Unschooling Trend Is Growing More Popular, But It Can Cover Up Neglect
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“Day one of ‘unschooling’ and I’ve got my kids helping me to clean the car out. [I’m] teaching them hard work, taking care of the things that you love [and] that you need. And, also, [I] just needed the car cleaned,” influencer Kelsey Rhae says in a TikTok video posted in April. Later in the video she takes her family to grocery shop at Aldi. Based on her approach to “unschooling,” the otherwise mundane errand serves as a way for her children to organically learn skills such as reading food labels, selecting the best produce, and spending their money wisely. The video garnered more than 460,000 views and a number of comments from critics concerned about the fact that the kids in the video aren’t receiving a more formal education.
As videos about “unschooling” grow in popularity across social media, critics have accused parents who participate in the practice of committing educational neglect. Still, with approaches varying widely from family to family, it can be hard to pin down exactly what qualifies as effective unschooling.
American school teacher John Holt became an advocate for homeschooling in the 1970s. He came up with the term "unschooling," referring to an educational philosophy that involves children learning organically from their surroundings. Unschooling, also referred to as “self-directed education,” has received increased attention online recently, alongside homeschooling’s growth in popularity nationally in recent years. But how effective is this form of education? Between the range of approaches and limited research, it's hard to know, even with its recent rise.
Eve Ettinger, a freelance writer and board member of the Coalition for Responsible Home Education (CRHE), says there can be some real benefits to a “child-centric structure,” where there is a deliberate strategy to guide a child's education using their interests and curiosities, they tell Teen Vogue. But intentionality and attention from parents is key, Ettinger adds. And, without a consistent definition of unschooling, they worry the term could be used to cover up a subpar learning environment — or worse.
There’s a difference, Ettinger says, in unschooling practices based on child-centered and child-led learning philosophies such as Waldorf or Montessori education and “‘Okay, my mom didn't have time to teach me math this year, so all of my helping with the siblings gets counted as homework’ — that's neglect, that’s not unschooling.”
Angela Baker, who is known as @parkrosepermaculture on TikTok and other social media platforms, has accused influencers like Rhae of co-opting the term unschooling and providing a harmful view of the concept. Baker says the practice is much more involved than what Rhae’s videos portray. Baker, who notes she’s been unschooling her kids for more than 15 years, posted another video saying the educational concept doesn’t impose a set curriculum on kids but instead focuses on letting them lead their learning. “Unschooling is following your child’s interests rather than this set school schedule when it comes to learning,” she explains. “So if an unschooled child wants to pursue formal training, formal classwork of some kind, then that is what they get to do, and that’s still unschooling.”
In the 2017 article “Self-Directed Education – Unschooling and Democratic Schooling,” Boston College research professor and a founding member of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education Peter Gray wrote, “Children come into the world biologically prepared to educate themselves through observing the culture around them and incorporating what they see into their play.”
Says Gray, “Unschooling — at least for legal purposes — is a variety of homeschooling.” Those “legal purposes” relate to how different states in the US regulate homeschooling — if they regulate it at all. While most states require parents to notify local school districts at least once of their decision to homeschool, 11 states have no such requirement. Additionally, the majority of states have no minimum education requirements for homeschooling parents. There are many states that require parents to teach specific subjects, but not all of them seek verification and children are often not assessed. In states with less oversight, it’s easier for families interested in unschooling to do so without much intervention from the government.
Some parents and experts say self-directed education also offers helpful flexibility for certain families, including those with children who are neurodivergent, have disabilities, or require a number of doctor’s appointments. Still, Ettinger of the CRHE worries that some students might not get all the resources they need, even if their parents have the best intentions: “Parents can be really wonderful advocates, but parents are also not trained specialists in whatever it is that their kid is dealing with until they can put in their 10,000 hours of advocating on it. They can learn, but [it’s] not necessarily the case that they know best what their kid needs and what's available for their kid.”
Potential harms can include educational neglect, too, according to critics. Twenty-seven-year-old Mia, whose name has been changed to grant her anonymity, tells Teen Vogue that she struggled with preparing for college and dealt with abuse and neglect while being unschooled in Oklahoma. Her state is one of the 11 that don’t require a notice to homeschool; instead, Oklahoma just suggests parents notify their local school districts.
Mia says her mom pulled her out of public school and began homeschooling her around middle school, ultimately transitioning to unschooling. “We really tried the traditional homeschooling route, and I think, like a lot of other homeschooling families, it devolves into not really standardized, not really consistent, not really structured,” Mia explains. “At the end of the day, when I wanted to make the choice for myself to go to college and be able to enter the workforce, I didn't have a basic math education. I didn't have the stepping stones to make that choice easily.”
Mia says she was also “severely neglected” and did not have access to running water “for a long time” during this period in her life. “Because I was hidden away from exposure to any public official who could have [been] mandated [to report] that or checked in on that, that abuse and neglect was able to be hidden from the world.”
While unschooling can be beneficial for some children, critics fear that other students might get left behind or fall through the cracks. In situations where consistent involvement and planning from parents is lacking, kids can miss out on key parts of their education or — even worse — abuse and neglect can go undetected. With so much unknown about the impact of unschooling on kids, it's clear that, at the very least, the practice needs a lot more research and study.
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Originally Appeared on Teen Vogue
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