Some Reflections From The Road

I'm not by nature a happy traveler, yet here I find myself in the midst of a five week barnstorming tour of Australia that has taken me all over Queensland and New South Wales and will take me next to both South and Western Australia in the coming weeks. Since the middle of last month, I've rarely slept two nights in the same bed. I've traveled by plane, train and automobile. I've literally slept in pubs, chapels, a child's play room, and tomorrow night I'm apparently bedding down in a mansion.

I actually got to sleep for two nights in this chapel, where I also presented workshops.

This is the third time I've been Down Under in the past four years and at every stop I find educators and parents who, shockingly, have come to hear this preschool teacher from Seattle speak. I'm in equal measures flattered and inspired by these grown-up people who come together wherever I go in the interest of making the lives of young children better. I talk about play mostly, sharing some of the things I've learned over the two decades I've now spent working with young children on a daily basis, doing a job I'm finally starting to really understand. And like happens with the children I supposedly teach, I feel that I'm learning far more from the incredible people who come to hear me than they can possibly learn from me.

My bedroom was behind that door to the left of the alter.

It might sound like false modesty, but I assure you it's not. Everyone I meet knows more than me. Everyone I meet is more accomplished than me, at least when it comes to their schools, their communities, and their way of working with children.

I've been forced to reflect on why it is that I get to do things like this, even as an unhappy traveler. In the past few years, I've been invited to speak in my own country as well as Greece, Iceland, England, China, New Zealand, and right across Canada.

That's the wonderful Prue Walsh presenting at the Village Ways conference at the Dusty Hill Winery. I had to follow her! Yikes!

Of course, the fact that I've become an obsessive daily blog post writer is the biggest thing. I stand out, I think, by virtue of having published at least five posts a week since 2009. In fact, there were two years in there (2011 and 2012) during which I wrote 363 posts, taking only Christmas morning and New Year's Day off. I've since cut back to only around 260 posts a year, but it's still a lot and people have noticed. So, one of the secrets to my blogging "success" had been sheer volume.

As far as content, I'm all over the place, I think, although for the most part I'm writing about play and the politics of education, subjects that appear to be universal. Prior to becoming a parent I spent 15 years as a freelance writer. I expect that has contributed as well.

Mangroves

I think people appreciate that I'm not an ivory tower academic or pundit, but rather, like most of my readers, a classroom teacher and parent who is just trying to figure this thing out as I go along. Folks have asked me if I would ever consider hitting the road full time. Absolutely not. The classroom is where I belong. If I had to give up one or the other it would be the traveling.

Then there is the gray beard. From the time I was a teenager I was interested in the cache that gray gives a man, even once going so far as to inquire at a local drug store after gray hair dye. The sweet clerk, laughed as she said, "Oh honey, they don't make gray hair dye. No one would buy that."

A tableau from Aussie World

And finally, we come to the uncomfortable truth that I am a middle aged white male in a profession dominated by young women. I would be an ass to not acknowledge the boost that this accident of my birth and longevity has given me.

I'm about halfway done with the trip. I've seen old friends and made new ones. I've had experiences and collected stories to tell when I get home, like when the reception clerk asked me, "What kind of accent is that?" When I answered, "American," she replied, "I thought so, but I didn't want to insult you." I'm by turns exhausted and fired up. I arose this morning at 4 a.m. to get this posted, then catch a shuttle to the airport. I can't wait to find out what this day will bring even as I'm dreading my time on the road.

Macadamia orchard on a sunny day.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

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Democracy And Education

As part of a conference at which I was presenting in the state of Queensland here in Australia, I had the opportunity to visit what is called the Ration Shed Museum in the town of Cherbourg, the site of an aboriginal reservation that was created by the 1904 "Aboriginal Protection Act." Tribes from all over Queensland and New South Wales were forcibly re-located here, and as European colonists did wherever they went, they took it upon themselves to control every aspect of the lives of these formerly free people.

Matthew, our aboriginal guide, went to great lengths to emphasize that there was no intent to place blame or to make anyone feel ashamed, but as a man of European heritage in the company of citizens of Ireland and South Africa, also of European backgrounds, it was impossible to not feel at least some sense of shame if only on behalf of our ancestors.

As we watched a video detailing the history of the place, we learned about the schools that were established for the education of these "primitive" people, schools chartered to teach children about keeping their noses to the grindstone, obedience, and a very narrow range of vocational skills. It was impossible to not see parallels with the current state of education in America and around the world. After several decades of trending in the direction of truly democratic education over the course of the 20th century we have now seen a sudden shift over the past twenty years in the direction of those aboriginal schools. Oh sure, we don't say it aloud anymore, but it's clear that those who designed such disasters as No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, and the Common Core federal curriculum are seeking to create the modern day versions of obedient domestic workers and field hands.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the great John Dewey's seminal work Democracy and Education (this links to a long, fantastic article I urged you to read):

Did you attend a public school in the United States and perform in a school play, take field trips, or compete on a sports team? Did you have a favourite teacher who designed their own curriculum, say, about the Civil War, or helped you find your particular passions and interests? Did you take classes that were not academic per se but that still opened your eyes to different aspects of human experience such as fixing cars? Did you do projects that required planning and creativity? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then you are the beneficiary of John Dewey's pedagogical revolution.

Today, we are facing the same sort of pushback against democratic education that John Dewey faced back at the turn of the last century. They claim they are only doing what is best for the poor "primitives," and perhaps they believe they are, but at what cost? The battle lines continue to be drawn between those of us who believe that the purpose of public education is to create citizens with the critical thinking and creative skills to take part in the great national project of self-governance and those who would use schools to turn children into malleable worker bees. While Dewey's ideas shaped the schools we attended, the so-called education "reformers" are shaping the schools of our children, something that if left unchecked will result in the end of our nation.

You think I'm exaggerating? Do you honestly think a man as demagogic and autocratic as Donald Trump would have had a prayer during your own childhood? Of course not. Our parents and grandparents no matter what their political leanings would have chased him out of the building with pitchforks. Trump is the result of this anti-intellectualism and the intentional dumbing down of America; not the intended result, of course, but an accident that could easily have been predicted.

The skills and habits of citizenship (critical thinking, questioning authority, living a well-rounded life not always tethered to the almighty dollar) are the diametric opposites of the those required to succeed in the nose-to-the-grindstone, do-as-you're-told future the anti-Dewey forces have planned for us.

A return to the promise of progressive education may not save us, but it's the best hope we have.

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Our Children Are Counting On Us

The scientific evidence is quite clear: formal "academic" style education should not begin before a children are seven-years-old.

Now I believe that this remains true throughout our lives; that what we have traditionally come to call schooling is a sham born of habit and laziness, and there is plenty of evidence to support my belief. Just flip to the appendix of Peter Gray's groundbreaking book on the subject Free to Learn and have a gander at the massive collection of anthropological, neurological, and psychological proof he used to support his position that children of all ages are better off if left to pursue their own education. But I continue to call it my belief because for many experts the jury is still out.

The case for letting children pursue their own education through play until the age of seven, however, is as settled as science can ever be settled and we fail to heed it at the expense of our children.

Tragically, this scientific knowledge remains largely unknown to most of those who we elect to make our educational policies, leaving them to be constructed not upon the foundation of accumulated human wisdom, as is proper, but rather upon the gut level beliefs of those sitting in the seats of power. This has always been true, of course, but with the advent of the No Child Left Behind agenda of the Bush administration, and continued by the Race to the Top policies of the Obama administration, we have fallen whole hog into the deep end of faith-based public policy.

This might be acceptable if we lived under a theocracy, but we purport to be democratic nations. In a democracy public policy must be based on facts, not faith.

I'm certainly not saying that our schools don't need to be improved. Indeed, our educational system was and is failing many of our children, and in particular those from disadvantaged backgrounds. What I am saying is that our elected leaders, rather than sitting down and drafting an improvement plan based upon the best science about how children learn and the advice of professional educators, instead rely on what strikes them as "common sense," which in this case means doubling down on the very system that was already failing these kids: the very definition of insanity.

They push for longer school days, more direct instruction, more testing, more homework, and less play, which results in a tragically narrowed curriculum that focuses almost exclusively on literacy and math. And then, in their ignorance, they push these "solutions" onto younger and younger children until we are now expecting even preschoolers to be reading and sitting at desks. They are stealing childhood from our youngest citizens based solely upon their beliefs.

And this is not just a problem in the US, but rather around the world, where ignorant politicians strive to impose their faith upon children. I am currently traveling in Australia where there is a movement afoot in state of Tasmania, lead by their education minister Jeremy Rockliff, to lower the compulsory school starting age to four-and-a-half in the name of improving academic outcomes. Four-and-a-half: it's outrageous.

Frankly, I don't care about the good intentions of Bush or Obama or Rockliff or any of them: this is a crime against children. The right to play may not be recognized in law, but the actual evidence supports it overwhelmingly, yet time and again, right around the world, our children are being subjected to the whims of faith-based education policy which is not just failing to make them smarter, but actually damaging their educational prospects, making them hate school, and driving many of them into chronic depression.

We can't stand by and allow politicians to steal childhood from our children. Our children are counting on us.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

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It's The Process That Matters

When those of us in the play-based world think of "risky play" we too often think only of the muscle, bones and blood of the playground, sometimes glamorizing the daredevils we've taught. I know I've often made the mistake of noticing the child who is climbing a little "too high," while ignoring the day-to-day risk taking going on all around me. It's not the degree of risk that's important to education, but rather, like everything else we do, it's the process that matters.

For instance, for weeks this boy called me over to look at him climb this tree.  I perceive no danger in him being less than a foot in the air, but that's unimportant because he did. He worked his way up from having not climbed the tree at all. And while I may not have been "inspired" by his efforts, someone else was, using both his example and body to support herself.

Perhaps, tomorrow they would climb higher, but for today, they had found their "just right" level of risk.

Our pallet swing is a perfect example of risk as process. Many children, especially our two-year-olds, start by simply pushing it, their own two feet on the ground. It doesn't occur to them to want to climb aboard. Others chose to sit, then stand, then share the space with others. It's a process that some children work through in a matter of minutes while others may take years.

With my own daughter, I often couldn't resist the call of my parenting ego to urge or cajole her into riskier play, but I learned to respect her risk assessment process. It's when we compel or help children into situations not of their own making that we most often place them in the greatest danger.

Parents sometimes push their children on our swings, higher and higher. I don't tell them to stop, but I do point out that the only children who have ever been injured on our swings are the ones being pushed by a parent or those knocked over by a child being swung to heights she could never achieve under her own power.

The process of risk is, in fact, risk assessment. Too often, adults attempt to usurp the role of risk assessment with meaningless warnings of "be careful." A better way to support our children as they explore their physical capabilities, as they challenge themselves, is to move a little closer and wait for them to request assistance. And even then, my response is often along the lines of, "I won't help you, but I won't let you get hurt."

This boy wanted to reach the trapeze bar. Instead of asking me to lift him up, he wrangled a table into position, climbed on it, then stood there for a long time holding the bar. I think it could have gone either way. Twice he released the bar as if to climb back down, but finally, after much thought, he let himself go, swinging wildly for a moment, then letting himself drop to the ground in triumph.

Feeling full of himself, I guess, he then made his way to the edge of the sandpit where someone had abandoned a broken plank of wood.

When he stepped on the raised end of the plank, his weight caused the lower end to rise from the ground. He spent several minutes experimenting with this, understanding it, figuring out with both his mind and body how it felt. Finally, slowly, he edged his way down, until his weight caused the raised end to dip suddenly downward. When it did, he ran the few steps to the bottom, where he turned around and, after testing the board a few more times, went back up.

I had witnessed the exact same process a few days earlier with an older boy who had found our homemade ladder suspended over the sandpit boat.

Children do take risks, but when left to their own devices, when allowed to freely explore their world, they also perform their own risk assessment along the way and it's more than just an individual process. Often risk assessment takes a village, going "viral" as one child is inspired by and learns from another.

A two-year-old, after many careful experiments that were not tainted any adults warning that he was going to hurt himself, discovered that he could clip a clothespin to his finger. Moments later, his friends were trying it too. He said, "I thought it would hurt but it only hurts a little."

That very afternoon we witnessed this sort of community risk assessment at its highest level.

I had placed a plank of wood across two tires as a sort of prompt. The younger children more or less ignored it, but when the older kids arrived in the afternoon, their first order of business was to raise one end by adding a tire.

There was much caution at first. The first few children to attempt it dropped to their knees and even their bellies. The ones who stayed on their feet edged their way slowly, often choosing to jump off before getting to the end.

When the third tire was added, some of the children moved on to other things. Two had been enough for this day.

The process here was similar, with children learning from one another, advising one another, and supporting one another.

They figured out that if you went to the very top, your weight would cause the lower end to kick up making it "scary," so they began to hold the lower end down for one another.

There was quite a bit of discussion about what might happen if you did fall from the top. They figured they didn't want to fall into the tires.

As time when on the play evolved, becoming objectively more risky, yet the process remained the same.

There were onlookers, many of whom took on the role of kibitzing, sometimes helpful, sometimes not. At one point a boy said, "The first one to the top gets this flag." The children heard him, paused for a moment, then continued their play as before. External motivation is irrelevant. The process of risk is it's own reward.

I put a lot of time and effort into this blog. If you'd like to support me please consider a small contribution to the cause. Thank you!

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