Why do little kids dress up like monsters on Halloween? Why does everyone sing the same song at a birthday party? Why do stockbrokers wear neckties?
These decisions weren’t made rationally. Kids dress up on Halloween because everybody else around them is doing it. “Happy Birthday,” if we’re being honest, is a pretty stupid song. We sing it because we were raised in an environment in which singing it was normal. And there’s nothing objectively superior about the necktie as fashion accessory.
In fact, I would argue that most of what we learn happens not through careful analysis of a series of options, but because of the environment we’re placed in. That’s why some progressive educators believe that the first focus of a school should not be academics, but in creating and maintaining the right environment.
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I agree. I looked at a bunch of schools when deciding on the school for my children. There were some highly structured, challenging academic schools, some middle of the road traditional schools and a couple progressive schools. I chose one of the progressive schools, even though the academics would have been more challenging and very managable for my kids at a different school. My children are learning how to get along with others, what it feels like to be respected by teachers, administrators and fellow students, how to ask questions and find solutions to them, how to learn cooperatively, I could go on and on. And, they are also learning to read, write, do math, science, etc. I didn’t choose more traditional schools because while they may have learned more math more quickly, they would have learned it at the expense of developing the qualities that make living and learning with other people worthwhile. I know I’m not explaining this well, but basically if they learn that aquiring understanding and solving problems is exciting and something they can do themselves and with other people, they can learn forever. If they learn that it is something you do to please someone else, it becomes less natural to do when no one is telling you to do it. They should never feel that not knowing something is something they need to hide because someone will judge them on that. Not knowing just means that you have to opportunity to connect with someone who does know, or you have the opportunity to delve into a new topic and learn something new.
Progressive education is not all empathy classes and legos. Academic instruction does happen, it just happens in an environment of choice and mutual respect.