Unschooling and what are you afraid of?

For those of you who never having heard of unschooling, received the extremely biased and negative introduction to the topic from ABC News (Good Morning America) this week as a first exposure, you can be forgiven for your initial outrage at what could be perceived as a irresponsible and negligent way of raising kids.
But my patience stops there.
As I would suggest with my own unschooling kids when confronted with a bewildering issue/question, I want you to dig a little deeper within your own self and ask yourself why is the idea of unschooling getting you upset?

Because, as with every other topic/concern/idea in this world, opinions need to be formed based on intelligent investigation, rather than a reactionary response.
Lets follow then for this occasion, the approach any unschooler child would take. Are you ready? Let me take your hand....

The first lesson, O New Comer, that the unschooling child would demonstrate to you is to approach a new thing with an open mind.

The beginner unschooler would then google the topic (or if he is too young, ask for your help doing this). He would take out books from the library; he would speak to the experts-other unschooling families.
This is known as research.

Find out all you can about the philosophy: this is the act of learning.

We think of it as immersion into the subject matter.
As unschoolers, we are unafraid of spending months, even years on one particular subject area: and this is called developing expertise.
After all, which would you rather:the doctor with loves his job, who is constantly adding to his knowledge and learning new ways to be a better doctor, or the doctor who is not really into doctoring, would prefer to be a playwright and spends most of his time dreaming up scripts?
Questioning, seeking understanding is what the unschooler is raised to do; all of which is natural to humans but gets booted out of people after years of being made to conform.

Are you still with me? Now that you have a better comprehension of the topic, you are now in the position to make an intelligent comment, O Newly Initiated.
From this beginning, a whole new world will begin to unfold. You might learn the history of education in our western culture and that institutionalized public education has only been around for 150 years; you might learn about the Greeks who preferred to learn in groups of 5 or 6 out in the world rather than in a classroom, you might learn about other sorts of educational strategies and opportunities such as apprenticeships, mentors and self education.
You might from there, become interested in history (and this is called following your interest) which might lead you to learn about slavery and how once upon a time, slavery was considered the norm.

Or by following this interest you might discover another passion; the history of women and their contributions and following that you might learn about a scientific method that intrigues you and that you can apply in your work.

When you get to the root of the word, etymologically the word education contains educare (Latin) "bring up", which is related to educere "bring out", "bring forth what is within", "bring out potential" and ducere, "to lead." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education).

You might actually discover that learning is a natural thing; and what is education if not a journey of self discovery; the bringing forth of that which is already there?