Post 9

Good schools have happy, excited, learning children in them. That, in my eyes, is indisputable. However, the “good school” is the one that suits the particular child/group of children it is teaching. All children learn differently, all children thrive best in different environments. Therefore, it is my belief that a good school will look different depending on the child being taught there.

This belief primarily comes from my lived experiences and my knowledge of others’ experiences. In my education I have been to both Public and Private schools, I have been a day student, flexi-boarder, week day boarder and full time boarder, I have been to a co-educational and all-girls school, and I have seen students thriving and getting lost in all of them.

I know from experience that I do best in a small classroom, with more teacher interaction, which is why I got behind during Public school as there were huge classes. However, there were students there that did amazingly well and learnt well in a large classroom, where competition was higher for recognition and there were opportunities to teach material to those that didn’t understand.

I also know from experience that I do best as a full time or weekly boarder, this is because I can immerse myself better in my learning and I find it easier to do work at school than at home. I like the independence boarding gives you and the sense of family and community that come from it. At a boarding school teachers and pupils become more like a family, which aids the teachers understanding of the students and aids the students understanding of those teaching them. It also builds trust. Equally though, I have met many people who struggle under these conditions, these are the children who are homesick most and during their time at school, especially until the age of about 16, struggle being away from their family support network. This is perfectly fine, and normal, but for these people a boarding school provides an intimidating and counterproductive learning environment. A day school would allow them to learn with a school community but at the end of the day feel safe in the knowledge that their family support network would be in their home with them and they would be able to concentrate on their learning.

Finally, I know from experience that I need a co-educational school system to learn, my time at the All-girls school was terrible. I felt very enclosed, separated and lonely, because I felt like I was missing out on an aspect of life. To some degree I was, the knowledge of how to interact with the opposite gender comes from two places, home and school, without boys at school I found myself more scared of boys, almost intimidated. I also felt like the girls were at each other’s’ throats all the time and I knew that boys didn’t act the same. However, there were girls, and are many, that did fantastically. They weren’t distracted by boys, felt a security in having a group of girls around them and could concentrate and be free from worry.

The same can be applied to learning styles, teaching styles, space, location, and so on. In essence, education is subjective; I cannot describe a good school any more than saying it has happy, excited, learning children, because that is the only commonality. A good school is the one that suits the children learning in it.