Democracy for All Participants
Oak and Orca School has created a learning environment that we feel allows children to both feel a part of important decisions about their school and teaches them skills of participatory democracy. Students are involved in age-appropriate decisions both in the classroom and for the school as a whole.
In the classroom, the learning environment is child centred, with a high emphasis on projects and self-directed learning. Children are free to speak their minds, are are taught techniques for negotiating and resolving conflicts. Children are made owners of their classroom space by being involved in most aspects of arranging and organizing the rooms and setting guidelines for the safe and effective use of space. The walls may look cluttered and disorganized to an outsider, however, to the children, it is their space to do with as they like.
For the school as a whole, decision making meetings are held regularly. Students and teachers bring problems, concerns and ideas to the agenda, and each topic is covered in turn. These meetings are run by consensus, a decision making process whereby each participant has an equal part in each decision. The decision is not made until everyone in the group is happy with the proposal, or, at least, can live with it. The needs of every individual must be accommodated by the group or the decision will not go ahead. (Everybody's wants will NOT necessarily be accommodated.)
Children in the school are taught the skills of participatory democracy. These range from simply getting along in a diverse group to specific techniques for communication of their ideas and thoughts. All students learn a consensus decision making model, and those who choose it may learn skills for meeting facilitation and peer mediation.
In summary, Oak and Orca has developed a participatory democracy by:
- creating a child centred learning environment
- allowing for self-directed learning
- encouraging age-appropriate decision making in the classroom
- creating opportunities for students to make important choices about their education
- providing training in negotiation, mediation and consensus decision making
- creating a process whereby students and teachers together make decisions about the school
"The secret in education lies in respecting the student." Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Resisting conformity and developing some small eccentricities are among the steps to independence and self-confidence." A. L. McGinnis
LINKS:
Educating for Democracy
Consensus Decision Making
More on Consensus decision making.