Rambling again

As a new sudbury parent you think you know what The Philosophy is all about and sure you have your reservations but you think you can handle it. Then, one day, you come to a realization about the staff.

They are not teachers. They are not there to teach your kids. They are not even going to try.

If your kids asks them a question, they'll answer it to the best of their ability. If your kid wants help, they'll help. But they really truly have no interest in teaching your kid anything.

Sudbury schools are not curriculum based. They have no great wisdom to impart. They do not make learning "fun". And most importantly this is not even their organizing principle.

When you get this, as a parent, it's a little scary. You might feel cheated, hoodwinked. Hey, you think, what the hell kind of school is this anyway?

It's exactly the kind of school that they said it was. The organizing principle of a sudbury school is to prepare children to be active engaged citizens in a democracy. To be responsibile adults. I think they throw in the life long learner crap because people can't handle the idea of a school that doesn't have the word "learn" in its manifesto somewhere. No, it's just that people have a very rigid idea of what learning means and "life long learner" fits that better.

The learning that happens at a Sudbury School is like a slow cooker. It's like aging a fine wine. Or letting a cheese ripen. You create the optimum conditions to get the desired product and then you just let it go. Check on it from time to time and wait for the magic to happen.

It isn't that simple, there is a lot of tinkering but the point is that it is a subtle and long process and you wonder if it is ever going to work and then one day it does.

Curriculum based education is like a vintner who keeps tasting his wine too early and every time he doesn't like the taste he adds something else. And keeps adding and adding and sometimes at the end he gets wine and sometimes vinegar and sometimes grape juice. And when you criticize him he says "my equipment sucks" or "I didn't have enough money to do it the way I wanted to" but he never questions his method in the first place.

This is an imperfect analogy but I'm sure you see what I'm getting at. Traditional schools suck and sudbury schools rock. Case closed!!