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Pedagogues for a New Age: Childrearing Practices of Unschooling Parents

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Pedagogues for a New Age: Childrearing Practices of Unschooling Parents PEDAGOGUES FOR A NEW AGE: CHILDREARING PRACTICES OF UNSCHOOLING PARENTS By REBECCA ZELLNER GRUNZKE A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2010 1 © 2010 Rebecca Zellner Grunzke 2 To my gentle husband, Andrew, and our children 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, Dr. Anita Spring transcended the traditional role of an academic advisor with her patience and support. Her professionalism and dedication to the field will serve as my primary example throughout my career. Dr. Faye V. Harrison’s well-versed scholarship proved indispensable to my literature review, and Dr. Elizabeth Guillette’s keen sense of the important and the inane resulted in the productive refinement of my research questions. Appreciation is also due to Dr. Sevan Terzian in the School of Teaching and Learning, who served as both my advisor for my Master’s degree in social foundations of education and as the external member of my Ph.D. committee. My interest in the cultural aspects of the education system in the U.S. would never have culminated in this dissertation if it were not for his skillful teaching and intellectual example. The cordial encouragement I received from all of my committee members provided the gentle nudge I needed to persevere when I was not writing quickly enough for any of us. A special debt of gratitude is owed to Sandra Dodd, internationally recognized “unschooling” expert and administrator of http://sandradodd.com/unschooling, http://www.chatzy.com/unschooling, and http://unschooling.blogspot.com; Sandra allowed me to tap into her network of unschooling parents for potential respondents by posting notice of my research on her site when it seemed like I just would not be able to milk another pilesort out of an already busy population of unschooling parents. I must also acknowledge Bob Collier, publisher of the Parental Intelligence Newsletter, a monthly e-magazine (e-zine) dedicated to “[e]xploring the psychology of happy and successful parenting” (http://www.parental- intelligence.com), who took it upon himself to include a short article and link to my webpage in his February 2009 issue encouraging participation in my research. Many thanks are also due to 4 the many parents of school-aged children, both unschooling and conventional, who patiently contributed their childrearing expertise to this research. My husband, Dr. Andrew Grunzke, worked (and played) by my side into many late nights, offering encouragement and commentary at every stage in the development of my research questions. My children Morgan, Benjamin, and Alice have motivated and taught me everyday how to be both a better mom and a dedicated anthropologist. Even though the road became longer after they were born, I would not have navigated graduate school any other way. My mom and dad, Kaylene Thomas and Robert Ervin, the first people to ask me what I was “going to do” with a degree in cultural anthropology, provided the impetus for pursuing an advanced degree in the field. Though I was publicly schooled, they chose to unschool my brother Bobby, and I think he turned out just fine. I am also grateful for the support of my mom- and dad-in-law, Margaret and Craig Grunzke, who always talked about my Ph.D. as if it were a foregone conclusion, even when it seemed far from reality. Finally, but perhaps most significantly, the awe-inspiring (and poorly imitated) parenting style of my twin sister Rana Zellner Burr first piqued my curiosity regarding the childrearing practices of homeschoolers and how they might depart from those of parents who send their children to external educational institutions, providing the genesis of a dissertation topic that is truly important to me. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...............................................................................................................4 LIST OF TABLES .........................................................................................................................10 LIST OF FIGURES .......................................................................................................................11 ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................................12 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................14 Literature Review ...................................................................................................................14 Anthropological Perspectives on Unschooling ...............................................................14 Non-Anthropological Perspectives on Home Education .................................................18 Virtual Community .................................................................................................................27 Authentic Representation and the Virtual Self ................................................................33 Previous Work Online .....................................................................................................34 Statement of the Problem ........................................................................................................35 Research Objectives ................................................................................................................36 Mazeway Reformulation and Cognitive Dissonance Theory .................................................38 Research Outline .....................................................................................................................39 2 REJECTING “SCHOOL”: THE PHILOSOPHY, ORIGINS, AND CHARACTER OF UNSCHOOLING ...................................................................................................................42 Philosophical Foundations of Unschooling ............................................................................42 Critical Pedagogy ............................................................................................................43 Ivan Illich: School is a fraud ....................................................................................44 John Taylor Gatto: School is a vampire ...................................................................45 Cultural Production Theory .............................................................................................47 Antonio Gramsci: School and hegemony .................................................................48 Paulo Freire: School and oppression ........................................................................49 Historical Background of the Contemporary Homeschooling Movement .............................52 Alternative Education and the Democratically Principled School .........................................58 John Holt and the Rejection of the U.S. Public Education System ........................................63 The Homeschooling Movement Today ..................................................................................67 Public Schoolers vs. Homeschoolers ......................................................................................71 Parental Motivations to Homeschool ..............................................................................72 Homeschooling vs. Unschooling .....................................................................................74 Unschooling as Both Educational Choice and Childrearing Style .........................................76 Conclusion ..............................................................................................................................79 6 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ...........................................................................................82 Operationalizing “Alternativity” ............................................................................................82 Research Design .....................................................................................................................84 Virtual Field Site: Perspectives from an Online Unschooling Community ....................86 Entering the Field ............................................................................................................87 Units of Analysis .............................................................................................................88 Sampling ..........................................................................................................................89 Study Time Frame ...........................................................................................................91 Qualitative Data Collection ....................................................................................................91 Non-Virtual Participant Observation ...............................................................................91 Virtual Participant Observation .......................................................................................93 Online Interview Protocols ..............................................................................................94 Cognitive Data Collection ......................................................................................................95 Cultural Domain Analysis: Freelisting ............................................................................95 Cultural Domain Analysis: Single Pile Sorts ..................................................................96
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