For anyone who cares, my existential employment crisis has come to an end. You are all looking at the newest member of the staff at Mountain Laurel Sudbury School, a free school in New Britain. Taking a cue from the blogmaster, I will not blog about work beyond the fact that I work there.
I think your free school concept is wonderful! If any of your students want to know about French Cooking do a post and I will answer and give them references where they can learn more or post online questions with people who are in Paris and working in three or four star restaurants. I’ll do any online introductions that might be necessary.
If you want, do a survey of things your students like and I will see what I can do find them information about these things.
Sean,
The other thing I will do is make of list things that I enjoy and know about. That way maybe one of your students will find something that they’re interested in but didn’t know how to express the question.
Actually, even freer than a Montessori. It’s a long tradition of free schools starting with a Catalan anarchist named Francisco Ferrer who founded The Modern School, through AS Neill’s Summerhill, through the Sudbury Valley School in Mass, through various Sudbury schools throughout the US and other countries, as well as a number of others. It’s hard to explain in just a couple of posts on a blog. There are whole books on the subject, and entire books on the Sudbury model alone. Not to mention books that don’t explicitly support free schools but shaped my thinking. I’ve actually written a thesis on the idea, before I knew free schools existed, and I’ve even outlined my own book on non-compulsory education. Again, any decade now.
Hmmm … so England isn’t the only place with a confused educational system - in England, a Public School is an old very selective (usually socially/genetically) and usually *very* expensive school - as contrasted with a Comprehensive State School which is taxpayer-funded and takes its student population from the surrounding residences …
So how expensive is it to attend a “free school” such as the one at which you now teach ?
I think the free school idea is conceptually a very good one. But I will admit to thinking that it is highly dependent on the student going through the program. Then again as is true for many things you generally will get out of something what you put into it.
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July 26th, 2007 at 5:43:07 pm
ok then. congrats on the job
July 26th, 2007 at 5:45:37 pm
YAY!! Congrats!
July 26th, 2007 at 5:54:51 pm
Now all I need is a book deal. Any decade now…
July 26th, 2007 at 6:20:25 pm
Excellent! Congratulations indeed.
July 26th, 2007 at 7:02:04 pm
Congratulations, but, ummm if the school is free, where are they going to get the money to pay you ;-)
July 26th, 2007 at 8:17:38 pm
What is a free school?
July 26th, 2007 at 8:44:20 pm
A free school is a school where the kids get to choose what they’re going to learn and how they’re going to learn it.
July 26th, 2007 at 10:08:30 pm
Glad to see the long cold night of the soul ending…now if we could do something about the winter of our discontent
July 26th, 2007 at 10:51:34 pm
A free school is a school where the kids get to choose what they’re going to learn and how they’re going to learn it.
Kind of like a Montessori? I never did quite understand that whole system of teaching. Not that I’m bashing it mind you, I just don’t get it.
July 26th, 2007 at 11:29:36 pm
I think your free school concept is wonderful! If any of your students want to know about French Cooking do a post and I will answer and give them references where they can learn more or post online questions with people who are in Paris and working in three or four star restaurants. I’ll do any online introductions that might be necessary.
If you want, do a survey of things your students like and I will see what I can do find them information about these things.
July 26th, 2007 at 11:33:24 pm
Sean,
The other thing I will do is make of list things that I enjoy and know about. That way maybe one of your students will find something that they’re interested in but didn’t know how to express the question.
I’ll post it on this posting on Monday.
July 26th, 2007 at 11:36:01 pm
Since this blog has a varied and large following…
Maybe others could contribute their interests and knowledge to Sean’s students?
July 27th, 2007 at 10:32:09 am
Actually, even freer than a Montessori. It’s a long tradition of free schools starting with a Catalan anarchist named Francisco Ferrer who founded The Modern School, through AS Neill’s Summerhill, through the Sudbury Valley School in Mass, through various Sudbury schools throughout the US and other countries, as well as a number of others. It’s hard to explain in just a couple of posts on a blog. There are whole books on the subject, and entire books on the Sudbury model alone. Not to mention books that don’t explicitly support free schools but shaped my thinking. I’ve actually written a thesis on the idea, before I knew free schools existed, and I’ve even outlined my own book on non-compulsory education. Again, any decade now.
July 27th, 2007 at 6:06:03 pm
Hmmm … so England isn’t the only place with a confused educational system - in England, a Public School is an old very selective (usually socially/genetically) and usually *very* expensive school - as contrasted with a Comprehensive State School which is taxpayer-funded and takes its student population from the surrounding residences …
So how expensive is it to attend a “free school” such as the one at which you now teach ?
July 28th, 2007 at 11:55:18 am
I’m not sure about the exact figure, but it is less per pupil than public funding.
July 28th, 2007 at 2:32:21 pm
I think the free school idea is conceptually a very good one. But I will admit to thinking that it is highly dependent on the student going through the program. Then again as is true for many things you generally will get out of something what you put into it.