A recent column in The New York Times, Building Self-Control, The American Way, highlights the importance of learning self-control. ”In any culture, the development of self-control is crucial. This ability, which depends on the prefrontal cortex, provides the basis for mental flexibility, social skills and discipline. It predicts success in education, career and marriage.”

Although the authors go on to mention many ways of developing self-control, it is the “American” (i.e. less coercive) ones that caught my attention as a Sudbury proponent. “Effective approaches for building self-control combine fun with progressively increasing challenges. Rather than force activities onto an unwilling child, take advantage of his or her individual tendencies. When children develop self-control through their own pursuit of happiness, no parental hovering is required.” Sudbury students spend their days pursuing their interests to the fullest, challenging themselves and fulfilling their own goals. They do so as full members of a participatory democracy, with all the responsibility this entails. You could say self-control is a cornerstone of the Sudbury curriculum.

Reach Sudbury School of Toronto is pleased to announce its next Information Meeting and Valentine’s Party

Dr. Carlo Ricci, an educational professor at Nipissing University and a long-time Reach supporter, has just published a new book, The Willed Curriculum, Unschooling, and Self Direction: What Do Love, Trust, Respect, Care, and Compassion Have To Do With Learning? We are all looking forward to reading it. If you would like a copy, it’s available in paperback or as an e-book.

I’ve been reading through some past articles on Sudbury education. A new year is a good time to think about new ways of doing things, and so I’d like to refer you to an essay by Daniel Greenberg, a found of the original Sudbury Valley School and a long-time staff member there. It’s called “Sudbury Valley School: The Birth of a New Paradigm for Education” and it’s on the Sudbury Valley School website. It outlines some of the ideas behind Sudbury education and talks about how the school’s founders decided to do things they way they do there.

Here is my favourite quotation from this essay: “I want to end with the essence of what the school is about: that a child is no different than an adult in the respect that is due to them from the rest of us. And the easiest way to get into this paradigm, the easiest way to break out of all of these other preconceptions, is to keep reminding yourself of that simple fact. Every time you interact with a child, stop yourself for a second – you can train yourself to do this – and ask, ‘Would I behave this way to an adult?’ Would you walk up to an adult and say, ‘Haven’t you been sitting a little too long staring at the roof? Wouldn’t you like to read a book that I have for you?’”

When I first encountered democratic schools, as a frustrated teachers’ college student skipping class to read through the alternative education section of the library, I thought, “This is incredible!” What I was reading resonated with my values and spoke to me on a deep level, and in that way it felt very familiar. Yet it was also extremely foreign. I had never seen a democratic school or met anyone who had attended one. (The only democratic school I had ever even heard of was Summerhill, which I had read about in high school when a friend lent me one of A.S. Neill’s books. We couldn’t believe this kind of school actually existed!)

I think one of the biggest stumbling blocks for the acceptance of democratic education as a viable schooling option is that it is so very different from what most of us have experienced. Even if the principles underlying democratic schools make sense to us, and we can imagine that they could work in practice, it can be hard to shake the nagging voice of fear of the unknown. School is school, we all know what it looks like, and doing something completely different than everyone else has ever done is just too risky.

Well, it was reassuring to me to find out that democratic schooling is part of an educational tradition and is practised at many institutions world-wide. This is probably not news to many of you. However, if you are new to democratic education and you are looking for reassurance that this is a credible idea, consider checking out these links. (This is by no means an exhaustive list of resources but it is a good starting point.) AERO is particularly good for showing the scope of alternative education options out there; IDEA (Institute for Democratic Education in America) has interesting contributions to the democratic education conversation; IDEC and IDEN (International Democratic Education Conference/ Network) give you an idea of the international scope of this movement.  Democratic education may not be mainstream (yet, we like to believe!) but it is an established practice.