Grace Llewellyn - The Teenage Liberation Handbook: How to Quit School and Get a Real Life and Education

Fresh thoughts for the 30th Anniversary edition

At MIT, grad students pass The Teenage Liberation Handbook around in secret to set our minds free from institutional thinking. Without it, I would not be the founder of a successful electronics company. It lit me on fire, and my learning went from regimented to an out-of-control fire hose. In fact, I assigned readings from this book to my own MIT grad studentsin teaching invention literacy, self-directed learning is essential to a hacker mindset: a way of exploring knowledge and possibilities beyond the path.

Jay Silver, Founder/CEO MakeyMakey, PhD MIT Media Lab

This handbook shook up my familys views of learning and life, and gifted us with liberating and exhilarating new ways of experiencing our unschooling journey. Its refreshing rebellious philosophy is infused into our lives to this day. This is a must-read for anyone who is considering the grand adventure of unschooling.

Leo Babauta, author and blogger, Zen Habits (ZenHabits.net)

Three pivotal events divide my life into Before and After moments: 1) meeting my wife, 2) becoming a parent, and 3) reading The Teenage Liberation Handbook. Before reading this book, I was a teacher committed to reforming schools by working my way up the system. After reading it, I was derailed into leaving the system to start a program that would help all of my students use the wisdom and lifestyle described in these pages.... I propose this book be handed out to all adults embarking on retirement just as much as it might be shared with teens who are seeking another way to live.

Ken Danford, co-founder of North Star Self-Directed Learning and Liberated Learners, author of Learning is Natural, School is Optional

I love that this version of Graces book speaks to some of the non-romantic realities of unschooling.... I encourage the slow drinking in of this book.... Grace offers plenty of madd question-askin opportunities, and plenty of invitations to challenge what you thought you knew about the purpose and power of education, so that you can be a liberation zone for a young person in your life.

Akilah S. Richards, Unschooling Organizer | Audio Nerd, Author: Raising Free People: Unschooling as Liberation and Healing Work

When I was a disillusioned public school teacher, a chance encounter with The Teenage Liberation Handbook changed my life. It gave me hope that a better and more meaningful life was possible for the young people I worked withand for me too. This book is a great starting point for teens (and their parents) who suspect they could learn more and live better without school.

Joel Hammon, co-founder of Princeton Learning Cooperative and Liberated Learners, author of The Teacher Liberation Handbook

Grace Llewellyn inspired many teenagers, and their parents, to let go of a schooled mindset and embrace the freedom of life without school. In this spectacular, updated edition we are inspired all over again by her wisdom and work over the past 30 years.

Kerry McDonald, author of Unschooled: Raising Curious, Well-Educated Children Outside the Conventional Classroom

Thirty years ago, I cheered loudly when The Teenage Liberation Handbook was published and have recommended it to families ever since. This new, updated edition provides parents and teenagers with the best ideas and proven strategies for helping teenagers find their place in the world without conventional schooling. The Teenage Liberation Handbook is an evergreen resource for enabling self-directed education.

Patrick Farenga, co-author of Teach Your Own and publisher of Growing Without Schooling magazine

On previous editions of

The Teenage Liberation Handbook

This is a very dangerous book. It contradicts all the conventional wisdom about dropouts and the importance of a formal education. It is funny and inspiring. Do not, under any circumstances, share this book with a bright, frustrated high-schooler being ground into mind fudge by the school system. This writer cannot be responsible for the happiness and sense of personal responsibility that might [result].

Pat Wagner in Bloomsbury Review

Heartily recommended to every flavor of human being, not just teenagers.... Sooner or later youre going to realize that youve been cheated out of a real life by missing a real educationwhen that time comes Grace Llewellyns Handbook will save you a thousand hours of frustration, false starts and missed opportunities. Anyone who follows this clear blueprint is certain to meet the future with courage, enthusiasm, resourcefulness and the abundant love of life that the author has. She demonstrates brilliantly that school and education are two very different things, defining the latter precisely and with such a wonderful zest the reader is left dazzled with his own rich possibilities. Get this book now so it will be on hand for the great emergency when you wake up.

John Taylor Gatto, New York State Teacher of the Year, 1991, author of Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling

Bursting with clever strategies, valuable resources and wise guidance on how to design an interest-driven self-education. It was the sole inspiration for our family to take on an endeavor we thought was out of the question.

Griff Wigley in The Millennium Whole Earth Catalog

Every teenager, schooled or notand every parent of a teenagershould get a chance to read The Teenage Liberation Handbook. It is a real eye-opener to many of lifes possibilities, as well as a celebration of the personal freedoms homeschoolers enjoy.... Llewellyns dream, it seems, is to set every teenager free to think and explore for herself, to make her world what she wants it to be.... Even as an adult shes affected my life and encouraged me to new heights. She understands well what its like to be a teenager, and she has anticipated every question and every argument that teenagers are likely to bring up.... Give copies to kids having problems, anxious parents, everyone you can think of. Do your part to liberate teenagers everywhere!

Pam Gingold in the Northern California Homeschool Association Newsletter

This book could foment revolution.... Brilliant and wise, its brimming with insight, information and humor.... The Teenage Liberation Handbook should be required reading (for those who believe in required reading) or simply pleasure reading for anyone whos ever wondered what theyre doing in school.

Kirsten Chevalier in Merlyns Pen

The TLH is more than a book. Its a map,... well written and entertaining. Shall I beg you to read it? If I must.... Please? Please read this book... itll help! Its not like other books, this one is only looking out for your best interests.... Sometimes funny, sometimes sad, but always thought provoking, the TLH is for anyone who wakes up with pains in their stomach at the thought of another day of rote memorization and pointless busywork.

Michael Condon in In 2 Print

Uh-oh. State schools keep turning out partially literate drones.... I have found the single essential book for those who value learning but not school and want to slap society to its senses. The Teenage Liberation Handbook is a complete tool kit for aspiring human beings.... This review cannot convey to you the loopy daring and wonder of Grace Llewellyns prose, the sheer megatonnage of shock value in her suppositions.... Get this book. Order many copies and infiltrate them into school libraries, leave them at bus stops and in plain view of the neighbors kids and in the Education Department of your local university.... Id lend you my copy, but there is a fair queue of people waiting for it.

Brien Bartels in LUNO (Learning Unlimited Network of Oregon)

Inspiring and very practical.... Llewellyn helps her readers think about what they can do by giving them examples of what actual teenagers have done, so her book is grounded in concrete experience. She answers all of the common questions about learning outside of school and helps teenagers see that they can take control of their lives and make adolescence, instead of the stereotypical period of boredom, alienation, and rebellion that we are accustomed to, a time of interesting discoveries, real learning, and meaningful work.