One of the reasons why I don’t want my children to attend a “No Excuse” charter school is because of the way they treat children. If a parent were to treat a child the way some of the “No Excuses” charters treat children the state would be called and the child taken away. But in charter schools we have entered a weird legal zone where it doesn’t matter what they do to kids as long as they do well on standardized tests.
Here are some of the documented practices of “No Excuse” charter schools:
Students punished for asking to use the bathroom
Students punished for not keeping their feet on the ground at all times while sitting
Students isolated and made to stand for hours as punishment
Students Must Keep Hands Clasped
Students’ eyes must follow the teacher at all times (eye tracking)
The eye tracking I find particularly offensive because there is a psychological element to it where the child is never allowed to collect their thoughts, let their mind wonder, think about what is happening to them. You force dogs to make eye contact when you train them. This is not the way to teach children. A child should be allowed to look away from a teacher without a demerit because of the inherent value and dignity of the child.
I’ve also been told that the eye tracking has been migrating over to public schools. I’m going to be keeping an eye on that because we should not be importing their worst practices.
I would’ve never made it through school with the eye tracking thing. I was a doodler. Despite this, I managed to succeed in school.
Recent studies show that – suprise! – doodling is actually beneficial for learning.
It’s even been written about in the Wall Street Journal, a newspaper which is read by and publishes the writings of lots of serious ed reformers, so they should already know that eye tracking is a farce.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-power-of-the-doodle-improve-your-focus-and-memory-1406675744
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