The Brooklyn Free School is an “institutional” example of “unschooling”that I wrote about a few days ago. My same agreements and concernsapply to both, and some of my concerns are apparently shared by parents andorganizers of the free school, evidenced by a few requirements that are startingto creep in:

Students will soon have to meet a set of graduation “requirements,” where they must present a portfolio showing proficiency in areas such as communication, investigation and reflection.

Students set the rules at New York City school - CNN.com

That approach to guidance and accountability, though, is exactly the kind of thing that I think is valuable about this perspective and a necessary component of school reform: a set of broadly-defined (but well-thought-out) goals that students must meet and for which they must provide evidence in a form most appropriate to each goal/discipline (rather than a series of standardized tests).

In this capacity, the teacher is still a leader (in helping students to determine what the goals should be), a coach (in helping students find the best ways to reach their goals and providing “exercises” to help them develop in their weaker areas), and a mentor (in providing a model of life-long learning). Students still have genuine choice and can focus their learning in areas within each discipline that interest them most (while still gaining an understanding of the various disciplines).

Recently, Clarence Fisher wrote about a “studio” approach to his classroom. He intuitively feels that this is where his practice is leading and perhaps where school reform should take us, but has no clear sense yet of what exactly a “classroom studio” would look like. He is clear on the strengths of the studio model that he would like to bring into his classroom:

Studios are places that are intense, both product and process oriented,and in many ways, are driven forward by the people who are working inthem. Many projects are self-selected, or organic, growing out ofexperience and idea. Assessment comes from both external and internalsources. Assessments look at both the products and the processes thatwere involved in production.

Classroom Studio - Remote Access

I’m in strong agreement with his ideas and have found my own practice moving more and more in this direction. Until I read his post, I didn’t have a word for what was happening, but I now feel that “studio” is exactly right.

We’ve created a WikiSpaces page to try to clarify for ourselves what this model might look like and to collect research, information, and resources to support and refine it. If you have ideas you’d like to contribute, please join the site and help us build. (As of this writing, the space is brand new and blank, but I hope to get something goin within a few days.)

And if you’re not up for the full-on wiki work, you might at least have a comment or two to leave here …

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