We have deep natural talents, but we have to discover them and cultivate them.
- Sir Ken Robinson
In late August of 2018, I spilled a dozen sets of tools, safety goggles, jumper cables, and drill bits onto the narrow checkout counter at the local hardware store. The clerk eyed the pile with annoyance as I tried to balance the odd-shaped items, catching a few that slipped from the pile and retrieving several other determined escapees from the floor. As the line behind me grew, he inquired with hint of derision, “What do you need all this for?”
"I teach robotics.”
Now he was interested. “At what college?”
“Not a college. I teach kids.”
As he monotonously scanned items, he stated, “You teach gifted kids.”
It was not a question, so I corrected him. “All kids are gifted.”
He stopped mid scan and looked right at me. What he said next was the moment I realized I was doing something different.
“Thank you.”
Up until that point I hadn’t thought of what I was doing as special, different, or even unique. I was doing what seemed obvious. Educating and treating children as individuals, valuing each child’s strengths or gifts, rather than focusing on what they don’t know. Who knew this would be a revolutionary thought in education? To me it seemed like common sense - and it still does.
I never set out to be an educator. I personally struggled through school - wrestling with the rigidity, prescribed expectations, and compartmentalized subjects. I eventually carved my own path - some teachers loved this, others didn’t. I forged ahead no matter what, until I graduated with a Masters in Science and became an Art Conservator - a job that blended Humanities and Chemistry in equal parts. Begone compartmentalization!
Then I had kids. And those kids went to school. And school had not changed at all since I had attended. Not one bit.
Then my kids started to struggle.
Homework was a bear, enhanced with tears and fits of frustration. It started as early as first grade, and every grade after that only increased the workload and distress. By middle school, my oldest son was reading at a 2nd grade level. My daughter, in 5th grade, was testing a grade level below. My spouse and I knew we couldn’t send them to high school unable to read.
Looking for guidance and assistance, we called school meetings with administrators. We believed, and naively trusted, they would care about our children’s education. Dyslexia runs in the family, and we suspected it was why they were struggling with a prescribed curriculum, but the administration wouldn’t hear of it. They called my children “lazy” - and then, at one particularly contentious meeting, a head administrator declared they were “stupid” and there was nothing anyone could do to help them. She went on to say the school was giving up and pulling any and all assistance, despite having an individualized education plan or IEP. Our advocate at the time leaned back and smiled - she knew we had won. That heated declaration made by the administrator was illegal under federal law. We were told we could pick any private school we wanted and that the public school would pay for it. We exhaled with relief. The children would learn in private school.
I proceeded to tour all the private schools in a 30 mile radius. In school after school, I observed children walking silently in single file to and from class, and sitting at desks facing toward the front, where a teacher lectured. After one highly rated private school touted their new, fully equipped, state of the art, makerspace, which was so clean it was devoid of students or projects, it hit me. Even though the private schools could boast smaller class sizes, they relied on the same standardized education edicts as the public schools. They, like public school, placed children on a conveyor belt to feed into the extremely standardized college admissions process. There was no room for exploration, creativity, or even innovation. It was obvious my kids would not fare any better in the pricey private schools than where they were.
At this point, I didn’t know what to do. My son was so far behind, and my daughter’s self-esteem was in the gutter. A two year statute of limitations for suing the school slightly quelled my fear of trying the only other option available: Homeschool.
I knew nothing of homeschooling - or of education theory. My mother had been a teacher, and she was horrified by this decision. “You will ruin your children!” is perhaps my favorite quote from her at this period (spoiler alert: she has since recanted and is one of the biggest advocates for personalized, learner-centered education reform). I proceeded to read every standard education book and website I could get my hands on - from the Common Core Standards (a not so riveting read) to the textbooks the kids were expected to read in school. Then I came across Sir Ken Robinson’s TED talk (apparently I was the only one who had not seen it as it is the most viewed TED talk in history on education) and I realized I was going down the wrong path. The kids are not the ones failing school, the school is failing the kids! I needed to break away from the standardized expectations. I had to let go of what I thought I knew and rethink education.
Diving deep into education reform, I proceeded to devour everything I could from researchers, reformers, professors, and authors like Tony Wagner, Ted Dintersmith, Adam Grant, and Todd Rose, whose works and ideas influenced my new view on education.
My kids needed an education that leveraged their individual strengths and interests to deliver a balanced knowledge base focused on developing the skills I knew they would need to be successful in the future: Creativity, Critical Thinking, Communication, Collaboration, and Compassion. The theory was solid. But theory is not action and no one, as far as I knew, was actually doing it except for High Tech High, which was on the other side of the country and for older students. Not feasible for us. I wondered how I was going to implement this new theory on my own?
Then, I came across Teresa Amabile’s Creativity Venn. It brilliantly visualizes her theory, and I being a visual thinker myself, I adapted the three bubble format and personalized it for each of my older two children to represent their education path. Relying heavily on my research, it took me three months to develop. With the generous help and invaluable input from a behavioral therapist friend, I was able to define what skills to focus on first. I really thought we had a solid, two year, individual, personalized education plan. But then the kids did something completely unexpected - they surpassed all expectations! In two months they accomplished all the tasks and skills I thought would take two years. Another Venn was soon on the way - then another and another after that. In the three years since we left school, my son has gone up eight grade levels and my daughter has surpassed seven. Both are now two to three grade levels above their former peers in school. They’re also confident, energetic, and excited about learning. So much for that foolish administrator!
Others have since taken note, and asked us to share our story and how we implemented a 21st century learning model for each of our educational journeys. I am thrilled and honored to include their stories in this book. Finally, like I always tell people when I start my training sessions, I am sharing my story and what worked for us. I am not telling you how to do it. I rally against standardization in schools and I know that if this framework were standardized, it would lose its effectiveness (and be hypocritical as well). That said, have fun with it, take it, use it, modify it - consider the framework open source. Make it work for you.
#sibe.rocks