Enough Already!

I'm skating at the local rink and I'm talking to a woman who I haven't seen in years.
"Homeschooling huh? Well my son would have benefited from that. What i really would have liked him to attend though is private school."

And then, "kids need to learn how to socialize." Oh God. Here we go again. I draw her attention to 3 other families (all friends of ours) skating along side of us. "Yeah but they have to learn how to grapple with other kids. Ya know?"
No. I don't know. They need to learn how to 'grapple' with all kinds of people. They need to learn how to get along with people of all ages. Period.

When will these well meaning folk learn that it doesn't have to happen in the context of school? To live well in society with others, kids need opportunities to be in the WORLD more, not less
(that is, stuck in school).
At school you learn facts and figures (and frankly you can learn these anywhere) but school doesn't MAKE a person.
I've said it before and I'm saying it again; school is not a good place for kids. School is a contrived situation. Get it finally. School is a fake. It is not real.
BEE

back on line at r4a

Oh happy day! Radio4all is back on line! Go, and download our shows!

weather report

The latest update on radio4all -

Shawn and David are still working to get the server back. They are having to reinstall the operating system which became corrupted. I hope we'll be back soon.
Hopefully some results soon, we have grown very accustomed/dependent on this web site.

coffee signs

While we are waiting for news about the status of Radio4all.net (which is still down days after they thought they would be back on line) I wonder if anyone out there in blog land would have the skills to interpret my coffee ground remains for a sign. Should I be worried?

r4all down

Seems Radio4all.net was down yesterday morning when CFMU was trying to download our latest show, so any Hamilton area listeners would not have heard the new show, nor anyone trying to access the show from the web site. It seems that the site was back on line later in the day, and downloading will have resumed.
This is not something that is in our (i.e. radio free school's) control, and it happens occasionally - but not frequently - at radio4all.
It is an amazing service for a show like ours to have the portal of radio4all there to upload our shows to the web, so please support them if you can.

the show must go on: getting your homeschooler to the ivory tower

College Bound Homeschooler?

interview - Jon Reider, Director of College Counseling at San Francisco University High School. Former Senior Admissions Officer at Stanford University.

music - Super Sun Natural, Tom Wilson, Dog Years

tech - beatrice, randy

podcast - www.radio4all.net/proginfo.php?id=25695

"It is improper for older people to keep saying...that activity of the young is 'counterproductive.' It is our business to do something more productive that they can join if they want to."
Paul Goodman
--

RADIO FREE SCHOOL an all volunteer show by, for and about Un-schoolers/Home Learners.
Check out our blog at http://radiofreeschool.blogspot.com or our web site at http://radiofreeschool.ca/

faceless gimmick

Another dundas independent video association production, this one featuring un-school band Faceless Gimmick: doing a cover of the Dixie Chicks' "Wide Open Spaces."

The band's first public performance...average age of band members is 12 (youngest 9-years, oldest 13-years).

mean kitty song

We had a "mean" kitty for a while...

no picnic

One of my favourite bands from the 80's - and a very cute video:

Kit Chat

Download the latest radio free school here

interview - Kit Pearson http://www.kitpearson.com/
- Toronto Small Press Fair - Bronwyn Kay

music - Careless, Drive-By Truckers, Decoration Day
-Big Boned Gal (Remix), K.D. Lang, Alberta: Wild Roses, Northern Lights

tech - beatrice and randy

"Definitions pin things down, they limit the prospects for creativity and diversity. A definition, implicitly attempts to reduce all possible variations of a concept to a single pithy phrase."

Ian Stewart, Letters to a Young Mathematician

Small Pressure

Sell sell sell. Three zine-makers with an array of zine material at the Radio Free School table at the Toronto Small Press Fair (Nov. 10) - At our table Kitty Corner proved the top seller, followed by Curdled Way, then World Wide Zine (France issue) and Poems.
We had a lovely time and our friendly neighbour Drew Simmie was a pleasure to hang out with, the un-schoolers making great use of his fine fountain pen to sign autographs!

Small Time Toronto

Any Radio Free School listeners in the Toronto area are welcome to come and visit some of the rfs team on Saturday at the Toronto Small Press Book Fair.

The kids will have their respective zines for sale: Curdled Way, Poems, and the ever popular Kitty Corner.

The event unfolds at Trinity St. Paul's Centre, 427 Bloor St W, Toronto from 11am-5pm on Saturday, November 10.

The Nature of Unschooling

A film featuring some radio free school regulars is heading to India to be included in The 'Re-membering Nai Taleem: Real Learning for the 21st Century' Film Festival.

After posting our video on YouTube, we were contacted by manish of Shikshantar - The Peoples' Institute for Rethinking Education and Development who then invited us to send a copy to them for the festival, to be screened this summer.

What's exciting - besides being asked to contribute a short video - is to discover the great work they are doing on subjects close to our hearts.

Please pay them a visit by following this link

citizen kay

An unschooling dossier is being built over at citizenshift on a beta site, a web-based project of the national film board of canada.

radio free school is contributing material to the project, including Bronwyn's sideline project, Kitty Corner zine.

We'll be updating you once the entire project is stitched together.

poppin off kids

In the spirit of Halloween, the radio free school search engine found this (approved by radio free school film board)

JK and WW and Zinga Zinga

Warning! Spoilers for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in the show...

radio free school for wednesday, october 31, 2007

interviews - Madeleine and Evelyna Kay about winning tickets to see J.K Rowling at the Winter Garden Theatre, Toronto, Oct. 23, 2007

reading - Zinga Zinga, by Dennis Lee, from Jelly Belly, read by Bronwyn Kay

- The Monkey's Paw, W.W. Jacobs, read by Beatrice Ekoko

music - Meet Ze Monsta, P.J Harvey, To Bring You My Love

tech - beatrice

download - http://www.radio4all.net/proginfo.php?id=25298

RADIO FREE SCHOOL an all volunteer show by, for and about Un-schoolers/Home Learners.
Check out our blog at http://radiofreeschool.blogspot.com or our web site at http://radiofreeschool.ca/

Contact us at radiofreeschool@gmail.com or P.O. Box 19, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton ON, L8S 1C0.

rock and water

life:now!

Monarch butterfly, Dundas Conservation Authority, Sunday, October 21, 2007.

Creating a Cooperative Learning Center by Katharine Houk

Many people like to learn together in groups. Small groups. Katharine Houk explains why in a radio free school interview that learning is "a relational experience"- doing things together with people in the community "adds another dimension" to learning.

A learning center also meant for her and her children, learning things that they might not even have thought or known about- so it opens up opportunities.

If you agree with this premise and you think classrooms are far too large, too boring, with no room for creative juices to flow then maybe creating a learning centre might be the way to go.

Personally, there are many days that I feel like I would like to see such a center around here- just cart the kids off or let them walk to it alone and stay there all day. Let them experience all sorts of exciting workshops and courses (of their choice naturally).

I would avoid calling it a 'learning' center though. It really bugs me that the myth is still prevalent amongst us-learning takes place only in institutions.

I think I would go with something like 'Doing Center' or Making space; with the focus on the doing part.
Check out the book though - it's very useful and you might get inspired!

help!

I lost my head at Ancaster Wells! Photo by Bronwyn

reading the airwaves

plunk the kids down in front of the radio and let radio free school entertain the little darlings for an half hour, kids reading to kids, with two stories pouring out of the tinny speakers in your kitchen:

- "Teach Us, Amelia Bedelia" By Peggy Parish, pictures by Lynn Sweat,read by Bronwyn Kay
- "Why are the ice caps melting? The dangers of global warming," by Anne Rockwell, Illustrated by Paul Meisel, read (and commented on) by Evelyna Kay

music - Across the Universe, The Beatles, Let It Be


editing - Beatrice Ekoko


production - Randy Kay

http://www.radio4all.net/proginfo.php?id=25004 is the place to go to download it, baby! (or just click here)

Radio Free School, part of a healthy, balanced media diet for your children

reclaiming street space

this week's show looks at Car Free Week - and lays out the various events organized by volunteers at Transportation for Liveable Communities and MacGreen in Hamilton - interview with Randy Kay of TLC on the week, and the Parking Meter Party that marked Car Free Day on September 22. Download the show here.

Our friends at DIVA have made a 2 minute movie - a web version can be found, well, right here.

Car free day 2007

Wow! What a week end! Car free day was sunny and beautiful this year.
We attended a parking meter party- reclaimed space that is habitually allocated to the parking of vehicles.

It was transformed into a people friendly space with sod laid out on roadside parking spaces, and a 'found' comfy couch installed (one person didn't get up the entire time!)
People sat playing chess, blowing gorgeous HUGE soap bubbles, or sipping lemonade. My kids (sadly the only ones in attendance) happily got tattooed with face paint. There was a free bike repair clinic too and best of all, music! Wonderful violinist and guitar duo, they performed for over 2 hours!

This is an idea that should be extended into car free weekend. Check out the organizer's web site at tlchamilton.blogspot.com

by BEE

airing quality and an unbouncing

interview - Susan J. Elliott, Professor, School of Geography and Earth Sciences, Dean of Social Science

book reading - "In Which Tigger is Unbounced," The House at Pooh Corner, A.A. Milne - read by Beatrice and Madeleine

tech - beatrice

download - here

Safe and Sorry

It’s the mid 90s when a child at a North Vancouver school climbs up a tree, falls out of it, hits her head and dies.

At the same moment, staff at an alternative democratic school in the same district is having a discussion about tree climbing because some of the kids are climbing way up and the staff is getting nervous.

The talk centers on how high they should let the kids climb. Maybe the rule will be that you’d have to show you can climb a tree well. Or maybe you can only climb so high. Perhaps only teenagers can climb up to the top. Or maybe a staff person can be there.

But the debate goes no further. Enter another staff member with this announcement; all public schools in the district have banned tree climbing from now on out of concern for that tragedy. Discussion closed.

Matt Hern, was one of the key players at that democratic school. A lecturer, director of Vancouver’s Purple Thistle Centre (an alternative to school) and an author, he says it was this incident that lead him to write his latest book Watch Yourself; why safe isn’t always better.

If you look at it from the perspective of the school board as Hern points out, it’s obvious that they can’t afford to get sued. On a deeper, more emotional level there’s the general view that ‘it’s all worth it if not another family has to go through this.’ It’s a view we’ve come to accept without challenge, no questions asked. But it’s a view that might be to our detriment.

For we who live in what some regard as ‘a culture of fear,’ where extreme measures are taken and much is sacrificed in the name of security and safety it’s sacrilegious to say as Hern does that this default response is “very wrong and insidious and it’s just not true. It’s not worth it.”

Hern acknowledges that it’s a “terrible and difficult thing to say-to have to look at the family of that young girl and have to say that it’s worth it to let kids climb trees,” but the concern is that banning tree climbing is just another example of a cultural attitude towards a difficult problem that requires examining in far more depth.

Why? Because we’re talking about a phenomena that is seeping into every aspect of the way we make decisions.

Whether it’s got to do with neurotically installing surveillance cameras at every down town street corner or whether it’s about bombing Afghanistan or Iraq so that we can feel safe-let’s do it.

“The discourse around safety has begun to trump all kinds of ethical and political decisions,” says Hern. “Oh it’s about safety? Okay. Oh there’s a risk involved? Never mind then,” Hern mimics the common knee jerk response.

To Hern, this attitude is a sort of cop out; it’s lazy, and in its own way dangerous.

“And it’s driven by all kinds of discourses- overwhelmingly by discourses around liability, around public fear and also just straight up parental and community fears of kids getting hurt.”

Often, as Hern points out, these are unreasonable fears that build up on each other into a kind of frenzy.

I couldn’t agree more. I take a quick pause while typing this to check my inbox and there is a flagged e mail marked ‘urgent’ from a friend; she’s forwarded me a security alert about the latest theft technology-bump keys. Are your door locks safe? She’s already made arrangements to get all her locks changed.

Just this afternoon, walking to the bus stop with my daughter after her violin lesson, I am stopped by two reporters carrying a heavy camera and microphone. “Hi. We’re doing a feature on safety and security. We’d like to know if you feel your child is being supervised enough at school?”

“Sorry. Can’t help you. My child is home-educated,” I reply.

“Oh, was that the reason you decided to homeschool?”

No where is fear exhibited more then when it comes to our children. Fear for our children permeates the very air we breathe in, our very consciousness.

We’ll do anything to protect them from dangers real or imagined; so much so that in the end we might be depriving them of ‘scope for imagination,’ (to borrow a well loved phrase from Anne of Green Gables), and the space necessary for development towards maturity.

It’s got to the point where we actually expect bad things to happen. Take something as essential as a place to play in- the park.

“Look at what’s happening to all the parks,” my daughter wails. “They’ve taken all the good stuff out and now they’re all babyish. All the challenge and excitement is gone. They’re boring!!”

A song by singer-song writer Bob Snider comes to mind. The song is essentially about a child having a fantastic place to grow up in- crab apple trees, raspberry bushes, a creek, robin eggs and salamanders to investigate and study, an abandoned shack, hills to roll about in.

What do they do? They leveled the land, built a couple of mounds and “put up a plaque saying no ball playing and nobody ever went there anymore.”

What’s worse than your child getting abducted or dying? “Nothing,” says Hern who admits that he would never allow his 11 year old daughter to walk home alone from school as he did when he was her age and even younger, although by his own judgment, she is “far more savvy and competent then I was.”

We know abduction is “over rated and that our level of fear doesn’t equate to the fact that in Canada, 3 kids a year get abducted,” Hern comments. Our fear is exaggerated.

It’s a distorted view that gets presented and that’s largely the fault of the media- ever ready to drum up sensationalism and how dangerous it is out there.

Hern refers to his home town where currently, there’s a tremendous push called ‘Project Civil Society’ to clean up the down town and the talk is centered on how dangerous the city has become.

The argument isn’t about there are too many poor people. Rather it’s about the city looking bad. Spitting and panhandling; “But if you look at every single statistic from violent crime to youth crime, to property crime all are down massively. In the same way we know the fear of abduction is overrated, still it’s in the foreground of our minds.”

Hern shares a personal experience; while at a summer horse camp, his daughter fell of a horse and broke her arm. What does that mean? he questions. Does that mean that no one should ever ride that horse again? Does that mean that I should sue them for not taking proper care?

The fact is “stuff happens. It’s part of life. Now would I be saying the same thing if she had fallen off and got brain injury and can’t feed herself. Would I be so sanguine then? Even if my kid had died, hopefully I would have the grace to not say that little girls should stop riding horses.”

It’s when we begin to reduce life to this “one big algorithm where it’s worth it or not,” as Hern puts it, that we get into a whole lot of trouble; distortions begin to arise when we talk about ethical or political decisions about what’s a good life.

“And when we begin to put it in that kind of catastrophic format, everything begins to tighten and narrow and of course nothing is worth it,” Hern reflects. “That’s not the place to make decisions. We have to be making ethical decisions first.”

We can’t allow safety discourses to over run all our rationality and all our ethical thinking.

Because what’s a good childhood? Hern has a ready reply; “One where kids can ride horses and climb trees. Do some kids get hurt? Yep. That’s the way it is.”

If we think back to our own childhoods, many of us will agree that we actively sought out challenging situations for ourselves; if there weren’t any, we’d create them. We would dare and double dare each other, we would go exploring, dig for buried treasure, seek the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, rescue the prisoner from the dragon’s lair.

Our favorite books were about children on exciting adventures, testing their mettle, overcoming adversary. Excited by their bravery, we’d try to emulate our most admired characters. Who would want less for their own children?

If the idea is to raise our children to be responsible adults, risk-takers (that’s almost become a dirty word now) then they are going to require a lot more room in which to practice responsibility, “because when there are so many rules the adventure becomes breaking the rules not the adventure itself,” observes Hern. “And the result is kids end up with such a tiny space that their capacity for self reliance is completely muted.”

If kids don’t have opportunities to play more freely, if they aren’t allowed to explore and test their own limits to test the limits of their physicality, “they are never going to be able to do develop those capacities for making good decisions; and ironically the kind of decisions that they can keep themselves from harm more or less,” adds Hern.

We could, as Hern does, extrapolate the larger ideas about learning. Children have got to be able to explore different fields, delve into different areas of interest, begin to learn what they like or don’t like, how they thrive. They need to be able to do that themselves.

You want kids to learn for themselves and make decisions, but it doesn’t mean ‘carte blanche’ either warns Hern. “Obviously, you’re not going to let you kid wander out in traffic to learn about the power of cars. Parents and mentors have their roles too.”

More importantly, “it’s recognizing that we are slowing down our kids at an incredibly quick rate. It means that we should be looking really carefully at the restrictions we place on our kids and asking why?”

As it is, parents (and schools) have taken on a managerial role, “as if kids were stock portfolio; where we begin to pick and choose the right choices, what options the best possibility for success,” Hern observes, “and I think it leads us all kinds’ inhumane ways to think about our kids. They are enigmatic and weird yet human- we’ve got to be able to think about kids as people that are human in and to themselves.”

In conclusion, what Hern offers is the proposition that we should never let safety trump ethical decision making- it should be part of it but never the thing that always wins. Hern’s advice is that instead of looking at safety as an unassailable good we need to be looking at it as one more factor in our decision making.

He suggests that we keep this difficult conversation open and on-going at all levels; “we need to talk about it and say the thing that nobody wants to hear; that the safe choice is not the right choice all the time. It rarely is.”

cob inside and out

COB BUILDING

Interviews - Georgie Donais (pictured), Cob builder, (Dufferin Grove Park, Toronto) Community Activist, Dancer, Graphic Designer. She and her husband unschool two children.

- Bronwyn (who loves cats)

Music - boil the breakfast early, the Chieftains, Best Of
- the Alberta Homesteader, Alan Mills, Classic Canadian Folksongs from Smithsonian/Folkways

DOWNLOAD THE SHOW HERE

My family and other Animals; Movie Review

Have you seen this movie? It's put out by the BBC Drama and it's about the life of home-educated British naturalist Gerald Durrell. My family watched it twice over the weekend. It's a heartwarming, funny narration of an eccentric family, who trade the damp weather of pre-WWII England for time on sun-shiny Corfu.

It's the perfect place for a budding scientist and Jerry thrives in this climate of abundance; bugs and much freedom to romp in the beautiful natural world. His older siblings, although often exasperated by one another's tendencies and personalities, allow one another to be who they are-and their mother is a brilliant example of good unschooling practise- "if you can control your children you're doing something wrong."

Hear hear!

today...

While other children are in school, you might find these un-school kids climbing trees. Or testing the ride on the new "articulated" buses sitting at the "swivel" joint. Or eating brownies in a cafe. Depositing money in the credit union. Walking through the woods touching "touch me not" seed pods and recoiling in shock when seeds explode in a burst of green, unwinding energy. Or more mundanely, picking up their reserved books at the library. Or helping carry groceries in the backpacks. Or just walking along with a contented parent, holding hands and chatting.
Not everyday is this good. But let me mark it down as possible, and more, truly lived experience.

LIVE...with the DOCTOR

Radio Free School checks in at the CFMU "tent" at McMaster during "Clubs Fest, 2007" today, while "Doctor Don" looks on from his perch in the host chair.
In typical Radio Free School live fashion we fumbled our way through the half hour with: some dead air, some confused commands, some bad passes of the headphones, and that was the first 10 minutes...
We still had a decent time, but we much prefer to do the show on audacity first, editing out those things we don't want (see above).
Live Radio is a blast, but you kind of need to be in shape for it.

Radio Free school Interview; Grace Llwellyn and Beatrice Ekwa Ekoko

Listen to the interview

May 2003- May 2004; Guerilla learning with Grace Llwellyn show 36

I wrote a book called the Teenage liberation Handbook; how to quite school and get a real life. I ran a summer camp for home school teenagers and I‘ve done some other writing books, and other work with homeschoolers especially teenagers.

Why the interest with teenagers in particular?

For me, personally it’s probably that when I was a teenager that was a really important transformative time for me and so I chose to go on and teach school with teenagers. And so when I got out and started working with homeschoolers it was a logical continuation of that.

I think a lot of people, when they are teenagers, it’s kind of the first time they are looking around and thinking about defining themselves as human beings- it’s such a very powerful time and I felt drawn to work with kids at that stage.

What do you think that teenagers need that society just isn’t providing?

Well, a lot of things. One is the opportunity to be involved in a meaningful way; to contribute something to society- not to just be passive recipients of education. I think that they also a little more visionary leadership from adults in terms of helping them see what some of their options would be and just more support in developing skills and working towards their own goals. I guess I see it as it is now, you know there’s a lot of pressure put on them but it is not necessarily in the interest of goals that are really meaningful for them.

In the case of homeschooling kids, when they reach age 14 or so, they really want to go to school. What’s going on?

I think it really is about having a meaningful alternative and it’s kind of trite but I think it’s true that when kids become teenagers it’s very important to them to have a peer group. And sometimes if they don’t see ways that that is possible outside of school then they want to go to school for that reason. With a lot of the kids that I know, it really seems that that’s one of the main motivations. That’s one of the reasons that I started my camp; because even though the kids come form all over so they are not going home to a community of people, it’s not providing them with friends geographically near them, it still helps them have that sense of connection to other teenagers who are out of school. The culture is just soooooo strong about ‘we go to school. That’s what we do,’ and a lot of teenagers start to wonder if they have never been in school, what is this thing that I’m missing out on? Would I really measure up if I were in it? Is it okay that I’m out of school? I think a lot of kids just want to try it out. And I’ve recently been in dialogue with some people in their 20s who were homeschooled as teenagers and some of them wanted to try school when they were teenagers and their parents let them. They just tried it and they realized that ‘oh! Okay. This is what all the fuss is about.’ and ‘I think I’ll get out again.’ and now they feel great about having homeschooled.

And two people in their late 20s that I’ve recently been talking with, their parents didn’t let them try school and they still to this day wonder you know, ‘well. What would it have been like?” So I think for some kids there’s really a need to prove themselves to check out what is this thing that everybody else in our society does because there’s curiosity and wondering about what they are missing out on. And for a lot of them, that runs it’s course if they are allowed to explore it.

I imagine that it’s really about drawing out a teenager, helping the teenager to articulate some goals and visions and then to find ways to support that person in growing in those ways. And for some kids that means letting them go away to do something for a while. And that can be scary for some parents- it doesn’t have to mean that. But it definitely is a transition time; and families that try to keep doing it the way they did when the kids were younger often run into resistance because it’s such a time of transformation.

And depending on what the relationships are like- sometimes it really helps to bring in a third party, another adult who both the parent and the teenager respect or feel comfortable with and let that person help draw out the teenager and help that teenager form some ideas about what their direction should be in life and then help brainstorm ways to support the kid in realizing some of that. I think it really helps to have some intentional leadership on the part of adults; not in the sense of like, ‘okay. This is what you are going to do now,’ but ‘okay. You’re older now and it’s a new time in your life. And I want to help you in studying some new intentions and articulating some goals. How can I best support you in that?’ taking leadership in that way.

I had no idea that my first book The teenage Liberation Handbook would have any where near as much impact as it had. When I just finished writing it, and it wasn’t printed yet and I was talking with my brothers I said, ‘oh. That would be so great if one person reads this book and it has an impact on them! Could you imagine if people actually read this book and got out of school and..’

And my brothers who thought that it was a great book said, ‘Yeah. That would be pretty cool. It won’t happen of course because it’s just too radical but..Yeah it’s a nice thought.’

It was just important for me to write it. It felt like what was true for me and sort of what I was called to do at the time. So then to be met with a really positive response was great and amazing. I still get a lot of response and it seems to continue to impact people’s lives and I feel really fortunate to have been in that position to have been able to do that.

And my second book Real Lives has also been pretty impactful. It hasn’t sold nearly as much copies- 10% maybe. But I didn’t actually write it. It’s a collection of essays by teenagers who are homeschooling. I think it’s really important because these kids telling their own stories in some depth and I think it helps to demystify for people who aren’t familiar with what can go on. It helps give a really rich sense of some of the different possibilities. So I would like more people to get their hands on that book.

So would you call your approach to living and learning, if you had to define it, anarchistic?

Anarchistic? Ten years ago I probably would have but no. I don’t think I would use that term now. I’m not sure what term I would use. I would call it natural. Like looking for what is natural in a human being and even in creating a healthy society I would call it creative in the sense that - like I don’t know if you are familiar with a book called Cultural Creative it’s kind of a hot book in this country in the last few years and it makes a point that we often tend to think in terms of classes. There’s the professional class, there’s the working class but that there is sort of a separate class- the creative class that’s shaping some new directions, that really doesn’t thinking terms of conforming or fitting into society as it’s already established but rather thinks in terms of ‘how can I live my life?’ or ‘how can I learn in such a way that maybe I’m pioneering new ground, and creating a new society.’ So in that sense I would call it creative, natural- wanting to support a really natural way of learning and developing. I mean I could use the term anarchistic in the sense that it’s so much about leadership from the ground up. You know, individual people discovering what’s right for them and following their own path rather than top down, rather than following a system dictating how we should live our lives and how we should learn.

I would love to see us as a society not thinking in terms of education but rather thinking in terms of life. I would love to see a very broad spectrum. I would love to see all of the fruits and vegetables in the grocery store are grown organically.

I think that we tend to see things in boxes, in categories that really don’t belong in boxes and categories. When people say ‘education’ I like to say, well if you substitute the term ‘life’ for education, or every time you say the word ‘education’ and ‘learning,’ substitute the word ‘life,’ and see how that makes you look at things differently. In terms of our society, I would love to see us think less in terms of categories- over here we have health, over there we have learning, over here we have work. I would love to see a less institutional society and more integrated society.

I know that also, you have written a book, which I haven’t read yet. But the African American dimension. I thought we could talk a little bit about that too.

That book hasn’t sold many copies and I feel sad about that because the response that it has gotten has been really positive. For one thing, I wish that more homeschoolers in general would read that book because I think that it’s good for us all to be aware of ways that we can be more welcoming and understand what is true for sub groups of the homeschooling community. Yeah. I think that in the African American community, traditionally there is such a high value placed on education and that translates to schooling. So I would just love to see more African Americans reading the book even if they ultimately chose to stay within the system. I would just love to see more dialogue on that issue. People seem to be way less interested in that book then in my other books but I think it’s a really really important book and I really enjoyed working with the writers on it so it was a fun one for me to do.

There is one thing I wanted to know more about- The not back to school camp. How did you get the idea to do that?

It was kind of a circuitous path. I taught school for three years before I wrote the teenage liberation handbook and although I had a lot of difficulty being in a school I really loved working with teenagers. And I missed that a lot and after I quit, for a while I felt satisfied with the correspondence I had with a lot of teenagers after they started writing to me, after they read my book. But pretty soon I thought, ah! I never work with kids one on one anymore. So I first opened a resource center here in Eugene, Oregon for mostly teenage homeschoolers with the thought that then I would get the pleasure of working with kids in person again.

And that had its ups and downs. It never really got off the ground. Another thing was that I was travelling a bunch of the time and speaking at different homeschooling conferences and I would meet these groups of kids like a group in Minnesota and talk about taking a bicycle trip across several different states. And then I would be in California and I’d meet a girl who just built her own bike and I would think, ‘oh! I wish those two kids could meet each other.’ So it was a combination for me personally, wanting to have more contact with these kids and to not get too abstract in my head about what was true. I wanted to have flesh and blood contact with these kids. And then I thought it would be great for them to meet each other more. And it’s been really fun, I love doing it. It’s a lot of work, kinda crazy but it’s really rewarding for me and inspiring for the kids particularly to meet each other.

So what are some of the things that kids get to do?

It’s very much a co-created week. So we invite any one who comes to teach a workshop on something that they love. That’s probably about 60% of the participants will teach a workshop during the day time. We have workshop slots, and at any particular time you can choose between four or five workshop that could range from identifying wild edible plants to math games, to beginning Japanese to making jewelry. It really depends on what people are interested in. And then we have talent shows in the evenings where kids get up and perform. And it ranges from professional musicians who have been touring for 3 years by the time they are 17, to kids who have just never- maybe they took their first tap dancing lesson 3 weeks ago. So they are complete beginners. But everyone is received with great appreciation and it’s a very encouraging time for kids. They get affirmed. It’s extremely supportive and I love that about homeschoolers, they tend to be very warm. They’re not spending their time in an institution where they are competing with each other for grades or for popularity so they tend to be much more relaxes socially then school kids so it’s really a pleasure to see them support each other, welcome each other. New campers get mobbed with hugs and welcomes when they first arrive. Normally people are 13, sometimes we take them younger when we know they and their parents understand what it’s all about.

Where do you see you future work heading?

Well I’m working on a book now, that feels pretty important to me and it may be that when I finish it I think okay. That’s the end of a chapter in my life. This book is kind of a parallel to my first book. It’s a book for teenagers. For kids who are in the school system and for what ever reason, are going to stay there. I feel that it’s important to show them okay- there you are. What are your choices right there? I’m working on that for a while and it’s a pretty interesting process and I think it will take me a year. And then, I don’t know what I’m going to do. I know I’ll keep running my camp but other then that I may take off in a whole new direction. I’ve been interested in counseling and learning about psychology. Maybe go to India!

Guerrilla Learning; How to give your kids a real education with or without school. By Grace Llewellyn and Amy Silver.

Grace and Amy have had enough of the ivory tower that is un-schooling and home based learning which hoards it’s knowledge of how children really learn, for the precious few. So they have set out to blast out our secrets to clueless schoolers with their book Guerrilla Learning; How to give your kids a real education with or without school. They are selling the goods to anyone who wants them; all can now enjoy the exciting methods of imparting knowledge that is inherent to this approach. Home based learning, natural learning, life long learning, interest based learning, call it what you will, it works. Even if it isn’t a reality for you, you can still find ways to benefit from the world we un-schoolers dwell in, we who have already reclaimed our right to directing our own learning. 

I mean, it is becoming obvious to mainstreamers from all walks of life that these non intrusive ways of educating kids are hugely successful- Broadly speaking home based learners are indeed a resourceful bunch; generally these families know their kids very well. They know their talents, their interests, and they usually can find ways in which to fuel their passions further. They are very good at searching out opportunities for their kids and being supportive of their interests too. 

Amy and Grace want to impart some of this know-how to all of you on the outside, so that your kids won’t loose out on the miracle that is learning beyond institutions and the system.

What’s that I hear from the non-schoolers? You mean this doesn’t sound like your happy homeschool? Do I hear anxious sounds of uncertainty and self doubt? Panic in the rear? Don’t worry! If the well has dried up, the “fire to kindle’ never got pass the spark, even you, the un-schooling family will gain a boost from immersing your selves in this book. (Admit it- it does happens- we get lazy and loose too you know. So you can wipe the smirks of your faces, un-schoolers, and don’t be in such a hurry to dismiss this book). “Guerrilla Learning” is at your service and to the rescue!

So what is this book all about? Well, to help you change your stagnant and long outdated ways of thinking about education and how you get it, these fine gals have proposed five basic keys to guerrilla learning whether your kids are in or out of the dungeon called school. (By the way they nicked the phrase “guerrilla learning” of John Taylor Gatto. 

If you don’t know who that is, it’s up to you to find out). These are opportunity, timing, interest, freedom, and support.

Opportunity. More fundamental than attending elite schools and universities is a person’s “attitude, sense of personal power and possibility, and comfortable familiarity with a wide range of subjects and activities.” So as they say, “ read. Write. Talk. Play music together. Go see dance and theater and paintings. Read poetry, write poetry..build things... Provide them with resources, materials, people, places to go to of course. But “do these only out of love.”

Next is timing. “If we could wave a magic wand and change American schools, we would change this: the idea that earlier is better, that there is some intrinsic value in children’s learning things (1) on cue and (2) early. Our experience, and a large body of research in developmental psychology, insists that there is enormous, mostly unrecognized value in children simply being allowed to learn things when they are ready,” they write. And then go into detail.

Interest- jump on it when it rears it’s inquisitive heads. Don’t wait until it dies away. But don’t be too pushy- the child must own her own interest. You might not even recognize it for what it is. Amy and Grace to the rescue again. Don’t overlook or under rate your child’s interest- just because it doesn’t fit your narrow system of evaluation. Yeah, it’s video game all day long, or sexist comic strips- but there might be a diamond in the rough for all you know. Build on this interest.

Freedom. Ah freedom, the biggy! We never give them enough of it. It’s always hurry, hurry, hurry. But let them have the time and space to move as they wish, to choose, when, where and how. The freedom of choice to discover and follow their own interests and impulses and to “commit oneself.” We need to stop being the nosy parkers that we are and mind our own businesses if you please.

Next is support. What’s the use of being brilliant if there is no support mechanism to bloom in? This means explaining, celebrating, witnessing and listening, listening, even when you are bone tired and not in the mood.

Each of these five keys are covered in depth with exercises you the adult can complete at the end of each key ( this is a self-help book after all) to get the old juices flowing.

The book is packed with resources, books to read, web sites to go to for inspiration, ideas to get things rolling; arts for example- art museums, galleries- keep art supplies handy at all times, explore architecture ,textile design, film making, jewelry making, statues at the park, sing songs together, play music. The list goes on...Physical science- stock up on science experiment books, simple equipment, hand lens, graph paper, anatomy charts, newspapers that include astronomy news. “Choose a small space in your house to transform into a cornucopia of science inspiration...cover hall ways with inviting, informative charts, maps or posters about dinosaurs, the phases of the moon, the wild flowers of your region...” 

In a helpful fashion, the book relates concepts and ideas back to Amy’s kids, Grace’s experiences and other parents input.

The book ends with appendices of valuable information which include alternatives to traditional schooling for those who don’t have the guts to un-school. Also included are organizations that promote alternative learning such as “Creating Learning Communities”, EnCompass, Power to the Youth and Genius Tribe, started up by Grace Llewellyn herself.

Guerrilla Learning is about getting for your kids a real education with or without school as the rest of the title says. It’s also about changing your own self- getting into the thrill and joy of following your muse to quote a cliche.

Guerrilla Learning is an absolute gold mine. It is a must for any family who cares about their children’s education, and honouring their children’s calling. Pick it up at your local library, buy it if you can. Beg, borrow or steal but get it. You’ll be sorry if you don’t!

*****

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc 2001

guerrilla gardeners

guerrilla gardens - hear the show here (AKA "creeping gardens, and other popular crimes")

interviews - beatrice ekoko, climate change challenge project manager, environment hamilton
- andy brown, guerrilla gardener, toronto public space committee

book review - the prophet of yonwood, by Jeanne DuPrau, reviewed by Bronwyn

music - fall on me, REM, Lifes Rich Pageant

tech - beatrice and randy

"...they should not play life, or study it merely, while the community supports them at this expensive game, but earnestly live it from beginning to end. How could youths better learn to live than by at once trying the experiment of living?"

Henry David Thoreau

wild dining

THIS WEEK'S SHOW:

download it here: http://www.radio4all.net/proginfo.php?id=24367

interview - Dieter Staudinger, Spiritual Psychotherapist (pictured with the kids)

music - How Deep In The Valley, Sarah Harmer, I'm a Mountain

tech - beatrice ekoko, randy kay

"Education ought to be viewed as a process of development and exploration, rather than as one of repressing a child's instincts and inculcating obedience and discipline. Children learn best when they feel good about themselves, others, and the world. The best education, therefore, would orient the child to the world, facilitating the child's learning from others and from his or her environment. Furthermore, it would engage children as fully as possible (taking advantage of all the senses), encouraging them to develop and value their own abilities as well as to cooperate with others. Education, that is, should be active, noncompetitive, and as nondirective as possible, relying heavily on children's natural curiosity."

Free Women of Spain, Martha A. Ackelsberg.

carpet crawlers

Bugging the Entomologist
Wednesday, August 8, 2007


interview - Marvin Gunderman, Technical Coordinator, Curator of Entomology, Insect Taxonomist, Dept. of Biology, McMaster University

music - "carpet crawlers", Genesis, Lamb Lies Down

edit - randy

download as MP3/Podcast: http://www.radio4all.net/proginfo.php?id=24178

Final Harry Potter tome is "greenest book in publishing history"

This is a neat piece of information fro those who environmentalists who love Harry Potter;

The final installment of the mugglicious series is said to be the greenest book in publishing history -- a good thing, since it's set sales records at retailers like Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble. Sixteen publishers around the world used eco-friendly paper for the edition, including U.S. publisher Scholastic, which went the conventional route for the last Harry book and faced a boycott as a result. In all, says Markets Initiative, a Vancouver-based group that helps publishers go green, the switch for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows has saved nearly 200,000 trees and avoided almost 8,700 tons of carbon dioxide emissions.
This from the Daily Grist, July 20th

Book Review

Discipline without Distress; 135 tools for raising caring, responsible children without time-out, spanking, punishment or bribery by Judy Arnall (2007)

If you've run out of ideas on what to do when your kid is driving you up the wall and hanging him out the window by his ankles is looking like a reasonable thing to do, if you feel like you've forgotten any wise parenting knowledge you ever had, or if the case is that you've never had any in the first place then Discipline Without Distress by Judy Arnall could be the book for you.

If you can be self-disciplined enough to plough through its many pages, you will discover therein, a veritable gold mine of helpful tips to assist you in your parenting journey.

“Parenting is the hardest job on earth,” Arnall doesn't need to tell us that but the premisses of her book underlines that which we often fail to see; We are not raising children. We are raising adults.”

And what we do today, how we respond to our children in the immediate, corresponds to the adult of tomorrow.

So what Arnall advices us to focuses on is relationship building with our child. This is the most important idea in the entire book. The parenting relationship is a love relationship; “ Just remember Newton's law: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. There are two people in your relationship, you and your child, and at the end of the day, your relationship is all you have,” warns Arnall.

What is necessary then, is that you treat your child “with the respect you would afford an adult in today's society.”

Punishment is not part of the picture- you can discipline your child and maintain good communication without it.

Which brings me to the word discipline; for many its not a comfortable word. It often connotes the idea of control, can bring up painful memories of spankings and yellings, it can remind us that we are fearful our children have no regard for our values!

But Arnall brings new meaning to the word- it's about respecting each other, it's about a democratic nurturing way of parenting. It's also about self discipline for both parent and child. It's fundamental to living in a healthful relationships with others and we can all learn it in a kind and loving way.

An in depth look at anger triggers, behaviour problems, the need to model what we expect our children to be like, all these are invaluable tools and advice for the adult interested in preserving intact the precious parent child bond.

By BEE

copyright 2007 by Judy Arnall jarnall@shaw.ca

www.professionalparenting.ca

Mischief Managed

Well, we just managed to pull the Potter show together after staying up past the bus hours with a bunch of potter fans at Bryan Prince Book Seller's Potter Party in our little part of the world.

Prince's Bookstore is a tiny narrow shop in a walkable community (Westdale) and features high shelves that patrons ascend on a movable ladder. Diagon Alley material, for sure. And of course owner operated by the marvellous man Bryan, and his wonderful staff.

He bought pizza for 500 people.

We ate it up and came up with this: Waiting for Potter

Sorry to the lady who asked me for I.D. when I was trying to interview the kids... I.D. ...at a dress up party! (I was wearing a cape and a fake moustache at the time)

Muggles! They are so suspicious.

The show is more of a dip into fandom, a brush with hype, and a bunch of nice people wearing funny clothes and buying books.

Click on the magic link (above) to find the show and download it.

Now that you've finished the book...

Potter Party

Trelawny, and many potter fans in costume partied at Bryan Prince Books in Hamilton tonight. The party included a fortune teller, games and prizes, and fodder for an upcoming radio free school show. Only one parent rescued her children from being interviewed by a grown man with a badly drawn mustache and a video camera (two kids actually approached to guess that your's truly was dressed as Professor Lupin.)
More later, since the party went on beyond midnight (as it should) and we cabbed home late late late.
Funniest was the two kids dressed as Potter who got sorted into Slytherin (which coincidentally was my house).
Like I said: more later!

ministry approved curriculum

Dolores Umbridge: Your previous instruction in this subject has been disturbingly uneven. But you will be pleased to know from now on, you will be following a carefully structured, Ministry-approved course of defensive magic. Yes?

Hermione Granger: There's nothing in here about using defensive spells.

Dolores Umbridge: Using spells? Ha ha! Well I can't imagine why you would need to use spells in my classroom.

Ron Weasley: We're not gonna use magic?

Dolores Umbridge: You will be learning about defensive spells in a secure, risk-free way.

Harry Potter: Well, what use is that? If we're gonna be attacked it won't be risk-free.

Dolores Umbridge: Students will raise their hands when they speak in my class.
[pauses]

Dolores Umbridge: It is the view of the Ministry that a theoretical knowledge will be sufficient to get you through your examinations, which after all, is what school is all about.

Harry Potter: And how is theory supposed to prepare us for what's out there?

Dolores Umbridge: There is nothing out there, dear! Who do you imagine would want to attack children like yourself?

Harry Potter: I don't know, maybe, Lord Voldemort!

C, eh? N, eh? D, eh?

People say "How will the kids be part of the culture if they don't go to school?" "How will they be good citizens if they don't have a civic education from school?"

First of all, "are you talking about pop culture?" is what I'll ask. Because if you are, I can tell you, you can't avoid it (Unless you live in a basement and never see the light of day).

Believe me, I've tried. My kids don't go to school and we don't even watch tv. Yet.... they know everything about the latest fashions in clothing styles, they know Brat dolls, My scene dolls, Barbies, Sponge Bob. They know Hello Kitty and Hilary Duff. They know Disney world, Polly dolls, Build a bear, Canada Wonderland. Crocs, 'My story is makeover. I'm revealing my ignorance here- because I don't know the half of it. But you get the point.

My daughters get all the pop I can take courtesy of our neighbour. This little girl knows more about what is in then most 16 year olds. And she is 9!

So maybe you're talking Canadian culture? Maple syrup. Hockey. Cottage country in the summer. Soccer in the summer. Tobogganing in the winter? CBC radio? Canoing? But you obviously don't need to go to school to be exposed to these.

As to civic education, my response is that civics is active. It is current. Sitting in a classroom is not- that's passive and is not very empowering.

Frankly, parents who have their kids out of school are actually more likely to follow current events and expose their children to what is happening in the world. The very decision to home educate doesn't come easily. A great deal of thought is put into it. It's a responsibility that home education parents don't take lightly. If they've made that decision you can pretty much guarantee they are enlightened enough to allow their children to question everything- including authority.

More likely us not, unschooled kids are encouraged to consider how the world around them operates, how it affects them personally, what could be different about it. How can they impact it in turn.

The bigger questions are asked- the environment, freedom of speech, freedom to pursue your own education...These are not light ideas. They are powerful and empowering.

I think that's what a civic education at school might lack. It's just not dynamic enough in the sense that kids feel they can make a difference in their community - which is where it all begins right?

by BEE

Notes:

This is from my 11 year old daughter (E.K.) who likes to get her history and Geography lessons from reading fiction books. Right now she is reading Dear Canada Diaries ( all written by Canadian authors) such as Not a nickel to spare, If I die before I wake. A prairie as wide as the sea. No safe harbour. Winter of Peril. with nothing but Our Courage. Brothers far from home. Orphan at my door.

She says about this series "Awesome! So many facts. Especially No safe harbour and If I die before I wake. Both are tragic and about huge loses. If I die about the flu pandemic caused more death than the Great War. (WW1) No safe harbour tells the story of the Halifax explosion. Better than My Canadian Girl- which reaches out to young readers. The Dear Canada Diaries are more for my age."

...why?

Why Grass? Why pesticides? Why cut? Why stripes?
O, for a future that lets nature back in!

whole lotta gardens and trees and things

this week on radio free school:

plant & page
download it here

interviews
- Caleb in his garden
- Randy and Bronwyn in their container garden
- Juby Lee and James during the Dundas Tree Count Inventory (Environment Hamilton project)

reading
- Madeleine reads Ladybug Garden by Celia Godkin

music
- Daybreak, Harry Nilsson, Everybody's Talking (Very Best of)
- Field Holler, Back Roads to Cold Mountain, T.J. Chesser
- glockenspiel impromptu, Evelyna
- Bimba dagli occhi, Madama Butterfly, Puccini

(the show has really nothing to do with Robert and Jimmy, but boy, do they rock!)

Summer smile

Caleb gets into the (belated) summer solstice spirit with a berry-smeared chin and a lovely smile!

sounds

The learning curve on new sound editing software (audacity) is cresting, so we hope the quality of the show recordings are heading back into the "good" range as we figure things out.

There are always challenges to getting it right including: our recording equipment (a digital video camera) is six years old and acting older with loose connections that make the audio good or bad depending on how you shake it; competing with child-generated music and general household noise while trying to edit the show, and (partly due to the previous reason) the fact that we often edit in the wee hours after long days of work.

But when the equipment is working, and the humans at the controls are awake, we hope to get the highest possible quality sound out to the airwaves and to the net for you.

You can help by letting us know what you think, about anything we are doing with radio free school. Anytime.

radiofreeschool (at) gmail (dot) com