Ontario votes tomorrow, October 6!
Hey Ontario Bunchlanders! Remember to get out to vote tomorrow! And when you’re at your local polling station, our friends at the Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario are asking you to think about which party best serves your kids and our education system.
Image via YouTube
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Should kids be spending more time at school?
Instead of 8:15-2:30, or 9:30-3:45 or whatever weird times your kid is in school, there’s been some discussion lately around making the school day longer, like 9-5 longer.
If your kid had a longer school day, they’d have more time to put precious knowledge into their brains and you (or your spouse) wouldn’t have to rush over at that mid-afternoon hour to bring them home, or, you wouldn’t have to pay for the extra two or whatever hours of daycare. But should that extra time be more straight-up lessons like grammar and arithmetic? Some people think so, while others think extra time added into the school day should be spent napping, socializing and running around.
An RSA Animation
The above animation comes from a talk given by Sir Ken Robinson, world-renowned education and creativity expert at the RSA. The RSA is “an enlightenment organisation committed to finding innovative practical solutions to today’s social challenges.”
So what do you think? How can education systems take advantage of the fact that young kids are crazy-capable of lateral thinking? What’s the first step you take when you suspect that this traditional model of schooling is not working for your kid? In what education models would the creative kids prosper? If there’s anyone in Bunchland whose kids go to an alternative of an alternative school and think they’ve found some solutions, please let us know!
This post is sponsored by the Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario and their Kids Matter campaign. Join the community on their forum or follow the #kidsmatter discussion on Twitter.
One Bunchlander things making things more open would make for better schools
For the past couple weeks, we’ve been asking you what you’d like to see in your kids’ schools. Bunch reader Dave Fingrut, who happens to have studied education a little, wrote to tell us he’d like things to be more open:
“Assuming that schools are going to continue using internet and computer technologies as educational tools, it would be great to see more open content materials, complemented by free and open source software, operating systems and hardware.
For kids at the elementary level who use computers at school – whether in the classroom, the library, or computer labs, and in desktop, laptop, tablet or mobile device format – the experience would be more creative and interactive, faster and easier for teachers to plan, cheaper for schools and school boards, and students could use older computer systems without losing speed and performance.”
The Elementary Teacher Federation of Ontario’s new TV spots:
OK, the ETFO definitely has something up their sleeves and with this latest campaign ads, but what? These seemingly negative “vote against kids” ads are definitely setting something up. We’re thinking it has something to do with saying (light-heartedly) that kids are monsters so you want them to spend lots of time at school and with teachers so you don’t have to deal with them?
Come on, part 2, we’re waiting!
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