How Children Learn - bookrastinating.com

English language

Published Sept. 4, 1995

ISBN:: 978-0-201-48404-5

How Children Learn is a nonfiction book by educator John Caldwell Holt, first published in 1967. A revised edition was released in 1983, with new chapters and commentaries. The book focuses on Holt's interactions with young children and his observations of children learning. From them, he attempts to make sense of how and why children do the things they do. The central thesis of his work is that children learn most effectively by their own motivation and on their own terms. He opposes teaching in general, believing that children find it just as patronizing as would an adult and that parents should provide information only as it is requested. Children learn best when they are not pressured to learn in a way that is of no interest to them.

1 edition

phonner reviewed How Children Learn by John Caldwell Holt

Review of "How Children Learn" by John Holt

4 stars

Written by John Holt in 1967, this sequel to “How Children Fail” feels like a historical preview of many modem education movements, like homeschooling, unschooling, constructivism, “discovery” learning, and the like. The book reads like a measured but outraged reaction to the stultifying, authoritarian schools and classrooms that I presume were commonplace in American education at that time, and sadly, may still be. It’s filled with insightful observations about learning and schooling – trust children to figure things out, follow their curiosity, let them play and experience before forcing a new model of thinking upon them – but it’s also filled with the kind of fallacious conjectures and post hoc explanations common to popular social science books.

Ika Makimaki

rated it

Sept. 17, 2023