Updated 2020-10-27

‘Unschooling’ In The Context Of Growing Mental Health Concerns Among Indian Students: The Journey Of 3 Middle-Class Unschooling Families

This article illustrates how issues such as parental experiences, culture, and concerns over mental health caused three Indian families to unschool their children and looks at their experiences with the practice of unschooling.
Emma Emily de Wit, Daniel Eagles, Barbara Regeer author
De Witt, E. E., Eagles, D., & Regeer, B. (2017). Unschooling in the context of growing mental health concerns among Indian students: The journey of 3 middle-class unschooling families. Journal of Unschooling and Alternative Learning, 11(22), 1-33. Retrieved from https://jual.nipissingu.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/25/2017/12/v11221.pdf

Description

India’s education system has often been critiqued for aspects of rigidness, competition, work overload, hierarchic power, and lack of creativity, resulting in feelings of stress and anxiety in students. Interestingly, alternative education approaches have come up in the past few decades in response to formal education, including the rise of unschooling. In this article the journeys of three unschooling parents are analyzed to bring insights into 1) what role stress and anxiety might play in the decisions of Indian parents to choose unschooling, 2) how key advantages and disadvantages of unschooling are shaped and recognized by unschooling parents, 3) how personal experiences of ‘stress’ are appreciated and experienced in Indian unschooling family contexts, and 4) what distinctively different processes are evident in the upbringing process of unschooled children, compared with those existing in formal education systems. Results reveal that a sense of tedium in formal classrooms, as well as a problematization of stress, motivates parents’ decision to unschool. Social pressures and challenges are experienced, yet also welcomed by parents as part of the unschooling journey. The ideas of stress versus distress are examined. Finally, this article reflects on aspects of trust and self-agency, which were found meaningful in unschooling and how to potentially encourage such notions in formal education settings to prevent mental health issues in children and youth.

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