Learning Freely Network

“Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school.”
Albert Einstein
Ask Naomi
Parenting Without Struggle 
by Naomi Aldort
Q: Our daughter is four and a very curious and social child. Even though we are planning to homeschool and I am at home with the baby (her brother), we signed her up [...]

by Glenda M. Jackson
Bachelor of Education, Avondale College
Masters of Educational Studies, Monash University
A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Education, Faculty of Education,
Monash University,
Clayton, Victoria, 3800, Australia, 2009.

ABSTRACT

Home schooling is a growing phenomenon in many countries throughout the world. Despite this, little attention has been paid [...]

from: Alan Thomas and Harriet Pattison

Between us we have been researching unschooling/autonomous education for the last 16 years. So far, based on more than 120 families, the focus has been on general aspects of unschooling. At the same time we have learned quite a bit about the process of learning to read. As you might [...]

Several years ago, a distraught mother who knew I was an “educator” called me in tears. She had just come from a parent/teacher conference where she had been informed by her son’s kindergarten teacher that he was “four months behind.” (In kindergarten!) She imagined her son’s future possibilities slipping away [...]

From Life Learning magazine
by Alan Thomas & Harriet Pattison

Researchers Alan Thomas and Harriet Pattison tell us about their work in the field of unschooling and invite participation in their new research project on learning to read.

It’s probably no exaggeration to say that home educators have done more to advance the scientific [...]

ScienceDaily (Apr. 15, 2009) — Adolescents and young adults typically consider peer relationships to be all important. However, it appears that strong family support, not peer support, is protective in reducing future suicidal behavior among young adults when they have experienced depression or have attempted suicide.

New research that will be presented here April 17 at [...]

Source: ‘Open Education’

The ongoing data is becoming exceedingly clear. If you want to see normal social, emotional and cognitive development in your children, then you must allow them the opportunity for free and imaginative play.

In her article published in the Scientific American, The Serious Need for Play, Melinda Wenner sums up the data this way: [...]

Overschooled but Undereducated:
Society’s Failure to Understand Adolescence
 
John Abbott with Heather MacTaggart

Pre-production edition June 2008

The Initiative published a pre-production of John Abbott and Heather MacTaggart’s new book Overschooled but Undereducated: Society’s Failure to Understand Adolescence in June 2008. In December 2008 Continuum Books agreed to publish the book in 2009.
* * *
With the publication [...]

For the discussion and refining of rhetoric for home education (aka homeschooling) law reform in Germany.

More of the story…

A text on the subject by Blane Després, PhD Assistant Professor, Faculty of Education The University of British Columbia Okanagan.

There is, indeed, plenty of evidence to support the anti-socializing effects of schooling (“detrimental”) and plenty of evidence to support the more positive socializing of home education. I imagine that Brian Ray should chime in [...]