Nurturing Children’s Natural Love
of Learning
By Jan Hunt, M.Sc (http://www.naturalchild.com/jan_hunt/unschooling.html) |
The main element
in successful homeschooling is trust. We trust the children to know when they
are ready to learn and what they are interested in learning. We trust them to
know how to go about learning. While this may seem to be an astonishing way of
looking at children, parents commonly take this view of learning during the
child’s first two years, when he is learning to stand, walk, talk, and to
perform many other important and difficult things, with little help from
anyone.
No one worries
that a baby will be too lazy, uncooperative, or unmotivated to learn these
things; it is simply assumed that every baby is born wanting to learn the
things he needs to know in order to understand and to participate in the world
around him. These one- and two-year-old experts teach us several principles of
learning:
Children are
naturally curious and have a built-in desire to learn first-hand about the
world around them.
John Holt, in
his book How Children Learn, describes the natural learning style of young
children:
"The child is
curious. He wants to make sense out of things, find out how things work, gain
competence and control over himself and his environment, and do what he can see
other people doing. He is open, perceptive, and experimental. He does not
merely observe the world around him, He does not shut himself off from the
strange, complicated world around him, but tastes it, touches it, hefts it,
bends it, breaks it. To find out how reality works, he works on it. He is bold.
He is not afraid of making mistakes. And he is patient. He can tolerate an
extraordinary amount of uncertainty, confusion, ignorance, and suspense...
School is not a place that gives much time, or opportunity, or reward, for this
kind of thinking and learning."
Children
know best how to go about learning something.
If left alone,
they will know instinctively what method is best for them. Caring and observant
parents soon learn that it is safe and appropriate to trust this knowledge.
Such parents say to their baby, "Oh, that’s interesting! You are learning how
to crawl downstairs by facing backwards!" They do not say, "That’s the wrong
way." Perceptive parents are aware that there are many different ways to learn
something, and they trust their children to know which ways are best for them.
Children
need plentiful amounts of quiet time to think.
Research shows
that children who are good at fantasizing are better learners and cope better
with disappointment than those who have lost this ability. But fantasy requires
time, and time is the most endangered commodity in our lives. Fully-scheduled
school hours and extracurricular activities leave little time for children to
dream, to think, to invent solutions to problems, to cope with stressful
experiences, and simply to fulfill the universal need for solitude and privacy.
Children are
not afraid to admit ignorance and to make mistakes.
When Holt
invited toddlers to play his cello, they would eagerly attempt to do so;
schoolchildren and adults would invariably decline.
Homeschooling
children, free from the intimidation of public embarrassment and failing marks,
retain their openness to new exploration. Children learn by asking questions,
not by answering them. Toddlers ask many questions, and so do school children -
until about grade three. By that time, many of them have learned an unfortunate
fact, that in school, it can be more important for self-protection to hide
one’s ignorance about a subject than to learn more about it, regardless of
one’s curiosity.
Children
take joy in the intrinsic values of whatever they are learning.
There is no need
to motivate children through the use of extrinsic rewards, such as high grades
or stars, which suggest to the child that the activity itself must be difficult
or unpleasant (otherwise, why is a reward, which has nothing to do with the
matter at hand, being offered?) The wise parent says, "You are really enjoying
that book!" not "If you read this book, youwill get a cookie."
Children
learn best about getting along with other people through interaction with those
of all ages.
No parents would
tell their baby, "You may only spend time with those children whose birthdays
fall within six months of your own. Here is another two-year-old to play with.
You can look at each other, but no talking!"
John Taylor
Gatto, New York State Teacher of the Year, contends, "It is absurd, and
anti-life, to... sit in confinement with people of exactly the same age and
social class. That system effectively cuts you off from the immense diversity
of life."
A child
learns best about the world through first-hand experience.
No parent would
tell her toddler, "Let’s put that caterpillar down and get back to your book
about caterpillars." Homeschoolers learn directly about the world. Our son
describes homeschooling as "learning by doing instead of being taught."
Ironically, the most common objection about homeschooling is that children are
"being deprived of the real world."
Children
need and deserve ample time with their family.
Gatto warns us,
"Between schooling and television, all the time children have is eaten up.
That’s what has destroyed the American family."
Many homeschoolers feel that family cohesiveness is perhaps the most
meaningful benefit of the experience. Just as I saw his first step and heard
his first word, I have the honor and privilege of sharing my son’s world and
thoughts. Over the years, I have discovered more from him about life, learning,
and love, than from any other source. Homeschooling is always a two-way street.
Stress
interferes with learning.
Einstein wrote,
"It is a very grave mistake to think that the enjoyment of seeing and searching
can be promoted by means of coercion."
When a one-year-old falls down while learning to walk, we say, "Good try!
You will catch on soon!" No caring parent would say, "Every baby your age
should be walking. You’d better be walking by Friday!"
Most parents
understand how difficult it is for their children to learn something when they
are rushed, threatened, or given failing grades. John Holt warned "we think
badly, and even perceive badly, or not at all, when we are anxious or afraid...
when we make children afraid, we stop learning dead in its tracks."
While infants
and toddlers teach us many principles of learning, schools have adopted quite
different principles, due to the difficulties inherent in teaching a large
number of same-age children in a compulsory setting. The structure of school
(required attendance, school-selected topics and books, and constant checking
of the child?
progress) assumes that children are not natural learners, but must be compelled
to learn through the efforts of others.
Natural learners
do not need such a structure. The success of self-directed learning
(homeschoolers regularly outperform their schooled peers on measures of
academic achievement, socialization, confidence, and self-esteem) strongly
suggests that structured approaches inhibit both learning and personal
development.
Homeschooling is
one attempt to follow the principles of natural learning, and to help children
retain the curiosity, enthusiasm, and love of learning that every child has at
birth.
Homeschooling,
as Holt writes, is a matter of faith. "This faith is that by nature people are
learning animals. Birds fly; fish swim; humans think and learn. Therefore, we
do not need to motivate children into learning by wheedling, bribing, or
bullying. We do not need to keep picking away at their minds to make sure they
are learning. What we need to do - and all we need to do - is to give children
as much help and guidance as they need and ask for, listen respectfully when
they feel like talking, and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do
the rest."
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