Micro-world

From 2020worldpeace

The school is a micro-world.

Students enter as children, and leave as adults (see Six-year Cycle), going from the youngest to the oldest. This represents the change we all undergo in society at large, as we start of new and eager young adults in our chosen occupations or professions, and we become old-hands. So, to create a system which is sensitive to this, would make use of the real energies that are going on.

Along the lines of private funding of school buildings, why don't teachers invest in their own classrooms? The main problem with equiping maths classrooms with smart-boards is the capital. A teacher could front £1000 of their own money, so that the department could pay back £200 a year.

OK, what about other ways to stimulate the flow of cash. Imagine if each child brought in £1 a week to buy their maths class a projector. They have seen the benefit of it, they can see how it will improve their learning, and also provide some nifty side-benefits. Within one term, they would have bought it. Imagine if this was standardised in registration classes? And at the end of each term, the kids had to decide what to do with their class fund? Say 20 students x 13 weeks in term, about £250. Perhaps they could afford a party, or a visit to the cinema, etc. With the notion of grouping, and improvement in co-operation, perhaps they may want to save it for the whole year and at the end of the year amount £750. Perhaps they could join it to the year-group fund, perhaps £3000. After a few years, I would have thought it possible that a school might come up with a good enough idea, that all the kids are willing to bring £1 a year, and splash out on staging a rock concert by hiring Hearts football stadium for £40,000, say. It is essential that the kids monitor this themselves. The teacher acts only as facilitator. The ideas for how to spend the money come from the kids. The teacher is there to provide them with suitable model with which to discuss their ideas and make decisions.

If the kids are becoming more confident with their skills, and multi-disciplinary projects are encouraged, a micro-world of companies may be encouraged, run mainly by fifth years, involving advertising and canvassing, to win the financial and political support to execute various business or political ventures. For example, an after-school club, or an investors club.

Although it may sound adventurous at this point, an in-school system of credits could be organised. Credits may be awarded by teachers, or perhaps fifth-years have a remit to disperse an amount to first years, for example. These credits are valuable in terms of the student's lives, enabling such things as buying pencils etc. Imagine a class, where is kid doesn't have his pencil, but uses a credit to avoid a punishment exercise. Perhaps a whole class may cash in their credits together so that they can have a party on their last day of term. Or perhaps a student uses it to waiver their homework. Perhaps your imagination is full of interesting possibilities, or perhaps it is reminded of some nightmare situations, take a moment to recognise that this goes on already: students do not bring pencils, they do not return homework, and they have end-of-term parties. All we are doing, is systematising it, in a positive framework. They earn these privilleges.

There are three important reasons for economising the school system. First, it allows the kids to experience the power of money. This is something that is very difficult for a child to understand, since they only have access to the money they earn or are given by their parents. They find it difficult to save it. Hence, a class can collect £30 a week, and even this amount is large for most kids to make a decision about. This is essential experiential feedback. Second, it attracts the attention that kids have already. They are targeted as consumers in the wider world: it is essentially they become savy to the techniques used to manipulate them. It is something which concerns them, and as such, brings the problem area into some kind of managable control. In a way, it redirects attention from the outside world, or from misbehaviour, to real experimental decision-making. Third, funds are generated, thus taking off pressure from school budgets for the additional funding of non-timetabled events, visiting cinema etc. It may also go some way to buying school resources. Imagine, the kids buying books for the library, or materials for maths classes. If they own the materials around them, then they will take care of them. Fourth, if a Six-year Cycle is working, then the investment in the material world around them, to possess the things, to control the environment, will eventually give rise to the sixth-year who is leaving the school, and hence the investment in things. In this way, a subtle parallel with leaving our possessions when we die, is experienced. So, although this appears to encourage possessiveness and materialism, something I think most teachers are concerned about, it actually tries to work through that desire.

See six-year cycle, institutionally transparent, and future proof.