Unschooling and this List

I've sometimes wondered why we don't see much about what unschoolers are doing here on this list. We're primarily unschooling and I'm interested in how other unschoolers live life.

Of course, we unschoolers don't have as much to say. We don't have curriculums per se, nor do we teach. We can't easily encapsulate our home-schooling experiences. We can talk about what our children are doing, and how amazingly well unschooling seems to be serving them. We can talk about ideas and the way we think, trying to prepare ourselves for the inevitable questions. We can talk about resources, so that our children will be able to find answers when they want them.

Perhaps this is why ideas are discussed on this list with fire and passion. We are working on our own minds, learning if you will, how ideas interact so that we can guide or follow our children in their learning. I see these meta-discussions as a very important part of this list, more important than dusty old curriculums.

For example, someone, a long time ago, posted a thought about a parent's role being to provide stories (I'd call them myths) for their children. As a person with a poetic bent, the idea that we provide metaphors for our children to think with is very exciting.

Ben Wolfe's recent post about the evolution of ideas (well, he didn't call it that, but that's where it fits in my mental map) was also exciting. It's almost as difficult for me to imagine being a twelfth century Dutch peasant as it is to imagine being a trilobite. And I'm noted for my vivid imagination. It's the little things that trip me up. What would it mean not to know how to read? How would living in one small geographical area (never going more than 5 miles from my birthplace) affect my worldview?

I enjoyed the whole Jefferson thread. To me, it brings up important issues. How do we reconcile slavery with the ideals upon which this country was based? This is an important question and one that I believe has a pretty shameful answer. Many of the Founding Fathers didn't regard black people as human. They came out of a culture that didn't regard women as human, either. I think this is very important. Much of the history of our country was made by groups of people who desired to be included as full citizens, to enjoy fully human status.

So, here's one vote for more discussion of ideas. I believe that they're very appropriate for homeschoolers. After all, we are demonstrating lifelong learning, which is something I want my children to emulate.