Why I Don't Do Homework

I was unschooled, and it kind of gave me an attitude. Today, I was sitting in class during a small group discussion  about "the reading." I hadn't done it. I have not, in fact, done it since the second week of class.

It wasn't worth it.

My attitude toward formal education is skeptical. My parents taught me to read at home when I was three. I went to public school for a few years, and liked it, then in third grade my parents pulled me out to home school me. (Long dramatic deal; long story short, OCD reared its anal-retentive head and I developed massive anxiety.) When I was eleven, my mom walked into the room and said, "Look, I'm really busy right now. Educate yourself, go to college, and if you're still living at home when you're 26, that'll be really embarrassing for you." With that, she walked out.

So from age eleven on, I was in charge of my own education. I made up curricula, tried out lots of textbooks, and eventually settled on googling cool stuff all day and working through an ACT prep book. I got awesome at finding good sources and finding ways to learn that worked for me.

Today, when confronted with any assignment, I don't have a lot of time for anything that doesn't work for me. I apply a fairly rigorous cost vs. benefit analysis to all school assignments. I usually do turn-in homework--that's where the points are, and I only ever want to take a class once--but about 80% of the time, I pass on the reading. Most of it is dry and unhelpful. Most textbooks are unnecessarily verbose in a way that makes me think the writers are more concerned with proving their credibility than providing useful food for thought. Most reading assignments, in short, are full of information that I can find in clearer, most interesting forms elsewhere.

Don't be confined by a syllabus. Don't go along just because "that's the way we've always done it." Think for yourself and don't waste your life away conforming to other people's suggestions. Use your brain, not your teacher's or your classmates' or the textbook authors'. Approach life like an unschooler. This approach may make you less involved in school, but it'll give you a much better education.

Photos by tanjila and Spree2010.