A Bit of a Rant - 22 January 2022 - Plague Journal Day 681

Micah 6:8
Genesis 8:22
Yes, your life matters.

Some of you are still sheltering in place, but fear not: I'm here to keep you sane and entertained.
One could hardly ask for much more than that, now could one?

I have long been opposed to year-round schooling for kids. One reason is that our current school year is linked directly with the rhythm of agriculture. That's why kids had the Summer off - to help on the farms and with preparation for the coming cold seasons. As we've moved further and further away from an agrarian society (more's the pity in a lot of ways), that Summer turned from work to enrichment.
Still, by basing our school year on the needs of agriculture, we've maintained a link - however tenuous - between modern life and the source of our food. I think that's not just important, it's imperative.

Now for my new reason for opposing year-round school.
Imagine life without Summer Camps, without Summer Enrichment Classes, without Summer Vacation Trips. You can't help but imagine a drabber, less wonderful life.
Not only is there fun stuff in there, it's broadening in ways that classroom education simply never could be. It's a way to experience other people than your classmates and neighbours. It's a way to experience other places - places far enough away that they couldn't be  visited reasonably in the shorter time of a school break.

Further, the whole point of education is to prepare a person for life. Note that it's not to prepare a person to make a living. That comes from job training, and that's a good thing too - it's just not education. Schools need to teach our kids how to think, not what to think. They need to teach them facts and ways of analysing them, not the currently approved analysis of the currently approved set of facts.

OK. I guess I'm going to stop here before I get too overtly political, but this is a very important thing. Not only do we need to let our kids be kids while they're kids, we need to teach them how the world works so when they're working in it they'll know what to expect and how to act (and react).



Keep Calm and Don't Stay Away.
I'll be back tomorrow.
The mental health issues related to our insane lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression. NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, has a 24 hour helpline: 800-950-6264.