Dreaming Of Dissent: Rochdale College And The Failed Dream Of Communal Education
Pages: 1-18
Abstract
The paper looks at experimental alternative education systems to explore different approaches to pedagogical theories of post-secondary education. The paper focuses on the story of Rochdale College, an experimental free-form college and communal housing project associated with the University of Toronto between 1968 and 1975. The aims, theories and methods of Rochdale College are contextualized by an examination of two theorists on alternative education: John Dewey and Paul Goodman. The theories of Dewey and Goodman are explored through a brief examination of two experimental colleges that preceded Rochdale: The Experimental College (at Tufts University from 1927-32) and Black Mountain College in North Carolina (active from 1933- 57). Ideas regarding alternative forms of education were integrated into socio-political ideas from the 1960s counterculture movement in America and Canada, and a major test site for a form of counterculture education was the controversial experiment called Rochdale College. The paper explores ideas of what an alternative post-secondary education system has looked like in the past, in order to pose questions about the ways it could take shape in the future.
Sean STEELE
A/R/Tography Of Life Learning: A Historical Perspective On Children’s Lived Experience And Eco-Cultural Sustainability Of Childhood Before The Advent Of Compulsory Schooling In Tibet
Pages: 19-55
Abstract
In this paper, I describe and explore a cultural and historical context of children’s lived experience prior to the advent of compulsory schooling in Tibet. Specifically, I focus on how children had been learning without schools, and what these life learning experiences meant to them. In doing so, I engage unschooling (Holt, 1972, 1974, 1976 1983; Holt & Farenga, 2003; Ricci, 2012) as my culturally responsive theoretical framework in order to acknowledge and recognize the historical significance of these unique learning contexts. In addition, I choose a/r/tography (Irwin, 2004; Leavy, 2012) as my methodological framework in order to respect and acknowledge the arts-based cultural heritage of local communities. Therefore, I celebrate the success and challenges of local children’s life learning experiences, as well as promote an eco-cultural understanding of how these historical learning experiences can inform educational policy, teachers, and the general public. This multi-modal arts-based study found that children’s ways of life learning included creative playfulness, gender equal games, intergenerational learning; and the overall context of subsistence as eco-cultural sustainability. Through these ways of life learning, children have experienced their existential happiness in childhood and ontological freedom, as well as developed a sense of eco-cultural sustainability.
Olga SHUGUROVA
Toward A Critical Unschooling Pedagogy
Pages: 56-71
Abstract
This paper outlines the theoretical, pedagogical, and philosophical framework for critical unschooling. Critical Unschooling is a student-centered and autonomous teaching and learning praxis rooted in decolonizing human rights education. Unlike homeschool, unschooling de-centers the hegemonic power dynamics inherent to essentialist and traditionalist approaches to formal education in favor of a student-led educational milieu in which learning is decompartmentalized and can occur at any place and time. Critical unschooling draws upon literature rooted in ethnic studies, postcolonial feminism, and human rights education, to propose conceptions of self- directed and community-based learning that develops students’ radical agency and critical consciousness.
Noah ROMERO
Book Review – Cooperative Games For A Cooperative World: Facilitating Trust, Communication, And Spiritual Connection
Pages: 72-76
By: Dada Maheshvarananda InnerWorld Publications 2017
Reviewed by: Kathleen KESSON, Professor of Teaching, Learning and Leadership in the School of Education at LIU- Brooklyn
Note: This piece is a book review and as such was not subject to blind peer review. It was accepted by the editorial team