I suppose that you want your children to have knowledge at least comparable with a decent high-school student. And then, as adults they can decide whether they want to study at university, but they should be ready if they choose so. (This is what I would want for my children.) I have no experience with unschooling, because it’s illegal in my country, so maybe I’m missing something obvious, but here is what I imagine:
For simple things, like grades 1-4 of elementary school, teaching your children should be trivial, except that it takes a lot of time, and depending on their temper, perhaps a lot of patience. Probably not possible if both parents work full-time, but should be possible if one of them stays at home or works half-time.
For the rest of elementary school, and for high school, teaching your children is possible and not very dificult, but also not trivial. You would need some preparation; maybe there is a subject that you didn’t understand well at high school; maybe your children will want to learn a foreign language you don’t speak or something else outside of your competence (for many parents, computer science would be a good example). Good part is, your children can already read, so you just have to give them good materials and make sure they use it.
Still there is a problem of choosing the right studying materials. (In my opinion, this is a very important task of school system. Teaching per se is often done badly, some students would be better with a book and/or internet. Problem is, there is a lot of nonsense published, and as a total beginner you have problems to separate good resources from bad resources. Selecting the good resources and providing you with a top-level view is an important thing school does. Another good thing is contacting you with people who study the same thing at the same time.) How do you want to solve this part, especially in subjects which are not an area of expertise of neither you nor your wife? Though even for an expert it may be difficult to recommend a study material accessible for a newbie. First idea is Khan Academy, what else?
That sounds like homeschooling. The difference for unschooling is, you don’t use “learning resources”.
Kids who aren’t exposed to the soul-crushing institution that is school, will learn things on their own. Having someone around to help them learn how to use reference materials and teach them to read is a good idea, but that’s about all they need. Unschooled children tend to do better and be brighter than schooled children (though most of that might just be selection effects). I know several siblings who were unschooled, and they’re all very interesting, intelligent people who are very well-adjusted.
It’s particularly helpful if you bring them around and do whatever activities they’re interested in together.
Please note that I don’t overestimate the quality of school system (I was a teacher and then I quit, because I felt the system is hopeless), and I also do not underestimate natural curiosity, especially of a child that has intelligent parents, so is naturally exposed to talk about interesting topics. Here are my two pieces of evidence:
Montessori education is based on giving children great freedom, and only providing them interesting learning tools. Are you saying that removing those tools would make education even more efficient?
Internet is full of distractions. Many people on LW suffer from procrastination (see, we even have a special word for “spending all your time on internet, accomplishing nothing”). I thank Bayes for not having internet access when I was of school age. Today many children play online games all day long. What makes you think that a child will be able to resist all that?
What learning resources will you use?
I suppose that you want your children to have knowledge at least comparable with a decent high-school student. And then, as adults they can decide whether they want to study at university, but they should be ready if they choose so. (This is what I would want for my children.) I have no experience with unschooling, because it’s illegal in my country, so maybe I’m missing something obvious, but here is what I imagine:
For simple things, like grades 1-4 of elementary school, teaching your children should be trivial, except that it takes a lot of time, and depending on their temper, perhaps a lot of patience. Probably not possible if both parents work full-time, but should be possible if one of them stays at home or works half-time.
For the rest of elementary school, and for high school, teaching your children is possible and not very dificult, but also not trivial. You would need some preparation; maybe there is a subject that you didn’t understand well at high school; maybe your children will want to learn a foreign language you don’t speak or something else outside of your competence (for many parents, computer science would be a good example). Good part is, your children can already read, so you just have to give them good materials and make sure they use it.
Still there is a problem of choosing the right studying materials. (In my opinion, this is a very important task of school system. Teaching per se is often done badly, some students would be better with a book and/or internet. Problem is, there is a lot of nonsense published, and as a total beginner you have problems to separate good resources from bad resources. Selecting the good resources and providing you with a top-level view is an important thing school does. Another good thing is contacting you with people who study the same thing at the same time.) How do you want to solve this part, especially in subjects which are not an area of expertise of neither you nor your wife? Though even for an expert it may be difficult to recommend a study material accessible for a newbie. First idea is Khan Academy, what else?
That sounds like homeschooling. The difference for unschooling is, you don’t use “learning resources”.
Kids who aren’t exposed to the soul-crushing institution that is school, will learn things on their own. Having someone around to help them learn how to use reference materials and teach them to read is a good idea, but that’s about all they need. Unschooled children tend to do better and be brighter than schooled children (though most of that might just be selection effects). I know several siblings who were unschooled, and they’re all very interesting, intelligent people who are very well-adjusted.
It’s particularly helpful if you bring them around and do whatever activities they’re interested in together.
This seems too good to be true.
Please note that I don’t overestimate the quality of school system (I was a teacher and then I quit, because I felt the system is hopeless), and I also do not underestimate natural curiosity, especially of a child that has intelligent parents, so is naturally exposed to talk about interesting topics. Here are my two pieces of evidence:
Montessori education is based on giving children great freedom, and only providing them interesting learning tools. Are you saying that removing those tools would make education even more efficient?
Internet is full of distractions. Many people on LW suffer from procrastination (see, we even have a special word for “spending all your time on internet, accomplishing nothing”). I thank Bayes for not having internet access when I was of school age. Today many children play online games all day long. What makes you think that a child will be able to resist all that?