I grew up in Connecticut and was raised in a rather large family. I had two brothers and two sisters, I was the the second to youngest.
The purpose of this post is to talk tell you about my education because there is a valuable lesson from this, that is do not ever confuse school with your education.

Homework was not a part of my education

I went to a public school in the 1970s and for the most part I never studied and barely paid attention in school. It was incredibly boring for me. I never read a book nor did any homework until I was 14 year old. Not even a second.
For the first ten years of my education, I do not know what I did. However, by the end of high school I graduated first in my class.

What happened, did I change my life? No.  Simply in the 1970s everything was so relaxed as it was a time that was influenced by the hippies and new ideas.  Pushing children and competition was bad.  Free expression was good.  Therefore homework was really not a part of schooling.

My real education growing up

My real education was when I came home from school and I meet my friend George Wheat.  He is still my friend to this day.  He and I would live in our imagination. We would read books on history, play in the woods and discuss historical what ifs, philosophy, the Soviet Union.  He played historical board games by a company called SPI.   These had thousands of pieces and rule books that looked like a codex.

We created rockets and experiments, my friend Scott Pass has an interest in insects and collected them, and classified them. Scott was the neighborhood liberal, George was the neighborhood republican. Between the two I got an education in political science.

It was mostly in our imaginations we live.  We lived in small town New England and there was nothing but forest around us so this is how we entertained ourselves. Building, creating, imagining and speculating.

It was the best education any child could have.  When we went to school, we just lived to let play.

I am a teacher today

I am a teacher today and I see school give kids endless amounts of knowledge. They must memorize and cram facts and dates.  I do not like it.  It creates minds that are closed.  Childhood is the most important time to make kids mind grow and expand. If you can not dream and play for most of your childhood you will have a very impoverished mental life as an adult.

My recommendations are:

  • Kids should always be encouraged to read books, not the Internet. Parents should get them involved in reading.  This is the most important thing you can do as a parent. It will change their lives.
  • Kids should be allowed to play with out too many restrictions for countless hours out of the day. Play is not technology involved, such as SMS and chat rooms. Cell phones are a brain drain.
  • Teach them to play and escape in their imagination.  Your imagination is where creativity resides and will carry them through their lives.

Let me know what you think is the best way to educate a child and encourage a child to develop their mind in every sense of the word.

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