Is it working?

Helen Hegener's Publisher's Note in the current issue of Home Education Magazine really hit home. The question she pondered was "What should be the end result of homeschooling? What great goal, what worthy purpose do we seek in educating our children?"

My answer is always along the lines of wanting Evie to be a competent citizen of the world, with all the skills that entails; to be confident, follow her inner moral compass and able to stand up for herself; and for her to have the skills to find the knowledge she doesn't already know.

Hegener's article quotes Ron Miller from Free Schools, Free People: Education and Democracy After the 1960s, quoting John Holt:

"Perhaps my deepest interest could be described as "How can we as adults work to create more decent, humane, conserving, peaceful, just etc., community, nation, world, and how can we make it possible for children to join us in this work?"

Hegener sums up "what to do" well,

"It seems to me the best approach to finding these answers is simply to model the changes we seek, go about doing those things which will, in our estimation, make the world a better place. As we 'walk our talk,' so to speak, we create a reality which speaks louder than words, and we create a pattern, an example for our children to follow if they choose."

In the words of Mahatma Gandhi, "BE the change you wish to see in the world." And in the words of author Linda Dobson, "An education that starts with self-determination will finish with self-determination."

I am rarely at a loss for words, but in this case, I really couldn't have said it better myself. Now go LIVE!