General

Re: Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

Mark B. — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 04:10:31 GMT

First of all, thanks for the various replies.

My kids are younger, so I have several years yet to figure this out. I own, both Robinson and A2, however, I currently am using Robinson and am strongly leaning towards continuing on Robinson. However, it is nice to have the additional books that are provided with A2 that are not present in Robinson.

Robinson is clearly more libertarian and while not purely Austrian, leans much more that way then A2.

I think pauled's idea of addressing the other economic schools from an Austrian perspective is a good idea.

I do have a nice collection of works, many purchased from mises.org, so I have a lot of material at home to work with. Starting with the Scholar's Edition of both Human Action and M.E.S. Don't think we want to start with that though. :)

Re: Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

Junker — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 04:46:30 GMT

I'd go with Robinson and put all of Mises.org ebooks on the reading shelf.

Re: Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

pauled — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 02:45:49 GMT

That's for sure. I settled for reading Mises and company to the kids, with me learning along side of them as we went. But after a few years of that, at least the youngest one is now reading and writing summaries on Hoppe's and Rothbard's work entirely on her own, and does "get it". It's pretty gratifying.

Re: Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

dvictr — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 00:19:29 GMT

pauled:
When the kids are around 10, start reading Mises, Rothbard, Hoppe, Salerno, and whoever of the Austrians you personally like to your kids. Forget about rounding them out with Keynes and the others - there's not enough time. Let the austrians address them

if you can get a 10 year old to read Mises... they better be on there way to attending an ivy leage school on full scholarship

Re: Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

pauled — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 22:18:51 GMT

WRT a homeschooling curriculum in economics, i would recommend the following: When the kids are around 10, start reading Mises, Rothbard, Hoppe, Salerno, and whoever of the Austrians you personally like to your kids. Forget about rounding them out with Keynes and the others - there's not enough time. Let the austrians address them - they're fair and reasoned. Do a book cover to cover. Start at about 30 minutes a session, once a day, taking time to clarify and elaborate on what you think is important and to encourage questions. Over time, increase the session duration to 40 minutes. It's a great way to instill your values in your kids while at the same time, laying a solid foundation of economics and ethics based on praxeological reasoning. It's fun, and you'll learn the stuff better yourself by being this involved in teaching it.

Good luck.

Re: Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

Inquisitor — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 13:40:22 GMT

There is no unified socialist economics. Do you mean Marxian, institutionalist, neo-Ricardian etc. perhaps?

Re: Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

dvictr — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 09:17:29 GMT

when you say "home schooling" im assuming this is for a high school level curriculum?

I think any level of of reading in economic philosophy would be rather intensive without covering the fundamentals of economic laws. Basically what im saying is that even with a college degree in economics some of the most important works are still abstract and would be difficult for, say a high-school student to grasp the concepts.

i would start any study into economics with a sound understanding of the tradidition of ethics and humanitites. The history of human thought is important to understand austrian economics. You could find a few pages/exerpt or a chapter from important titles to drive home an idea.

Questions regarding Home Schooling and curriuculum

Mark B. — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 06:23:23 GMT

I wanted to gather people's opinions on a couple of questions.

First of all, any thoughts regarding a preferred homeschooling curriculum. I am familiar with Robinson and A2, not as familiar with others.

Secondly. What lineup of economic authors and titles would you include in a homeschool curriculum. From my opinion, both Robinson and A2 seem deficient in that regard, Robinson being slightly better. I know Rothbard is on the Robinson list, but I don't know which particular title.

I would think that a grounding in all the major economic schools, <i.e. Austrian, Chicago, Keynesian, Socialist and neo-classical> would be a good idea. How to do that without overloading the curriculum?

Anyhow, no hurry about this. Just looking for general info at the moment.