ParisTampaBlog

I read as much or more than I write. And in my reading I’m always encountering others’ expressions of my own ideas, that which stops me in my tracks, as it were, from going ahead and writing down my own thoughts. For what I was going to say, as I find in so many instances, had already been better said by someone else.

Progress may very well be standing on the shoulders of those who have come before and thereby seeing further yourself. But from where I stand on others’ shoulders I see still others onto whose shoulders I first have to climb before I can even begin to see for myself. A process with apparently no end.

One such article, “Let’s Abolish High School,” by Robert Epstein, articulating many of my own thoughts, appeared just recently in “Commentary” on the back page of the publication, Education Week. Now I find my own thoughts about school and school reform thoroughly embodied by what Epstein has to say.

Epstein writes, “about 10 years ago I noticed—I couldn’t help but notice—that my 15-year-old son was remarkably mature. He balanced work and play far better than I did, and he seemed quite ready to live on his own. Why, I wondered, was he not allowed to drive or vote, and why did he have so few options? Simply because of his age, he couldn’t own property or do any interesting or fulfilling work, and he had no choice but to attend high school for several more years before getting on with his “real” life.”

Well I have an almost 10 year old grandson. He spends a couple of nights a week at our house which is near his school. When he comes in he sits right down and does his homework, that which is currently mixed numbers and improper fractions along with reading assignments from Time Magazine for kids on which he has to answer a few questions.

His homework may occupy him for about 30 minutes, a little longer if he needs to ask me a question. Once finished he goes to his computer in the big upstairs room where his grandmother and I also have our computers and are working. My grandson, while listening to some of his favorite rap or hip hop music downloaded from iTunes, plays Neopets, the online virtual pets game which allows him to create and take care of one to four of 54 species collectively called neopets.

If I were asked to determine from which activity, homework or Neopets, he was learning the most it would be Neopets hands down. On his own he has to care for his neopets, keep them alive and well by feeding them virtual food obtained by means of Neopoints which is the currency of the game. all of which taxes his numeracy, powers of memory, and judgment, as he seeks to master the intricate world of Neopia.

While watching my grandson I conclude that school and homework is just a small part of this 10 year old’s growth and development, a small part of his education. I sometimes think that school and homework are most of all restraints that prevent the child from doing the things that are most interesting and meaningful to him. In that way school may even be and often is a major obstacle to learning.

What Robert Epstein is saying about his 15 year old son is essentially true for my 10 year old grandson. Simply because of their age they’re not allowed to do the things they would probably choose if left more to themselves. Instead they have to follow adult prescriptions as to what is best for them, in the case of my grandson that being improper fractions rather than the intensive, long term care of a virtual pet.

But I’m not so much saying that Neopets ought to take the place of school. Rather that school ought to give more place to what’s most interesting and stimulating in the life of a 10 year old boy. This particular boy is not excited by mixed numbers. (Neither am I.) All this is not too different from having the boy listen to Mozart while the “music” that he is hearing is Rap. Shouldn’t we go more with what he hears than with what he is supposed to be listening to? In general we want them to hear, but we can only make them listen.

Finally, of what is my 10 year old grandson capable? In my experience the 10 year old’s mental abilities are much more advanced than the demands placed on those abilities in school. We’re not tapping into what kids are capable of.

For example, the other day I asked my grandson how he could be like all children, like only some children, and like no other child.*  Why "Bonpapa," he said, "like all children aren’t I human, and like some children, I’m fast, or slow, or maybe crippled, but I’m really not like anybody else."

Try asking that of one of your adult friends. Then see if his answer is as well formulated as that of my 10 year old grandson. (He also correctly gave me the answer to the riddle of the Sphinx the first time I asked.)

*See Clyde Kluckhohn and Henry A. Murray, "Personality Formation: The
Determinants," in idem, eds., Personality in Nature, Society, and
Culture (New York: Knopf, 1950), pp. 35-48. "Every child, to is like
all other children, like some other children, and like no other child."

This entry was posted on April 14, 2007 at 6:34 pm and is filed under Education. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.