School as an Extension of Home

Exploring Acceptance, Access, Abundance and Attention

Acceptance

“Kids who don’t match the faux norm of the middle class white neurotypical child, get beaten down so continuously, run into so many roadblocks, so many tripwires, that the school day is nothing but misery from start to finish, day after day, year after year. To quote a high school student, “it’s like a video game, except I hate it, and you can’t win.” — Ira Socol, The Four A-s in Moments

“(Children) arrive at our schools with different talents, passions, skills, knowledge, relationships, dispositions, attitudes and experiences. Each and every child possesses a jagged profile of strengths and weaknesses. Each and every child has something worth celebrating and developing. Each and every child has a dream that is worth realizing. Each and every child has unique needs that we can help meet.” — Ira Socol, Pam Moran, Chad Ratliff, Timeless Learning.

“…What a child needs is love and stories and tools and conversation and support and guidance and access to nature and culture and the world. If a kid asks for your feedback, by all means you can give it; it would be impolite not to. But what we should be measuring and comparing is not our children but the quality of the learning environments we provide for them.” — Carol Black, Children, Learning, and The ‘Evaluative Gaze’ of School.

A Tesla coil created by a student for an exhibition of learning called “Sparks and Stories”. Kids need time and space to find a problem, passion or purpose to plug into.

Access

“Access means all students can fully access the learning and the opportunities they need. Full access. If they can’t read via alphabetical code you still need to get them what’s inside the books they want. If they can’t sit still in your classroom you still need to make them comfortable in a way that allows them to stay and be fully involved. If they can’t do your ‘math facts worksheet’ but want to compute their batting average, you need to find a way that allows them to do that. When access — to books, or math, or art, or recess — is denied to a child you are making them second class citizens.” — Ira Socol, Semi-Charmed Kind of Life, part I

“We need to do everything we can to invest in digital equity not just because of COVID but in spite of COVID & we need to affirm equity through philosophy, policy, professional competencies, & practices to ensure each child is supported thru attention, abundance, access, acceptance.”

Does what we do match up with what we want to achieve?

Creating authentic audiences and opportunities for students to share their skills and learning is a vital part of access and abundance.

Abundance

“Abundance represents what we hope surrounds every child. That doesn’t mean things — it means primarily what we can give without any financial strain.”
— Ira Socol, A Semi-Charmed Kind of Life: Part I

“When we let kids make themselves comfortable, that’s abundance.” — Ira Socol

“What we should be measuring and comparing is not our children but the quality of the learning environments we provide for them.” — Carol Black

Attention

”Most of all, attention is the act of treating every child as the full human being they are, celebrating their gifts, helping them grow up their way, holding them when they need support, and listening to their hearts.” — Ira Socol, Semi-Charmed Kind of Life: Part II

“If you google “attention” and “student” you’ll find thousands of articles on getting your students to pay attention and very little on paying attention to our kids. But, why would I, as a kid in your class, pay attention to you if you are not paying attention to me.” — Ira Socol, The Four A-s in Moments

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Education blog. "I write because I don't know what I think until I read what I say" - Flannery O'Connor

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Abe Moore

Education blog. "I write because I don't know what I think until I read what I say" - Flannery O'Connor