Category: Humanities

Homeschooling humanities subjects

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Homeschool Diary: Democracy and the Rule of Law

 

Background image public domain from https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/magna-carta-1215

 

There’s a section in the registration document for homeschooling in Victoria that states that we agree that our children:

“will receive regular and efficient instruction …[in]… the principles and practice of Australian democracy, including a commitment to:

  • elected government
  • the rule of law
  • equal rights for all before the law”
Which sounds worthy, important … and to be honest, a little dull. The thing is, I think this stuff is awesome, amazing and full of all the drama, deaths and explosions you would expect from a Hollywood blockbuster.

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I Got My Lunchbox …

I was 13 when I decided school was a prison. As I read my way through the classics of sci-fi – from Asimov’s ‘Foundation‘, through to Phillip K Dick’s ‘Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?‘, wending my way through Heinlein, Herbert and Clarke, – I learned about social structures. And I learned more by finding and reading works like Machiavelli’s ‘The Prince‘, Bernard Shaw’s ‘Man and Superman‘, and even the mad absurdity of ‘Waiting for Godot’. And in my 13-year-old mind, I started to put together a theory of social conditioning.

Warning: Occasional foul language when appropriate.

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