deschoolingn.
/ˌdiːˈskuːlɪŋ/, U.S. /ˌdiˈskulɪŋ/ Education.
1. The action or process of transferring the function of education within a society from conventional schools to non-institutional systems of learning which are held to allow the student to develop more freely. Chiefly in or with reference to the writings of Ivan Illich.
ΚΠ
1970 I. Illich in Sat. Rev. (U.S.) 17 Oct. 68 The radical deschooling of society begins..with the unmasking by cultural revolutionaries of the myth of schooling.
1972 Where Nov. 301/1 The search for alternatives to school implicit in the issue of de-schooling.
1983 D. Ravitch Troubled Crusade vii. 238 The ‘deschooling movement’..was a literary sensation. Its practical effect was to lend support to the fast-growing assumption that out-of-school activities were equal in educational value, and perhaps actually superior to, in-school activities.
1995 Guardian 19 Sept. i. 15/6 The Internet could do more to make their [sc. Illich and Castro's] dream come true than any revolutionary edict or experiment in deschooling.
2. The action or process of removing a child from the school system so as to educate him or her at home; the transitional process undergone by a child removed from the school system. Cf. home-schooling n.
ΚΠ
1979 Mother Jones Apr. 64/2 It is not so much the fear that their children won't learn that prevents many parents from attempting deschooling. Rather, that they will somehow fail to be adequate enough teachers for their kids.
1990 J. Webb Children learning at Home ix. 158 This finding was..confirmed..by my own experience with my son's deschooling: we found far more interesting opportunities for all kinds of shared activities.
2010 Globe & Mail (Toronto) (Nexis) 11 Sept. f1 Guest speakers will address quandaries such as..how to transition your children out of the regular school system—a sort of psychological-detox process known as deschooling.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2015; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1970