OK, I am not an unschooler and I don’t think I could be one if I wanted to be one. However, experience has led me to appreciated this sort of post more than I would have a decade ago.

The role of fear in all this
It seems to me that the 12-year curriculum is all based on insurance. When a child reaches a certain point he will have many options, it is thought, that he would not have otherwise. For example, if I had been forced against my will to take piano lessons, I might have had entertainment and musical career options open to me later in life that were quite far away from me instead.

I think this is a pretty powerful incentive. People respond to their fears, especially the fear of not preparing their children.

The role of relative scarcity
Then also, we ought to remember how it used to be in pre-modern times when it was almost a given that a child would work his father’s business, or else he was entered into an apprenticeship of many years outside the home. Education was mostly training and it both empowered people and limited them.

Why isn’t seen as necessary? I could see some claiming that the invention of public school began to provide a way to through off the dictates of nature. One could choose one’s profession by proclivity after having many options left open. But I think the wealth increase of the industrial revolution played a part. People were glad to be given a trade because they wanted to have some reasonable chance of gaining the necessities of life. But as we became filthy rich (as a society we are incredibly wealthy) we simply ceased to find those necessities so hard to grasp.

The system cuts off options even as it may give some options
And arguably, the 12-year curriculum cuts off the best options. If I want to enroll my child in band, typically I have to add this on to a work load that remains unchanging. This means, by definition, that a person who is more musically gifted but not as gifted in other areas, will not be as likely to practice music. Homework time will eat away at everything else. The only people who will be likely to explore and build on their musical gifts will be those who are already naturally gifted in other areas so that they can get the homework out of the way.

What is the education ideal of the 12-year Curriculum?

In this video, the speaker suggest the academic professor is the ideal of the school system. But I wonder if it is something else. Since the industrial revolution we have seen managerial elites in both government and business basically run the world. I wonder if they are not preserving an educational system that assumes desk jockeying is the basic posture of productive human effort. Belonging to a corporate system. Being supervised and constantly evaluated on paper. These are the marks of the ruling culture.

But while I have no problem admitting that such rule can be appropriate and beneficial, I wonder if they would have the same kind of hold on us if we didn’t have the sort of educational system that we have.

The schools assume that the one who thrives in that sort of regimented environment is the ideal person.