by Robin | Jan 4, 2012 | Public School Perspectives |
Rather than demanding that everybody meets minimal standards like schools, we should strive for a learning environment that emulates love, patience, contentment, generosity, inner strength, and humility. See if you can find any of those life pillars in the government mandated learning outcomes, school rules, or class expectations. The place that comes closest to modelling and teaching such grand ideas is the family home and that is where I want my children to be taught.
by Robin | Oct 26, 2011 | Public School Perspectives |
In my job as a teacher I am consistently amazed at the capabilities of teenagers. Most recently, I have been amazed by a local mountain biker whose online videos of himself astounded me, both for the difficulty of the tricks that he successfully landed and for the quality of the video footage that was taken and edited by another rider. I have been equally impressed, over the years, by teenage figure skaters, piano players, painters, actors, inventors, mechanics, and entrepreneurs. By the age of sixteen, a dedicated individual can amass an impressive amount of skill in one area. For an individual to attain this level of accomplishment, one important event must occur. Somebody must recognize a youth’s interest and ability and connect them with the opportunities to pursue it. When a youth’s interests are connected with opportunity to learn at an appropriate age, they will tend to do the rest. I need to give my parents a lot of credit for recognizing my healthy interests in my childhood and connecting me with people who could show my how to succeed. I remember my badminton coach showing me the most efficient way of moving on the court and telling me how important it was to have consistent and efficient footwork. I went home and measured out a badminton court in my parents garage and practised daily until the footwork pattern became second nature. Similarly my track coach mentioned how important it was to start the season with a strong base that came from regular distance running. I responded by choosing to run to school rather than drive my own vehicle, for...
by Robin | Oct 5, 2011 | Public School Perspectives |
The other day I walked into our carport only to discover my son, Ronan, stabbing my car’s engine with a stick through the grill at the front of the car. Before I could get mad at him, he looked at me and proudly stated, “I am fixing the car.” Only a few days earlier we had changed the oil together and now he was mimicking my efforts to the best of his ability so I popped the hood of the car and pulled up a stool so we could both get a good look at the engine. Not being the least bit mechanical I did my best to explain the parts of the engine. I could tell him where the fluids went such as oil and antifreeze. I could also name a few engine parts like the air filter, engine block, and spark plugs, but when he asked me how it worked, I could couldn’t give him a good answer. If I recall correctly, I simply told him that the car engine converted the energy from the gas into forward momentum. We poked around the engine a little bit longer and then moved on to something else. A few hours later, I realized that my understanding of engines wasn’t sufficient, when Ronan suggested we watch a movie about how an engine works. My son is only three and he could already see through my lack of understanding on the topic. And, since we had used short educational clips from the internet to answer a few of his previous questions, he figured that it could explain the engine to him better...
by Robin | Sep 21, 2011 | Public School Perspectives |
I vividly remember the summer after grade ten because it was the first of two long solo bike trips that I completed. The previous summers I had biked with my Dad on the Gulf Islands on the Pacific Coast. We carried a tent and took to campsites for night. So I had all the gear in the garage on the fateful day that I got caught sneaking out well beyond my curfew with friends. My parents were obviously disappointed in my choice and grounded me from those particular friends for a couple of weeks. After I went to my room to sulk, it dawned on me that I didn’t want to admit to my friends that I was grounded for something so minor. At the time, I was embarrassed by my parents traditional approach, so I didn’t tell my friends much about them or the rules that I was supposed to follow. So once I was grounded my biggest concern was what I would tell my friends when they called to hang out the next day. Alone in my room I came up with a solution. I headed to the living room and I asked my parents if I could ride my bike 1300 km from Fort St John to Vancouver by myself. Unbelievably, they said yes. And I left the next morning. I packed a tent, ate in restaurants, averaged 160 kilometers per day and finished a week later. My parents were on their way to visit my relatives in Abbotsford anyway and so I met them there before we came home a couple of weeks later. ...
by Robin | Aug 24, 2011 | Public School Perspectives |
I have never heard my father talk about his views on family but it is easy to see how important family is to him and how important it has always been. First, despite being a professional, he moved our family to a hobby farm just outside of the city limits so that, as a family we would have chores to do together. We raised chickens, pigs, cows and grew a substantial garden each year. And our driveway was long enough that I have vivid memories of being woken up early to help shovel the driveway so that my dad could make it to work on time. It took our family of five close to an hour to shovel the entire driveway and it had to be done first thing in the morning. And our lawn took close to three hours to mow by hand. We could afford a lawn tractor, a snow blower, to buy our groceries, and to live in an easier environment but my Dad knew that a family that worked together grew together. I suspect that he fabricated work for our benefit. Second, he discouraged my mom from going back to work until all his children were in school and then he still ensured that we would never need a babysitter by juggling his schedule with that of my mother. I can only occasionally remember being home alone with my brothers and I have no memories of ever having a babysitter. Third, and perhaps most impactful, every holiday we ever took, except for the cross county road trip, was designed around visiting relatives. We lived thirteen hours...
by Robin | Aug 6, 2011 | Public School Perspectives |
