GROWING WITHOUT SCHOOLING
over 3000 current GWS subscribers (3109 for GWS #20) . Although we've been getting new subscribers all the time (an average of 30 a week in 1981 so far), many subscriptions have been expiring, too, which has been worri some . But a recent renewal reminder card has had some success, and I'm considering doing some sort of phone campaign for renewals, which I've heard has worked for The Progressive magazine. - John Holt
21
COMING SCHEDULE
I've been very busy the last month or two travelling and writing revisions for new editions of my first books, HOW CHILDREN FAIL and HOW CHILDREN LEARN, which Delacorte ~lans to issue in 1982. This has proved a bigger job than I expected; I found that once I started writing and thinking about these books, I had a great deal to say about them. Next week we'll be moving to a new office' The new owner of 308 Boylston plans to renovate it into "luxury offices," so everyone has to leave. We found space at 729 Boylston that I think will be fine - it has a little more room, a nice bay window, and much better heating and lighting . Moving at any time causes problems, of course, and we wish we didn't have to do it right now, but we'll cope. Just came back from an unschool ing luncheon in Connecticut (see story on Page 3) and I'm about to leave for Philadelphia to do a TV show, "Whitney & Co." on station WCAU. Nancy Plent will also be a guest on the show and several GWS readers have said they'll be in the audience. At the Mar. 18 lecture in Pala tine IL, I met Kathy and Tony Mingl and J.P.' A lively and delightful three-year-old. The lecture - attend ed by many parents with babies and small children - was in an amphithea ter type lecture hall. During my talk J.P. and a friend came down to play
on the stage - but they took their
shoes off so as to be very quiet. It
was nice to see all of them .
Besides the other engagements we told you about in the last GWS, I also went down to U. Mass. in Fal mouth for a small seminar with teach ers, and I was on a radio talk show May 5, WHAM in Rochester NY, that brought us a few inquiries. The Ontar io Secondary School Teachers Confer ence, to which I was supposed to speak on May 9, canceled their meet ing. But a group of unschoolers in the area, led by Anna Myers, organ ized a meeting on the evening of May 8; more than 200 people showed up and it was very lively and interesting . Heidi and Melanie Priesnitz helped to sell and collect tickets, and Drew Myers (7) and a friend passed out paper and pencils for written ques tions . Then Drew introduced me' After the meeting a number of children, including Drew and sister Beth (5), interviewed me for a local radio station. As I am so busy writing and travelling, more and more of the work of putting out GWS has fallen to Donna Richoux. For some time now she has been doing most of the editing, correspondence, and layout needed to produce the magaZine. Last month our records showed
that for the first time there are
Aug 7, 1981 : Nat'l Elementary Education Assoc . Summit, Hyatt Del Monte, Monterey CA . 8 PM. Contact Martha Evans in L.A., 2l3-670-3894~ Aug 16: University o( Calif. at Fullerton . Contact Cathy Levesque, 2650 W Trojan Pl, Anaheim 92804; 714 995-6059. Aug 23-24: Auckland, New Zea land. Contact Tricia Cheel, 1/186 Staple ford Crescent, Browns Bay. Aug 29-30: Australian Reading Conf., Darwin, Australia. Contact Bob Counahan, PO Box 38221, Winnellie NT 5789; phone 84 4277 ext 40 . Sept 2 : Western Australia Read ing Conference. Contact: Frances Hardinge, 4 York St, South Perth, Western Australia 6151. John has other possible engage ments in August in Utah, California, Hawaii, and Australia . GWS #22 won't be mailed until about mid-August, so if you would like more information on his schedule before then, send us a SASE and we'll tell you the latest news. TEACH YOUR OWN
John wrote in the introduction of his new book TEACH YOUR OWN: .. . During the late 60's and early 70's I knew a number of groups of people who were starting their own small, private, alternative schools. Most of them did not try to start their own school until after years of trying to get their local public schools to give them some kind of alternative. When they finally deci ded to make a school of their own, they had to persuade other parents to join them, reach some agreement on what the school would be like, find a place for it that the Taw would accept and that they could afford, get the okays of local fire, health, safety, etc . , officials, get enough state approval so that their students would not be called truants, and find a teacher or teachers. Above all, they had to raise - money. One day I was talking to a young mother who was just starting down this long road. She and a friend had decided thay they couldn't stand what the local schools were doing to child ren, and that the only thing to do was start their own . For many months they had been looking for parents, for space, for money, and had made almost no progress at all. Perhaps if I came up there and talked to a pub lic meeting .. . As we talked about this, I sud denly thought, is all this really nec essary? I said to her, "Look, do you really want to ,un a school? Or do you just want a decent situation for your own kids?" She answered without hesitation, "I want a decent situa tion for my own kids." "In that case," I said, "Why go through all this work and trouble - meetings,
buildings, inspectors, money? Why not just take your kids out o f school and teach them at home? It can't . be any harder than what you are doing, and it might turn out to be a lot easi er." And so it soon proved to be - a lot easier, a lot more fun ... As we said in GWS #20, TEACH YOUR OWN will be · available in August and we'll be happy to take advance orders ($12 . 50 + 75¢ postage.) John's publishers will be arrang i ng publici ty for the book (TV shows, inter views, etc). One way GWS readers can help is to find out if local radio talk shows in their ~rea would be interested in interviewing John over the phone. The advantages of radio shows are that they require no travel time, John can do them from anywhere - office, home, on the road - and they reach a fair number of listen ers. Tell the station about home schooling, GWS, and John's new book, and if they sound interested, please let us know so we and the Delacorte publicity people can follow up. And of course, you can help by asking that libraries and bookstores in your area carry the book, and by telling as many other people as you can about it. - Donna Richoux QUOTES
"Blight never does good to a tree . . . but if it still bear fruit, let none say that the fruit was in consequence of the blight." - William Blake. "The fatal pedagogical error is to throw answers, like stones, at the heads of those who have not yet asked the questions." - Paul Tillich . "Marielle has been quite talka tive and playful, but over the past two weeks has shown considerable improvement . " - On a report card. "The days that make us happy, make us wise." - John Masefield . STANDOFF IN V A..
Abbey Lawrence (VA) writes: .. . Hope you've heard from other ·
Va . readers on the outcome of this
year's legislative session [GWS #16, 18); I'll summarize. Apparently, the subcommittee that was appOinted last year to "study" home-schooling has, after a few meetings, reached no con clusions and made no report, but that didn't stop some of its members from introducing ·legislation on the sub ject . A senator introduced a bill that would have provided a specific homeschooling option in the law; it died in committee . Three delegates sponsored a bill defining a school in such a way as to make it impossible for parents to teach their own child ren by calling such an arrangement a school . This .bill passed the House . The Senate amended it to require a tutor, which could be a child's par ent, to have a college degr~~, and passed it . The bill died in confer ence on the last day of the session. So for the time being, things are no worse, or no better, than they were. .. . 1 plan to write to all the people in the state I know of - those listed in the Directory, those I've met with - outlining what has hap pened so far and urging some action long before next year's session .