence agency. “I’ll also finish a Ph.D. in computer science somewhere down the line,” says Matt.

What makes Matt’s story even more interesting is that, unlike other traditionally home-schooled children, Matt had no formal schooling at all until he was 16 years old and requested it. He then attended TCC taking algebra and calculus through a concurrent enrollment program offered to high school age students.

But just because Matt wasn’t formally schooled doesn’t mean he wasn’t educated. Matt’s parents chose a different educational approach known as “unschooling.” . . .

The article is thorough and interesting (seems to have been written by someone who really cared and understood), and there's an extensive book list and link to resources.

Great article; worth saving a link, and I hope they keep it there for a long time.

Added on Friday:
Here's a longer-term version with working links on all the resources and booklist. zamozo, thanks!! http://liberatedlearning.wordpress.com/2007/10/03/featuring-leslie-moyer/

Radio Free School

2007-09-07T10:23:00.000-05:00

Radio Free School's blog is worth a bookmark of its own.
http://radiofreeschool.blogspot.com/

This week's news is an interview of Grace Llwellyn, by Beatrice Ekwa Ekoko who does some great interviews!

http://radiofreeschool.blogspot.com/2007/09/radio-free-school-interview-grace.html

And here's an older piece, in which someone else interviewed Beatrice herself. It's really great:

http://radiofreeschool.blogspot.com/2006/12/devil-in-details.html

The beginning....

How long have you been doing Radio Free School? How did you start doing it?

We're into our fifth consecutive year of Radio Free School. I had done a social justice and environmental spoken word show on campus/community radio for a few years, and love the medium; we thought that it would be fun to do a show with our kids. There isn't much radio featuring children, especially shows that have kids as primary agents; we applied for a half hour spot on CFMU and got accepted.

How many people are involve with each episode?

Sometimes as few as two people, interviewer and interviewee, sometimes more, like when we go to visit a science lab we take along some friends, there might be ten people or more. The way the show developed over time is that producing it became a family project primarily.

Could you talk about the distinction between Free/Un schooling and homeschooling, and I guess what the show is about; why you do it?

We started radio free school as a way to follow our childrens' interests and give them a forum to be heard. Since we weren't sending them to school, the show was a way to pursue anything and everything we wanted, very free form,while enhancing their experience of the world. This nicely aligned itself with the philosophy of unschooling which doesn't impose set courses to follow, but follows naturally the child's interest. It is a challenge as people like myself who grew up with schooling (my dad was a public school principal) to realize that we don't need schools as the model for learning,in fact, the way schools are structured they actually kill initiative and the joy of learning in many many children. My permanent record at highschool probably reflects my innate rebelliousness against arbitrary authority, and I really don't expect my kids to be forced into such a position.

Read the rest to learn more about this wonderful and long-running project.

Trashing Teens

2007-08-21T10:42:00.000-05:00

Although this isn't a homeschooling article, it discusses schools and school-related problems in ways that will be very revealing and freeing for homeschoolers.

Psychologist Robert Epstein spoke to Psychology Today's Hara Estroff Marano about the legal and emotional constraints on American youth.

HEM (Hara Estroff Marano): Why do you believe that adolescence is an artificial extension of childhood?

RE: In every mammalian species, immediately upon reaching puberty, animals function as adults, often having offspring. We call our offspring "children" well past puberty. The trend started a hundred years ago and now extends childhood well into the 20s. The age at which Americans reach adulthood is increasing—30 is the new 20—and most Americans now believe a person isn't an adult until age 26.

The whole culture collaborates in artificially extending childhood, primarily through the school system and restrictions on labor. The two systems evolved together in the late 19th-century; the advocates of compulsory-education laws also pushed for child-labor laws, restricting the ways young people could work, in part to protect them from the abuses of the new factories. The juvenile justice system came into being at the same time. All of these systems isolate teens from adults, often in problematic ways.

Our current education system was created in the late 1800s and early 1900s, and was modeled after the new factories of the industrial revolution. Public schools, set up to supply the factories with a skilled labor force, crammed education into a relatively small number of years. We have tried to pack more and more in while extending schooling up to age 24 or 25, for some segments of the population. In general, such an approach still reflects factory thinking—get your education now and get it efficiently, in classrooms in lockstep fashion. Unfortunately, most people learn in those classrooms to hate education for the rest of their lives.

The factory system doesn't work in the modern world, because two years after graduation, whatever you learned is out of date. We need education spread over a lifetime, not jammed into the early years—except for such basics as reading, writing, and perhaps citizenship. Past puberty, education needs to be combined in interesting and creative ways with work. The factory school system no longer makes sense.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/index.php?term=pto-20070302-000002&print=1

Dependence Nurtures Independence

2007-08-15T14:26:00.000-05:00

A researcher at Carnegie-Mellon University has shown that attachment theory (referred to in La Leche League and among Unschoolers as "attachment parenting") works with married couples too. Things we've been discussing among unschoolers for years has research now! How cool. Part of my purpose in posting this here now is so I can find it again more easily when my world finally settles from this upcoming conference and Kirby's move to Austin (he's going to Sacramento with me; we get back Monday afternoon; he leaves town Wednesday morning).

The Thinkers: CMU prof shows benefits of emotional support

By Mark Roth, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Monday, June 04, 2007

Brooke Feeney has discovered that the same thing that works for
crying babies also works for adult couples and for parents and their
teenage children.

http://www.postgazette.com/pg/07155/791406-51.stm

There are audio files at that site too, as described below:

Carnegie Mellon relationship researcher Brooke Feeney says parents'
emotional support of children is more important than giving them things.

Ms. Feeney explains why people's behavioral patterns are hard to
change.

Ms. Feeney talks about why people who avoid emotional involvement
often pair with those who are anxious about relationships.

Minnesota Public Radio interviews the Traaseth Family

2007-05-18T18:09:00.000-05:00

The latest trend in education: Unschooling
Minnesota Public Radio Thu, 17 May 2007 11:02 PM PDT
Unschooling is an unstructured approach to education. Children don't have classes, text books or teachers. Instead they pick their own areas to study. They learn about the world by living in it.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2007/05/16/unschooling/?rsssource=1

Roya Sorooshian is quoted there too.

The obligatory naysaying "expert" is particularly irritating in this one, but it seems to be what all reporters think they MUST do to "be fair," which is ask someone who has no real idea about unschooling.

Sarah Sobonya says unschooling led to creativity

2007-05-14T08:25:00.000-05:00

"When I look back on our eight years of unschooling, what strikes me most is how much fun we’ve had. I never expected unschooling to be so much fun. In a way, it’s been a kind of an endless summer: eight years of watching Rain follow her whims and her dreams and of learning and growing alongside her.

"With unschooling, no two days are the same. Some days we rise late and spend the day puttering around the house, maybe baking pancakes and reading together, gardening or watching movies. Other days we’re up early and off to museums or classes or berry-picking or visits with friends."

(the article continues... http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2007/may/13/first_person_sarah_sobonya/>)

Lawrence Journal World
May 13, 2007

Pittsburgh City Paper

2007-05-01T16:45:00.000-05:00

SEPTEMBER 28, 2006
Learning Curves
Education is no longer a simple line from "A" to "B." How do students feel about the dizzying array of choices their parents can make?

http://www.pittsburghcitypaper.ws/gyrobase/Content?oid=28620

"In his 2005 book It Takes a Family, Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum argues that home-schooling, and not mass education, is really the norm.

"Santorum has a point. While it seems as if school buses and back-to-school shopping have been with us for eternity, our public education system is relatively new ... about 150 years old. And while mass education is hardly on death's door, it does appear that families are increasingly choosing alternatives to traditional public and private schools: from "cyber-schools" and charter schools to parent-led home-schooling. The National Home Education Research Institute reported this July that there were between 1.9 and 2.4 million children home-schooled nationwide during the past school year, an increase of about 10 percent from the year before. Home-schooling is growing even more quickly among non-white families; about 15 percent of all home-schooled families are non-white.

"In Pennsylvania, about 15,000 students were home-schooled in 1995; today more than 23,000 kids are being home-schooled, about 1.2 percent of the state's student population. ...."

The article has a section of questions and answers with teens, the intro to which is

"In late August, City Paper sat down with five Pittsburgh-area students who have participated in at least one of these forms of alternative schooling: charter-schooling, cyber-schooling, home-schooling and "un-schooling." If the students in our discussion group are representative, we may be witnessing the birth of a new fluidity between traditional and alternative forms of education."

Laurie Chancey and Valerie Fitzenreiter

2007-02-22T07:38:00.000-06:00

http://thestory.org/

Podcast and links.

From their intro:

Valerie Fitzenreiter's daughter Laurie never spent a day of of her childhood in a traditional classroom. When she was pregnant with Laurie, Valerie read a book called "Summerhill," about a progressive school in England where students were given such a vast amount of freedom they weren't even obligated to go to class. It changed her philosophy on parenting forever.

If Laurie wanted to spend the entire day reading a book or playing computer games, Valerie allowed it.

I remember growing up feeling like I could try school if I wanted to. But I never remember wanting to.
- Laurie Chancey

Dick talks to Valerie and Laurie about life in an un-schooled household.