IDEC 2023 Ep. 01. What is Self-Directed Learning? Prof. Peter Gray.
Prof. Peter Gray Talks about Self-Directed Learning. Watch the Video.
Dear Friends,
Here is the synopsis and link to Prof. Peter Gray’s talk at the International Democratic Education Conference 2023 on Self- Directed Education.
The talk covers the following topics:
A. Definition of Self-Directed Education (SDE): Education is the sum of everything a person learns that enables the person to live a satisfying and meaningful life.
Self-directed education is education that derives from the self-chosen activities and life experiences of the person being educated…. Contrast to imposed education.
Self-Directed Education (SDE) is distinguished from self-directed education (lower case).
Legal routes to SDE: Democratic schools, homeschooling (unschooling), SDE learning centers.
B. The Educative Instincts, Which Underlie Self-Directed Education
1. Curiosity—the drive to know and understand.
2. Playfulness—the drive to practice and create. Children everywhere, when the have the freedom to do so, play at all of the basic human skills. Play is how they build their bodies, learn to manage risk, acquire language, learn to follow rules, exercise their imagination, practice logic, and learn to use the tools of their culture.
3. Sociability—the drive to know what others know and share what you know.
4. Willfulness—the drive to be in charge of one’s own life.
5. Planfulness—the drive to plan for the future. This is manifested first in play.
6. The drive to grow up, to become an adult.
C. Self-Directed Education in Hunter-Gatherer Bands
Main conclusions: (1) adults do not direct children’s activities. (2) Children, including teens, have unlimited time to play and explore. (3) In their exploration and play, children acquire the knowledge and practice the skills that are essential for success in their culture.
D. Evidence that Self-Directed Education Works in Modern Societies
Follow-up studies of graduates of the Sudbury Valley School and of grown unschoolers, revealed that they are succeeding well in adult life. They have done well in higher education and careers. Keys to their success include a strong sense of personal responsibility, continued self-direction, ability to learn on the job, and, often, careers that are direct extensions of passionate interests they developed as children.
Reasons why SDE is easier today than in decades past.
E. The Optimal Context for Self-Directed Education
1. The social expectation (and reality) that education is children’s responsibility.
2. Unlimited freedom to play, explore, and pursue own interests.
3. Opportunity to play with the tools of the culture.
4. Access to a variety of caring adults, who are helpers, not judges.
5. Free age mixing among children and adolescents.
6. Immersion in a stable, moral, democratic community.
None of these conditions are present in our standard schools.
See his WEBSITE, substack, Psychology Today blog, & Facebook.
His book Free to Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Life, is available in 18 languages.
Subscribe and Support his Substack Play Makes Us Human
Prof. Peter Gray: What is Self-Directed Education? IDEC 2023
Link for IDEC 2023 Resolution: https://www.idecnepal.org/PDFs/resolution-idec2023.pdf