Mom Is Teaching

While we were traveling last week, I managed to read a couple of books and post about them in great detail.  I’m not finished, just adding some other things to the mix as the day by day activities arrive. 

On Saturday or Sunday, I received an email from Tom Hanson who is an editor of Open Education.  He had read some posts from this site and read many of the posts and comments regarding homeschooling.  He sent me a link to the site where the discussion seems to be regarding Sugata Mitra and Minimally Invasive Education - Confirmation for Homeschool and UnSchooling Proponents. 

I took a few minutes to read the information at the above link.  And, I have to tell you, if you have a minute, it is definitely a good read.  I love research but normally I find that the manner of the writing afterwards is so technical and difficult to read that I abandon it. 

But, this article is written in very easy jargon and I could easily see the point of Professor Sugata Mitra’s research with the hole in the wall project.

“According to Mitra, without any instruction, these underprivileged children were able to achieve a fundamental level of computer literacy. In his follow up work, Mitra determined that the children, ages 5-16, had little if any prior formal schooling and could not speak English.

Mitra’s “Hole in the Wall” experiment revealed that even without the direct input of a teacher, if there is an environment that stimulates curiosity, then it is possible for children to self-instruct and share pertinent knowledge. Because of its fundamental structure, Mitra dubbed the entire process “minimally invasive education.”

I think this is the premises behind what the homeschooling parents have been trying to make me understand since I took over this blog.  It is amazing, I see it happening with my own eyes.  I just know that unless something radical happens (and my next post about public schools not homework is one step toward radical), I don’t feel I am cut-out for homeschooling.  And, as I’ve said many times, I will do what is best for my child and if it were to come down to me needing to homeschool in order for him to succeed, then I would definitely try it.  But, for the most part, I’ll stick with the public schools for now.

But, this article, this article is extremely thought provoking and every parent, teacher, administrator, etc needs to see just how important their role is in teaching our children.

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