I have read all of John Holt’s writings and he has influenced me more than any other educator. This is one of my favorite passages from his book “What do I Do Monday? He addresses the comment that so many people make about forcing children to do something they don’t want to do. I have also found that it rarely works to require a child to do something “for their own good”…
” More times than I can remember, teachers or parents have said to me, of some child, ” He didn’t want to do something, but I made him do it, and he is glad, and if I hadn’t made him he would have never done anything.” The other day a pleasant and probably kindly coach and swimming instructor told me about some child who hadn’t wanted to swim, but he had made him, and the child had learned and now liked it, so why shouldn’t he have the right to compel everyone to swim? There are many answers. The child might have in time learned to swim on his own, and not only had the pleasure of swimming, but the far more important pleasure of having found that pleasure for himself. Or he might have used that time to find some other skills and pleasures, just as good. The real trouble, as I said to the coach is this: I love swimming, and in a school where nothing else was compulsory I might see a case for making swimming so. But for every child in that school there are dozens of adults, each convinced that he has something of vital importance to “give” the child that he would never get for himself, all saying to the child, ” I know better than you do what is good for you.” By the time all those people get through making the child do what they know is good for him, he has no time or energy left. What is worse, he has no sense of being in charge of his life and learning or that he could be in charge, or that he deserves to be in charge or that if he were in charge it would turn out anyway other than badly. In short, he has no sense of his identity or place. He is only where and what others tell him he is.”