I know and like what Sudbury tries to do. And I think Sudbury's ideas and
practice have something to offer the reflective educator and the reflective
school. I'm not sure society at large - or certainly the powers that be -
want to foster the kind of independent thinking that Sudbury fosters.

What's the goal? What outcome is wanted? Our schools were founded to contain
children - not really to educate them. Basic literacy was the goal but not
more than that but to bring children in off the streets. When we designed
our 'common schools' or 'free schools', we never intended them to do more
than impart some basic literacy. We certainly never wanted them to foster
independent thinking or to challenge the status quo in any way.

And so they don't but Sudbury and places like it do. Not only in that they
achieve literacy but that they try to be democratic in structure. Democratic
education is considered laughable by most educators and frightenly radical
by those who aren't doubled up over laughing at it.

And don't be too quick to glorify the alternative schools or 'open schools'
as having no flaws. The perfect school has yet to be designed but any school
that is a school of choice - as is Sudbury - is not fairly compared to the
masses of schools that admit the masses who really just don't want to be
there at all.

I personally try to take hope in the charter school movement and in the
school choice movement but it is hard to have hope these days.
> I'd like to offer evidence of a solution. There is a school in
> Massachusetts called the Sudbury Valley School. The students decide what
> they want to learn, and when/how they want to learn it. There are only
> classes if the students want them. The school has been in existance for
> 40 years, and all of the graduates are literate. The school has never
> seen a case of dyslexia. All of the students learn to read, yet they are
> never expressly taught how to read. What is going on there that those who
> promote traditional schooling don't want us to know? Are all the
> mainstream ideas about education utterly wrong? I think so. The school's
> site is:
>
> sudval.org
>
> On 11/06/09, ElemESOL wrote:
>> I agree. Children and adults learn by doing. But all the programs at
>> my school are so teacher-centered. (We don't teach
>> standards/curriculumn/objectives, we have "programs" we have to stick
>> to like glue.) The experts from the programs tell us to do a lot of
>> modeling. Well, if the kids aren't doing most of the work, they aren't
>> learning and it's not at their level. But we are forced to teach the
>> programs the district spends millions on. It's like living on a
>> hampster wheel, only we can't hop off.
>>
>> I also agree it's all about family values, not money/race/religion. I
>> wish school could be a choice, but could you imagine all the kids who
>> would wander the streets all day? Sadly, we need schools to be holding
>> tanks.

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