Site Contents:
Freedom-in-Education Newsletter
June 2006
The topic of this month's newsletter is being a Father, to celebrate Father's Day on the eighteenth of June.
|
Links of the Month: uk.groups.yahoo.com/group www.learning-naturally.blogspot.com www.lochnessproject.org
|
Last month's topic 'Late Readers', provoked plenty of response, and some of the letters are included below. It is always encouraging to hear from families who have decided to do what they feel to be right, even when it is against the advice which society might be giving them.
I think it is always hard at first, to do something contrary to what is normal; but if it really is the right thing to be doing, it will be easier in the long run. Having happy children around the house who like each other's company, is certainly much easier than having resentful, angry children around the house, who are always fighting and arguing, which I know perfectly described me in my school days!
I was trying to work out the other day, what the main reason is that people send their children to school. Few people would argue that school is ideal, but even the ones who don't like it at all, often don't do something about it.
I came to the conclusion that the real
reason that most parents send their children to school, is simply because it is the normal thing
to do, and everybody else is doing it.
And this is probably true for most things - and I don't exclude myself!
It sounds rather sheep-like, I know, but it is so much easier to do what one is told, rather than stand on one's own feet. After all, if one is the only person doing something, one has to be prepared to take the full weight blame if it all goes wrong.
Hopefully, as more and more people take their education into their own hands, people will realise that school is not the only option, and those who never did feel school was right for them, will have the courage to try something else.
I think that home education is set to
grow. As schools continue, more parents will try another approach, and the more
parents who try another approach, the more 'normal' it will become, and the more
normal it becomes, the more people will do it, and so on.
A beneficial side-effect of this, is that schools will be forced to improve,
making them places that all the children in them choose to go to.
Anyway, June is here, and for those happy with their choice, they really don't have to worry about it! They can go outside in the Summer weather, and see all the beautiful flowers which are out at the moment.
Best wishes for a lovely Summer!
Wendy
Father’s
Day
With the approach of Father’s Day, now is perhaps a good time to return to a subject that the Freedom in Education Newsletter has already covered once before – the role of a father in modern society.
Since we started publishing books on home education, we have, over the years, spent quite a lot of time writing out envelopes and posting out books and letters to people on our mailing lists. Every time that we do this, we are struck by how many more women than men there are on our lists. Most of the orders that we receive for our books come from mothers, and most of the letters and enquiries that we receive also come from women. Furthermore, I quite regularly hear from mothers who want to take responsibility for their children’s education themselves – because their child is unhappy or unfulfilled at school – but have found the child’s father to be obstructive, uncooperative, and unsupportive; it is rare to hear of the reverse.
|
‘Women’s Liberation’ and the feminist movement is often blamed for the uncertainty that men feel about their role in the family: the argument goes that women now have children, put them in childcare and are back at work within a few weeks, which means that they can earn money for themselves, and therefore have no need for men in their daily lives.
Whether or not there really are any women who look at life in this way is a debatable point, but it is certain that it is not the way that children see things. There is absolutely no reason to believe that children feel any less need for a father now, than they ever did in the past.
Whilst it is true that mothers play a larger role in the first few weeks and months of a child’s life than do fathers, it is also true that, as a child grows up, their father becomes more and more important to them, and they look to their father for help and support in all sorts of different ways – especially in terms of education. The problem seems to be not so much that fathers are no longer needed, but that fathers have stopped fulfilling the role that their children want them to play.
This is a problem that predates the advent of ‘Women’s Liberation’: ever since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, it has been considered normal for fathers to be out of the house, at work, for ten to twelve hours per day, five or six days per week. This sort of work pattern is clearly incompatible with being a parent, and fathers who work hours of this length find that they become increasingly distanced from their families and that, in a sense, their children grow up without really having a father.
Even though this is something that has now been going on for many years, it is still not something that young men are warned about during their education.
Clearly, one of the biggest challenges facing any young person today is finding a way to, on the one hand, earn enough money to pay the bills, whilst, on the other hand, still having enough time to fulfil their obligations to themselves and their families. The modern system of education emphasises the importance of the first of these, but pays little more than lip service to the other.
Young men, in particular, leave the education system determined to get a good job, to earn lots of money, and to have a successful career; assuming that if they do this, other areas of their lives will fall into place. Everyone is then surprised and horrified when the divorce rate continues to rise, when children’s behaviour at school continues to get worse, when anti-social behaviour amongst young people is seen to increase, and when fathers and children find themselves alienated from each other.
The fact is that there is more to being a father than just coming home from work each day, putting money into the family bank account, and asking your children what sort of day they have had at school. Being a real father in today’s world takes a special sort of commitment and a special sort of courage. It requires a man to put his children before his career, and his family before his standing in society. It requires that he has the strength of character to organise his life so that his children always know where he is, and that he is always available to help them.
As with many of the really important things in life, the rewards for being a good father are unlikely to come in the form of wealth, honours, or the recognition of society; but in something far more valuable – the gratitude and respect of the people you love. Furthermore, if more men give this role the importance that it deserves, then we will, at last, start to see some of the problems that afflict modern society begin to be resolved.
Gareth Lewis
Letters
Feedback on last Month's Late Readers Article:
Dear Gareth,
I enjoyed
your article on late readers immensely!
I agree with you 100% that children will read when they are ready and should not
be forced, as if they were robots.
Intelligence is definitely not measured by whether one can read or not.
If a child is forced to read too early, all it will teach them is to hate
reading!
Thanks for your wonderful newsletter! I feel it helps us Home Ed families through the rough spots in raising well-rounded adults, who can think for themselves!
Clare Finley
Mr. Lewis,
I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciated your article. I have a nine-year-old son who started reading at age six and really took off with it. He had struggled the whole year with reading and then one day picked up a book that looked interesting to him and he has devoured book after book since.
On the other hand, my eight-year-old
son still does not read very well at all. Last year I struggled and struggled to
get him reading and often our phonic lessons resulted with him in tears and me
very frustrated. I really felt this was the wrong approach and finally I sat and
really thought about what to do, as I wanted him to enjoy reading, not consider
it such a trial. I came to the conclusion that he would eventually learn
how to read, whether now or in several year...that his exposure to learning did
not really require him to read. Since I finally came to this conclusion, life
has been much more peaceful and schooling is stress-free. He himself eventually
picked up a phonic workbook that someone had given me and started working on it
himself. He still is not a wonderful reader, but he has initiated this learning
himself and he has made some strides towards learning how.
It was refreshing to read your article and see that I am not the only one going
through this and that I made a good decision when I stopped pushing and let it
come naturally.
Susan Turchon
Florida
Dear Lewis Family
Just a quick thank you for the may letter. It really was a subject close to my heart as this was the main reason that we took our children out of school. Having always been a book family my eldest daughter went from loving books to hating visits to the library and saying books were 'boring' all in the space of a year or two at school. We were told to give her an eye test and she actually wore glasses for a few months (having since found out that she has perfect vision!!), we were told that she was to be put in a 'low reading group' (great for a child's self esteem!), and finally that she would need a learning difficulties test. That was the last straw and we took her out of school along with her sister. Her first year out of school my only goal was to help her to enjoy books once again. Well.................she is now 14 years old and a massive book worm. She finished the 'Sharpe' series last year, is half way through The Iliad and reads 'grown-up' fiction and non-fiction books for hours very week. Something that she would never be doing had we left her in school.
Best wishes
Georgia Fowler
Hi Wendy,
I was just reading your May newsletter with the late readers article, liked your intro and the article! Am Mum to one early and three late readers and they are all great :-D Well done on keeping up such an excellent site that is easy to recommend to new home educators.
BWs
Barbara Stark
Your letters and comments are welcome. You can send them to Gareth
Lewis at the following address, or to me at the address beneath:
gareth.lewis@freedom-in-education.co.uk
wendy@freedom-in-education.co.uk