In first grade I wanted to be a bunny rabbit.
I spent the first month or so at school that year under the table hopping and nibbling on whatever I could find that looked most like a carrot. Studying was beneath me. Bunnies don’t need to know math or grammar, or anything else. I just needed my carrots.
After Professor of Literature and Western Civilization Anthony Esolen’s speech on Children’s Literture and Education, I contemplated the lack of what any Hillsdalian would consider classical education in my primary and high school. My school might even have been insulted to be considered in that light.
At a normal school I probably would have been reprimanded for such behavior, at a private school they would have met with my parents, my California public elementary school deemed it “creative expression,” and in a conference with my parents my teacher called me “unique.”
Eventually playing with other kids and reading took over my time. My studious interests overwhelmed (or at least balanced) my ridiculous antics. Even so, our teacher let us do wherever we wanted, so the class became extremely gradated. As long as we avoided violence and got our work done eventually, we ran free. It was all about individual desire to succeed, but there was no stigma against failure.
In certain ways, this lack of structure, focus on personal goals, and the responsibility of the student to succeed or to stay in stasis were beneficial. In others, it allowed stagnation in the subjects for which we already had an aptitude. It permitted disinterest and laziness. Public education does not prepare well-rounded students.
Just as Hillsdale has a set of core requirements that reach across the disciplines and maintain well-rounded students, and different levels of classes for the various skill levels, so also should primary education.
Schools should stop requiring school based on age and arrange classes by interest and ability.
In his lecture, Esolen asserted that one of the most successful aspects of the one-room schoolhouse is that it revolves around ability and not age, and that students of lesser ability can listen to the teacher whether or not the subject is at their level.
This allows students with an aptitude to step up to a higher level and for students without to study with others at their skill level, alleviating the social aversion to being apart from one’s piers.
While I stopped wishing I were able to just be a bunny and started to study and find all sorts of subjects that I wanted to do more (veterinarian, geologist, pilot, etc.), many other kids never actually decided they wanted to be in school. While literacy and competence are important, schools that are supposed to fit all types of students only end up retarding the progress of all.
As a solution, Esolen tended to promote the value of local education, but even more reasonable was his suggestion not to make schooling requisite. In order to maintain literacy and encourage and maximize potential for learning perhaps some should be required, but keep students in school who love it, not those who suffer through it. Choose the carrot, not the stick.
tsawyer1@hillsdale.edu
