Progressive parents realized that neither the big mind, nor the grandiose career successes, nor the presence of the classical family of the format “mom + dad + two children” does not guarantee the child peace of mind, feelings of satisfaction and, after all, mental and physical health. Being a parent is a much more responsible role than being a president or a minister. And today, like never before, moms and dads are under the pressure of a huge number of factors, not even from the birth of the child, but from the moment of the first thought of him. Harmful ultrasound or not? To give birth or cesarean? How long to breastfeed? Vaccinations: for or against? Sleep: joint or separate? Preparing for school in 5 or 6 years? Choosing a school or a teacher? Does not want to go to school so what to do?
The problem is aggravated by the fact that there are no right answers. Specialists – teachers, doctors, psychologists, physiologists from district pediatricians to professors of the world’s leading clinics argue with each other, leading powerful arguments on both sides. Not all parents are specialists in chemistry, biology, medicine and psychology, and certainly not all at once. They have a head around the forums and blogs on the Internet, broadcasts on radio and TV, from books and articles (Barbara n.p.).
Today, parents have to bear the burden of responsibility for each of their choices, defending it before grandparents, neighbors in the stairwell, on the playground, and sometimes even before the state institutions – polyclinic, kindergarten, school. But there are two more trials ahead: the first is the school years, the second is how the child will evaluate your efforts. No one knows if your son will ask you in the future why you did not move to an ecologically clean region or even a country when it was covered with allergic rashes, choking in your native land. Maybe her daughter will say that she has no friends, because you did not give her to a kindergarten, and then to a regular school. Eternal questions, pangs of choice and difficult decisions.
An average resident of our country has three options for securing a secondary education for a child: a well-trodden path of a municipal school “by residence permit”, an inexpensive education in a private educational institution, or a worldwide renunciation of public services and a transition to a family-based form of education. With the first two options, it’s all the more or less clear: we all studied at public schools and perfectly know their procedures, advantages and problems. Units of us graduated from elite private schools, but even if not, it is also clear that the conditions and quality of education there roughly correspond to the difference in the cost of services (Barbara n.p.).
Into the unknown. In space, the infinite and, thanks to the Internet, the boundless educational space of the whole world again scary, again a lot of questions. Fortunately, there are rays of light in this dark realm of home study options, open (I’m not afraid of this word, non-institutionalized) forms of education, interactive educational sites – modern publications (magazines, newspapers, blogs, websites) and support groups for parents who have chosen a family education (CO). It would seem that this is the future: freedom from a school comb-leveling, tyrant-directors, hysterical teachers, overloaded schedules, unhealthy diets, cruel peers, dangerous companies, school stress.
No. In the modern high-tech world of information and communication technologies and moral degradation, when individuals own the riches of the whole world, and millions are starving, when it is possible to destroy an entire family by one post in instagram – no, the best mom and dad can not give the child a modern high-quality education at home, nor at the tutors. They will be able to give something they themselves consider good, namely, to help the child become well-read, educated, erudite, and physically developed. However, it is impossible to give something that you do not have a clue about (Barbara n.p.).
This is not taught by any book, no country’s school, no courses. Modern education is not wider and not deeper than the subject is. Modern skills cannot be formed in tandem with a loving mother. Only in a real uneven-aged team of different people from different families and cultures. This can not be ensured in home schooling. While the parents of children in family learning teach each other to “read” the textbooks and “explain” to the children, “retelling” the content (the technology of training characteristic of the 16th-19th centuries), while the leading “experts” of family teaching tell how to “learn all subjects” through answering, it is clear that their task is to get rid of the school with little blood, “surrender the objects”, “close the quarters and half a year,” to free their children from school for … for what seems to be the best in the parent’s view.
I’m not only a parent, I’m an expert in education and a supporter of professionalism (Barbara n.p.). I want my professional doctor to treat my children and me, protect a professional lawyer, wear a professional tailor, and we want to learn from a professional teacher in a modern organized educational space with the most advanced educational standards. Neither public, nor private schools, nor home schooling will not allow these conditions to be met. But there is a way out.
Just as Waldorf schools open at the request of the parent community, in America there will be small schools oriented towards the achievement of the modern quality of education in accordance with the values and incomes of families. These schools will be organized not by those appointed from above, but by education specialists chosen by their parents. Perhaps head hunting will begin, and parents will be able to hire directors of public schools, at the same time there will be new faces and names of those who could not achieve positions in the state system.
This, and not endless and stupid state reforms, will lead to the fact that teachers will master the most advanced technologies, implement an individual approach, apply effective methods. And the educational organizers will hear and respond flexibly to the family’s requests, providing truly transparent financial reports (rather than collecting thousands for repairs and gifts). The network of such initiative schools, of course, will not replace the state education, but will finally lead to true reforms of the country’s educational system, because it will simply not be able to change in the conditions of such competition with a new modern school (Barbara n.p.).
We will not be able to disclose the secret of happiness and make up his recipe. But, at least, the new initiative schools in America will allow small associations of parents, teachers and educational organizers to come to a common understanding of what is good and right for children. And if not, join another small school, or open one more. When we equip the space of each small school and give our children the opportunity to feel what it is like to live and learn, understanding and respecting each other, making an informed choice, and not submitting to someone else’s will, openly asking questions and expressing their opinions, assessing the boundless opportunities that were in the hands of humanity and, in this connection, a great responsibility for the fate of all people – this will be very much in comparison with the decadent state in which we are today. We must learn to come to an agreement in small groups, making decisions at the local level. Then in tens of years our children will be able to make effective decisions of a planetary scale, so that the resources of all bowels, heights and oceans and all people serve the solution of world problems and contribute to the development of everyone.
Works Cited
School, Barbara Hettle in Homeschooling High. “Best TED Talks for Homeschoolers.” Homeschool Success, 27 Feb. 2013, https://homeschoolsuccess.com/ted-talks-for-homeschoolers/.
