So What Ever Happened to Grammar?

Posted on May 30th, 2002 in Otherways Magazine

A reflection by Fred McArdle, West Brunswick, Victoria

I think it is safe to say that grammar, meaning the formal and technical analysis of how English sentences work, has disappeared from most educational environments. Yet we can still distinguish between one who speaks “well” [or grammatically] and one who does not. So what is this grammar which we can sense, if not describe?

There are lots of definitions of grammar, but the one I like is more or less this: if an educated English speaker/writer can understand the speech or writing of another such person without any hiccups, then it is probably expressed quite “grammatically”. In other words, the two people follow the same structural rules. For example, if I answer your question, “Who’s there?”, by saying, “It is me” [or, much more likely, "It's me"], this is perfectly correct grammatically, despite the wish of some people to dispute this.

Spaceship School

Posted on May 30th, 2002 in Otherways Magazine, Socialisation

By John Holt.
From: Growing Without Schooling #34

“Earlier this year I visited for a few days some old friends who are not home schoolers and whose children have always gone to school. Spending some time with their schooled kids made me realize that the combination of school plus “peer group” (an odd way to describe a group of people who have nothing in common with you except being the same age) can do children a kind of harm that I had not previously thought of.

My objection to the social life of almost all schools, as GWS readers know, is that it is for the most part mean-spirited, competitive, ruthless, snobbish, conformist, consumerist (you are judged by what you can buy, or your parents buy for you), fickle, heartless, and often cruel. Most children come out of school with far less self-esteem, less sense of their own identity, dignity, and worth, than they had when they went in. I know this was true of me. Most children in school feel like losers and outsiders, and most will do almost anything that will, if only for a short time, give them the feeling of being insiders, truly “One Of The Gang.” But I had generally felt and said that there might be a few children who were so good at all the things that schools and “peer groups” considered important, so completely winners at the school game, that socially, at least, the school experience might be more positive than negative for them.

Riding the Rainbow

Posted on May 7th, 2002 in Autism Spectrum Disorder, Getting Started, Otherways Magazine

By Cleve Elaine Richey

Long before my decision to pull my seven-year-old son, Alex, from public school, I was his teacher. But teaching him meant far more than “enrichment.” It meant reaching him. It meant his survival.

As a baby, he’d never wanted to be held, never cooed or babbled. Unlike his sister, who took such pleasure when we played with her, Alex didn’t seem to care what he did, where he was, or who was with him.

I’d seen these early warning signs and done my research. Still, I drifted into shock as the director of the prestigious diagnostic center gave us our two-year-old son’s verdict: autism. He drew a normal curve on his legal pad, then a second one underneath, explaining that, as an adult, Alex would function as a five year old. He would be a child forever.