-Caveat Lector- From http://www.lewrockwell.com/delemos/delemos16.html }}>Begin Home Schooled and Free by Michael Gilson De Lemos Libertarian ideas do seem counter-intuitive to people who believe you have to punish that virtue in. I regularly get letters from people who connect to the LIO website and say we must be kidding when we point to Libertarian solutions or at least discussions such as abolishing police or prisons to cut crime or how arbitration might work or two-year olds reading – let alone 12 month olds. They are unaware that these things are already happening – even as they theorize on why Libertarianism is OK except just for that. One recurring issue is schools. WHY SCHOOLS? Schools don’t. The truth is there is no great social need for schools, but instead for environments at home conducive to learning. Private schools have their points, and some things may be conveniently taught by experts, but in my view children should be schooled first at home and then at their parent’s side, in the world. Schools are an antique and obsolescent institution and should go. They are based on the mind-deadening presumption of the authoritarian mindset that people benefit only by what they are taught – and not by their ability to teach themselves. But self-learning is the real goal of education. The self-learner is confident in the world. The taught person, in contrast, is constantly in search of the next expert like a chick seeking to be fed. And they understand the value and need for freedom and self-discipline. As our little chick, waiting to be told, does not. Schools create the present world in a bizarre take on Rousseau: man is everywhere born naked and free, and now is everywhere, not in chains, but diapers. Among the least pernicious schools are the Sudbury schools. Based on the Libertarian idea of self-management at an early age, and inspired also by not only the older communal libertarianism, but also modern Libertarian attitudes, they undermine every assumption in the educational establishment. The Sudbury students run the schools – setting curricula, going about as they please, and hiring and firing the teachers from an early age. Sudbury and similar less startling models, such as Montessori and Summerhill, now under attack in the UK, are not perfect, but they show that superior students can run themselves. In Sudbury, the consumer – the child – directly hires the teacher. Indeed, I advise Libertarians to get off the school voucher kick and raise the issue of student-run public schools (not to mention Universities). Everyone in the Education establishment says that is an abomination, it can’t be done, but there it is. Indeed, firing the teacher is arguably an integral part of the learning experience, inherently unprovidable by government schooling. I know. My kids fire me all the time. HOME-SCHOOLING SELF-TAUGHT Private schools, as I said, have their points, but they are far inferior to the home. Home schooling is easy if you realize three things: first, the child wants to learn far more than you want to teach – but at their pace. Second, making self-education decisions is part of the process. Third, a little structure goes a long way, the rest is making it available – because you are in the Freedom Business if you’re doing "education" right. Indeed, most of the time the best way to provide structure is to simply review with them what they have achieved – thus bringing it to full consciousness – and asking what they plan to do next. It is quite something to say, "What did you learn today?" and get detailed, enthusiastic answers complete with graphs, computer presentations, and origami models. Which is why my kids fire me. Here is how they do it. There I am, resplendent in learning plans, books and syllabi, Yet once they get the drift, they say "OK, Dad, go away," or "I’ll do it myself." I set moderate goals, encourage them to take over, and try and look dignified as they dive into dinosaurs or some other subject that I know little about except to demand they research the answer – which about does it. Now they make a little exposition once a week and teach me stuff. You want structure? You want flexibility? Intimidated by the educational panjandrums with all their Carnegie Commissions? There is something I call the Tsiolkovsky method. The great Russian space pioneer Tsiolkovsky paid his way through school tutoring in every subject. Was he some polymathic prodigy? Not when he began. His secret was the simple expedient of staying one lesson ahead of the student. He thus taught (and self-taught) in a lively way to satisfied students on subjects from Celestial Mechanics to Sanskrit. This method, when in doubt, works. If you can stay one lesson ahead of a four-year old, knowledge fresh and enthusiastic in your mind, you are better technically qualified than nearly every teacher in the US. Let me tell you: If it was good enough for a man Einstein praised as a greater genius than he was, it is good enough for me. And good enough for my 6 year old daughter, who reads at High School level and wants to be a paleontologist, and my 8 year old son, who reads at normal grade level (as it used to be) but knows an amazing amount about computers, military tactics, and real estate. This, in between caring for their baby brother, handling numerous chores ("I clean the kitchen like a professional, go away, please," my son growled to a helpful visitor) and telling me to get lost. GOVERNMENT SCHOOL LESSONS They also are learning, by being free to learn, to learn to be free. They set their bedtimes, mealtimes, and recently wrote a short video play. Here are things happening in the public schools in my area, though, that they are not learning at a cost of $7,000 yearly (Warning – If this sounds like the Soviet Union or some ‘40’s film about how the Nazi’s brainwashed arm-banded kids named Franz, you have not been paying attention). They are not learning: To sit around for 6 hours daily and learn nothing of interest or exactitude To hit or sneer at others in between To report to their teachers the details of their parent’s lives To not draw guns, as happened yesterday to an elementary child in my county who was handcuffed by police for that That problems are caused because someone was a no-good who doesn’t understand no one can help it so we must be self-responsible and see that they must be punished, fined, regulated or shot To be afraid to touch the opposite sex while dressing like Ancient Roman sex slaves To disrespect adults by calling them by first names while worshipping a flag of a government that teaches that disrespect That 2+2=5 is right if 2/3 of the class says so, except no one can explain what 2/3 is, we didn’t cover that in sixth grade That if they take a sip of the Latin cultural drink sangria before 18, they should be arrested and denied the right to drive or have their grade honors entered That Hannibal was a nice Black man who looked like Isaac Hayes; and Carthage, which practiced mass child sacrifice, was the epitome of culture destroyed by oppressive Roman logic That you can only get an aspirin after you have waited three hours for permission while the health nurse has been lecturing that people turning to drugs because of pain in their lives is a myth That to sit at computers, books, hammers, art materials and other learning tools at only assigned times is "flexibility" and "child centered" knowledge construction To eat un-nutritious foods promoted by the government’s favorite corporations or fractured food surpluses That home birth is evidence of child-abuse To be graded, like cattle To wake up at a time set in the distant capital repugnant to their body-rhythms That if their father smokes, it’s abuse; but when the government says they must walk 1.1 miles over dangerous 5 lane streets to kindergarten since they are in some arbitrary school-bus limit, it is not That they are too stupid to learn and must be made to learn To be searched at any time for any reason by strangers That if you actually know something, you’re strange That if you can actually do something, it’s not hard work, it’s talent That being taught by a male who is your father is suspect, but being fashioned to ignorance by female strangers is normality – and this is gender equality That the student paper can only publish what is approved That not everyone can learn about doing a paper, since resources are scarce and must be regulated That if you want to go to a school where they learn French and you do not meet the racial quota, tough That we are not having our math lesson today as we are writing the governor for more money for textbooks Then we carry last year’s text books for teacher to be sent for sale to homeschoolers at one dollar each while we then wait around two months for new books and supplies That if you write a paper saying that you don’t want to be a teacher when you grow up but a businessman who builds rockets to Jupiter, you will receive a counseling session To be punished for reading ahead of the class, or reading the text at all To not be talked to politely by adults To suffer the constant interference of ignoramus teachers who think a piece of paper subverts the basic laws of trade, so that the customer is always wrong. Recently I received detailed "standards" of education for the home from the government. I handed them to my daughter for her reading lesson. She struggled through them for three days. At the end she discovered it had typos. She also said there was nothing about learning there. When I brought this to the attention of the Home-School official, he said in a frank manner that they were designed to increase teacher pay and have a basis for lawsuits against home schooling parents, and no one actually read them. "Sounds like your kid is doing well in peer development, though. She has learned to work with her father." He then hinted broadly I should keep her off the Home-School radar as long as possible. And, recently at a local hotel pool club, where we often wile away the afternoons in the school year, something happened yet again. My son organized kids from several nations in some sort of water game. It is a pretty regular thing with him now. As he generaled them about the pool to and fro, people were surprised that we were locals and not on vacation. "You mean they are not in school? I mean, when do you home school them? They let you do that?" they asked in French, German, Canadian, Hindi and New York accents, "How are they educated?" "My boy is home-schooling right now," I respond helpfully, "He is self-educating to command your children who wait to be let what to do." My son walks up, his admirers in tow, to take a munch off my plate. "Was ist loss, Mein Herr?" he says respectfully to the rubicund German tourist in pleasant tones. UNEMPLOYED IN YOUR REAL JOB Do yourself a favor. Re-arrange your life and get out of the rat race. Sit down right now with your partner, figure out how to transition to rotating jobs or a half job each so you are both home. You will learn to save, plan ahead, set priorities, communicate to a common plan, and to your amazement see your standard of living soar as your stress level goes down with less work, you stick to what matters, and your savings go up as your tax level plummets. Why? You stop spending $1200 monthly on day care, taxes, transportation, clothes, hidden costs, improvement classes and take-out food for a second job that nets you $2 an hour. Money so you can fix the car that takes you to the job and have a "meaningful, empowering" career. Do that and throw out the TV. Get a library from a used bookstore and some acrylic paints and those neat electronic cheapo keyboards and discount computers and telescopes for nothing. Let the day flow, and just go with your kids where you wished your parents had the time to take you when you were a kid. Go to that amusement park. See that afternoon movie four times. Sit at home. Look under every rock in the yard and see what is there. Visit the local firehouse and have them explain every bit of equipment to the kids. Take a judo class with them. Audit a University lecture with your 7-year-old on the stars. Go to a construction site. Hunt with your daughter and sing with your son. Sit at a brokerage firm. Go to the auto mechanic. Have him sit there while you fill out taxes. Follow a stranger down the street and pretend you are secret agents. Mr. Rogers and Barnie pretend to do it, wandering everywhere in a TV simulacrum. They are filling a vacuum you created. Take the kid to work whenever you please, and if your boss doesn’t get with the program, fire him as you would a schoolteacher. Take a tour of the local public school and have them explain their rationale of operations and blow the teacher’s minds. Look at the reaction of the other kids when your kids say to the teacher, "You mean you have to ask permission to go to the bathroom?" Set one day a week to just go all day to a library or museum and explore. Tear something apart with them and rebuild it. Plant a seed and care for it. Work through a cookbook. Visit folks in a hospital and cheer them up. GIve a detailed history of when you were a kid. And above all, just chat. Then end the day as follows over snacks. Spend a set time a day with your children, expect them to read and calculate above their "level," don’t get anxious over uneven progress, don’t censor but explain, and jump out of the way. You’ve been fired. Unemployment is good. It means you will not be on your deathbed saying, "Thank Heavens I never spent time with my kids except to yell at them so I could have the time for another day at the office and pay another bill." And…they will learn. While you will get, at last, a real education…as you bring up the people who will, seemingly out of nowhere, and despite your deficiencies, save the world. For they’ll understand what freedom is. They will accept no government substitutions. May 16, 2000 Michael Gilson De Lemos [send him mail], known as MG (articles at www.gilson.uni.cc), is Coordinator of the Libertarian International Organization. He believes with Jefferson that, along with Gibbon, Cicero and Tacitus should be read by all grade-schoolers. In Latin. Copyright 2001 LewRockwell.com Michael Gilson De Lemos Archives Back to LewRockwell.com Home Page End<{{ T' A<>E<>R Forwarded as information only; no endorsement to be presumed + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without charge or profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this type of information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Integrity has no need of rules. -Albert Camus (1913-1960) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The libertarian therefore considers one of his prime educational tasks is to spread the demystification and desanctification of the State among its hapless subjects. His task is to demonstrate repeatedly and in depth that not only the emperor but even the "democratic" State has no clothes; that all governments subsist by exploitive rule over the public; and that such rule is the reverse of objective necessity. He strives to show that the existence of taxation and the State necessarily sets up a class division between the exploiting rulers and the exploited ruled. He seeks to show that the task of the court intellectuals who have always supported the State has ever been to weave mystification in order to induce the public to accept State rule and that these intellectuals obtain, in return, a share in the power and pelf extracted by the rulers from their deluded subjects. [[For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto, Murray N. Rothbard, Fox & Wilkes, 1973, 1978, p. 25]] <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. 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