The Unschooling Conference 2007 was an UNQUALIFIED success! We thank all of you who attended, and who with your kind attention and commitment to unschooling supported our vision for an event which fostered great conviviality and sharing! Scroll down to see some of the comments we received from participants. If you're curious about what you missed click here to see a photo album of the day !
HERE ARE JUST A SAMPLING OF THE COMMENTS WE RECEIVED:
"Inspirational! I'm going home to learn to play the piano. I've always wanted to...thank you."
"It was refreshing to come to a homeschooling conference that wasn't about academics and took learning way beyond the first 18 years."
"Great support and resource for people starting out like myself."
"Great food!."
"Very comfortable atmostphere and location was eaily accessible despite the driving distance." (This attendee drove more than 100 miles to attend.)
H.O.M.E.
Proudly Presents
Wisconsin's First-Ever Unschooling Conference!
Trusting Our Children, Trusting Ourselves
Living and Learning in John Holt's Legacy
Join us for a day to learn, celebrate and share the joy of being free of
institutionalized learning! Gather with a like-minded community which
supports freedom from curriculums and external authority over what and how
you and your family choose to learn. Contribute your experiences to the
eclectic mix of learners and learning environments.
We welcome all who are interested in, committed to, or curious about unschooling to attend. It is our intention and hope to strengthen and promote the idea that learning is part of life - for our whole lives; that learning is natural and unavoidable. Learning happens all the time!
*DISCOVER, or re-acquaint yourself with the philosophies of John Holt, the
Father of unschooling,*RECOMMIT to the unschooling lifestyle for yourselves and your children,
*EXPLORE the richness offered by home and community-based life-long
learning,*REINFORCE your freedom to choose to pursue learning outside the confines of schedules, curriculums, and external expectations and institutions,
*CONNECT with others who enthusiastically support self-directed learning,
*SHARE your learning experiences,
*RECEIVE guidance for challenges,
*SUPPORT the conference sponsors.
BE PART OF HISTORY; DON'T MISS THE OPPORTUNITY TO BE PART OF THE WISCONSIN'S FIRST-EVER UNSCHOOLING CONFERENCE!
Saturday, February 10, 2007
8AM - 4PM
Meriter Hospital Community Learning Center
202 S. Park Street
Madison, WI
Click here for registration information.
Session Descriptions
Keynote Remarks Possibility in the Face of Probability--Matt Hern
Our institutions, especially those we build for children, both reflect and construct society. If we want a more democratic, respectful and equal world, then we need to create relationships and institutions that reflect those values. Telling, or teaching children how to behave, or describing what good citizenship looks like, is not enough; they need to be living it right from the start. Kids need to be experiencing and learning how to create democracy, respect and egalitarian relationships.
Community is the most important arena for political and cultural life: it is in the experience of place, of neighbourhood and local community that genuine, participatory democracy can flourish. Thus we need to be creating semi-permeable institutions that are integrated into community and family life. Women, children and families need to be involved in every level of community life, not isolated from active life.
To achieve such a community we need to be moving towards diversity, not away from it. A good community can accept and integrate a pluralism of values: that is a diversity of viewpoints and values, and not just about minor things, but about fundamental things. Thus in every community there should be a variety of institutions for kids reflecting a diversity of viewpoints, needs and learning styles. Educators, families and kids need to come together to create democratically-controlled sites reflecting the wide variety of children.
We cannot reduce learning, to the practice of teaching. Learning cannot just be about filling kids up with canonical knowledge. The question we need to be constantly asking is "What it will take for these kids we have before us to thrive?"
There is no method, no guru, no system that we can turn to for a complete set of answers. No one knows how kids grow up best: there are many models and examples we can use for inspiration, but we have to be creating and recreating our own designs of liberation. As Paulo Freire said: “Knowledge emerges only through invention and reinvention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world and with each other.” Families and children need every opportunity to pursue that constructive inquiry within community life.
This suggests a model that is not child-centred, but community-centred; one that seeks to liberate the family and community, not just the child. The practice of freedom has to be about social freedom, that is a freedom towards something, not simply an individualist freedom from something. Pedagogical and political freedoms are closely linked: they are the practice of self determination.
John Holt? Unschooling? I Thought I was Homeschooling!--Alison McKee
"Babies learning to walk, and falling down as they try, or healthy six- and seven-year-olds learning to ride a bike, and falling off, do not think, each time they fall "I failed again." Healthy babies or children, tackling difficult projects of their own choosing, think only when they fall down or off, "Oops, not yet, try again." Nor do they think, when finally they begin to walk or ride, "Oh, boy, I'm suceeding!" They think, "Now I'm walking! Now I'm riding!" The joy is in the act itself. The walking or the riding, not in some idea of success." John Holt, How Children Fail
Unschoolers often say to themselves, "If it were only that simple..." It can be. John Holt, founding father of the unschooling movement, was a prolific writer who championed the rights of self-directed learning. In his first book, How Children Fail, Holt described how schools fail to meet the needs of children. By the time he wrote Teach Your Own, he had coined the term "unschooling" to describe how we can truly help children learn without relying on school methods. This session will be a presentation and explanation of Holt's ideas, based on the texts he wrote. Alison will share many of her personal unschooling experiences from raising two unschooled children, in an attempt to help you transform your life into an unschooling dream come true.
Moderated Panel Discussion: Unschooled Experiences, Parents, Teens and Graduates--Jenina MellaJoin this session to hear, firsthand, about the experiences of unschoolers, their successes and difficulties. Plenty of time will be allowed for audience questions, and discussion. This is an opportunity to hear different and differing unschooling approaches, philosophies, and measures of success.
Fathers' Perspectives on Unschooling--Matt Hern
Fathers have a their own perspective to bring to unschooling. This session will explore the unique challenges and contributions of fathers in the unschooling journey. Dads, here is your chance to put your heads together with experienced dads, to share doubts and joys, your stories and experiences as only dads can.
How To Be an Autodidact; Moderated Panel Discussion--Tanya Cunningham
Hear from successful people who have incorporated the autodidact's approach to learning into their everyday life and pursuits. Remember that modeling autodidactic behavior yourself is one of the best ways to encourage your children's confidence in their own inner-directed learning and to lead them into a life-long love of learning.
Speaker Bios
Matt Hern lives in East Vancouver with his partner and daughters. He runs the Purple Thistle Centre (www.purplethistle.ca), a youth exchange project and 'Crank' magazine (www.crankmagazine.com). He holds a Ph.D. in Urban Studies, is on faculty at the Institute for Social Ecology, and writes and lectures widely. He is the editor of the collection Deschooling Our Lives . His other books are Field Day; Getting Society Out of School, and Watch Yourself: Why Safer isn't Always Better, his newest work.
If you are interested in reading more about Matt there is an interesting interview of him available here, and a journal article entitled "The Promise of Deschooling" is available here.
Alison McKee, is the parent of two grown and independent unschoolers, and the author of two books about homeschooling: Homeschooling Our Children, Unschooling Ourselves , and From Homeschool to College and Work. She stumbled onto unschooling in 1980 when she read an interview with John Holt. In it he mentioned going off to school with an appetitie for reading and graduating 13 years later detesting the thought of reading anything at all. Wow was that a wake-up call!
Since that time she has read every issue of Holt's magazine, Growing Without Schooling (now out of print), founded an unschooling support group, written extensively about unschooling, learning and unschooling her own children. Over the years she has cherished the opportunity to champion unschooling ideals through her writing, national conference presentations, consultations with families and many small speaking engagements. Alison has seen her unschooled children grow into extremely interesting independent adults firsthand, and if she had to do it over again she'd trust her children even more than she had during their years at home.
You can support both Alison and Matt's work by buying their books, which they will be offering for sale at the conference. Click here for detailed descriptions.
Schedule of Events
8:00am - 9:00am Pick up registration materials, meet & chat time
Coffee, tea, juice, and breads will be provided
9:00am - 10:30am Keynote
10:30am - 11:45am Morning Session
11:45am - 1:15pm Lunch
1:15pm - 2:30pm Afternoon Session
2:30pm - 3:00pm Closing Social Time, refreshments
4:00pm End of conference 2007 - See you next year!
