Ailantha
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact

How About...Artisanal Education?

11/6/2014

5 Comments

 
    Met with the Panera Posse yesterday.
    As usual, a number of topics were visited, among them the currently-maligned  concept of artisanal parenthood.  (See the previous two blog posts).
    As it turned out the Posse,  all of whose members belong to the  previous generation of child-raisers,  were not so quick to dismiss artisanal parenthood as a scorn-worthy thing.
    In fact, the final conclusion reached by the members present was that  people  - be they M.D.'s psychologists or just your garden-variety  casual judgement passers  - who nay-say or even ridicule taking a non-mainstream if somewhat more labor-intensive approach to parenting are doing so out of jealousy or sour grapes that they're not doing as much for their own children. And so in defense of themselves they make up a derisitory  label and claim that such parents do what they do out of self-centered  narcissism. 
    Not so, says the Panera Posse.
    Say we:   all good parents are artisanal parents at heart in that  everyone's own children are special among all others in the eyes of their parents.  And everyone wants to do the best for their children in as much as they're able.  And that's at the heart of all parenting, however you label it.
    But back to this idea of taking an artisanal approach to child-raising...turns out one of the Posse members,  a retired teacher, also had some counter-culture ideas on education. 
    Actually, we thought some of her ideas were pretty good, which inspired the rest of us to throw in a few of our own.
    So, here are the Panera Posse's artisanal education ideas:
    1.  Offer Weight Watchers classes as an elective or an after-school club. 
    2.  Offer yoga and aerobics also as either electives or intramural non-competing sports teams.
    3.  Offer gardening as an elective or after school club.  Designate a green space on school property, fence it off,and have it be the school garden.  Just as schools have sports coaches, have a teacher be the "gardening coach."  The flowers that are grown in the garden could be used to decorate the school and the fresh vegetables could be served in the school cafeteria.
    4.  Open  some of the school's areas - gyms, pools, auditoriums, playing fields - for comunity use when these areas not  in use by the students.  That way the community would feel more ownership of the school and would be more inclined to pass levys.
    7.  Have a couple of staff members at each school whose only job  would be to track the progress of students who were having academic issues and communicate with the parents of these students to keep them informed about  what's going on with their children. 
    I  came up with this idea based on a story told by the retired teacher in our group.
    She actually once had such a job.  It was a side job that her school had opened one year to teachers who were interested.  My friend's job involved tracking student's performance and calling parents and sometimes meeting with them and their children if they were interested in coming into school to discuss the problem.  Some parents blew her off or didn't want to acknowledge what she was telling them.  But there were a few students whose lives she knows she helped turn around.  For this work my friend received  $1100 compensation for the school year but after one year  the program was dropped by her school.
    But my friend took the $1100 she made and with it bought herself a ring with a beautiful purple stone which she wears to this day.  She wears it to remind herself of that year and of the students and parents whose lives she visited, those she tried to help and those she succeeded in helping. 
    I do love the stories we share.

Picture
5 Comments
Romaine
11/6/2014 01:50:27 am

Speaking of artisanal education -
I learned about the mindup program this weekend in one of my classes. It is amazing and I think the wave of the future for education (or should be) Among other things they are teaching 8 year olds how to recognize when they are acting out of stress or anger and what part of the brain is taking over when that happens.
One of my classmates is using this technique with her group of students and she presented on this topic to us. So inspiring!

"This program is composed of 15 lessons based in neuroscience. Students learn to self-regulate behavior and mindfully engage in focused concentration required for academic success. MindUP™ lessons align with all state standards including Common Core and support improved academic performance while enhancing perspective taking, empathy and kindness as well as fostering complex problem solving skills." http://thehawnfoundation.org/mindup/

Reply
Patti
11/6/2014 07:41:52 am

Very interesting. It's amazing what young children are capable of achieving.

Reply
joseph
11/7/2014 01:48:58 am

patti - I agree that some of those proposals sound very good on paper and would also be good in the real world. here is the problem: MONEY. it is fiscally impossible to hire additional people for jobs that are not mandated. there are so many non-funded mandates out there that your head would fall off if you knew about them. I speak from many years on the school board including being school board president. when is the last time that you or any members of the Panera posse bitched about your taxes. when hiring a new teacher, one of the major concerns often was at what level they would have to start. it is common for school districts to pay health insurance for teachers at the near retirement age to et them to leave so a new person can be hired more cheaply.

as far as opening the facilities up to the community - the community will never support new levies no matter how many times they got to use the gym. believe me - I know. you also then have insurance liability issues - wear and tear and damage - hiring monitors to make sure everything is going smoothly. from an administrative viewpoint it is a nightmare. what sounds good in utopia is often not feasible in our world

Reply
Patti
11/7/2014 06:49:41 am

(Sigh). Maybe that's why every time my teacher friend tried to get one of those ideas implemented in her school the principal blew her off.

Reply
joseph
11/7/2014 06:56:50 am

he had no funding. he so many un-funded mandates to cover that the well was below dry. the teacher had to know this.




Leave a Reply.

    Picture
    "Equal And Opposite Reactions"
     by Patti Liszkay
    Buy it on Amazon:

    http://amzn.to/2xvcgRa
    Picture
    ​"Hail Mary"
    by Patti Liszkay
    Buy it on Amazon:

    https://www.amzn.com/1684334888
    Picture
    "Tropical Depression" 
    by Patti Liszkay
    ​Buy it on Amazon:   
    https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BTPN7NYY

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013

    RSS Feed

    I am a traveler just visiting this planet and reporting various and sundry observations,
    hopefully of interest to my fellow travelers.

    Categories

    All


























































































  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact