Students

I have been extremely puzzled for some time that our society seems to be eagerly pursuing mutually inconsistent goals, almost as if we are unaware that in so doing, we are trying to go in opposite directions at the same time! Let me give you some… Read more ›

There is a myth out there, a false idea called the “real world”. “It’s not like that in the real world.” “When you get out there in the real world, you’ll see.” The idea fed to children and students is that they must do unpleasant things to prepare… Read more ›

Children Are Like Locs by Anika Prather The Living Water School, Alexandria, VA This has been the year for me personally, as a mom and as a school founder, to fully mentally and emotionally grasp that kids do not need our help to learn. It took… Read more ›

We often hear people talk about Sudbury schools as "unschooling schools". Besides the fact that the actual phrase, to me, does not even make sense, I think the people who use it overlook a lot of dissimilarities that are important keystones as to… Read more ›

I realized that one of the kids in school who had been here for many years was about to turn eleven. (How dare she get so old?) I said, “Oh, I wish you were still 7½ .” What I meant, of course, was that the years go by too fast, and we remember… Read more ›

I confess that I wasn't thinking about happiness in 1968, when my husband and I decided to send our children to the almost-open Sudbury Valley School. We had unfortunately noticed that public school seemed to cause our little son to feel something… Read more ›

How can every person be above average? It sounds impossible, but it is a given in the community at Sudbury Valley. Living life with a measuring stick, watching to be certain that you are doing OK by others’ standards, and getting a thumbs up that… Read more ›

Our son recently spent two weeks visiting his grandmother in Paris by himself. It was a wonderful adventure that allowed him to explore his independence and experience the world in a new way. He had an amazing time and came back with a lot of great… Read more ›

It was Valentine’s Day. There had been something afoot for quite a few days, and there were lots of valentines – simple but perfect (Cori and her friends at work) – made for people to write inside. Pink, white, lavender and red papers were… Read more ›

[reprinted from The School Bull, Informal News about The Clearwater School] Feel in it Even swim in it And music noits Fill my bain This is the poem my son wrote to accompany a three-foot tall, three-dimensional art project he created while… Read more ›

It started with the 12-year-old girl down the street who told my daughter she would never get into college. I am sure many of our friends, who were devoting untold hours to ensure that their children excelled in public school, wanted to say the… Read more ›

What do SVS students have in common? What are the distinguishing features of this vibrant collection of people whose energy strikes you the moment you encounter them? For a long time I have been trying to articulate the answers to these questions.… Read more ›

All through this past winter kids at school spent time outdoors when they could (usually), playing basketball, taking walks, climbing on the rocks, or using the swings and the slide. After the pond froze and was safe to walk on, many of them were… Read more ›

This is a tough question. SVS lacks the more traditional ways of bench marking a child’s progress through school. There are no parent-teacher conferences, no grades, no MCAS scores, no curriculum, no classes and no grade point averages. There is… Read more ›

Emma is just one of those “little girls”. They don’t look that individualized; they look like the little girls one used to see in picture books, the ones that behaved either perfectly or horribly, but the story came out all right in the end. But… Read more ›