JOHN HOLT

BY: GLADYS P. GUZMAN

UNSCHOOLING APPROACH
 John Caldwell Holt (April
14, 1923-September 14,
1985)- was an American
author and educator, a
proponent of home
schooling and,
specifically, the
unschooling approach,
and a pioneer in youth
rights theory.
Holt did not have a teaching degree, which many believe allowed
for his work in the private school sector to make way for him to
have a more objective opinion on the American school system.
Being new to the environment, it is thought that he was able to make
more objective distinctions than other educators, as to what the
schools said they were doing and what they were actually doing. For
the first many years of his teaching career, he maintained the belief
that schools overall were not meeting their missions due to using the
wrong methods and pedagogical approaches, and that these failures
were the cause for rendering young scholars as children who were
less willing to learn and more focused on avoiding the
embarrassment and ridicule of not learning.
Unschooling

An educational method and philosophy that advocates

learner-chosen activities as a primary means for learning.
Students learn through their natural life experiences
including play household responsibilities, personal interests
and curiosity, internships and work, travel, books, elective
classes, family, mentors and social interaction. It
encourages exploration of activities initiated by the children
themselves, believing that the more personal learning is, the
more meaningful, well understood and therefore useful it is
to the child. Unschooling questions the curricula,
conventional grading methods, and other features of
traditional schooling in education of each unique child.
HOMESCHOOLING
 Is education of children inside the home. It is
usually conducted by a parent, tutor or online
teacher.
 Homeschools use a wide variety of methods and
materials which represent a variety of educational
philosophy and paradigms.
 Some methods include: Classical Education,
Montessori Method, Theory of Multiple
Intelligences, Unschooling.
Philosophy in Education
Basically that the human animal is a learning
animal; we like to learn; we need to learn; we are
good at it; we don't need to be shown how or made
to do it. What kills the processes are the people
interfering with it or trying to regulate it or control
it.
Holt said, “ I want to make it clear that I don’t see
homeschooling as some kind of answer to badness
of schools. I think that the home is the proper base
for the exploration of the world which we call
learning or education. Home would be the best base
no matter how good the schools were.”
 Holt believed that “children who were provided
with a rich and stimulating learning environment
would learn what they are ready to learn, when
they are ready to learn it”.
 Children should not be coerced into learning; they
would do so naturally if given the freedom to
follow their own interest and a rich assortment of
resources.
 In his first book, How Children Fail (1964) he said
that “if they (meaning us) know that you can’t do
anything, then they won’t blame you or punish you
for not being able to do what you have been told to
do.”
 He began putting less emphasis on grades and tests,
and began to decrease the notion of ranking the
children.
He focused on:
 Students being able to grasp concepts
 Adopted a more student-centred approach

 Distinction between good and bad student

For him, a good student is “careful not to forget what

he studied until after the test is taken.”
 Ultimately, Holt came to a conclusion. He felt that
schools were “a place where children learn to be
stupid.”
 After then, his focus shifted to making suggestions
to help teachers and parents capable of teaching
their children how to learn, promoting his second
book, How Children Learn (1967).
Holt’s Books
 The Underachieving School (1969)
 What do I do Monday? (1970)
 Freedom and Beyond (1972)
 Escape from childhood: The Needs and Rights of
Children (1974)
 Instead of Education: Ways to Help People do
Better (1976)
 Growing without Schooling (1977)
 Never Too Late: My Musical Autobiography
(1978)
 Teach your own: The John Holt Manual in
Homeschooling
Learning All the Time: How Small Children
Begin to Read, Write, Count and Investigate
the World, Without being Taught

 Holt’s last book published after his death which

contains a number of writings for Growing Without
Schooling has become a tool for the promotion and
encouragement of homeschooling in light of the
lack of school system reforms.
Thank You! 