[Kabal]

I saw this link posted on WallStreetOasis--a piece by James Altucher on his site.

I often think his writings are too zany, but this one gave me thought.

Quote:

Ugh, trying to unravel the Rubik’s Cube-like scam of lower education is a full-time job. Once you get a side with all one color you realize you’ve hopelessly prevented yourself from getting the other side to be one color.

I have not read much about home schooling or unschooling so I am no expert. But I’ve thought about it. And this is how I would do it if my kids were to let me unschool them.

A) First, (and again, this is without reading about it at all so I, at best, uneducated on the topic). I prefer the word “unschooling” to “home schooling”. I assume home schooling means I replace the teacher, buy them science textbooks, math, Canterbury Tales, etc. I don’t want to do that. That sounds boring to me and I assume to them as well. Unschooling sounds more like it – i.e. just completely no education at all.

B) Only one requirement: read one book a week. It doesn’t matter what book. I will pay them 10 cents a page. WHAT!? How can you pay your kids to learn? Well, I want my kids to get used to being paid for doing things they enjoy. Later in life (just a few years really) they will have to do it anyway. Why not get used to being paid for something they enjoy right now? This way they will know easily to avoid getting paid for things they don’t enjoy. (this is hopefully a way to avoid them going into a life of prostitution).

Then we talk about it. Then we visit the bookstore and they get to browse other books and see what they like. I get a synesthesia of experience when I go into a bookstore, some sections have bright colors and draw me to them (fiction, current affairs, philosophy, art, comics, history) and some I can just feel the drab greyness (interior decorating, crafts, children). They would browse until something pulls at them. Then they would buy it and read it.

C) Every day: I’d set out drawing and painting materials. They’d also be encouraged to keep a diary. I want the creative neurons going. I can’t force them to do this. But maybe they would want to.

D) At least an hour of sports a day.

E) I’d set up playdates for after school so they can get socialization. Or playdates with other kids that are being unschooled or home schooled (there are more than you think out there). My kids think that all home-schooled kids are “weird” because they aren’t social. But I ask them, “when do you talk to your friends anyway?” And they say, “after school”. So that argument is out the window.

F) The rest of the time they can do whatever they want: eat, read, watch TV, sleep, blow stuff up, do nothing but stare at the wall, walk around the block, go to the movies. Whatever. In fact, I hope they do a lot of nothing. People get addicted to doing “something”. What’s so great about “something”. I like to do nothing. Even when people do nothing they try to label it: like “meditation”. Ugh, what a boring thing: meditation. Try, “I just did nothing. I even thought about nothing in particular.”

When you are capable of actually doing nothing (not so easy after decades of “something addiction”), there’s a deep well that springs up, and fills every corner of you, crowding at the anxieties, the fears, the pressures put on you from government jobs colleagues bosses friends family. The nothing replaces all the vomit they try to kiss into your mouth.

Last italics mine.

A lot of variation in child outcomes is explained by genetics (e.g., I.Q. at >= 50% heritability).

Home-schooling could be a good way of shielding your kid from the deleterious effects of Blue Pill brain-washing, while not losing much on the "education" side of the ledger--perhaps even gaining.

On the other hand, the lack of socialization could be an issue. And home-schooling is labor intensive, from the parent's perspective--and it could be annoying having your kids around all the time.

[Emancipator]

Let the kids socialize via sports and the internet.

[AFspecOps]

I think the ultimate goal is to raise kids that are very curious, motivated, and self-disciplined. A lot of time at school is wasted and kids can get bored easily. Hell, the guy who just sold tumblr dropped out of high school at 15 and homeschooled.

Some kids learn to read at 5. Some kids learn at 8. By the time they are 10, you oftentimes can't tell the difference. Doesn't seem right that everybody should learn in a lock-step fashion.

With young kids, it can't be too difficult providing the parent(s) have the time and desire to do it. Grow a vegetable garden, take care of an aquarium, spend a whole afternoon taking apart an old appliance, built an actual go-kart (boys don't do this anymore), make a model airplane, learn how to cook, spent some time learning a language with real speakers, etc. Just don't watch TV or spend a lot of time on the computer.

For boys especially, it can be difficult to sit in a building 8 hours a day, and many will start acting up. Schools are overly female-centric and not geared towards the needs of many of the males. I don't think homeschooling could hurt, but it really depends on the motivations of the parents. And many couples couldn't afford to do this, even if they wanted.

[Samseau]

Sending your kids to school is a punishment, especially if they are boys. For girls it makes them more vain and slutty, for boys it sucks out their soul.

I think this entire forum is a by-product of our shitty school lives growing up. Instead of having fun, getting strong, and chasing girls while we were teenagers, we were cramped inside of a classroom forced to learn useless shit. That's why so many on this forum are "late bloomers." Had we been able to live out our desires for fun as children, we'd probably enter our twenties with far more discipline, motivation, and focus, having gotten out the need for "fun" when we were actually children.

A reoccurring theme with most historical genius's and success stories was the lack of formal education. Not all, but most.

I blame the decline of American - it's economy, culture, and government, on our worthless education system. Back in the 1800's of America very few people had rigorous formal education and yet the country was a much better place to live in than now.

[WestIndianArchie]

I've never met a well adjusted home-schooled kid.
Smart as whips, great students, hard workers but they generally end up as problems cause they don't know how to behave.

WIA

[Samseau]

(05-23-2013 01:18 AM)WestIndianArchie Wrote:  

I've never met a well adjusted home-schooled kid.
Smart as whips, great students, hard workers but they generally end up as problems cause they don't know how to behave.

WIA

It's because the average parent has no idea how to raise their children. Child rearing is a lost art. Ever since society starting giving their children away to schools to "educate" them, parents have forgotten what it means to educate a child themselves.

Instead they educate their children in the same way a modern school does it - drilling information into them all day long, making sure they get high test marks - but unlike a school system the home-schooled child is over-protected from the harsh aspects of society that we must all be aware of in order to proper.

Good parents make sure they socialize their children enough so that they understand how human societies function, but most home-schooling parents neglect this aspect and focus on solely turning their children into the next super-star student instead of a well-rounded human being.

Home-schooling is the way to go. But not the way most people think about it.

[InternationPlayboy]

I think school is socially a great thing. Obviously it's much easier for kids to meet piers at school than if they are home schooled. Not to mention, it's not like EVERYTHING school are teaching is bullshit. 1+1=2 no matter how you look at it, so it's not like classes like science or math are brainwashing your kids. If you do want to educate your kid yourself, they can still go to school and you can still pass on the messages you want them to learn. I had a great time in high school, I would have never wanted to be home schooled, that would have sucked. At the end of the day, being able to socialize is a huge part of life, more so than advanced math or science or most of the shit you learn in school. You can do all this stuff you're talking about even if your kid is in school. Why wouldn't they be able to read one book a week if they were in school? It's not like they are in they're last year of med school and have 20 hours of homework a week, it's the American education system for christ sakes, how hard could it be?

[Caligula]

(05-23-2013 03:02 AM)Samseau Wrote:  

(05-23-2013 01:18 AM)WestIndianArchie Wrote:  

I've never met a well adjusted home-schooled kid.
Smart as whips, great students, hard workers but they generally end up as problems cause they don't know how to behave.

WIA

It's because the average parent has no idea how to raise their children. Child rearing is a lost art. Ever since society starting giving their children away to schools to "educate" them, parents have forgotten what it means to educate a child themselves.

Instead they educate their children in the same way a modern school does it - drilling information into them all day long, making sure they get high test marks - but unlike a school system the home-schooled child is over-protected from the harsh aspects of society that we must all be aware of in order to proper.

Good parents make sure they socialize their children enough so that they understand how human societies function, but most home-schooling parents neglect this aspect and focus on solely turning their children into the next super-star student instead of a well-rounded human being.

Home-schooling is the way to go. But not the way most people think about it.

I like the way European nobility raised their children in the Middle Ages. They fostered their child away from home with family members or family friends who were considered good influences (though often it was done for political reasons too). The children would thus learn from good role models that were not their parents and gain powerful life-long mentors in the process.

Some of my most rewarding experiences growing up were staying with family friends for extended periods. I learned a lot that way.

Of course it's important for children to spend time with their peers, but what's missing in modern child-rearing is spending time with grown-ups who can be good role models, but who are neither teachers nor parents. The most socially well-adjusted people I know are those who were used to relating to adults from an early age.

The extreme extension of childhood often into the early twenties is very recent.

[The Beast1]

I'd send my boys to an all boys school.

Seriously, that male bruhaha socialization makes real men and teaches you how to deal with women instead of the annoying opposite.

I couldn't stand home schooling them.

[Dr. Howard]

When responding I had to stop and think...am I thinking about how school was for me 30 years ago or how it is for my kids now. I would gladly send my own kids through the same public schools I went to in Canada but its not the same now. Here are some examples from my nephew who is in elementary school and there are 3 male staff in the whole school. One teacher and the two janitors.
1. for gym/phys ed all they do is dance. My mind was so blown the first time that I make a point of asking him when we talk and its always some new dance.
2. Science is way beyond what I learned at that age
3. Playground and creative writing rules are insane. No violence, no play violence, no pretending to be ninjas, no mention of guns (see pop tart incident) allowed. In my day it was 'guns are for hunting' not 'guns are bad'
4. Computer time is about the SAME as I had which is crazy. I grew up in a time when computers had keyboards, black screens with green text now my phone is a computer and kids have no more schooling in them than I had.

In short, school today is not the school of my youth. As for home schooling, I had a few kids work for me that were home schooled in elementary and went to a public high school, they were MORE reckless on their weekends than the other kids but were otherwise fine and very independent. It was like high school was "pre-college" for them in terms of existing apart from their parents.

Now, the trick about home school, and those advocating for it is that it requires one parent to be available to actually teach the kids. That means no single moms or double career parents. If you want to home school your own kids you're going to need a wife, who you would actually want to teach your kids or the money to hire an intelligent, well educated...eastern european.......au pair...to. Wait. I think I just had an incredible idea.

[Caligula]

(05-23-2013 07:46 AM)frenchie Wrote:  

I'd send my boys to an all boys school.

I went to an all boys school. Highly recommended.

[Walderschmidt]

(05-23-2013 03:34 AM)InternationPlayboy Wrote:  

I think school is socially a great thing. Obviously it's much easier for kids to meet piers at school than if they are home schooled. Not to mention, it's not like EVERYTHING school are teaching is bullshit. 1+1=2 no matter how you look at it, so it's not like classes like science or math are brainwashing your kids. If you do want to educate your kid yourself, they can still go to school and you can still pass on the messages you want them to learn. I had a great time in high school, I would have never wanted to be home schooled, that would have sucked. At the end of the day, being able to socialize is a huge part of life, more so than advanced math or science or most of the shit you learn in school. You can do all this stuff you're talking about even if your kid is in school. Why wouldn't they be able to read one book a week if they were in school? It's not like they are in they're last year of med school and have 20 hours of homework a week, it's the American education system for christ sakes, how hard could it be?

How old are you?

Wald