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Taking Children Seriously

From the archives

The Taking Children Seriously survey

The bed-making story

Does educational freedom lead to big gaps in knowledge?

Home education in Britain

Do not wait until you are perfect

Smash the TV and burn all the books

Sooooo bored in school

Snapshot

Taking Children Seriously: it is rocket science!

Moralyzin’ Maggie

Why stuff-management matters

Forget about it!

Imposing rules so children feel secure?

Medical emergencies

Practical Taking Children Seriously

When toddlers get upset

Rank pessimism

Curious young children taking things apart

Bedtimes and ill effects of lack of sleep

Enacting a theory

Vegetarian parents, meat-eating child

Coercively protecting children

A chat about Taking Children Seriously

Against ego-centric epistemology

The right to refuse medical treatment

The paradigm shift

What Taking Children Seriously is, and what it is not

Question or command?

Great change of mind without self-sacrifice

Help! Child hates eyepatch!

Why is a three-year-old child hitting and what to do

Do the kids rule?

Children do not need bedtime routines

Carseat in a medical emergency?

Watch out! There’s a toddler about!

Engaging sexually with children is NOT taking them seriously

Joke test of taking children seriously

How to get enough sleep with a toddler who does not sleep

Ideas for parent whose toddler does not want to go to sleep

Is your child worried about death?

Children do not need what conventional wisdom says they need

Reacting to an angry child

Protect the victim

Respecting other people’s wishes

No way out – and loving it

(NOT) listening to children

Choosing to go to school or Iraq

Moving, improving: punishment will not help

But if we don’t make her do maths…

Can an emotion be wrong?

In praise of ignorance

Taking toys seriously (yes, really)

The Keeping-One’s-Options-Open mentality

Lying about lying

There but for an internet post go I…

Does your child love visiting the dentist?

My heavenly-horrific vision of Taking Children Seriously

Parenting by the book

Are time outs time off or serving time?

Housework help for a harried mother

Questioning natural consequences

Natural consequences and “enabling”

The dark side of John Holt

Swearing is not a four letter word

Parental rules mess up children’s thinking

Is Taking Children Seriously revolutionary?

Non-coercive schools?

Are schools inherently coercive?

Breaking the spiral of coercion

On Politically Incorrect…

Where is the choice for the child?

Waste not, want not

Never make a child feel bad

Taking sick children seriously

Beware the homeschooling mentality

Taking Children Seriously and fallibilism

Requiring children to do chores

Objectifying education sabotages learning

(Not) doling out looks and latitude

The importance of video games

We lost our internet account

Children who prefer to go to school

Unhappy with natural consequences

Supporting a child’s choice to go to school

Treat information about local education authorities with caution

Unnatural consequences

A discussion about whether problems are solvable

Taking the free world and children seriously: an anecdote

How do you get children excited about maths?

Biting lessons

Punished by rewards

Creativity and untidiness

Doing nothing academically?

Both coercion and “doing nothing” are mistakes

Coercion – the meaning of the word

Answering questions about Karl Popper’s epistemology

Karl Popper on the growth of knowledge

Coercion of adults vs. coercion of children

Is creativity a boon to the affected individual?

Is creativity even desirable?

How about explaining to your children?

Getting kids to ‘agree’ to TV limits

Educational theory: science or philosophy?

The language of parental power plays

Genuinely protecting children versus coercing them

Expressing approval vs expressing appreciation

It is impossible to control for all the variables in any experiment involving human psychology

Why giving children rules and boundaries is a mistake

It’s your house, your income, your everything; and if the kids don’t like it…

Are your children free to follow their own interests?

How would you like it?

Relax about babies watching TV

How to transmit inexplicit knowledge without using real life examples

“Natural authority”?

Unschooling and Karl Popper

Herbert Spencer on children’s rights

Different labels for adults and children

Trying to turn philosophy into science is a mistake

Philosophical theories are refuted by argument, not empirical tests

Coerced to change their values

Bathtime and hairwashing

Time out is not taking time out

“What if…?” questions

Playing with guns, real coercion

Blind obedience, thoughtful obedience, ‘cooperation’

Mistakes and what to do about them

In defence of television soap operas

The final prejudice

The Simpsons – the best teacher in the world

Coercion as a ‘solution’ to behavioural problems

The mistaken belief that we have to doooo something

Learners’ rights vs. alleged ‘responsibilities’

Why discussions take a philosophical turn

We should not be coercing our partners either

Unschooling and schooling as a continuum

Ivan Illich denounces the internet

Children’s welfare secondary to a dogmatic ideology?

Common misapprehensions about Taking Children Seriously

Coercion prevents problems being solved

Solving problems takes creativity

A lack of forcefulness is good not bad

Consensual family dynamics get easier

The heavy societal pressure to coerce children

Branded lazy parents for not coercing

School children have less freedom and choice than prison inmates

“You gotta be kidding. That would never work with my kid.”

The joy of consensual parenting

Avoid coercing other rational beings

There is no safety in ignorance

What if your child wants a dangerous substance?

All choices restrict future choices

‘Tantrums’ are a response to coercion

Ideas colour experience

Differences in knowledge not reason

Don’t children prefer strict rules so they know where they stand?

Criticism of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child

Common emotional blackmail

Hand wringing instead of intervening?

Popper’s epistemology and the everyday lives of children

That something is legal does not make it right or best

Why allow minors to disregard the guidance of their elders?

Theory-laden observation

What to do if you get a visit from a social worker or CPS

No dogmatism here

Coercion, manipulation, reason, persuasion

‘Influence’ versus ‘coercion’

Young children, reason and creativity

Violating parents’ rights of conscience

Fallibilism is not self-contradictory

Young children, non-coercion and the interplay of reason

How to talk so your kids will be manipulated

Coercion punishes children for reasoning

Unschooling and academic education 3

Covert educational coercion

Unschooling and academic education 2

Instruction does not address the immediate moment-by-moment concerns and questions of the learner

Parents accept costs and inconvenience for their children

Unschooling and academic education 1

The education game

Parents know that punishment is damaging

The primary function of teachers is to coerce children

Who wouldn’t be ‘school phobic’?

Coercion needed to prevent cavities?

Children’s rights and the law

Television vs. workbooks

“What do you think?”

Never stop reading to your children

What does the UK do about homeschoolers not educating their kids?

Clarification of what I mean by ‘coercion’

Coercing children to play an instrument

Unschooling is not the same as non-coercive education

The education of Karl Popper

Video games: a unique educational environment

The social, educational, economic and political oppression of children

Autonomous learning, autonomous life

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