Yesterday, I took our two boys (aged 6 and 3) to a place where they could be their best. Not the only such place but a great one nevertheless. The place is called Naturescape, free and right in the heart of Perth’s Kings Park. It is an impressive place with a particularly impressive (if not obvious) feature – its design was based on extensive survey of kids. What did the kids want? Dirt, water, sticks, rocks, stuff to climb, stuff to build, to craft and move.
Our boys dreamt up games, challenges and scenarios. They hung on and drew their breath while crossing creeks on tricky logs, climbing tall ladders, hanging off ropes or waiting if the structure they built with sticks is going to hold out. They built a dam, a bark boat, a ‘rock harbour’, read the map to find the way around, pretended to be Lorax standing on a chopped trunk (spot them on the pics below :-), spotted different rocks, plants and bushes, ran around a maze, fell off ropes, got wet, sandy, dirty, tired … a great few hours spent. It has also triggered a stack of stories and (no doubt) upcoming pictures, annotated cartoons, Lego creations on the theme and more.
As stated in the opening sentence – they were at their creative, acting, learning best.
When our 6 year old goes back to school this week, he will be expected to sit in a chair pretty still and ‘behave’ from 8.45am to 3pm. His teacher will be expected to ‘show progress’ with our kiddo on some pretty narrow parameters that dominate newspapers and societal DNA on ‘what schools should do’.
Likely results? Mr 6 will not be bouncy, creative self as much for sure and his teacher might feel guilty for not bringing the best out of him. Do I feel sorry for both of them? I do. Because a chair, a classroom and five-periods-a-day are not necessarily the things, the spaces, no wait … the technologies (!) that bring out the best in people. Every day I watch ‘at risk’ teenagers who turn into zombies when they walk through the school gate but they are brilliant mechanics, traders (just don’t ask what they trade…), bike riders, carers, navigators, budding chefs and lawyers (judging by their ability to argue finer points :-)) out there.
A chair, a classroom and five-periods-a-day (with a teacher who ‘knows’ and students who ‘don’t’) are simply historical accidents that we have found comforting to fund and support.
Now please, I would not just ‘get rid of schools’ but I would like us all in a society to think deeply and carefully about the lessons we can learn from watching the kids in places like Naturescape. And don’t for one minute think adults are hugely different and don’t want to play and learn.
Change by delight, not by fright. An old line we could heed a bit more.
And as I got home I came across this post by an old friend…
“Every day I watch ‘at risk’ teenagers who turn into zombies when they walk through the school gate but they are brilliant mechanics, traders (just don’t ask what they trade…), bike riders, carers, navigators, budding chefs and lawyers (judging by their ability to argue finer points 🙂 ) out there”
in the mid 19th century school building architects and educational system designers, collaborating across (at least) the English-speaking, French-speaking, and German-speaking worlds intentionally designed buildings, schedules, classrooms, and “lesson plans,” with the goal of turning children and adolescents into zombies. Thanks to Google Books, you needn’t even take my word for it, all their old books are now available everywhere, and they will tell you how just about everything we do in the traditional school is designed to turn “wild” “sub-human” “children” into passive, compliant, workers to fill the factories and office blocks of New York, Chicago, London, Manchester, Berlin, Frankfurt, Paris, et al. Passive, compliant workers who would know only how to work and consume, and thus, not revolt, expect better, or resist military conscription.
If that is what we still want, all we need do is continue to do what we have always done. If our goals are different, there is NOTHING about the way we run most schools which should continue unchanged.
“Every day I watch ‘at risk’ teenagers who turn into zombies when they walk through the school gate but they are brilliant mechanics, traders (just don’t ask what they trade…), bike riders, carers, navigators, budding chefs and lawyers (judging by their ability to argue finer points 🙂 ) out there”
in the mid 19th century school building architects and educational system designers, collaborating across (at least) the English-speaking, French-speaking, and German-speaking worlds intentionally designed buildings, schedules, classrooms, and “lesson plans,” with the goal of turning children and adolescents into zombies. Thanks to Google Books, you needn’t even take my word for it, all their old books are now available everywhere, and they will tell you how just about everything we do in the traditional school is designed to turn “wild” “sub-human” “children” into passive, compliant, workers to fill the factories and office blocks of New York, Chicago, London, Manchester, Berlin, Frankfurt, Paris, et al. Passive, compliant workers who would know only how to work and consume, and thus, not revolt, expect better, or resist military conscription.
If that is what we still want, all we need do is continue to do what we have always done. If our goals are different, there is NOTHING about the way we run most schools which should continue unchanged.