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Carol Perkins: The Perfect School

Previous Column: Keep the Party Going

By Carol Perkins

If I were younger, I would open a school unlike any other in the area.

Since I know nothing about teaching youngsters, my school would begin with seventh graders. Each year these students would have an intense course in practical living skills. That would be Class One.

Class Two would be a concentrated course in grammar and public speaking. Speaking correctly and confidently is valuable to their future growth.

The Third Class would be practical math: basic skills like adding, dividing, multiplying, and subtracting without a calculator, plus how to read a ruler, convert fractions, calculate percentages, and interest rates.


Class Four would be for creative inspiration: art, music, drama, languages, and dance. (I would love this class.)

Class Five would involve fine arts such as poetry, literature, and creative writing.

Science would be Class Six: a taste of biology, botany, zoology, chemistry, physics, astronomy, and other natural and physical sciences.

The last class of the day would be History from World History to American History. Civics and state history would be a must. Teaching would begin and end with the bell. No worksheets and no homework. In six years, students would own these subjects.

My school would also have no popularity contests. (No, this isn't sour grapes; I had my day.) Kids wouldn't nominate kids. All honors would be based on merit. No "Mr. and Miss" this or that. No best this or that. No "100%" award. No crowns. Yearbooks would not have pages of the "most popular" because in my school there would be no popularity except that which is earned. (I have always felt bad for kids who never had a chance to be voted anything!) Best of all, in my school, the bullies would not last long. They are easy to spot, but not easy to stop.

If I could find a place, bring back the excellent retired teachers I know, and steal the outstanding ones from other schools, I think parents would enroll their children as fast as they could get to the door. Who wouldn't want to go to this school? Hold on a minute. I think my mother taught in one very similar. It was called a "One Room School." The concept of my school is much the same. If we got back to a version of this type of school, America might not be ranked 10th in the world. Does anyone want to invest?


You can contact Carol at carolperkins06@gmail.com.


This story was posted on 2023-09-20 08:40:36
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