How Unschooling Works

quote:
The fact is that learning the way schools teach is really hard. It's
why it takes 12 years!

If kids were taught how to build with Legos the way schools teach
everything, they'd first -- before kids had ever seen a Lego or even
had the desire to build with them -- be made to memorize all the
colors Legos come in, then the shapes, then ways Legos could be
connected, then systematically go through architectural styles (since
that would be practical knowledge that could be useful for future
careers), engineering principles. Then the kids would be given plans
and told to put the Legos together exactly according to the
instructions. (Points off for any bricks out of place.) And then the
kids who were truly gifted in sucking up this information would be
allowed free access to Legos.

When your child was first acquiring language, did you worry that
because he wanted to talk about balls and dinosaurs and favorite t-
shirts that he would never be able to discuss how nuclear fission
differs from other forms of radioactive decay?

Think about the non-academic interests he can speak knowledgeably
about and how he acquired that knowledge. Did it come from building
an abstract foundation of knowledge before beginning to tackle what
he was interested in? Or did it come bit by bit picking up more
information as he used what little information he had? Basically
doing something before he understood it.

That's how unschooling works. Kids build up knowledge about what
interests them. They have a vested interest in understanding what
interests them.
unquote
Don't remember the author tho...sorry!