Dr. Gray spoke and answered questions from the audience for an hour and 40 minutes. We have broken up into 15 segments, which will be uploaded weekly installments. These videos can also be found on our Vimeo page.

We have also made a dvd of this talk. If you are interested in a free or cheap copy, please contact us.

Chapter 1: Evolutionary Developmental Psychology
Peter Gray introduces his interest in the overlap between evolutionary and developmental psychology. Humans evolved as hunter gatherers.

Chapter 2: A Correlation Between Decreasing Play and Increasing Pathology

From anecdotal and clinical evidence, Dr. Gray demonstrates a clear correlation between a decline in the freedom of children and an increase in developmental pathology.

Chapter 3: Causation Between Decreasing Play and Increasing Pathology

Though correlation does not mean causation, there is good reason to believe the decline in children’s freedom and ability to play is a cause of the documented rise in unhappiness and pathology.

Chapter 4: Kids Today Are Trusted Less

A little tangent about what it was like being a kid, even just 30 years ago, compared to today.

Chapter 5: Culture Throughout Human Evolution

Human beings have had agriculture for just a flash in the history of our species’ evolution. As an evolutionary psychologist, Peter Gray gives great weight to the long period of evolution prior to agriculture. It was during this period that the innate learning processes of our species evolved. What was culture like during this period? How were children educated? What was (and presumably is still) necessary for healthy development of children into adults?

Chapter 6: The Role of Play in Evolution

Play has been central in the development of competent, mature individuals throughout essentially all of human evolution. Dr. Gray discusses the character of this play and how it acted as the dominant, if not only, mode of education.

Chapter 7: Too Bad We Aren’t Hunter Gatherers!

That all sounds well and good, but culture is radically different today than it was in hunter gather societies. Right?

Chapter 8: Creating Educational Opportunities

Under the paradigm discussed in this series, it is up to children to educate themselves, but it is up to adults to provide for an environment where children can educate themselves. As adults, how do we create these possibilities for self education within modern society? What are characteristics of such an environment?

Questions and Answers

Peter Gray used the last 40 minutes of his time speaking to answer questions from the audience.

Is unrestricted access to video games too much?

Is it too late for my teen to get something out of a Sudbury School?

What about homeschooling? Unschooling?

Comments from one family on boredom in unschooling vs a Sudbury school.

One parent comments (inaudible in recording) on their families experience with boredom in unschooling vs at a Sudbury School. When unschooling, their kids would respond to boredom by whining. At a Sudbury School, they began to respond to boredom by thinking of things to do.

Questions and comments about age mixing, competition and bullying.

“Defensive Parenting”

AUSTIN—On Tuesday, March 5, from 7 to 8:30pm, Boston College professor and evolutionary developmental psychologist Peter Gray will present compelling evidence for the vital necessity of free play.

Children are born with a natural curiosity, playfulness, and sociability. These instinctive drives enable children to educate themselves by exploring the world. It’s puzzling, then, that our schools feature forced lessons and standardized tests. “How,” asks Gray, “did we come to the conclusion that the best way to educate students is to force them into settings where they are bored, unhappy, and anxious?” Not surprisingly, he has found a direct correlation between the decline of play and the rise in emotional and social disorders among our youth.

In his upcoming book, Free To Learn , Gray offers a proposal to make school more conducive to children’s biologically shaped style of learning. Returning to our hunter-gatherer roots, Gray shows that children learn best in an environment that allows free age-mixing; provides the time and space for children to play and explore freely; and offers access to a free exchange of ideas.

This kind of educational setting exists at places like Austin’s Clearview Sudbury School. Sudbury schools hold to the hunter-gatherers’ core social values of autonomy, sharing, and equality, and are built on the philosophy that each person is directly responsible for his or her own education.

Peter Gray will also be speaking at SXSWedu, and he maintains a popular blog at Psychology Today.

Join the event and spread the word on Facebook!

For more information, feel free to contact us

Thanks to a generous donation from the Yellow bike collective, we are able to offer bicycle upkeep related assistance to the community. This takes place in room three of the Clearview campus. We have chain breakers, cone wrenches, freewheel tools and many other bicycle specific tools. No knowledge of bicycle maintenance is necessary, but you should be willing to learn.

The clinic is free to anyone. All you need is a bicycle, or something that could potentially be worked back into being a bicycle.

Call Elliot with questions: five one two – five eight four – six eight eight two

Enjoy,
Tom