Unschooling Students with Disabilities
Pages: 1-23
Abstract:
As the number of families choosing to homeschool continues to grow, it becomes increasingly important to study different ways in which families choose to homeschool their children. Unschooling is a variety of homeschooling where children learn through everyday life experiences and through their own intrinsic motivations. The percentage of homeschoolers who consider themselves unschoolers can be estimated at approximately 20%, and that number continues to grow at a steady rate as unschooling increases in popularity (Blanding, 2018). As the population of homeschoolers increases, the number of parents who choose to unschool their children with disabilities has also risen. Many find unschooling to be an ideal educational alternative because of its self-directed, self-paced approach. Within this study, fifty parents completed a survey regarding their experiences unschooling a child or multiple children with disabilities. Overall, most parents saw unschooling as a healing environment that provides a more personalized learning environment for students with disabilities as compared to school. However, the unschooling parents in this study did report significant time/career sacrifices, as well as a need for more respite. Also reported was a need for more unschooling friendly practitioners and service providers, a more inclusive unschooling community, and increased normalization and legitimization of unschooling as a choice through further research.
Gina Riley, Ph.D.
“I Want Them to Have the Right”: John Holt’s Seven Arguments for Curricular Libertarianism
Pages: 24-48
Abstract:
In this paper, I list and examine seven arguments John Holt gave for curricular libertarianism (CL), the idea that learners should be free to choose what they learn. I group these arguments into three groups by type of reason they employ; Holt offers three epistemic, two moral, and two practical arguments for CL. After listing and examining each argument, I suggest that while each may be vulnerable on its own to obvious counterarguments, these seven reasons mutually reinforce each other to make a more compelling overall case for CL.
Dr. Kevin Currie-Knight
Curriculum, Teaching, and Learning as Meditative Inquiry: A Book Review of Engaging with Meditative Inquiry in Teaching, Learning, and Research: Realizing Transformative Potentials in Diverse Contexts (2022, Routledge, edited by Ashwani Kumar)
Pages: 49-58
Abstract:
In this book, Ashwani Kumar explores meditative inquiry as curriculum, enfolding the personal and professional experience into a blended sensational phenomenon. He believes a continual practice of contemplative dialogical engagement can manifest a re-envisioned approach to teaching as it acknowledges and nurtures the inter-relational and wholeness aspect of living and learning. Through an edited collection of essays from scholars, teachers, and practitioners, infused meditative inquiry experiences are shared. Each of their unique depictions demonstrates the transformative value and far-reaching effect of a deep reflective study of the self. Their stories show how evolving a greater sense of self-awareness generates a change in action which transfers through to all interrelations. This insight reveals that teaching, learning, and living are experientially embodied and educational; the practice of teaching is a practice of the self. Kumar’s research indicates a holistic view with a meditative mind embedding theory into practice allows for a healthier, progressive advancement in education.
Cherie Carter