I am embarrassed to say I somehow missed Neill and Summerhill ..... probably at the time I was more focused on potty training <g>. That's an extraordinary link. I would like to know what the members of this list, the literati, think of this approach/philosophy of education. I pulled my 12 year old (have I said this here already? apologies if so) out of public school in September. It's been a struggle since she was in 3rd grade, but this fall was an absolute train wreck. Her self-esteem was pummeled to zero, and her continuing complaint was, "I'm not learning anything". My inclination, in sorting out issues of home-schooling curriculum, designing lessons, etc., has been very much like the below. It's a little hard to be comfortable with the notion of no "set" study of various individual subjects, a la "Math: fractions & decimals", etc. And yet my intuition says that something like the below is how my daughter learns best. She's a free spirit, that one. And she knows what she wants. Julie Krueger ========Original Message======== Subj: [lit-ideas] Re: Organic Learning Date: 2/11/06 1:33:22 A.M. Central Standard Time From: _robert.paul@xxxxxxxxx (mailto:robert.paul@xxxxxxxx) To: _lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx) Sent on: Julie wrote: > [ââââââââââ] Is anyone familiar with this > program/entity/approach? Remember A. S. Neill, and Summerhill? 'Parents are slow in realising how unimportant the learning side of school is. Children, like adults, learn what they want to learn. All the prize-giving and marks and exams side-track proper personality development. Only pedants claim that learning from books is education. Books are the least important apparatus in a school. All that any child needs is the three Râs; the rest should be tools and clay and sports and theatre and paint and freedom. 'Most of the schoolwork that adolescents do is simply a waste of time, of energy, of patience. It robs youth of its right to play and play and play; it puts old heads on young shoulders.' http://www.summerhillschool.co.uk/pages/school_policies.html Robert Paul Reed College ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html