Patrick Farenga

Patrick Farenga worked closely with the author and teacher John Holt until Holt’s death in 1985. He is the president of HoltGWS LLC and was the publisher of Growing Without Schooling magazine (GWS) from 1985 until it stopped publishing in 2001. GWS was the nation’s first periodical about unschooling, homeschooling, and learning outside of school, started by Holt in 1977. Pat and his wife learned at home with their three girls. Pat has written many articles and books about homeschooling and unschooling, including Teach Your Own: The John Holt Book of Homeschooling (Hachette, 2021). Growing Without Schooling (GWS) is a record of the grassroots homeschooling movement. Its timeless content about how parents and children live and learn together at home and in their communities will inform anyone seeking ideas about how homeschooling can work for their family. GWS is also a record of school and society during the late twentieth century: the emergence of school-related illnesses like ADHD and school phobia; the increase in paranoia about letting children play outdoors without constant adult supervision; the inroads to schooling made by computers and the internet; the never-ending demand for more instruction time at the expense of playtime, and so much more. GWS is a unique publication about education from the perspective of self-directed learners and their teachers and supporters.