Great read, just remember to correct the end of the “(“.
Marrie Cohen´s last [type] ..בניית אתרים

Am now following your lovely blog – found it via Sausage Mama :)
Clare Kirkpatrick´s last [type] ..Parenting, judgement & guilt

We have quite a few charter schools here in MN that are actively striving, and many with good results, to support these notions. Though of course, there are some ‘within the system’ parameters that they must follow… yet most of those compliance’s don’t affect the kids directly. If I was seeking a high school today and didn’t have a GOOD selection of physical Charter Schools to look at I’d definitely search for a virtual high school online or consider homeschooling. What kind of choices are you looking at in your area?

And thanks for bringing me back to this one, Rachel. It’s always interesting to me how quickly and easily we can become blind to the obvious… and pretend that something else is so. Oh, we often start out with the best of intentions… yet frequently in our efforts to serve some targeted group that is perceived by educators (for reasons both simple and complex) as ‘disadvantaged’ we lose sight of the truth.

For instance, yesterday I found myself in the city passing an Elementary School. They had a big banner across the the front of the building that said:

“If You Don’t Show Up, You Can’t Learn”

Now I understand this school is in an area of the city that suffers sketchy attendance and high drop out rates and their intention was probably to encourage attendance…

Yet didn’t occur to anyone in the school system that what that banner says is PATENTLY UNTRUE??? Humans, of ALL ages, are ALWAYS learning! “Learning” is virtually interchangeable with “growth”.

Ahhh… I can feel another post coming on… LOL

Thanks so much Rachel – I am equally happy to have found YOU! :)

I’m not so sure I’d go as far as saying we were ‘better off’ – yet I strongly feel we can incorporate the ‘new’ without tossing out valuable, proven, natural methods and materials. In my humble opinion, our social organization has reached some absurdly rigid proportions… and is bound to collapse on us.

And I’ll tell you what… should we ever experience, for whatever reason, an extended period of ‘blackout’ where current power sources fail, it will likely be the kid who can tie his shoes who will ‘win the race’! Yet I also know that we human’s are very creative and capable of making some amazing intuitive leaps… so all really is… always and forever… well! :)

No one is perfect. Everyone has a uneven neurological profile: we all have strengths and weaknesses in various areas, regardless of how “smart” we are.

There are days that I see kids who are so depressed and frustrated because they don’t fit into society’s definition of success. The worse thing about it is, these kids are sometimes very successful in several other areas, but the adults around them seem to have forgotten that success in school does not predict life success.

Kind of reminds of that book “All I need to know I learned in Kindergarten.”

P.S. I love your site Mary! So happy to have found a like-minded thinker!

Sometimes I get the feeling that with all the texting, iPhones, iPads, and everything else, we were better off when things were less “developed.”

I ran across a study that said that more children can manage an iPhone than tie their shoes! The argument was whether or not tying your shoes counts as a life-skill anymore…what do you think?