Aware that many public schools are preparing students for a world that no longer exists, Educate the Whole Child promotes a fresh paradigm that is truly nurturing and educates the whole child. We embrace a variety of approaches that fully engage students—head, heart, and hands– and prepare them for a lifetime of continued growth.
WHY
To the extent that we narrow the purpose of schooling to what can be measured, we fail to engage those qualities children will need in order to pull learning from life. We also increase the likelihood that they will be bored, question the value of school, and in some cases even drop out.
Instead of starting with the questions “How do we prepare kids to compete in the 21st century global marketplace?” or “What will ensure that graduates all have command of basic skills?”, suppose we start by asking what qualities we want to encourage in children as they grow toward adulthood. When students are fully engaged, they want to learn. By stimulating the various kinds of intelligence students possess, we prepare them to become adults who are creative, take initiative, and want to continue learning.
WHAT IS
AND HOW DOES IT WORK?
Of course, developing a command of skills and content is important, but there’s more to education than intellectual attainment. Seasoned educator Lynn Stoddard surveyed parents, asking them what qualities they wanted their children to develop. Some of these were: initiative, imagination, ability to discern truth, an inquiring mind, interpersonal skills, and integrity. Students have a better chance of acquiring qualities like this if they work on projects in teams, spend time outside the classroom or in nature, and have a chance to exercise their creativity. To this end, we draw on the best holistic approaches.
HOW
We know what does NOT work:
• Treating schools as if they were factories turning out workers to compete in the world economy
• Standardization, excessive testing, and narrowing the focus of education to measurable intellectual performance
• Top-down government mandates that disempower teachers and drive creative ones from the profession
• Students bored, alienated, and insufficiently challenged so that they lack an appetite for learning
• schools that fail to connect with what is highest and best in each child
And we know what DOES work:
• Aiming to draw out what is highest and best in each child.
• Learning that demands full engagement for each child—head, heart, and hands.
• Project- and place-based learning that teaches teamwork, resilience, and problem-solving skills
• Activities beyond school walls that make a connection with a real world
• All forms of creativity, to develop skills that cannot be measured by tests.
Use the SCHOOLS tab to see the variety of ways our schools implement these practices.