| | This article is always a good read during this time of year. (Ethan)
Indeed!
Somehow I've never seen this one before. Excellent!
My own son, who is now 15 and just beginning his sophomore year in high school, has attended public shool for most of his life. But due to my influence at home, what he hears from his teachers is frequently questioned by him.
(If your child has to attend public school---because you don't happen to be wealthy enough to send him to a private academy)---then you need to make an effort to "counter" the crap he will learn there, and then not only will it not be as harmful to his development, he will learn to recognize it for what it is when it happens and actually be able to make judgments about it on his own.
Few things make me prouder than when my son has come home from school in a huff because "The teacher yelled at a girl for asking a question, and that's not right", or "Today, my teacher said that Democrats care about the poor and Republicans don't." (He just couldn't believe that she was allowed to make such a statement in class.) The fact that he knows not to automatically respect the opinions of his teachers was an important lesson I taught him (it went hand in hand with, "Not all adults deserve respect. Some of them are idiots. Remember that.")
In another instance, though, he was pleasantly surprised by a social studies teacher (a flamboyantly gay man whom he'd assumed would be especially liberal) who asked the class if the government should be responsible for everybody, and when he was met with answers of "Yes!" he promptly said, "No!" and proceeded to introduce the notion of personal responsibility to the class. A Log Cabin Republican, perhaps? I don't know. But my son had respect for that guy from that time on, and loved being in his class. (Sometimes your kid lucks out with one or two teachers in the system.)
Bottom line: if Montessori (or something just as good) isn't available to you (for whatever reason), EDUCATE your child at home as well. Ask him/her what they learned today in school (especially in fields like social studies and literature) and help them properly assess what they've been taught. And encourage them to do independent reading and learning on their own. (My son loves the library and the bookstore.)
Public education is not the only education your child will receive if you make an effort. :-)
Erica
|
|
