The Drive to Grow Up

Here's a seed for Monday's walk-and-talk about one of the school's founding beliefs: That people are born with an instinct, a drive, to understand and master the world around them. Their most important activity is growing up.

There is much agreement that this is true for toddlers, who are intent on learning to walk and talk. Nothing will stop them.

It takes tremendous effort to stop kids from following this instinct to grow up. To stop a kid's drive to grow up, you need to stop them from moving and you need to stop them from talking.

You also need to separate them from older kids who might act as role models. This part is easily done if you have enough authority. Authority isn't enough, though, to stop kids from the instincts to move and talk. To do that, you need to be constantly disciplining them. This is a teacher's main activity, where most of their energy goes, in a mainstream classroom.

It's clear when you see Sudbury-model children that they are driven to grow up. They're exploring their world, they're talking about it, they're observing older kids or using their life-experience to help younger kids. They're creating worlds and fully living in them, and they're doing it with tremendous energy and focus. Wonderful preparation for creating a life as an adult.