So the other day, I thought - wouldn't it be interesting to actually sit back and jot down what I remember from being in school myself? As in, my oldest is in "kindergarten" right now...what do I remember kindergarten being? For me, I remember it being a lot of playing, and me being really bored when they tried to teach us anything because I had pretty much really figured it out on my own at home. I also remember being pulled from one school and put in another because my mother had a fit about the K teacher I was given. The second day of school at my original elementary, the teacher came over and told me I would need to go play with the girls because little girls just did not play with cars with the boys. (Imagine my surprise, when I'd been allowed a total tomboy lifestyle at home!) Well, you can guess what my mom's reaction was...I was pulled, but not before I brought in some sort of dead wild animal's tail (probably that my Dad had got while out trapping) for show and tell. Dang, I was kind of a sassy girl back then, wasn't I? Oh yes, and kindergarten was hours at the painting easel. And that, my friends, is what I remember. What do YOU gals remember about the "grades" that your kids are in now, when you were there?
Something else that struck me as...well, I don't know what, but...I don't remember ever being taught how to read. My mother never sat me down and said "These are the rules of phonics, these are all the things that don't make sense..." and yet I was reading really well by the time I got into kindergarten. I don't say this to brag about early reading, I bring this up because sometimes I think that although there are a lot of insane rules to the English language, I think there are kids out there who just pick it up along the way. I did not teach Iggy how to read. And yet, he's doing it. What I did do was read to him constantly. And it makes me wonder if there are a lot of things having to do with learning that if we just naturally immerse the kids in it, they will learn just as much (or better) as if we cut the process into a million pieces and drag it out forever and ever. This is not to say there aren't kids who need things cut up and explained. (After sixth grade math, I was totally lost and never really recovered.) But at the same time, sometimes I think the way we learn at "the big school" or how people are taught to teach is way more complicated than it might need to be.
I found this quote last night and I really liked it: It is so tempting to think we can teach kids, but the fact is, we present, and they learn. I agree 100 percent.
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1 comment:
Oh yeah.....
What I really remember from Kindergarten is that I was afraid that the bus driver wouldn't get me to the right house on the way home.
What I remember from 1st grade? That one of the teachers had had polio as a child and walked "funny". She also was a great storyteller.
What I remember from 2nd grade is that my teacher was from the former Czech republic and told us stories of her mother and father smuggling her over the border to freedom.
What I remember from 3rd grade is that my teacher had a baby the summer before but the baby died from what we now know as SIDS. The baby's picture is prevalent in our yearbook too, so it was a sad memory for me. Too, my mother miscarried that year and I remember going to my teacher after school and hugging her and telling her I was sad for her and me because we both had lost babies. We just sat in the classroom for 20 minutes (my mom came to pick me up from school) hugging and crying, rocking, comforting. Bittersweet memories and the sad fact is that kind of bonding in school is soooooo rare now.
But as far as learning SCHOOL stuff? Nope. Nada. Don't remember a bit of it.
Interesting isn't it? Good exercise, Amy!
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