Ask HN: Is Gatto's 'Against School' all BS?

by nekopa on 4/27/2014, 9:22 PM with 3 comments

I read this article

http://www.wesjones.com/gatto1.htm

Which has been put forward a few times here on HN. It really struck a nerve with me as I found a lot of my intuitions about schools reaffirmed in it.

But as I am working on an educational startup I decided to dive into his references and check them out to give myself a good grounding in what is wrong with education. The first one I checked out was his summary of Inglis's 6 functions of secondary education from the 1918 book 'Principles of secondary education'. I managed to find the book online and read the relevant section. Unfortunately Gatto seems to have read a completely different book as I cannot see how he managed to interpret what was actually written into his summary.

This makes me not want to read anything else Gatto has written, yet he seems like he is super popular in the area of unschooling and so on. Has anyone else here read through (and checked) any of his other works? Are they worth reading, or is he just pushing his agenda at all costs?

  • by informatimago on 4/27/2014, 10:07 PM

    There are a lot of articles by teachers at all levels (and often by teachers having just resigned) published in newspapers, that confirm Gatto's views.

  • by justintocci on 4/28/2014, 5:14 AM

    I recommend John Holt. I can't comment on Gatto since I know nothing about him.

    I unschool eight children, though the word "unschool" has various meanings. Feel free to contact me if you have questions.