Disruption: A contemplation on mainstream education
What if we expanded our understanding of schooling?
What if we stopped making the children responsible for why they can’t learn, or sit still, or remain quiet in crowded classrooms with artificial lights for over six hours a day?
What if we stopped over-assigning labels to children, stopped focusing on how they don’t “fit” the mould, and began examining the environments they learn in as potential catalyzers of these conditions?
What if we acknowledged that this generation of children has had more exposure than ever to technology and instead of funding more tech, we began funding opportunities for children to be in the world around them?
What if we stopped worrying about how our children are going to “compete” in the world when they grow up and admitted that we don’t have a clue what that world is going to look like twenty years from now?
What if we stopped obsessing over marks and results and began focusing on questioning, exploring, integrating and understanding?
What if we stopped downloading our fears, our anxieties, our concerns about how they will perform in old, outdated systems and ways of thinking and instead began questioning the systems themselves?
What if we focused on connecting them to the earth we so badly want them to protect and care for?
What if we offered them opportunities to attune their fragile nervous systems to the sound of birds chirping, the rustling of leaves, and water streaming down a river?
What if their classrooms had wide open doors with sunlight streaming through big, beautiful windows and they had the freedom to move in and out without being forced to sit in a 3ft square box?
Why is it that the only mainstream perspective we have on learning and schooling is one that was developed over one hundred years ago for the purpose of creating cohorts of factory workers ready to take their place on the line?
How is it that we can talk about all we think is problematic with the school system, but we can’t pool our collective wisdom and extend that dialogue into dismantling that which isn’t working and creating something that does:
Something that serves all children.
Something that nurtures their mind, body and spirit.
Something that connects them to the very earth they stand on.
Something that honours their need to run, jump, play, make noise, touch, feel, dig, build; in community, together.
What could those children create in their future if their learning was centred around real-world problem solving, tangible, heart-felt experiences, exploration, stewardship, communication and community?
What if the future of schooling is not more computers, digital tools, and high-tech gadgets? What if it’s simpler than that? An unearthing, a return, a remembering: of that which is most important and vital to childhood and its honouring?
