Education without Coercion. Is it possible?

Perhaps a better title would be "Parenting without Coercion. Is it Possible?" But I have been thinking about it in the context of education, so I will stick to that for now.

Recently I have been reading about different early childhood education ideas/ philosophies. There are so many. The fundamental question I feel the need to answer before moving forward with any choices is this, "Is coercion a viable tool in the educating of children?" From my reading, there seem to be a range of ideas whose extremes may be summed up thus:

1) No. Coercion is never appropriate. It will kill the love of learning/joy of discovery. All learning should be child-led and nothing should be imposed upon the child that they are not interested in learning about.

OR

2) Yes. Children will never learn all the things that they need to know if they are not formally and properly taught these lessons. Therefore as parents/ educators, it is our responsibility to drill into them the things they will need to know.*

So, the question is, Is it possible to get your child to learn these things without the use of coercion? I know that formal school settings rely on coercion as both a classroom management (behavior) technique and a way to motivate students to complete assignments, therefore presumably learning the material. (For the purpose of this discussion, we will assume it works.) Consequences for non-compliance are getting spoken to privately, getting a note sent home to parents, going to the principal' office, and perhaps even public reprimand.

At the opposite extreme is "Radical Unschooling," which is sometimes accompanied by a "consentual living" approach to life. From what I can make of it, the idea is that children will learn what they need to know just by living. No formal education/ teaching is necessary for children to aquire the skills and knowledge necessary to be productive people. At a deeper level is the idea that no one should be forced to do anything they aren't ready to do, so forcing a child to sit down learn something is wrong. They trust that the child's own natural curiousity will kick in and he will want to learn [to read, multiplication tables, world history, etc.] in his own time.

The first extreme might produce a child who learns only for praise or who has completely shut down to any learning because the joy has been taken out of it for him. The second extreme might produce a child with little self-discipline and lacking in the skills or knowledge that he never had an interest in aquiring. So where is the middle ground?

After discussions with my pediatrician, I am convinced that children do not have enough perspective or self-regulating ability to know that it is not good for them to watch TV all day or eat Snickers bars for breakfast. Some limits are necessary, an therefore some coercion is necessary to ensure basic health and safety. But how much should be our efforts as parents or educators to provide opportunities for learning that are fun and engaging and how much should be setting the standard or expectation that the child will learn X, and using coercion to force the child to comply? Is there a percentage ratio? How do you know which skills or ideas require which method to learn?

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*Note: Different educational philosophies think different things are essential. For my purposes I will use these criteria for early childhood education: basic social manners, a sense of self-assuredness (security?), respect for others and their possessions, how to be part of a group, letter and number recognition, basic counting, and phonics. For later elementary, I think the following are essential: the 3Rs, history of civilization, general science concepts and the scientific method, the opportunity to appreciate and make art and music.