May 2, 2005
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I am looking back at early influences that
might have moved me towards my current understanding of schooling and
education. Back when I was a secondary student - maybe 16 or 17, I had two
pretty progressive teachers: Mr Lee taught English, while Miss Pillai taught
literature.
Miss Pillai was strident in her political
views and occasionally ran into trouble with the authorities, but she made us
understand that literature wasn’t just words and stories, but ideas that shaped
society.
Mr Lee who was more laidback, lent me books. Like Herbert Kohl’s 36
Children, John Holt’s How Children Learn, and Ivan Illich’s Deschooling Society.
Lee and Pillay were a couple who shared a modest apartment not far from the
school they taught in.
Those paperbacks packed a wallop. I don’t think I understood
fully what these
authors were saying, much less grasped how radical these books were
then in the
mid-70s. I don’t think I understood how influential these men’s ideas
were -not knowing any better - but I was utterly sold on their
arguments. They were questioning conventional wisdom about
schools, how kids learn, how process and substance were two different
things, and yep, they certainly made me ask the same questions although
I couldn’t
see how anyone could beat the system.
In some ways, you could say these early
ideas made it easier for me to ‘deschool’ and homeschool my own kids when the
time came. Since then there have been other books, but that's a story for another time.
What early influences led you to homeschool?
Comments (2)
I have to say my influences were more bad than good. I severely had issues with school from an early age, and was one of those children that *never* did all my work without being prodded. It was all so boring, none of it was engaging. I'd rather read stuff on my own than ever be 'taught' by having facts drilled into me in a classroom. I think the final straw and the reason I ended up making a decision that public school education was broken was an incident with a 10th grade Honors English teacher. I'd poured my best stuff into a term paper that I was absolutely fascinated with. Because it was so remarkably good, I was accused of cheating. Needless to say, I learned that it didn't really matter what sort of work you turned it, most of the education was about being able to play the game of social and peer interaction.
Ouch - it's a story that could be multiplied many times over and I know just what you mean.
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