I have to be honest here. I would like to see change in how the education system works, but I’m not entirely sure what I want the finished product to look like. I’m not even sure there is a perfect finished product, unless you could design a system so fluid it could mold and adapt to the specific learning mechanisms of every individual child. Let’s face it, we all learn best by different means – check out this video by a 16 year old with Asperger’s Syndrome for a wonderfully descriptive explanation of this – and an education system that could adapt to the child instead of forcing the child to adapt to it would certainly have advantages beyond measure. And not only do we all learn best differently, we all learn different things differently, too. This has a lot to do with our natural talents, and even more to do with our natural interests. Our best education system would take best advantage of our natural talents and interests.
Our public schools have adapted somewhat in recent years to an approach based on individual learning plans, but have yet to progress toward individualized curriculum. Certainly the best possible education system we can design should be a primary social goal. There is much to be done, though, before such an adaptive public school system can be accomplished. And that begins with a community dialogue. Toward such an end, the Green Party platform calls for “broad consultation with parents, teachers, school administrators, paraprofessionals, academics, psychologists, and students.” The italics are there, right in the platform, because somehow it seems we rarely ask the students, even though they have the deepest and most direct interest in education. New Brunswick is looking at a novel approach by giving students direct representation on district education councils. That might be a good place for Nova Scotia to begin. It seems to me that we can never have the best possible school system until:
a) we ask the students directly: “How do you learn best?” and ” What do you learn best?”, and
b) we adapt to their answers.
Tomorrow I will be at Dartmouth High School with Green Party leader Ryan Watson. I want to talk to students about electoral participation. And I want them to talk to me about what they want from an education. I’ll let you all know how it goes.
Posted by Claudia Earl on June 13, 2009 at 4:08 pm
I have a 10 year old grandson that has been diagnosed with Aspergers by several different doctors. His biggest problem used to be at home, but now is in the school. His school refuses to see him as being on the autism spectrum, because he is Asperger. I don’t think they know what that is. With all the IEP meetings, and the parents talking to all the school personnel, my daughter only gets negative feedback like, “He’s just pushing your buttons,” “he’s just crying to get out of the work,” and on and on. He gets picked on, has no friends, and when he fights a bully, (by kicking, hitting, or bad language), he gets in trouble and punished while the bully goes free.
I hope someday, this school changes their view on Asperger children, and luckily my grandson is attending a different school next term.
Schools really need more education on these type of children if they are to succeed with their education.