That just makes it even more ridiculous, doesn't it. Thanks for a good
laugh. For those who aren't familiar with the terms - Q&A is an
abbreviation for "question and answer," which you can guess is not at
all the same thing as "quality assurance."
Michael Bolton made me aware of a fascinating five-year-old
article on networking called
"Six
Degrees of Lois Weisberg" by Malcolm Gladwell. It gives an
interesting counterpoint to my "Meaningful Connections" column. Here's
one quote that touches on the need for diversity in your network
- "I hadn't seen him since I was seven. We had zero in common. It
was wonderful."
Robert Pearson pointed out a recent article by David Strom,
"Social networking may be
the next social disease," which casts a critical eye on social
networking services like LinkedIn. Strom says: "I think the whole
concept is the next Internet sock puppet: something
that is mildly cute and annoying."
Anne Wiser had this to say about my article "Homeschool Lessons
for Everyone" -
It
was a neat little article. I like the fact that it was written for a
large audience, there's definitely some good advice in it like keeping
kids intellectually engaged in learning during summer break. When I was
a kid I always asked my mom to buy me homework books for the summer and
when it was getting close to going back to school I couldn't wait to go
back. I also like the idea of finding group learning opportunities for
home-schoolers like museums and such because I bet they do need the
social interaction with other kids (strangers - not just siblings or
cousins) as well.
Thanks for sharing your experience.
I've just read your "A Testing Career in 3-D" article and enjoyed it as
well.
I appreciate the feedback. Socialization is a touchy subject for many
homeschool parents, since the question comes up so often. In fact, the
highly structured format of most public schools allows very little time
for socialization over the course of a day. There are numerous
opportunities for homeschool kids to build social skills, though
homeschool parents have to take the initiative to take advantage of
them.
I didn't get around to putting together an electronic copy of the
article, but I do have a few more hard copies of the publication that
I'd be glad to mail to anyone who'd like to see it.
After further discussion about homeschooling, Carl Nagle asked about
two terms I used:
Perhaps
you can elaborate on what you mean by "deschooling" and
"unschooling"?
Deschooling is what we had to do during the year after my wife and I
removed our oldest daughter from the public school system. She had to
get over the trauma of not fitting into the mold they gave her, and she
needed to open her mind to different ways of doing things. Many times
she said, "But my teacher says we can't do it that way." Of course,
some of this is natural any time a student changes teachers, but
deschooling helped her to think more for herself. We don't have to
worry about deschooling now, and in fact, it's easier for her to
remember positive experiences in the public schools and to utilize some
of what she learned there in her current studies.
Unschooling is a different concept. It's an unstructured approach to
learning. The idea is to let the kids choose their own path and take
advantage of their natural curiosity. Academic subjects aren't rigidly
separated, and lessons often have a direct bearing on the things we
need to do in our everyday lives. Many kids still need frequent
guidance, because they don't naturally gravitate toward activities that
parents would consider sufficiently educational. We are unschoolers to
some extent, always watching for opportunities for learning and not
planning a detailed syllabus more than a few days in advance. See
The Unschooling Handbook by Mary
Griffith for more information, and keep in mind that this is just one
of a very wide variety of approaches that homeschool parents use.