Children's Schools

[the buddha & the beast]

I was interested in people's opinions on picking a good school for children. Meditation, open-mindedness, and love are very important to me. Unfortunately, all of the schools I have looked at in my area are really not concerned with these concepts. Any school ideas for my kids? I plan to move in a few years so if anybody knows any good ones, feel free to let me know.

 

Thanks!

[thelerner]

Reading, writing, rithmetic plus a safe environment and nice park to play in is all I required from a school.

 

Meditation, Mindfulness, Mushiness those are things best taught and practiced at home or under a good teacher in an after school program.

 

Montessori can be a good choice- if you don't mind paying college tuition for 14 years. There's home schooling, but a good solid regular school is not a bad option. I'm against busing kids far away for schooling, it puts them too far from local kids who are the most convenient to play with.

 

 

[Zhuo Ming-Dao]

Here is a list of charter schools in Louisiana. Charter schools are public, and therefore free, and can sometimes be radically superior to traditional public schools.

 

http://www.doe.state.la.us/lde/uploads/3389.pdf

 

My recommendation to you is that you do your homework. Look into the schools near you, see what their graduation rates/state test scores/etc look like and see what their curriculum looks like. Also, charter schools are required to let you see all of the teacher's resumes, so you can get a look at what kind of background the teachers have. Finally, charter schools will almost always let you do tours of the campus and let you sit in on classes. Bring your child to these tours (of several schools that you already would be OK with) and let them help you in the decision making process.

 

Although it is private, a Waldorf school sounds like it would be right up your ally if you are living in the New Orleans area:

 

http://www.waldorfnola.org/

[Yoda]

home schooling is an option south of the mason dixon line. If nothing pans out, just make sure that you read Tom Sawyer to them so they know how to play the game.

[Aetherous]

My cousins were home schooled, and actually have turned out to be great people. I assumed they wouldn't be able to adjust to the world, but they are actually much more "adjusted" than myself. They are free spirited and fun...so to me, I've been shown that it works.

 

Bad social experiences in elementary/middle and high school can have a big impact, whereas if you didn't have those experiences until you were older, you could better cope with it. I remember many experiences where people were simply MEAN...and kids don't know how to deal with that, so sometimes they think it's their own problem and develop social anxiety...instead of just realizing that the other kids are shit heads.

 

So maybe home schooling wouldn't be so bad for a while, until you find a great school.