by Derry Hannon
What young people need & Covid-19 opportunities
It seems to me that the crucial commodity that young people need in order to find and deepen their interests and identity, and to learn how to live with others is TIME. Time to think, time to wonder, time to question, time to create, time to hang out with their friends, time to find out who they are, time to relax and just be idle for a while – and a space to do it in.
Yet this is the one thing that prior to ‘the virus’ most state funded secondary or high schools, and increasingly, middle, primary or elementary schools as well, deprived them of. Lunch hours and playtimes/recess were shortened or cut. The encroachment into their free time was not just during the school day but also at home, in the evenings and at week-ends, with often relentless homework and test/examination revision. . . .
Read the entire proposal here: https://www.progressiveeducation.org/the-20-project-for-schools-a-modest-proposal-by-derry-hannam/.
Derry has been a long time proponent of democratic education. He is currently working on a soon to be published book titled Another Way Is Possible – Becoming A Democratic Teacher In A State School.
This idea of dedicating 20% of our time (teachers/students) to one of the explicit goals of schools, building active & educated citizens, is a brilliant small first step!