European Films about Unschooling

Unschooling in France, Germany, UK, and the US

This coming Thursday, Sept. 29, after viewing Being and Becoming with the audience, I'll be a panelist discussing it. It is a French documentary about learning paradigms that are not based on school curricula. The show is presented by Advocates for Home Education.

Based on the film's trailer and this description, I’m really looking forward to seeing this:

Being and Becoming explores the theme of trusting children and their development, and invites us to question our learning paradigms and options. The filmmaker takes us on a journey of discovery through the US, France, the UK, and Germany (where it’s illegal not to go to school).

We meet parents who have made the choice of not schooling their children, at school or at home, but of letting them learn freely what they are truly passionate about.

It is a quest for truth about the innate desire to learn. It belongs to a wider theme than education, connected to a change in our belief system and to our society’s evolution, as well as to the importance of reclaiming one’s life and self-confidence.

More information about the movie and event is on Facebook.

Being and Becoming Tickets

Unschooling in Portugal

Álvaro Trindade, a filmmaker and proponent for unschooling in Portugal, contacted me about using a portion of “John Holt’s New England Today Interview” in his new film.
Alvaro wrote this about his documentary, Danos EsColaterais:

The title of the film means something like Causalities (in Portuguese would be “Danos Colaterais”), but written in such a way that means School Causalities (Danos EsColaterais). Escola means school in Portuguese.

The film begins with the attachment problems the child suffer today resulting of the early institutionalization, then the problems of the traditional school system, then an excerpt from Prof. Gerald Hüther's interview about how the brain works, where he defends that true learning only happens when emotions are present.

After that the film expose the unschooling/homeschooling life. After this comes John Holt interview.

The last two subjects presented are the problems coming from intensive peer group development and the environmental consequences of the school based development paradigm.

URL: https://youtu.be/sS8688KAaLA
Title: Danos EsColaterais
Duration: ca. 1h
Language: Portuguese (We plan to add English and German sub-titles as soon as possible.)