As Peter Gray's Freedom to Learn blog describes so well there is no evidence that herding children of the same age, into the same classrooms, reading the same books at the same pace, with the same teachers for 13 years in an environment almost entirely sheltered from the reality of how the world actually works is the best methodology for educating human beings. It does however, seem to be the best approach to farming them. Child labor laws are supposed to protect children from mass exploitation from a ruling oligarchy, yet I don't remember receiving a penny for my part in keeping the teaching industrial machine rolling along even as it crushed the curiosity, creativity, and and the love of learning from my tender brain when I was growing up. Nowadays is my spiritual belief that every human being belongs to himself, and yet schools teach children that their lives are state property. It appears that much of what takes place inside a classroom is psychological indoctrination. We all would agree that educating the young is an essential thing for a rational, empathetic society to do. But what happens if, upon investigation, one finds that the whole established order of how this goes about getting done is not only obsolete, but immoral?
School Sucks - The American Way: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okPnDZ1Txlo
School Sucks - The American Way: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okPnDZ1Txlo