Heidi told me about these schools around the country ( and world, for that matter) that I'd never heard of before. A lot of them are new, but the original has been around for thirty years in Framingham, Mass (a town that Billy really likes, having lived next door in Natick in his Boston years). The schools are called Sudbury Schools or more generally democratic schools and they basically do all the things that I'm so philosophically interested in that made me want to homeschool, except in a small private school setting. Interesting! I have yet to inverstigate whether or not they live up to their mandate in practical everyday life, but the idea is good. The flow of power is one thing they are big on- all the kids and staff each have a vote on rules, hiring, and the running of the school (I've never heard of that before). They're big on freedom- trying to do the American ideal of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for kids- and kids basically choose what they do all day without any curriculum and are helped along by 'staff' (not even called teachers) when the KIDS ASK THEM TO AND NOT BEFORE. Kids often learn from each other- the school goes from age 4 to 18 or 19. There is no testing or evaluation of academic work, except what the children do themselves. They are responsible for finding interesting things to do and learning what they want to learn. They do a lot of going outside the school to play and learn and there is generally a lot of play that happens that naturally leads to learning. They have had great success with this approach and graduates (who defend a thesis that they are ready to be productive members of society to get a diploma) have gone on to all kinds of careers and most go on to college and advanced degrees. Mostly, though, they know who they are and what they want. They can still think for themselves at the end of their school days. Revolutionary! It costs a lot, but not as much as Montessori, and they often have sliding scales and/or discounts for second and third, etc. children from the same family. So go check it out if you're curious- you can google it to find Sudbury Schools.
Posted by Bahiyyih at January 2, 2005 09:27 AM