Children are more capable of competent self-directed learning than we give them credit for.
This interview was done about a year before Holt died.
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Martin Brickman (Teachers College Press, 2003) has written a wonderful history of the alternative vision of a lineage of American thinkers who challenged conventional education to be more than sitting down and taking tests. Ralph Waldo Emerson, Bronson Alcott, Margaret Fuller, John Dewey, John Holt, and George Dennsion, are among those featured.
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Ron Miller's book Free Schools, Free People: Education and Democracy After the 1960s contains a great chapter that discusses Holt's contributions to American education, "The Legacy of John Holt."
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The first printing of this book in over thirty years. It is amazing how little of this material is dated!
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A great interview by Pat Stone with John Holt in the July/August 1980 edition of The Mother Earth News.
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Susannah Sheffer's brilliant introduction to this book of Holt's letters is a great summary of Holt's work and life.
Read MoreThe Education of John Holt by Mel Allen. This profile appeared in the December 1981 issue of Yankee magazine.
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This is a time for zeal in education reform, and it knows no bounds. Newsweek reports, “More than a third of the state legislatures have passed laws mandating testing that emphasizes achievement in basic skills.” Cries for, “’More, tougher tests!,’ ‘Higher standards!,’ and ‘Back to Basics!’” are being made all across the political spectrum. All political parties agree that education is in need of serious overhaul, but they still urge their people to support the cause of public schooling, value a four-year college education, and work hard to purchase more and more years of schooling for their children. The time is 1976, but it could easily be today.