The Family: America’s Smallest School

As the beginning of a new school year approaches I find myself pondering about my own choices to educate my child and recommitting myself to the decision we have made. It has been a great sacrifice to send Awsumb to the school he attends and I won't go into the specifics today. The reason for this post is to remind us all that...

"For the Opportunity to Thrive to be realized, and for us as a nation to reach the ambitious educational goals that we have set for ourselves, we must keep clear in our minds that our family is our first and smallest school." -Marc H. Morial

I recently finished reading The Global Achievement Gap by Tony Wagner. Kenneth listened to this educator and father speak a few months ago. He reminds us that when we were growing up our parents told us to finish our dinner because children were starving in ____ (name the place). But today we need to tell our children to finish their math homework because children in India and other places are studying harder than ever.

Our schools are failing. Our schools have changed very little over the past 50 to 100 years. We are still teaching children to be ready for a 1950’s work environment. A basic professional job in the 50’s required an employee to obey their boss and follow directions. Things are different today. Children today need to graduate ready to succeed in college. (a rant for another day). When they hit the workplace, they will need to have critical thinking and problem solving skills, they will need to know how to work in groups with people that may be located all over the world. They will also need to know how to research and sift through a plethora of information and find the relevant, truthful info to complete tasks. I can’t wait to discuss more about this with you…

But, however outraged I might become about what it NOT happening in our schools I always remind myself that it all begins at home. The reason so many charter or choice schools look like good on paper has little to do with the method of teaching or even the teachers. What sets these schools apart is parent involvement. Of course if you group all the kids who have parent support at home they will do well!

I often rant that most all the problems in the world can only be solved if we start with the family. Social, financial, are among these, but especially education. Our country will never pull ahead and begin to change things if we don’t first start in our families. And this means first putting a value on the family unit. The importance of having a mother and a father. The importance of a regular family schedule. The importance of having parents AT HOME. The importance of creating a stimulating environment in the home full of books and free play time. The importance of parents as examples, reading to their child and continuing their own education, formal or informal.

This does not mean taking children out of their homes earlier and earlier as previous programs such as No Child Left Behind. It means teaching families and parents to value education. Kenneth and I listened to An American Life the other day about Baby College in a poor neighborhood. While the program may seem obvious to those raised in middle or upper class families it was amazing to hear the parents realize that not beating their kids and using positive forms of discipline might actually make life easier in the long run… Or for them to realize the importance of reading to their child, talking to them, using real words, spending time with them… These are things that no school program can give a child. We now know that those early developmental years and most important. More than any programs that we can come up with for kids that age. We need programs for the parents of the kids that age!

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Whatever the educational options you might have for your child, what you do in your home means more than anything. Continuing to read to your children, guiding them as they research their interests, providing stimulating imagination and play time and most important showing them the value you place on education are a great start. Whether we realize it or not, we are all homeschooling our children!