HOW UNSCHOOLERS CAN HELP TO END TRADITIONAL READING INSTRUCTION

Unschoolers can help end traditional, de-contextualized reading skills instruction, a change which might create other beneficial ripple effects. An unschooling parent and early childhood teacher educator, the author describes how his children learned to read without formal instruction. Next is a description of how prospective and practicing teachers react to this example, to examples of how children learned to read in alternative schools, and to reading research that clearly favors a more natural approach to learning to read. Five ways in which the unschooling model can influence others are described, and three specific suggestions for advocacy by unschoolers are outlined.