Singer Alanis Morissette says she un-schools her kids at home, following their inclinations, rather than guiding them, or boring them, with rote learning. But are children born into a Jean Jacques Rousseau Utopia where they are naturally predisposed to do the right thing. As you’re growing up, is there anything ‘You Oughta Know’?
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16 replies on “Alanis Morissette Home Un-Schools Her Kids: Is There Anything ‘You Oughta Know’?”
Growing up, I hated word problems and problem-solving in general. I had trouble figuring out what were the essential parts and what was non-essential. Eventually I got better at it and it has made all the difference. One bonus was that even if I might not have the exact answer, at least I knew I was in the ballpark.
What I see these days is younger people relying too much on calculators and not knowing if their answer is in the ballpark. They lack the ability to trouble-shoot. I think this is because they don’t know what the end result should look like, so they don’t know how to get there. That’s one of the most useful things I ever learned.
When I was a young father I would often ask myself “how would dad handle this”? Because I had, still have, so much respect for how my parents raised their kids.
Are kids no longer required to know their ‘TIMES TABLES’? OMG, my mother had flash cards that drilled those into my brain. Instant recall. Period. Ask a kid what 9×12 is, if he says “I can google it” it requires the next 20 seconds to get the answer. Sorry, he’s loser.
Looking back, I was a lazy student. My parents transferred me from public school to an all-girls private school in the fifth grade, thinking that discipline and clear goals would clarify my determination to become educated. Turns out that I was more a leader, and not a follower, and still had my bad grades. It annoyed the administration when I was regularly voted team captain (in field hockey, basketball, and lacrosse), athletic association president, or vice president of my class. I attended that school through to 12th grade graduation (1971), which I loved, where was awarded the highest athletic award they bestowed. I was shocked. My mother was shocked. I had been referred to therapists, and honestly my parents were concerned…because I was a mediocre student. But I wasn’t making bad decisions…I was just in my own world..and found so many instances of hippocracy that I was really confused. I remember thinking, “why this but not that?
Bottom line: I received a great education, because – at the end – I could ask “why this, but not that?”
And to this day I have been able to do my own research, and ask, “why this, but not that?” I learned reason and logic. In college, I learned how to evaluate statistics and the many methods involved in their conclusions. These models are crap. I’m just a 60+ woman who knows that stats can be manipulated, and I know at this point politics has overtaken the science.
Very unfortunate for Ms Morissette’s (and anyone foolish enough to approach life this way) children, they will likely grow up and be let loose on society with a pocket full of parents money (or not), no direction and absolutely nothing to do other than seeking to pleasure themselves. The really sad part is they will also involve their “friends” and hanger on’s in the folly. A whole new crop of children with no self restraint set out into society. The real milestone will be if they make it to 25 years without jail time, destroying other peoples lives or multiple trips to rehab.
Historical note: J. J. Rousseau had five children with a woman he did eventually marry. He put all the children in a “foundling hospital,” per the Encyclopedia Britannica (hardback). Apparently this appalling practice was not uncommon, but it certainly doesn’t establish him as an authority on educating children.
Ironically, I watched this video as Little Bob was having a meltdown over the fact that he can’t have his friends over until he finishes his schoolwork and cleans up the mess he & his friends made testerday. Full meltdown, tears, shouting, and tryng to hit me, ending with me sending him to his room. Amidst his howling complaints, my pointing out to him that if he had just started on his tasks when I first told him to we’d already be done didn’t go over too well.
As the vid wrapped up, one of his buddies appeared outside our yard, and Little Bob is now playing with him while getting his buddy to help him clean up. He’s a good kid, and as the Bad Cop to Sister Babe’s good cop (although we always back each other), I will do all I can to wring out of him every bit of Antifa activist that lives in every child.
Select A or B:
My job as a parent is to
A) Raise happy well-adjusted kids
B) Help children grow in to adults who are contributing members of society
I think a person’s answer to this question pins them on the political spectrum just as easily as any other. Grown up kids need a nanny state (strong government) to tell them what to do.
Well raised adults can use reason and make their own decisions, while considering the impact of those decisions on their neighbors.
If you don’t think children are not barbarians, read “The Lord Of The Flies” by William Golding. Frightening.
Spot on as usual.
I was in terrified awe of the headmaster of my Middle School (children of 7-11 years old). David Lewis was as a formidable man from the Welsh Valleys. Very much greatest generation, he’d been a navigator in Wellington bombers during the war, always wore an immaculate three-piece tweed suit with a crisp brilliant white shirt and hair brylcreemed back. He was the epitome of “old school” at a school with a lot of proto-progressive teachers drawn to the diverse ethnic mix of the area.
I was thought to be a bit slow by my teacher (turned out I needed glasses) David Lewis would take me up to his office twice a week and put me through times tables and spelling (and sometimes reinforce the lessons with the flat of a ruler across my backside when I’d not done the work). At the time I resented him for it. Today I look back on him with respect and love. He cared enough to take the time and to be the bad guy.
A poor job of homeschooling no matter the method does not mean all using that homeschooling method is bad. All schooling as a matter of fact. Hence your discussion recently of Detroit schools. As parents of 10 children and homeschooling now for 35 plus years we have seen numerous failures in homeschooling methods no matter what is chosen. Unschooling methodology is not necessarily the best method her application of such is appalling. The goal for us was successful contributing citizens and we saw the government schools as no guarantee of our children achieving that goal.
Wrote my post then saw what you wrote. Yes! contributing citizens. Congrats to you (10 – wow!). My wife and I have known several homeschoolers who did not try very hard. Done right it is a lot of work. To do it right for 10, you both deserve all the kudos in the world.
I thought I’d heard about Unschooling as a home school method when they proposed this topic back stage but hadn’t had time to look up anything on it. My impression was that it wasn’t the rigorous methods of one subject at a time and moving from classroom to classroom but a more “whole learning” (which might be a bad phrasing) of of gaining knowledge from a number of subjects about a thing as you encountered it.
I don’t think the subject’s description of learn as the child goes is really unschooling as much as not schooling and letting the little barbarians run amok.
There is a school that would allow Alanis’ children to follow their own interests. It’s called Montessori. But is has civilizing and protocol built in. You can choose your learning material, but you have to wait your turn and put it away when you are finished. Also, I think Bill does a disservice to tribes when he compares them to someone who gives no guidance or instruction. Tribes let children know immediately if they have acted outside of what is acceptable, don’t they? And you’d better be useful to the tribe, so you’d better develop some skills.
Both my kids went to Montessori schools (a separate one for each because one closed & a new one opened) before starting public kindergarten. The teachers also met with the kid at the start of the term and they talked about what they would learn and enter a contract that obligated the kid to do what was necessary to learn it while waiting their turn at the materials, putting them up when finished & keeping their work area neat & organized. It is certainly not unstructured or unguided, and teaches personal responsibility at an early age. (Both did well in a mix of public & private schools and were off the parental payroll as soon as they graduated college in 4 years.)
Dr. Hy Monroe told us children are little barbarians way back in 1978. And Dr. Monroe got his degree from Bubba. Cause Bubba knew that Hy knew all there was to know.