The Choice Channel

“Some people understand unschooling as soon as they hear about it. Others wander about in a fog of confusion, wondering how unschoolers can be so certain about something that seems so counterintuitive to everything we’ve picked up about how kids need to learn. Maybe a few, well-defined steps in the unschooling direction could lead out of at least the very pea-soupiest part of the fog. Step One: To unschool, you begin with your child’s interests. If she’s interested in birds, you read - or browse, toss aside, just look at the pictures in - books on birds, watch videos on birds, talk about birds, research and build (or buy) bird feeders and birdhouses, keep a journal on birds, record and ponder their behavior, search the web for items about birds, go to bird sanctuaries, draw birds, color a few pictures in the Dover Birds of Prey coloring book, play around with feathers, study Leonardo DaVinci’s drawings of flying machines that he based on birds, watch Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘The Birds.’ But DON’T go whole hog on this.” (02/02)