"Children do not need to be made to learn about the world, or shown how. They want to, and they know how." -John Holt
The kids were so excited to visit the new dinosaur exhibit with our
Unschooler Playgroup at the Science Center today. That is until Gabriel actually SAW the very life-like, moving, noise-making prehistoric reptiles in the flesh. He refused to go through once he peaked in the darkened tunnel and spied an Ankylosaurus swinging her tail and shrieking. Luckily, the non-moving dinosaurs outside of the main exhibit were fine and he was happy to pretended a T-Rex was biting his head off. Of course!
Simone on the other hand was unfazed with them moving or not and later, I took her through alone to see the rest. She said her favorite part was "the babies and their mommies".
"By nature people are learning animals. Birds fly; fish swim; humans think and learn. Therefore, we do not need to motivate children into learning by wheedling, bribing, or bullying. We do not need to keep picking away at their minds to make sure they are learning. What we need to do - and all we need to do - is to give children as much help and guidance as they need and ask for, listen respectfully when they feel like talking, and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do the rest."
John Holt
"In the end, the secret to learning is so simple: Think only about whatever you love. Follow it, do it, dream about it...and it will hit you: learning was there all the time, happening by itself." -Grace Llewellyn
"What we want to see is the child in pursuit of knowledge, not knowledge in pursuit of the child."
George Bernard Shaw
Real, natural learning is in the living. It's in the observing, the questioning, the examining, the pondering, the analyzing, the watching, the reading, the DO-ing, the living, the breathing, the loving, the JOY. It's in the joy. ~Anne Ohman
"How could youth better learn to live than by at once trying the experiment of living?" -Henry D. Thoreau
1 comment:
OH MY GOSH! MAX did the same exact thing when we took him last time they were in town. Ugh, it was so frustrating to see all those cool robot dinosaurs and he was like NO WAY and Jacob (only one then) was marching right down to see them. LMAO. How funny!!! Then the next day he was asking to go back, but it had been the last day of the exhibit.
We are going during vacation to see them. I have been WAITING for them to come back! So excited!!
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