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Math. As a society we worship it, hate it, and fear it. In our schools we force kids to study it (or pretend to study it) for thousands of hours and then we wail about how little they learn. Here, now, are reports from "unschoolers" that tell a different story. Math is fun; math is easily and naturally learned as a tool when needed; and kids who want to go to a competitive college can learn SAT (or ACT) math in 30 hours or less, even if they have never previously done any formal math study. Read More
I really love what you're
I really love what you're doing!! I know that it's wonderful, as an unschooled young person who's often asked lots of questions by new unschooling parents, to be able to direct them toward your articles. They're great. And I'm really looking forward to hearing more of what you have to say at the Northeast Unschooling conference! :-)
Huh, maybe this explains it
In early grade school I found math pretty easy. I remember purposely not doing overnight math assignments so I'd have something to do while the teacher talked about less interesting subjects the next day. As school wore on it did start turning into a chore, but one that wasn't all that hard.
I have some learning disabilities, so after grade 8 my mom and I decided to lessen my course load by doing math classes by correspondence over the summer. This made things a bit more fun, particularly once my mom started hiring tutors to help me understand - I could ask question after question in order to understand. I did pretty good grade wise.
Then for grade 12 I went back to normal classes, and failed miserably. The teacher rushed through the material too quickly for me to follow, and never explained the logic behind the math. Plus, I'd never really learned how to study for a math test or how to take notes - I didn't have to before. During that summer I tried doing it by correspondence with a tutor, doing it the slow but more interesting way I had before, but ran out of summer before I could finish. I went back to the normal class and was able to keep up due to my headstart, but it was still a big struggle.
Then I go to university and get an 86% in first year calculus and a 90% in first year probability, while genuinely enjoying myself. I could follow along with the professor's explanations as he talked and actually find the elegance of it exciting. It was absolutely baffling.
Thanks
I'm enjoying your articles on learning, unschooling and open schooling. I have three kids, 10, 8, and 5 years old, and a partner in parenting who is as dedicated to unschooling as I am. Not a huge fan of labels, I think of us as simply a learning family, and I use the term "unschooling" when someone specifically asks our style of homeschooling.
If you're curious, here's our unschooling history in a nutshell, from a post I wrote last year for friends and family who wondered what we were up to: http://roamschooling.blogspot.com/2009/08/why-and-how-we-homeschool.html
I have found it increasingly hard to distill how and what my children have learned into anecdotes (or comments in response to a call for examples), even as my trust deepens that they are learning well and growing in a well-rounded, healthy way. Perhaps that difficulty comes from having worked so hard to interrupt my deeply ingrained tendency to assess their progress in terms of curricular checklists and grade level competencies. It's liberating to appreciate that most of their learning happens outside of subject areas and lesson structures, and to watch as it all ties together into a sturdier fabric of mental resources than I had at their age.
Thanks so much for the stories and analyses. I'll keep tuning in, and sharing your blog with my friends on facebook and in my personal blog.
Meg
Hi Peter
Great article, and I enjoyed your catagorisation of various maths contexts.
However, why do you have to make such an incongruous and patronising conclusion like this:
"And so, dear educators, please step out of your boxes..."
What makes you think that educators (other than yourself, presumably) inhabit boxes? How many educators have you spoken to in order to get this impression? How many schools have you visited?
"see how education can work in such a painless and joyful manner when kids are free and in charge of their own learning."
I'm sure that if you went into a few classrooms, you would see that painless and joyful learning does actually go on in schools. Just go into a few classrooms. Talk to a few kids (28% of whom across the US "like school a lot" , 92% in Portland), and you will go some way towards allaying your fears.
"Nobody, at least no student, benefits from the thousands of hours of forced math study"
But in how many schools have you recorded "forced maths study" going on? How many states have you visited in order to come to this impression of US maths in schools?
You will never know the truth about how much kids control their own learning in schools, or be able to accurately comment on schools, until you condescend to visit some real schools and see for yourself the level of free, self-directed learning which genuinely goes on.
The "dear educators" you are addressing in such a patronising manner are already quite happy to work outside the box. It's you who needs to come down from that ivory tower of yours and actually see it going on for yourself.
If you visited a wider number of schools then you would then most definitely see free, self-directed, joyful and painless learning going on.
Steve
"But in how many schools have
"But in how many schools have you recorded "forced maths study" going on?"
"You will never know the truth about how much kids control their own learning in schools, or be able to accurately comment on schools, until you condescend to visit some real schools and see for yourself the level of free, self-directed learning which genuinely goes on."
There is little to no self directed learning that goes on in school. Math is required in every grade level. If a student doesn't pass they must take the class over. In the high school grades, they must complete a certain number of math classes with a passing grade in order to receive a diploma. Kids who don't pass enough classes don't get issued a diploma. Kids who routinely fail math classes must take summer school. It is a required hoop to jump through, for many kids.
Tell me again, how that isn't forced? Tell me again, how that is genuine learning, or free and self directed?
Many teachers would agree with Peter Gray's assessment. Teachers have about as much say in what goes on as the students who must attend their classes by law.
Hi Jenny, You say: "There is
Hi Jenny,
You say:
"There is little to no self directed learning that goes on in school"
Peter says this too, but by his own confession he spends little to no time at all in state schools, and has provided no evidence to back up his opinion.
Do you spend a lot of time in a lot of schools? Have you visited many schools to get this impression? Do you have any evidence that this is the case?
Forgive me for guessing that like Peter you haven't (I am kind of cynical)
Many teachers may well agree with Peter's assessment, but I reckon many more would vehemently disagree. Have you asked many?
I would be interested to hear what they said
:)
Steve
"There is little to no self
"There is little to no self directed learning that goes on in school"
===Peter says this too, but by his own confession he spends little to no time at all in state schools, and has provided no evidence to back up his opinion.===
Probably because it's blatantly obvious. Kids are told what to learn, what to study, what to write their essays on, how to write their essays, how to solve math problems, what pencil to use, which calculator to use, which books to read, what time to show up to class, when to eat, when to use the toilet, which aspects of history are worth knowing, how many foreign language classes to take, how many literature classes is enough, which sports are important to know, etc, etc.
Sure, within all that being told what to learn and how to learn, there's a bit of individual freedom. Some literature teachers may allow students to pick from a list of topics or books, and some teachers are more flexible about the finished product, BUT the kids are still going to be graded to someone else's standards. So, sure, if you can find a way to paint the inside of that box your put in, with some nice rainbows, you'll have a bit of free expression, but you're still in a box.
high anonymous
Just do some research. Look up "Assessment for Learning", "Creative Curriculum", "Fox Fire"
Even better, go into some schools and watch them in practice. You will soon see that is blatently obvious that self directed learning does go on in schools.
Steve
You just proved my point.
You just proved my point. Assessment for Learning is anything but natural learning, it's very contrived. Creative Curriculum is an oxymoron. Fox Fire is all about choices within a box.
None of those things are about free learning and natural learning at all. Those things are the norm in schools. You speak like a lot of teachers do, as if you have the ideas of learning co-opted. Most people have been to school, have been inside those 4 walls. I'd suggest you read some John Holt, but you didn't do the other homework you were given yet.
Hi Anon
You say
"Assessment for Learning is anything but natural learning"- what do you mean?
"Creative Curriculum is an oxymoron." in what way?
"Fox Fire is all about choices within a box" can you explain?
I would love to debate these ideas with you, but you need to be a little clearer about what your objections are.
"None of those things are about free learning and natural learning at all". This depends on how you define free and natural learning. It could be argued that the low intervention technique adopted by some educational fads is in fact unnatural learning.
John Holt was instrumental in many educational changes from the 1960s. I agree with a lot of what he says (though not all)
My dog ate my homework
;)
Steve
"Assessment for Learning is
"Assessment for Learning is anything but natural learning"- what do you mean?
Natural learning is something that happens with or without anyone measuring and assessing. I don't think there is a way to measure what is in another person's brain. Schools try, and this is one of many ways in which schools have tried to do this, but it has little to do with natural learning.
Assessment for Learning is all about having a predetermined set of knowledge and skills and measuring whether or not a person has attained them based on various methods of observations. It's very much about what one person or body of persons thinks another person or body of persons needs to know and determining whether or not they know.
If a child's own motivation for learning isn't regarded, then what they are doing is for the benefit and value of someone or something else. The very fact that there is predetermined information set before a child, that they must attain and then be evaluated on, ignores a child's own motivation. Sometimes, yes, a child's motivation makes a crash course with what they are supposed to know, but very often what becomes the motivator, is the desire to be evaluated in a positive light, which almost always isn't about being motivated to learn the given predetermined information, but rather doing what it takes to make the grade.
Hi Jenny
You are mistaken here,
Assessment for learning is about giving kids the tools and skills to assess their own progress
Steve
"Creative Curriculum is an
"Creative Curriculum is an oxymoron."
Even a basic definition lookup of both those words displays this!
Creative as defined by wikipedia: referring to creativity which it says
"Creativity is a mental process involving the discovery of new ideas or concepts, or new associations of the existing ideas or concepts, fueled by the process of either conscious or unconscious insight.
From a scientific point of view, the products of creative thought (sometimes referred to as divergent thought) are usually considered to have both originality and appropriateness."
Curriculum as defined by wikipedia:
"is the set of courses, and their content, offered at a school or university. As an idea, curriculum stems from the Latin word for race course, referring to the course of deeds and experiences through which children grow to become mature adults. A curriculum is prescriptive, and is based on a more general syllabus which merely specifies what topics must be understood and to what level to achieve a particular grade or standard-"
Sure people can find ways to make all kinds of things creative. Divergent thinking isn't valued when following a course with grade attached. Even a college course in philosophy doesn't value creative and divergent thinking! It's almost always about what other people think and then being tested on whether you can remember the thoughts of others!
Hi Jenny
You are also mistaken here
Creative curriculum is about children deciding what they want to learn about- The children set the curriculum. I imagine it to be very similar to what SudVal students do.
It's becoming quite popular in UK elementary schools, and spilling into high schools
For example, I have a creative curriculum content which is set by the children, but a set of skills which I possess, which I teach them while they explore their own chosen issues and themes
Steve
"Creative curriculum is about
"Creative curriculum is about children deciding what they want to learn about- The children set the curriculum. I imagine it to be very similar to what SudVal students do."
Children do NOT, in any public school, set their own curriculum. A curriculum is a base set of things which must be taught and check listed, with some sort of measurement system in place to prove that a child has acquired a certain portion of that knowledge set.
If you don't KNOW what goes on in a Sudbury model school, then you ARE only imagining.
Curriculum have very little to do with natural learning. A person who is interested in learning something in particular could certainly use a curriculum. It is, but one of many resources a person could utilize to attain information and knowledge.
"Creative Curriculum" is a catch phrase that was invented to make curriculum seem more appealing. People like to believe that their children are learning creativity in schools. Creativity is one of those highly prized skills that is ever so elusive. By tacking it onto the word "curriculum", educators have made it seem like a magical omen to achieve this elusive quality.
Creativity is not created with a lock step ANYthing. All children are born with creativity. Schools squash it in large and small ways. Anytime a child's question about the world goes unanswered and or pushed aside, their creative process is squashed just a little bit. Schools do this to children everyday, all day long. Teachers can't and won't answer all question from all children. They physically can't do it, partially because there is not enough time in the day for one teacher for 25 children and partially because those answers don't lead into the scope and sequence set before them to follow lesson plans and get enough children to pass enough tests to create enough positive tests scores to prove that learning is happening and that funding can continue being funneled in.
As a drama teacher, I'm sure that YOU have much more creative license than most teachers, to allow for flexibility within the class structure, but even you must report to someone and validate your program's effectiveness. So even your own students who you say create their own curriculum, must follow whatever guidelines that you, the teacher, have in place. It's still confined to a set of predetermined ideas of what a child should come away knowing about drama.
Children can still learn things in that environment, but it is NOT natural learning and it is NOT fostering creativity.
Hi Jenny
You say
"Children do NOT, in any public school, set their own curriculum".
Your opinion is largely uninformed. Why don't you just look up "Fox Fire" Or "Creative Curriculum", or "Assessment for Learning"? Genuinely look them up rather than making uninformed comments on them. Look up the principles behind them, and the systems in place before forming an opinion. Then you might understand what is going on in schools.
You say
"A curriculum is a base set of things which must be taught and check listed, with some sort of measurement system in place to prove that a child has acquired a certain portion of that knowledge set."
With all due respect, a curriculum is simply the content of any given series of sessions. With "Fox Fire", with "Creative Curriculum" and indeed in a huge part of my own practice, the kids have a huge control over what they learn.
You say
"So even your own students who you say create their own curriculum, must follow whatever guidelines that you, the teacher, have in place. It's still confined to a set of predetermined ideas of what a child should come away knowing about drama."
You are beginning to make a large number of negative assumptions about what and how I teach. I will gladly share my methods with you if you like. I think that homeschoolers and unschoolers could genuinely benefit from my knowledge, experience and skills in free-learning, but so far most people seem not to want to believe that free-learning can go on in the classroom, and prefer to stick their heads in the sand rather than hear what I am saying.
"Creativity is one of those highly prized skills that is ever so elusive. By tacking it onto the word "curriculum", educators have made it seem like a magical omen to achieve this elusive quality."
Sorry Jenny, but you have been wildly inaccurate in almost all of your last post and it strikes me that you are now grasping at straws. It is like for some reason you simply refuse to believe that creativity and child ownership of work goes on in state schools. I can assure you that it does!
Are you not interested in finding out more about my classroom practice, rather than making negative assumptions? I will happily share
:)
Steve
What do you want Steve? You
What do you want Steve?
You can hold whatever opinion you like. I've done a LOT of research. I know what I'm talking about. Just because you are stuck in your teacher paradigm does not mean I don't know what I'm talking about.
You don't have to agree with anything I or anyone else says. Have at it. I'm not willing to engage in any further discussion with you because you can't or won't do anything but argue ad nauseum, the same load of crap in a big circular argument.
It's clear to me that you don't understand at all what I'm talking about and that you're not even going to try. I get what you're saying, I've heard it for many years, have read about it, have found logical and sound reasons for the way I believe, which very much counter what you say. You parrot back the same old stuff, which I'm sure you deeply believe. I won't fault you that. Plenty of people do that.
It takes a lot of thought and insight to get what people are talking about here. You'd rather argue your own belief system than try to understand a different way of being.
It's that sort of stuck thinking that keeps schools from really doing better. You can't change what you can't see and don't know.
You ask "What do you want
You ask
"What do you want Steve"
As I stated earlier, I would like you read about Fox Fire, or The Creative Curriculum, or better still, observe them in practice, in order to have an informed debate.
I would quite happily discuss either, but you need to have a look at them first, to know what they are about.
You say
"It takes a lot of thought and insight to get what people are talking about here"
On the contrary, it takes a lot more thought to investigate and honestly weigh up the evidence, rather than go spouting nonsense about things you clearly haven't experienced.
If you have a legitimate argument against Creative Curriculum, or Fox Fire, beyond your preconceived (and mistaken) notion of what the either creativity or curriculum entails, then please state it.
"You can't change what you can't see and don't know."
Precisely, so why don't you just have a look?
Seriously, read up about Fox Fire and the Creative Curriculum. Better still, go into some schools and observe them in practice.
If you have any specific objections, then let me know. I would be very happy to discuss your informed views. However, your uninformed opinion that "Children do NOT, in any public school, set their own curriculum" is simply not true
Steve
These blurbs speak for themselves
Creative Curriculum http://www.creativecurriculum.net/
"CreativeCurriculum.net is an easy-to-use, all-in-one system that combines the comprehensive assessment tools of The Creative Curriculum Developmental Continuum Assessment Toolkit for Ages 3-5 and The Creative Curriculum Developmental Continuum Assessment Toolkit for Infants, Toddlers, & Twos with time-saving communication features only available in our online system. "
Creative Curriculum http://www.circleofinclusion.org/english/approaches/creative.html
"The Creative Curriculum® approach has been used widely in Head Start programs throughout the United States. An array of resources may be reviewed and purchased directly from the parent company, Teaching Strategies Inc. Teaching Strategies, Inc. was founded in 1988 by educator and author Diane Trister Dodge. Its stated mission is "to enhance the quality of early childhood programs by offering the highest quality curriculum materials, training programs, parenting resources, and staff development services that are practical, developmentally appropriate, responsive to the needs of the field, and reflect the most innovative thinking". The Creative Curriculum materials are directed to programs for infants and toddlers, preschool age children (3 to 5 years) and children in the primary grades. A brief summary of the curriculum content relative to the these three age groups follows, but a more comprehensive review of the available materials and the approach is available via the Teaching Strategies Inc. web site (see link at the end of the page)"
Foxfire http://www.foxfire.org/teaching.html
"As Foxfire grew and gained national recognition, beleaguered teachers all across the country looked at The Foxfire Magazine, and saw an opportunity to change things. They started producing their own magazines in an attempt to “do Foxfire.” Most of these teachers met with partial or little success because they had missed the very heart of why Foxfire succeeded—student choice.
"The success of the Foxfire program was due in large part to the fact the the students chose to create a magazine. Since the magazine was their choice, the students were deeply invested in the work of creating it. The magazine product itself was not the solution to classroom woes that so many teachers thought it would be. Kaye Carver Collins, an early magazine student and later a Foxfire staff member for 13 years, explained the problem like this: “It seemed that people couldn’t understand the importance of the difference between the magazine, which was the choice we made, and the fact that we made a decision.”
Assessment for Learning http://annedavies.com/
"Most people think of tests and exams that evaluate student learning as primary examples of assessment, but those are examples of assessment of learning. Assessment for learning, also known as classroom assessment, is different.
"It is not used to evaluate learning but to help learners learn better. It does so by helping both students and teachers to see: the learning goals and criteria; where each learner is in relation to the goals; where they need to go next and ways to get there."
"It is not used to evaluate
"It is not used to evaluate learning but to help learners learn better. It does so by helping both students and teachers to see: the learning goals and criteria; where each learner is in relation to the goals; where they need to go next and ways to get there."
Whether a student is assessing their own learning, or a teacher is doing so, the very fact that someone is needing assessing is the part I find objectionable. There are learning goals.
In the absence of learning goals, there need not be assessing. In the real world of most people, they live, work, go about their day, learning along the way in large and small ways. Kids are no different than adults in that, except that there are more things to learn and know, since they haven't been alive as long. If I go about my day working, I may learn how to do something easier and better and I alter my process and thinking accordingly.
Kids do this too. What happens in schools, in classes such as math, is that kids are learning all the time about mathematical concepts from the world around them, then are told what math is and how it works and looks. Kids already instinctively know these things and it isn't at all what they are told it works and looks like. That's very confusing. So teachers work really hard to get kids unconfused, and meanwhile, something that was natural becomes difficult to understand.
From that point onward kids learn that math is difficult, something unnatural, something so hard and mysterious that they must have an expert tell them how to do it for many years to come. The kids that thrive in math classes, and there are some, are the ones that would no doubt go that direction anyway, or like me, find it interesting how difficult math is and how satisfying it is to overcome it.
Perhaps, if left to my own devices, I would have found the "golden mean". Instead, someone told me about it and it took the magic out of art and the magic out of math.
That, to me, is the real disservice we do to children in how we present math to them in schools. It takes away the magic and replaces it with tedium for the sake of passing a test to prove what? Or for the sake of assessment either their own or someone else's, to prove what to whom?
"However, your uninformed
"However, your uninformed opinion that "Children do NOT, in any public school, set their own curriculum" is simply not true"
Steve, you are confusing curriculum with teaching methods and/or materials.
The government body in charge of education sets the curriculum.
An Example Close to Home (UK)
http://dramaresource.com/resources/articles/288-drama-in-the-national-cu...
"The profile of drama in UK primary schools will soon be raised as a result of the New Primary Curriculum, which will be rolled out from September 2011. The curriculum will be organised around six broad areas of learning including direct subject teaching as well as a cross-curricular approach - which drama is well-placed to help with as a teaching tool. Drama will be included as part of "Understanding the Arts", which advocates participation in a range of art forms – including art and design, drama, music and dance."
UK Secondary
http://www.ite.org.uk/ite_topics/drama_secondary/003.html
http://curriculum.qcda.gov.uk/key-stages-1-and-2/subjects/english/keysta...
http://curriculum.qcda.gov.uk/key-stages-1-and-2/subjects/english/keysta...
One more blurb about Foxfire
"It remained an English-credit class for many years, until changing staff and changing state curriculum guidelines forced the magazine to shift to a vocational elective program."
Hi Rebecca
see below for reply (this thread's getting a bit narrow)
And apologies to Peter too, for hijacking the thread (although it is still relevant to whether kids control their own learning in school)
Creative Curriculum is an oxymoron
"Creative Curriculum is an oxymoron"
I agree with this statement.
I'm wondering if there are a variety of products with the words "creative" and "curriculum" in the title. I've found this product that seems to be used in the UK. It's not called Creative Curriculum. It's called Creative Thematic Curriculum (the themes are set). Perhaps this is the one Steve has been referring to.
http://www.doretolearning.co.uk/learning-philosophy.php
Here's part of the blurb:
"We are passionate in our desire to help our children to become real learners, who not only have the key skills of literacy, numeracy, ICT and science, but have a true thirst for learning. We recognise that in a fast changing world, our learners will need the skill of discernment – there is so much information available to us at the touch of a button; they will also need to be able to work independently and with others; and to have developed a resourcefulness that will see them through periods of challenge or change."
This blurb is problematic for me as an educator. How is it that children are not already "real learners"? They learn rapidly from the moment they are born (and perhaps even earlier). Children only shut down their curiosity and their "true thirst for learning" when they are in compulsory schooling where they can no longer choose their own "themes" for learning or their preferred manner of expressing what they know.
Attaching the word "creative" in front of a curriculum package does not mean that children need to be taught how to be creative. Anyone who has spent time with a young, unhindered child knows that their creativity knows no bounds.
More of this nonsense follows:
"Throughout all aspects of school life we believe that we should encourage the children to become increasingly responsible for their own learning. We encourage them, and orchestrate opportunities for them to develop the learning capacities that we all need to thrive as learners."
The learning capacities are as follows: resilience, resourcefulness, reflectiveness, reciprocity. All these things are part and parcel of normal human development, especially when in relationship with a loving care giver. Surely, a curriculum cannot take credit for any of a child's development in any of those areas. Nor does a child need to become "responsible" for their learning... his/her learning already belongs to him/her. Adults, on the other hand, are responsible to ensure that a child has access to whatever he or she needs to fully develop as an organism and this includes interesting things to explore, discover, manipulate, and use, as well as other people to communicate ideas with (as children are so happy to do outside of a school setting).
"The activities needed to develop these capacities cannot be bought in any scheme or publication; rather they are developed alongside the skills and knowledge which form the content of the curriculum. The development of the capacities accompanies the more traditional lesson objectives, so that each lesson has “dual objectives”."
There are traditional lesson objectives, so this means that the child is not choosing what they are being taught (content-wise) although they may have some control within a topic.
This may be better than many approaches used in most school environments. But it is still top-down instruction that does not acknowledge and recognize children as learning organisms.
Apologies to Peter for hijacking his comment thread.
Hijacking
Hi Rebecca,
You quote verbatim the web pages of various sales packages (blurb is the right word). While I appreciate your aims, I don't think it is helpful. I don't think much of the blurb either
I have linked you instead to some contemporay research into creative curriculum innovation.
http://www.qcda.gov.uk/resources/467.aspx
http://www.qcda.gov.uk/resources/4573.aspx
http://www.qcda.gov.uk/resources/assets/Probe_5_FINAL.pdf
and also some assessment for leaning
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formative_assessment#cite_note-23
I hope you find it useful. I'm not much into paid teaching resources.
And, once again, if you want to know how the kids control their learning in my teaching, I will be glad to share my skills and knowledge with you (and also how I use formative assesment)
Steve
Steve
Nothing New or Innovative Here
Hi Steve:
Thank you for the links... I spent a lot of time reading them because I was interested. They certainly provide a huge chunk of information that was previously missing in our back & forth commenting, and provide me with some context for understanding your perspective. I'm pleased that many of these initiatives are happening in a school setting. I'm pleased to see that teachers are rolling up their sleeves and attempting to do things differently in their schools. It seems that things are moving in a better direction.
However, I could write a criticial thesis on why these "innovations" aren't quite enough and why they aren't always appropriate (eg. encouraging students to be emotionally vulnerable in front of their peers as per pg. 15 of the PDF about Bridgemary).
These innovations aren't really a new trend. I've seen these strategies scattered throughout schools since the early 70's and I certainly operated my own classrooms in similar ways.
The difference between what you are championing and what Peter is describing on this blog is the level of choice that is being offered to kids.
When parenting preschoolers who may be asserting their independence, a lot of parenting guides suggest offering choice. But the choice is limited. A child doesn't want to put on clothing, so the parent (oh so cleverly) asks, "would you like to wear the blue shirt or the red shirt?" The premise is that the child will then think that the only two available options are wearing a red shirt or a blue shirt. Of course, this strategy often fails because the child realizes that there are other colours of shirts. And the child may prefer no shirt at all on that particular day. And then we're back to coercion to get clothes back on the kid (if the parent goes that route).
This is the difference between what Peter is talking about here on this blog and what you are talking about in terms of what is happening in some British schools.
I hate using this term, as it is overused, but it really comes down to a paradigm shift - how we perceive kids (and how much autonomy they should be allowed) and learning (and how it occurs).
In the examples provided above, the teacher is still directing the students, the teacher is still attending to gov't-decreed curricular goals, the teacher allows student choice but within parameters, and that the students are still required, by law, to be in attendance (although they could attend private school or homeschool with their parent's support).
For a compulsive school setting, what is being offered through curriculum innovations is much better pedagogy than is happening in many schools.
But it's not what Peter is talking about here. I've worked in both public schools and alternate "free" schools (where we used consensus instead of voting). Because I've done both, I get the difference. I suspect that until you've really been in both places (including attending school as a child and then choosing to unschool your own kids), then it's hard to wrap your head around the huge separation there really is between what you've provided here in terms of student engagement/choice and what happens when kids are really free to choose.
Formative Assessments
When I was a classroom teacher, self-assessment was big and I used it heavily.
I noticed some children gave themselves bad assessments, not based on their work but on how they felt about themselves (either in the context of school in general or how they felt about themselves as people). I also noticed that some children marked themselves against very high expectations, regardless of criterion-references or a self-evaluation rubric. It was much too subjective for those kids - they were unable to be objective about their own work, even when I was there to support the process and advocate on their behalf!
If it were up to me, I would rather children not be marked for their work - ever. What I have seen in alternate learning environments is that children who are not worried about evaluation often work on their project to their own satisfaction. They often go beyond age expectations and they simply feel good about the end result (without concern that someone else will like it or confusion as to what they need to do in order to get a good mark). If they want feedback or suggestions from others, they ask for it. And because they own the project or idea in the first place (if they aren't being co-opted into it by a well-intentioned adult), they also own the end result. This means that they never do just enough to get by. If they don't enjoy it after all, they are free to abandon it to move onto something more fulfilling and interesting.
It's such a qualitative difference in performance that I simply am unimpressed by any type of assessment any more.
I know it's part of going to school. But it's not necessarily part of life when a child learns outside conventional schooling. Another "paradigm shift".
"Attaching the word
"Attaching the word "creative" in front of a curriculum package does not mean that children need to be taught how to be creative."
This is exactly what I was referring to! A curriculum, by definition is a set course of materials. When I was teaching dance classes, I taught a set course, one that I created. Within that set course there is always room for creativity, BUT, and here's the part that also applies to schools; If a child is to reach the end point destination of that set course of materials, they will need to demonstrate, in some way or another, that they know what they are supposed to know. They need to do that in order to move to the next year in school, or the next level in the course. That's how that works.
"This may be better than many approaches used in most school environments. But it is still top-down instruction that does not acknowledge and recognize children as learning organisms."
Agreed! Most schools aren't this way though. Experiential schools are very much the exception. If I didn't have a choice about being in school, I'd much prefer a more relaxed experiential type of school. Most kids don't have a choice.
I spent the day with a middle school teacher from Germany. There is NO choice at all there. She readily recognizes how problematic it is to have zero choice. She sees first hand how unhappy kids can be within a system that they are powerless to do anything about. She likes her job, she likes teaching, she sees the small ways in which she can make her student's lives better.
Those are all noble things. None of it is how children learn naturally. Kids can take a math class and pass it and learn nothing more than the fact that the clouds outside the window, if there is one to look out of, move at different rates of speed. If a child is sitting in their own living room watching clouds for their own reasons, they may discover the rates of speeds at which the clouds are moving, simply because they were paying attention to the world around them. That is how math can be learned when a child is free to learn. That isn't something that can be taught.
This is why "fox fire" never really took off in other settings. Other schools tried to make lessons on the "movements of clouds".
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