Falltime Schooltime

For about four days, I thought that maybe I wanted to go to law school. I am not exactly sure why I thought this, but I did. I looked at an LSAT book and got excited about learning the best and fastest ways to do logic puzzles, and thought that actually, the analytical section didn’t look too bad, though of course I’m still fairly slow because that part of my brain is out of shape.

For those of you whose eyes glazed over as soon as you saw “LSAT,” I’ll summarize: I am a nerd and I like logic puzzles and I miss school.

So for four days I’ve looked at law programs (well, a cursory look), studied logic problems like they were my job, and actually felt mildly better about my life. (besides, seeing that Yale Law has a very small number of students and they don’t give grades sounds amazing… wait… the rest of the country thinks so too, that’s why it’s at the top. ok it all makes sense now.)

Today I realized that going to law school would mean that I want to be a lawyer. I don’t really know that I want to be a lawyer. I just want to go back to school, and studying very hard and using the analytical part of my brain sounds fun. Yes, you shake your head, but being in an environment where my brain is challenged sounds perfect. Living in a college town makes me realize how much I enjoy learning, and how much I really want to study again.

But what do I want to study? I want to know what I’m going to do after I finish this hypothetical grad program, and that really is the hang-up. Oh, that and getting into a good/decent program, because I haven’t done anything impressive with my life thus far, but I will eventually need some kind of job to pay off the debt that will be up to my eyeballs once I finish.

Homeschool Moment

Confession: when I arrived at college my freshman year, I did not know what double spacing was, nor that papers were supposed to be double spaced.

My first paper of college was assigned in Freshman Seminar. The professor handed out the assignment, which included specifics of formatting. I do not now remember the topic of that paper, just that the formatting instructions included that it should be 2 pages in length, 12 point Times New Roman or Arial font, and that it should be double spaced.

I stared at the page in front of me. Double spaced? what on earth was that? I looked around the room, and no one seemed to have any problems with the assignment, and I was too embarrassed to ask what double spacing meant.

Later I sat in front of my computer, staring at the blank page in Microsoft Word, wondering how to begin. It was, after all, my first paper of college. I wanted it to be good. I wanted to be (at least somewhat) eloquent. I wanted… I wanted to know how to double space.

I figured out pretty quickly that double spacing meant to leave a line blank in between each line of text, but knew that there had to be an easier way than hitting ‘enter’ after every line. I glanced surreptitiously at a classmate’s computer and saw that she was typing and did not have to hit enter after every line, but Word cleverly left spaces in between the text for her. At least my hunch about leaving a blank line between text was correct! Now to figure out how Word magically does that for you….

It took a good 20-30 minutes to discover the paragraph setting, but at long last, just when I was almost prepared to admit my ignorance and ask for help, I found it! Oh the triumph of that moment. Now it was time to start the paper, after losing half an hour of my life to the formatting search.

Looking back, it is strange to me that I never learned how to double space in high school, but it is one of those funny things that got left out when I was writing papers in high school English as a homeschooler. I suppose of things to be left out of one’s education, it is a mere blip on the radar. Also, it meant that it would be two years of college before I wrote a paper that rivaled the actual length of my longest high school paper.

My senior year of high school, I studied American history, and my final project was to write a research paper on a president — any president. Since I was the oldest, my paper had to be the longest: 10 pages.

Remember please that I was unaware of the joys of double spacing. Yes, my paper was actually around 20 pages long. This is why I picked Franklin D. Roosevelt as my subject. I wish I could go back and read that paper, in all its single spaced glory.

Life Skills 101

Things I wish elementary school aged kids were taught:

• How to identify local trees
• How to identify local birds
• How to identify local wildflowers
  (basically, observe the world around you and become familiar with it)
• Stories –more stories

Things I wish middle schools/ high school kids were taught:

• How to do taxes
• How to make (and stick to) a budget; responsible money management
• Basic auto maintenance
• General household maintenance
• How to write a resume
• Grocery shopping/ simple cooking
• Introduction to Economics
  (…and other practical life skills)

While I think that it is important for children to be taught many of the subjects they are currently taught in schools, I think there is a large practical portion missing from our education. Parents are probably the best people to teach these skills, but not all parents do, so maybe they could be picked up by schools (especially things like budgets and economics).

You may think that there isn’t enough time to teach students to do things like checking the oil in their cars when they have so many other classes to attend, but when schools have time to teach teenagers how to put condoms on bananas, I think they could probably spare a few minutes to teach them some practical life skills.

Quoting from Others

“Once upon a time we were a new nation that allowed ordinary citizens to learn how to read well and encouraged them to read anything they thought would be useful. Close reading of tough-minded writing is still the best, cheapest, and quickest method known for learning to think for yourself. This invitation to commoners extended by America was the most revolutionary pedagogy of all.

“Reading, and rigorous discussion of that reading in a way that obliges you to formulate a position and support it against objections, is an operational definition of education in its most fundamental civilized sense….

“Once you trust yourself to go mind-to-mind with great intellects, artists, scientists, warriors, and philosophers, you are finally free.”

[J.T. Gatto, The Underground History of American Education, p. 56]

 ”For the sole true end of education is simply this: to teach men how to learn for themselves; and whatever instruction fails to do this is effort spent in vain.”

[Dorothy Sayers, The Lost Tools of Learning]

Do we still think of education this way? Is this the goal of schooling, to make people free?
Sometimes I think that these fundamentals, reading and communicating well, are left by the wayside in our attempts to create well-schooled children….

Why School?

What is the purpose and goal of American education, especially public education? This question may seem silly, but I really want to know.

Why do we do what we do?
What philosophy of education lies behind and underneath our individual schools?
What benefits does our system produce, especially when compared with other educational systems?
How seriously do we take the responsibility of shaping young, impressionable minds?

I suppose my questions make it clear that I am a little suspicious of American public education. I will admit that I have my doubts, but I would actually be happy to be proved wrong.

To that end, comments, suggestions, and ideas are welcomed [but I am looking for civil discourse, and not just ad hominem attacks or defenses of the system]. Also, if you know of any good resources for further research, I will be appreciative.