Monday, December 27, 2004

Changing my mind

As I've made it clear on this blog, we were looking at two schools for my son. I feel that the signs he is currently displaying of having an inquisitive mind, a lack of zitsfleisch and a willingness to let his mind go beyond the normal confines of the standard box that most kids are limited by, lead me to believe that he would be better served in one of the two schools. Of course, while I feel that this school's grade-school approach would be better for him, I also see that the other school has a much better pre-school program. Their program is based on the montessori method - which I will not pretend that I know too much about - kids can pick the stations at which to play in, but are then bound by rules when they get there.

I wondered all weekend if this is a good or a bad thing. In particular, for our son, this is somewhat of a good thing. He still has the freedom to express, experiment and play the way he wants to, yet at the same time, he needs to follow certain guidelines as he does so. I have started to think that this approach is better for him. That at the same time where he has the ability to explore his creativity and self-guide himself, he still needs to find it in the roots of structure.

I guess, I am realizing from my professional world that it is wonderful to be able to think outside of the box, but it needs to be done with the understanding that sometimes whatever thinking we do there needs to be able to get back inside of the box when we are done.

This is tougher than I thought - I don't know which is an easier decision - picking from amongst the lesser of two evils, or deciding between two first-rate schools.



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