6. “If you happen to be a little innovative, or
maybe you forgot to come to school one
day because you were reading a book or
something, that’s a tragedy, that’s a crime
– because you’re not supposed to think,
you’re supposed to obey, and just
proceed through the material in whatever
way they require”
(Chomsky, 2003, p.28)
8. What’s Holding It Back
• History
– Aristotle
– Mass Schooling
– Education Act 1877
• Purpose
– Philanthropic
– Economic
– Ideological
– Social Control
13. Ivan Illich
• Experiences of school
• The role of faith
• A person of three
folds:
– Iconoclast
– Polymath
– Apophatic theology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Illich
14. Deschooling Society
• Any form of
schooling actually
‘dumbs’ people
down
• Hope and
expectation
• Knowledge and
society
• The alternative
15. Deschooling Society
To reiterate, deschooling argues for:
• Less ‘schools’ not more
• Unlimited alternatives
• Learning that focuses on competence before
qualifications
• Technology that is publicly controlled - toward a
transparent society
• Social ‘goods’ before economic gain
• Trust between older and younger, teacher and student
• Schools weaken people’s sense of place, self, other
people
• The rejection of compulsory schooling
16. “Learning is like breathing, it is a
natural human activity: it is part of
being alive. A
person who is active, curious, who
explores the world using all his or
her senses, who
meets life with energy and
enthusiasm - as all babies do - is
learning. Our ability to
learn, like our ability to breathe does
not need to be improved or
tampered with.”
(John Holt)
17.
18. John Taylor Gatto
• Organic intellectual
• School teacher and
social activist
• Brought together the
arguments of social
control, social
stratification, and
social control
• Attempted to redefine
teaching
19. “Whatever an education is, it should
make you a unique individual, not a
conformist; it should furnish you with
an original spirit with which to tackle
the big challenges; it should allow
you to find values which will be your
road map through life; it should
make you spiritually rich, a person
who loves whatever you are doing,
wherever you are, whomever you
are with; it should teach you what is
important; how to live and how to
die”
(John Taylor Gatto)
20. Let’s Go Alternative
• A.S. Neil and
Summerhill School
• Out with socialisation
– in with exploration
• Focus on flexible
curriculum
• Built on progressive
pedagogy
21. “Obviously, a school that makes active
children sit at desks studying mostly useless
subjects is a bad school. It is a good school
only for those who believe in such a school,
for those uncreative citizens who want docile,
uncreative children who will fit into a
civilization whose standard of success is
money…
When my first wife and I began the school, we
had one main idea: to make the school fit the
child – instead of making the child fit the
school”
(Neill, 2006, p.6, authors italics)
22. The Policy of Summerhill
• Providing choices and
opportunities to young
people (individualisation not
socialisation)
• Compulsory assessment is
not the benchmark standard
• Encourages free play
• Provides students with the
freedom to express and
experience all feelings
• Focuses on using a
democratic process
23. “Do you think that non-compulsory
lessons were an advantage or a
disadvantage?
An advantage with a big A because
the pressure in compulsory lessons
is ridiculous. If somebody is telling
you that you have to go and that
getting exams is the most
important thing in the world then it
is a lie.”
Carla
24. The Summerhill Movement -
Metro
• The onslaught of the
Hippy Era
• Freedom Schools
• Freire, Ilich and the
Latin American
Thinkers
• Metro High School
starts in 1977 – 4,000
students apply for 120
places
25. “The Auckland Metropolitan
College, as a redefinition of the
form of the school, frees the
student from the
“dehumanisation” found in the
isolation of the traditional school
from the community and in the
restriction of the timetable which
predefines when learning will
occur.”
(Hoskins 1975a: 42 in Vaughan, 2001)
26. The Death of Metro
• Key Problem – State
Funded so bound to
policy
• Tomorrow’s Schools
• Alternative becomes
a cabbage label
• ERO gets the reports
out
27. The school has become a school of
last resort for students and
parents…The school has retained its
original philosophy and structures and
has tried to make such students fit
them. It has not successfully
adapted its programmes,
management style or teaching
methods to meet the needs of its
present students. (Education Review
Office 1996, November: 5)
There is little evidence that the
majority of students are being
educated as intended for all State
school students. The school has failed
to meet the terms of its charter.
(Education Review Office 1996,
November: 12).
29. “Real education is about getting people
involved in thinking for themselves – and
that’s a tricky business to know how to do
well, but clearly it requires that whatever
it is you’re looking at has to somehow
catch people’s interest and make them
want to think, and make them want to
pursue and explore”
(Chomsky, 2003, p.27, author’s
emphasis)
