What, exactly, do you feel is the purpose of school?

[Orinoco]

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You'd never ever question anything a child told you happened? Hmmm...that seems a mistake to me.
As I say, a VERY unusual school and a VERY unusual experience Critter. It simply bears as little resemblance to my children's experiences, and those of all the children I know, as a walk to the park at the bottom of my road bears to a foray under sniper fire in Afghanistan, and I it is completely inaccurate to assume that other people have the same experience to you. You have been massively unfortunate.

I do believe what my DD tells me about school. She's a very direct and honest child, who knows that I follow up on things. Furthermore, I spoke to the Class Teacher about the counting beyond 11 incident which she regarded as an 'issue', given that her peers were unable to do so.

I don't assume that anyone has had the same experience to me!!! However, I can only speak from our experiences.

OP
'What, exactly, do you feel is the purpose of school?'

Critter

"Is or should be?

The more I home educate my DD, the more I realise how school messes you up, stunts creativity and holds you back academically."

Why have people jumped on this post?

The OP asks for individual opinion and this poster gives hers/his. This is the poster's own view on his/her experience of school. It answers the thread from a personal pov so WHY does that make it a sweeping generalisation?

If the OP had asked: "what purpose do schools serve today" rather than a more explicit request for personal opinion then one might have some grounds for offense at critter's response.

We had the full moon already.

"I think it's extremely rare for anyone to reach their full potential" - well quite. By saying anyone has reached their full potential, it implies that there is nothing left for them to learn.

How utterly dull life would be if we felt we had nothing left to learn.

Agree, Cory's posts are excellent.

The school mine go to do seem to do a fantastic job of teaching the children to their individual ability - our head of foundation/KS1 is a young, dynamic, forward thinking woman and we are blardy lucky to have her.

When ds was about a quarter of the way through year 1 - he and about 5 others were separated out and did yr 2 SATS tests and other work that matched their ability. I know there were other groups in the class that were struggling with literacy and they too had separate work and separate sessions with both the TA and the teacher.

I think they do a pretty good job of teaching to ability there so I'm happy.

I could not face HE 3 children - they wouldn't get anything done, it would be a nightmare and I wouldn't be able to shop, lunch, gym work!

School does so much more than teach the 3 Rs as far as I can see - there's all the trips, visiting artists/musicians etc, sports, music, productions.....

The best thing at the moment is our school's wake up and shake up - this morning the whole of infants did a super routine to 'When the going gets tough' blaring out of the PA system with all the teachers and parents joining in. They LOVE it and they love school.

No, 'I realised school messed up my dd, stunted her creativity and held her back' is an opinion based on her own personal experience.
'School messes you up, stunts creativity and hold you back' is stating that it is fact that this is the general effect of school, which does imply that anyone who sends their kids to school is happy with this.
People talking about school tend to say, 'my school is fab and my kids love it because of X & Y', or talk about the social value of education etc.

It is the difference between saying, 'I tried home education and we never got anything done, I didn't feel competent and they missed their school friends' and saying, 'Home educators never get anything done, they don't feel competent and kids miss their school friends'. The first is an opinion based on personal experience, the second is a wild generalisation, which is bound to offend.

Sadly some of those emerging from our schools still can't read or add up.

True, but if we didn't have schools, I doubt the literacy rate would increase!

I obviously agree with you Objectivity and Bridie3. And I'm glad that someone recognised/ quoted my question in terms of differentiating between what the purpose of education is, and what it should be.

I think one of the main issues is that some may assume that by HEing your child you are rejecting the state system that their own child is in (which they may then feel is a criticism of their choices); despite the fact that thousands send their children to private schools, essentially for the same reasons.

I too believed that I'd chosen the best possible school for my child, and that she would benefit from both the academic and social side of schooling. However, I fast came to the conclusion that if she was going to learn to read and write it would be because I had taught her. So, essentially I was taking her to school for the 'social aspects'. However, as I've explained previously, she simply learnt about aggression and poor behaviour and how kids can get away with it at school.

I agree with others that Cory's posts have been excellent on this thread.

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I think in the schools which lock themselves into following the NC and only the NC, which teach their children to pass tests and no more, the purpose is to educate to a set standard. For the schools where the teachers can be flexible, where they are allowed to teach the way they can do, then the schools are there to give children the chance to go as far as they are capable of going.
Does that make sense?(sorry it's late )

I am the type of person that loves museums and art galleries. I've taken my ds to almost all of them in London, almost at every half term.

However, my DS and his class went to the ragged school museum this week. They had to dress up as old victorians with victorian names etc...my ds was soooo excited, he woke up at 6am (normally its a nightmare waking him up at 7), the other parents also commented how their dc's woke up early too and very excited.

After the trip, my DS and his friends didn't stop talking about it, they clearly enjoyed their trip so very much.

So for me, that's the purpose of school. I (personally) wont do it so effectively as the school.

Obviously, Critter you had a bad experience of just one school (or schools in your area), but there are loads of fantastic schools out there and our school IS one of them.

Orinoco on Fri 20-Jun-08 21:15:38
'I just meant, do you feel that the purpose of school is to educate a child up to a set standard and no more, or to educate that child to the best of that child's ability? I always thought that schools taught to ability, obviously within reason, but my recent experience of dd1 going through her yr 2 SAT's, and dd2 having reading books much below her ability makes me wonder. '

Ah, now I see where your OP was aiming.

Well, in our case I have to say that it hasn't made that much for difference. Dd may well have been doing work under her ability now and then- in fact, almost certainly so- but the fact that she has found school life in general a stimulating experience means that she has always wanted to extend her own reading range and invent more work for herself, writing stories and looking things up.

What with the school library, the public library and an excellent home library, class reading books are only a beginning and that's how she's always seen it.

Ds struggles with reading and is dyspraxic, so I am grateful for the support he is getting at school- though again, I see it as part of my job to improve on that and keep on stretching his mind.