“My Dad’s a Teacher”

An adult was heard to say “my dad didn’t teach me what to do, he just lived and let me watch”.

That’s rich.  How many parents spend a great deal of time “telling’ their children what to do, how to do it, how to be “polite”, “kind”, etc.  Is this the best way?  The adult above clearly valued a different approach: modelling and let it be.

People learn best through self-discovery and exploration.  “Telling” rarely communicates what is important because it is disconnected from your own experience- it amounts to accepting received wisdom, so to speak.  Parents who live their lives well, don’t tell their children to do as I say not as I do”, teach them what is important and teach them in the best way possible.

The other thing at work here is not micromanaging a child’s development or future. Sure, as parents we all want what’s best for our children, we all want them to succeed in their endeavors.  There is a difference between providing opportunities and support and what some parents do, which amounts to controlling their children’s lives and not allowing for self-expression and self-awareness.  Letting your child discover what moves them, what contributions they can make to the world, is the best way to help them become both whole and happy.

 

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Parent Teachers

“Hey! Teacher! Leave them kids alone!”  (sing it with me.)  Yes, Pink was on to something.  Parents – leave them kids alone!

When did parenting become a vocation?  When did parents become artists whose children are the raw material from which to sculpt their masterpiece?  This is what too many parents do these days: from Baby Mozart (hopefully mostly debunked… right??) to prep-school for a prep-school for a prep-school…. getting into the “right” kindergarten, yes?  Otherwise it’s all downhill.  Helicopter parents who attend job interviews for their 18 and 22-year olds – then call up the employer when they don’t get the job to ask why.  I don’t make this stuff up.

When president emeritus of the American Public Media Group, Bill Kling, was asked what his parents were like, he said “They were wonderful.  They absolutely left me alone.”  What?! Come again.  Not in today’s world.  He talks about all the exploration he did and experiments he invented (and, yes, things he blew up!) – all in the pursuit of his own ideas, his own conceptions, his own thinking, innovation and curiosity.  That’s an education.  That’s a child given the space, the freedom to learn.  Not plugged-in, entertained and “activitied” (I made that up: it’s the parental over-scheduling act of having activities being thrown at you all too frequently).  No, this was a child left on his own to learn.

It really is that simple.  We are born to learn.  That’s the one huge gift we are given at birth: ready and powerful learners.  Naturally curious and explorative we will figure it out, whatever it is.  It’s what humanity has done all  along and will continue to do if we don’t short-circuit the system.  Leave them children alone, and all will be fine.

We need anxious parents to relax, take a step back and understand that this is how it works best.   There are too many parents motivated by good intentions but who are lacking some basic information.

A good new website provides some guidance: http://www.aidtolife.org

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We’re all Teachers

From the minute a child is born she is learning.  Some will argue before.  This is literally true, and fascinating in its truth.  Think about  it.

Because  learning is happening in every waking moment of a child’s life, we should pay attention to what they’re learning – because they are.  Parents are teaching their child with every little thing that they do.  As an educator/administrator I remind teachers who are dealing with an unruly child that “they weren’t born that way” (Lady Gaga is talking about something else).  The point is that the child learned to be unruly by what she saw or how she was treated.

The parent who always brings to their infant the very thing that  the infant is seeking, so that they won’t have to exert so much energy and can be happy NOW, is teaching the infant that effort and persistence are unnecessary and that things will come easily.  This is what learning in every waking moment means.  The child has no choice about this- it’s how nature set the system up.  For this “now happy” infant: what a shame.

“Maybe their lives will turn out differently” says president emeritus of the American Public Media Group, Bill Kling, when talking about his childhood opportunity to explore things first hand, on his own.  “I think  we often undervalue the importance of giving kids that kind of hands-on experience.  It may not lead to their deciding what to  do with their lives, but  it’s surprising what they will  absorb- and maybe their  lives will turn out differently.”

Indeed.  Let’s step back from being so on top of our children.  Let’s give them space to explore, inquire on their own, make mistakes, mess up, fail, and of course… learn all the while.

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legions of parents

If you read Thomas Moore’s UTOPIA you might be surprised to learn that his conception of the ideal world, when it comes to child-rearing, was to have the state remove children from their parents at a very young age so that the state could turn them into what was needed.  That is, educate them according to the needs of the “master plan”.  This would likely strike most parents as odd and certainly unsavory- peculiar for a “perfect world” .

Moore got his ideas from Plato, who argued for just the same sort of setup: the state knows best and parental bonds should be broken- best if you don’t even know which child was yours.  You just produce them so that society ash the raw material to do what needs to be done.  Very much a factory model when you think of it: churning out “goods”.

While no culture ever explicitly adopted this approach overly, one has to wonder how much we’ve adopted it indirectly.  Where did the idea that the state should control your child’s education come from?  Central control and planning?  There is plenty of research today to suggest that with greater local control (at the school level) comes greater educational outcomes.

Take this the next step and you get the “school choice” movement.  We’re slowly making our way down this road with home schooling, more private/independent schools, magnet schools, charter schools, etc.  As one commenter (Czako) to this blog said recently, “I strongly believe that it is ultimately the parent who has responsibility for their child’s education and growth…not the school system….It is parents that need to encourage determination, self discipline, self awareness, etc. It is only if the parent does this can the child be successful. This is done by being involved with your kids, leading by example, and encouraging these behaviors.”

We need the legions of parents out there to step up more and more and demand that schools adapt to what science knows to be best.  We need parents to demand from their schools and school districts that the disconnect between what takes place in traditional schools be broken, so that the evidence in the research can reach the children.

Encourage all you know to use their voices.  Too many days have gone by, wasted, as the education conversation remains the same.  The system needs to serve the users, not the state – speak up to change that, to change the conversation.

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