SOLE School
Setting up a SOLE
school is not for the faint hearted. It requires a belief that education is
about more than what we grew up with. It is about recognizing that education is
personal and self-driven. Education must follow the interests of the child so
that they can develop their skills and ideas to help them become successfully
educated people who from childhood are working to fulfill their dreams.
A SOLE school would be
a school that would look radically different from other schools. Gone would be
desks and lectures and structured lessons. Gone would be the adults making the
final decisions. In their place would be the students learning about the things
they are interested in. It would be cooperative decision making with adults and
students being equals. The adults would provide the guidance and moral
reasoning. Teachers would be inserting the curriculum into the learning where
it was necessary. Some language arts concepts would be taught through drama,
dance, art, music. Laptops and research would be cornerstones in the
educational development of the kids. Direct, hands on experience would be
integral in their education.
In order to have a SOLE
school become a reality it involves hiring the right people for the position.
No longer required are the type A, structured, by the book people who now
inhabit our classrooms. Required are open minded thinkers who are flexible and
adaptable in understanding that curriculum is to be taught within the
boundaries established by the children in the room. They must be ready to
pursue any angle to help the children grow. Curriculum must be woven into the
children’s learning. It should not be the sole basis for their learning. This must be done from Kindergarten forward
as children are capable of doing modified forms of SOLE at the early grade
levels.
As important as all
this is students need to be exploring a world in which they live. Their
learning should have technology and resources available to facilitate research
and hands on learning. There should be an understanding within the community
that all students should receive hands on experience where their interests lie.
If someone wishes to explore auto mechanics they should have time in a garage
and then spend time researching the things they are trying to understand. Along
with this students need to understand how speaking, presentation, social skills
affect their place and understanding in the world. Students should also have a
social conscience. In exploring an area of the human condition and their world
they need to see and understand firsthand how their actions and behaviours
impact the rest of the world. In the past children would learn trades/jobs from
their parents. If your father was a storekeeper you would learn how to run a
store. If your father was a farmer you would learn everything you needed to
know about farming. As we moved more towards urban centres we have moved away
from the concept. We need to revive this concept with SOLE so that kids may
explore and understand the world around them.
Teachers and students
need to explore ways of self-funding. This teaches the students about handling
money and developing their interest and abilities in entrepreneurship which
allows them greater freedom to pursue their interests.
I want to stress here
that the curriculum will be covered, not just in the way that formal education
has seen it done for the last century. If we are simply teaching curriculum for
the sake of teaching curriculum we are wasting our time. The teaching of curriculum must be done in a
more practical way that evolves as the child grows. If they need to write a
letter they need to be taught letter writing skills. We can no longer afford to
teach children skills that they may or may not use in the future. The
curriculum is like many government laws. They are added to in order to make
them stronger but in so much detail the enforceability is lost. There are too
many things in a curriculum to cover satisfactorily.
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