“…after 26 years of teaching, I must conclude that one of the only alternatives on the horizon for most families is to teach their own children at home.”  John Taylor Gatto

I’m so very sorry to learn that John Taylor Gatto has passed away.  (Another informative obit HERE.) He was the New York State Teacher of the Year who quit teaching because he came to believe that schools were not good environments for children. After that, he devoted the rest of his life to speaking and writing about the negatives of forced schooling, and became a supporter of homeschooling.

Gatto’s work was a huge influence on me as a homeschooling parent in the 1990s. I had already been homeschooling for several years when I bought a cassette tape of his speech, “The Six-Lesson Schoolteacher,” at a homeschool convention. The first time I heard his message, it blew my mind. I listened to it over and over, in my minivan and my home cassette player. It helped me understand why I had been so unhappy as a child in the school system. It also gave me plenty of encouragement to keep homeschooling, which I did until my youngest child finished high school.

You know, I still have that tape, though I don’t know if it still works. (It’s got to be pretty worn out.) I also have most of Gatto’s books, which I highly recommend. Below are links to some of his videos and books.

RIP, John Taylor Gatto.

VIDEOS

Gary North shares several good ones HERE. And don’t miss this one:

BOOKS