Musings on Education
The only formal qualification that I possess is a RSA1 in Typing. I know, this is hilarious and unusual for a guy, especially one like myself (who was a sk8r when I was in school, amongst other things), but I figured it would be more useful to me than trying to cram maths and crap in my head when the teachers despised me. It turned out to be a great class, I didn't have to 'think' and my brain simply absorbed the information. I touch type thanks to the really regimented way we were taught (old skool teaching FTW - apparently) and have a typing speed around 50 wpm on an average sort of day. It's not really done me any good work wise but that's more to do with a lot of other factors, but it's been the most useful thing I learnt in the years of schooling that I was subjected to.
When we moved here for our fresh start, I went to a local FE college and attempted to take some GCSE's (the exams we normally take from 14-16, the exams themselves being sat at 16). I struggled with maths, but Jack was always massively enthusiastic about it (he's a veritable maths genius when compared to me) and my Maths teacher, who was hot, was very helpful and dedicated to trying to help me 'get it'. English was incredibly hit and miss, no one had ever taught me the 'rules' of English language, so my essays were rubbish and I stopped trying. I enjoyed art, but as the ms started I found myself becoming frustratingly less able to do it and it was not the kind of art that I was used to so it was already a challenge.
The only thing that I was really any good at was Biology. We had an awesome teacher who decided that she would teach us what was interesting and correct, not the dumbed down crap they wanted her to teach for the national curriculum. She taught us degree level stuff on cell & molecular biology, genetics, physiology and even a little microbiology, I loved it and I did really well averaging mostly As on my coursework. The mock test she gave us I managed a B. That was when the ms started to creep in, when I started to struggle with my memory and slur my words, when tiredness & insomnia started to kick my ass and I would stumble like a drunk while walking down a straight corridor. I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis things rapidly unravelled from there. I tried to keep going with the biology and ditched the other subjects as they were far too stressful (they had just made me worse), but my marks began slipping and just making it to class was a nightmare. I gave up rather than be faced with failing.
Over the last few years, my interest in writing has led me to teach myself bits and pieces about grammar and the like. I've come a long way since I first started writing fanfic. Funnily enough though, there are days when I feel like I'm fighting harder to remember the 'rules' and even am fairly sure I'm fucking them up massively. I'm fairly sure that the quality of my writing fluctuates greatly on any given day depending on what's happening with my ms (and pain meds), it can be amusing and embarrassing to recognise that I've mangled this rule or that, or realise that I can't remember if that should be a comma, semi-colon or full-stop. I start doubting every single punctuation mark I use (except for when I use a question mark lol).
You're probably wondering what prompted this ramble (if you've actually still reading lol). Well, Luke is gearing up to his yr2 SATs. He's an incredibly smart kid and his last school report he was exceeding expectations in all his subjects. He's always asked for help with questions he doesn't understand and we've been great at helping him work through the problem without giving him the answers. Trouble is, he's started asking questions that I don't know the answer to and ok, they're things that he doesn't really need to know yet, but if he's to continue to be challenged and kept progressing then I see know reason for him not to be given the help.
He enjoys learning, likes to read and be challenged. I bought him some workbooks to help keep him interested, he found his age appropriate ones boring and easy. over the Easter holidays he's blasted his way through the ones for ages 7-8 and 7-9 in both maths and English. He's now on the 9-10 year old books. I'm worried that it won't be long before I can be of no help at all to him and the thought is beyond embarrassing. He asked a question about fractions using a word I'd never even heard before, I had to look it up. We're all concerned that he's too advanced for the class he's in at school, he's starting to find it boring and I recognise the familiar patterns (this is how I started off, at 5 I was ahead of my age, but I was hyperactive and difficult to control, by 9 I was failing at everything - though by age 9 I had other problems (home), I kept making myself go to school because it was the 'better' option). He's not being naughty as such, just...difficult, he'll do his work in a quarter of the time it takes the other children but it's sitting through the explanations that he doesn't like/can't be bothered with. I suspect it's only a matter of time before TJ starts getting called to the school about him being disruptive.
Here lies the problem with the English state school system, there has never been any opportunity for a gifted child to jump school years. If you're 6-7 you're in year 2, if you're 9-10 you're yr 5, 12-13...yr8, so on and so forth. If you're advanced, like Luke you can't move up and if you're struggling you won't be moved down (if you have recognisable learning difficulties you may well find you can get a statement that will give you assistance and if it's really severe you could head to a 'special' school, though most of those have shut I think, but they won't put you in the learning groups that suit you best).
When I was in secondary school our year was divided into classes and then some classes would be combined and divided into 'sets' depending on the level of ability. So, you'd have 4 classes of children aged 11-12 (yr7), we'll call them classes a, b, c & d (in bigger schools you may even have an a2, b2..etc) some classes like history & geography would just consist of your class, then subjects like English & Maths you would have class a & b together, then divide into three sets (Top, middle, bottom). This has the potential of working well, if the Top get accelerated learning to keep them challenged and interested and Bottom are given catch up classes to help them achieve the level they should be at. This, however, has never been my experience, usually what happens is that Top get the best teachers, they're taught the stuff they should be learning at that age (in some good schools they may well get accelerated/extra stuff though), Bottom on the other hand will get the teachers who really don't care or even actively dislike teaching (think Snape from Harry Potter), these teachers have already decided that anyone in Bottom is stupid and can therefore never be taught or learn to catch up; they're effectively 'written off' - this was me. So, our educational institutions perpetuate that divide, the academically good get boosted, the mediocre remain mediocre (or maybe even get shat on a little until they become rubbish) and those that struggle stop struggling and accept that they'll always be thick when it comes to these things.
The last IQ test came out in the 140s, technically I'm not stupid, I have common sense and good logic, I intuit pretty well and can think creatively (yes, mr yr9 teacher whose school report said I had no imagination, I write stories for fun and they're pretty good, or so people tell me) and outside-the-box. And yet, I failed school in quite spectacular ways. I've finally come to terms with the fact that this isn't because I'm thick (although there are many times I'm still made to feel this way), not because my teachers failed me or even the schools, but because the way that the education system itself is set up in England failed me (and many like me) and not just educationally but that's another ramble. This isn't what I want to see happen to Luke. He has the potential to go far, to go from being a brilliant child to an even more brilliant adult.
There's a fine line between encouraging a child to learn, to do well, and putting too much pressure and stress on their young shoulders. While we want to do the former, we really would hate to go too far and end up with the latter. And yet, doing nothing would probably be worse than either of these two.
It's funny, this ramble started because I wanted to discuss something about myself but it's ended up being mostly about Luke and the English state school system. So, I'll get back to what prompted this long-arsed post lol. After discovering that Luke will probably be smarter than me by the age of 8 and talking to someone I know vaguely well who works in a coffee shop I like to visit about the Open University(OU) course he's taking, I've started to feel a renewed interest in learning for myself. Before I started this post, I'd spent half an hours clicking around the OU website and found myself contemplating the idea of studying, not for a degree but just because the courses looked interesting and then it occurred to me...there is nothing stopping me from studying for a degree, in fact, if I did all the little courses that interested me and did well in them, they would eventually culminate in a shiny bachelors degree (though it would probably be the most bizarrely made up degree ever conceived lol). The thing is, you see, while I want to be able to help Luke become the best he can be, I'll be proud of him no matter what...we all will, what I want more than anything is for him to be able to be proud of me.
So, I'm not sure what I might do, I certainly found a lot of interesting things on the OU site and for the first time in almost 20 years learning actually sounds like it would be fun. But, there's that little niggle holding me back, the fear of failure or worse... being forced to quit because of the ms or whatever. It's not massively expensive but I wouldn't want to waste good money like that and it would be embarrassing to 'fail' again.
Back to Luke. It's highly possible that we're going to be looking at private schooling for him, not some big posh boarding school or something, but I'm sure there must be somewhere that he could get the right mix for what he needs. It won't come cheap and would take us some juggling to be able to achieve it, but it's not impossible. If not, then maybe we'll just end up having to pay tutors for him or something. Learning should be fun, at the moment it is for him and he enjoys it, it would be an absolute shame if that was ruined for him. I know a great independent day school where my bro Jase lives but that's way too far away and I'm not sure we'd all want to move.
Anyway, I think I'm all rambled out.
Nate
When we moved here for our fresh start, I went to a local FE college and attempted to take some GCSE's (the exams we normally take from 14-16, the exams themselves being sat at 16). I struggled with maths, but Jack was always massively enthusiastic about it (he's a veritable maths genius when compared to me) and my Maths teacher, who was hot, was very helpful and dedicated to trying to help me 'get it'. English was incredibly hit and miss, no one had ever taught me the 'rules' of English language, so my essays were rubbish and I stopped trying. I enjoyed art, but as the ms started I found myself becoming frustratingly less able to do it and it was not the kind of art that I was used to so it was already a challenge.
The only thing that I was really any good at was Biology. We had an awesome teacher who decided that she would teach us what was interesting and correct, not the dumbed down crap they wanted her to teach for the national curriculum. She taught us degree level stuff on cell & molecular biology, genetics, physiology and even a little microbiology, I loved it and I did really well averaging mostly As on my coursework. The mock test she gave us I managed a B. That was when the ms started to creep in, when I started to struggle with my memory and slur my words, when tiredness & insomnia started to kick my ass and I would stumble like a drunk while walking down a straight corridor. I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis things rapidly unravelled from there. I tried to keep going with the biology and ditched the other subjects as they were far too stressful (they had just made me worse), but my marks began slipping and just making it to class was a nightmare. I gave up rather than be faced with failing.
Over the last few years, my interest in writing has led me to teach myself bits and pieces about grammar and the like. I've come a long way since I first started writing fanfic. Funnily enough though, there are days when I feel like I'm fighting harder to remember the 'rules' and even am fairly sure I'm fucking them up massively. I'm fairly sure that the quality of my writing fluctuates greatly on any given day depending on what's happening with my ms (and pain meds), it can be amusing and embarrassing to recognise that I've mangled this rule or that, or realise that I can't remember if that should be a comma, semi-colon or full-stop. I start doubting every single punctuation mark I use (except for when I use a question mark lol).
You're probably wondering what prompted this ramble (if you've actually still reading lol). Well, Luke is gearing up to his yr2 SATs. He's an incredibly smart kid and his last school report he was exceeding expectations in all his subjects. He's always asked for help with questions he doesn't understand and we've been great at helping him work through the problem without giving him the answers. Trouble is, he's started asking questions that I don't know the answer to and ok, they're things that he doesn't really need to know yet, but if he's to continue to be challenged and kept progressing then I see know reason for him not to be given the help.
He enjoys learning, likes to read and be challenged. I bought him some workbooks to help keep him interested, he found his age appropriate ones boring and easy. over the Easter holidays he's blasted his way through the ones for ages 7-8 and 7-9 in both maths and English. He's now on the 9-10 year old books. I'm worried that it won't be long before I can be of no help at all to him and the thought is beyond embarrassing. He asked a question about fractions using a word I'd never even heard before, I had to look it up. We're all concerned that he's too advanced for the class he's in at school, he's starting to find it boring and I recognise the familiar patterns (this is how I started off, at 5 I was ahead of my age, but I was hyperactive and difficult to control, by 9 I was failing at everything - though by age 9 I had other problems (home), I kept making myself go to school because it was the 'better' option). He's not being naughty as such, just...difficult, he'll do his work in a quarter of the time it takes the other children but it's sitting through the explanations that he doesn't like/can't be bothered with. I suspect it's only a matter of time before TJ starts getting called to the school about him being disruptive.
Here lies the problem with the English state school system, there has never been any opportunity for a gifted child to jump school years. If you're 6-7 you're in year 2, if you're 9-10 you're yr 5, 12-13...yr8, so on and so forth. If you're advanced, like Luke you can't move up and if you're struggling you won't be moved down (if you have recognisable learning difficulties you may well find you can get a statement that will give you assistance and if it's really severe you could head to a 'special' school, though most of those have shut I think, but they won't put you in the learning groups that suit you best).
When I was in secondary school our year was divided into classes and then some classes would be combined and divided into 'sets' depending on the level of ability. So, you'd have 4 classes of children aged 11-12 (yr7), we'll call them classes a, b, c & d (in bigger schools you may even have an a2, b2..etc) some classes like history & geography would just consist of your class, then subjects like English & Maths you would have class a & b together, then divide into three sets (Top, middle, bottom). This has the potential of working well, if the Top get accelerated learning to keep them challenged and interested and Bottom are given catch up classes to help them achieve the level they should be at. This, however, has never been my experience, usually what happens is that Top get the best teachers, they're taught the stuff they should be learning at that age (in some good schools they may well get accelerated/extra stuff though), Bottom on the other hand will get the teachers who really don't care or even actively dislike teaching (think Snape from Harry Potter), these teachers have already decided that anyone in Bottom is stupid and can therefore never be taught or learn to catch up; they're effectively 'written off' - this was me. So, our educational institutions perpetuate that divide, the academically good get boosted, the mediocre remain mediocre (or maybe even get shat on a little until they become rubbish) and those that struggle stop struggling and accept that they'll always be thick when it comes to these things.
The last IQ test came out in the 140s, technically I'm not stupid, I have common sense and good logic, I intuit pretty well and can think creatively (yes, mr yr9 teacher whose school report said I had no imagination, I write stories for fun and they're pretty good, or so people tell me) and outside-the-box. And yet, I failed school in quite spectacular ways. I've finally come to terms with the fact that this isn't because I'm thick (although there are many times I'm still made to feel this way), not because my teachers failed me or even the schools, but because the way that the education system itself is set up in England failed me (and many like me) and not just educationally but that's another ramble. This isn't what I want to see happen to Luke. He has the potential to go far, to go from being a brilliant child to an even more brilliant adult.
There's a fine line between encouraging a child to learn, to do well, and putting too much pressure and stress on their young shoulders. While we want to do the former, we really would hate to go too far and end up with the latter. And yet, doing nothing would probably be worse than either of these two.
It's funny, this ramble started because I wanted to discuss something about myself but it's ended up being mostly about Luke and the English state school system. So, I'll get back to what prompted this long-arsed post lol. After discovering that Luke will probably be smarter than me by the age of 8 and talking to someone I know vaguely well who works in a coffee shop I like to visit about the Open University(OU) course he's taking, I've started to feel a renewed interest in learning for myself. Before I started this post, I'd spent half an hours clicking around the OU website and found myself contemplating the idea of studying, not for a degree but just because the courses looked interesting and then it occurred to me...there is nothing stopping me from studying for a degree, in fact, if I did all the little courses that interested me and did well in them, they would eventually culminate in a shiny bachelors degree (though it would probably be the most bizarrely made up degree ever conceived lol). The thing is, you see, while I want to be able to help Luke become the best he can be, I'll be proud of him no matter what...we all will, what I want more than anything is for him to be able to be proud of me.
So, I'm not sure what I might do, I certainly found a lot of interesting things on the OU site and for the first time in almost 20 years learning actually sounds like it would be fun. But, there's that little niggle holding me back, the fear of failure or worse... being forced to quit because of the ms or whatever. It's not massively expensive but I wouldn't want to waste good money like that and it would be embarrassing to 'fail' again.
Back to Luke. It's highly possible that we're going to be looking at private schooling for him, not some big posh boarding school or something, but I'm sure there must be somewhere that he could get the right mix for what he needs. It won't come cheap and would take us some juggling to be able to achieve it, but it's not impossible. If not, then maybe we'll just end up having to pay tutors for him or something. Learning should be fun, at the moment it is for him and he enjoys it, it would be an absolute shame if that was ruined for him. I know a great independent day school where my bro Jase lives but that's way too far away and I'm not sure we'd all want to move.
Anyway, I think I'm all rambled out.
Nate