The School System:
The Incarceration of Children
By Razi Berry
CAFOs, also known as Concentrated
Animal Feeding Operations, are confined feedlots in which animals raised for food
products are kept in confined prison-like
conditions absent of natural vegetation. Here, animals are kept outside of
their natural habitat and fed feed they would not eat in nature. The filthy
conditions and poor nutrition make for sick animals, so the CAFOs depend heavily
on antibiotics which are given prophylactically. Beef and dairy cattle,
pigs, turkeys, and chickens are among the animals in the more than 257,000 AFOS
in the United States.
Rather
than eat native foods such as grasses, vegetation and insects, they are “fed”
mostly genetically modified crops
such as soy and corn, or cereal based feed made from these crops. Instead of
eliminating waste naturally on the land, which acts as fertilizer, the waste is
stored in anaerobic “lagoons”. These cesspools of waste emit carbon dioxide,
methane and ammonia into the air and leach antibiotics, endocrine disruptors,
heavy metals and bacteria into the land.
Without
going much further in to the devastating science of why CAFOs are
bad for human and animal health, and our environment, it is safe to say
that animals do best in
their natural habitat, living, reproducing, eating and eliminating as nature
intended, and that we as omnivores do best when eating food raised in its wild or
natural habitat.
There
are many ways in which we go against nature and are worse off for it. Our food
“system” is one big glow-in-the-dark example of this. We have so tampered with
the food cycle that the very natural system to digest our food is affected.
Allergies, leaky gut, sibo, Crohns, and IBS are just a few examples of
illnesses related to the way we produce our food. CAFOS,
antibiotics, chemical
fertilizers and pesticides cause disease because we have removed the
nutrients in our food AND lessened our ability to absorb the nutrients that are
left.
I
was pondering this and the many other departures from nature we have set upon
in the name of science, technology and profit that I have sadly learned about
in my last 11 years as a publisher in the natural health space. As a parent, I
am concerned for our children, and find a loose, but eerie parallel to the way
we not only feed our children, but the way we educate them. We have taken
animals out of their natural environment; and
we may be doing the same to our children.
Declined Creativity
Children
are sicker, more anxious and depressed than ever before. Sadly, in a time of
life often referred to as the wonder years, children are
less creative and imaginative. In the
Creativity Research Journal, Kyung Hee Kim published an article
discussing the decline in creativity in children over time. Kim introduces the
TTCT, Torrance Tests for
Creative Thinking, and explains how scores have steadily decreased
since the 1990s. When predicting creative success, Kim found that the TTCT
scores predict creative achievement better than any other measures. After
comparing yearly TTCT scores starting in 1990, Kim concluded
“… creative thinking is declining over
time among Americans of all ages, especially in kindergarten through third
grade. The decline is steady and persistent, from 1990 to present and… begins
in young children, which is especially concerning as it stunts abilities which
are supposed to mature over a lifetime.”[i]
Because
creativity is declining at such a young age, efforts to increase and promote
creativity should begin at an early age, prior to preschool, and continue
throughout development.
School Starts Too Young
Children
are starting
school at an earlier age for the sake of learning or ‘preparing” for school. According to Baby
Center, most preschools begin accepting children at age 2 and half.[ii] But
childhood is not a preparation, it’s a stage of life in itself, and research
has shown that beginning
formal education earlier is not necessarily better. Raymond Moore, author
of Better
Late Than Early: A New Approach to Your Child’s Education, writes on his
website,
“In addition to our basic research at Stanford and the
University of Colorado Medical School, we analyzed over 8000 studies of
children’s senses, brain, cognition, socialization, etc., and are certain that
no replicable evidence exists for rushing children into formal study at home or
school before 8 or 10.”[iii]
On
average, children are beginning kindergarten at age 5 and continue schooling
until college. This continues even though it is not necessarily better for a
child’s creativity or intelligence. In fact, children in Finland don’t
start school until age 7 and they beat the United States in math, reading
and science. In an
article on NPR, Claudio Sanchez writes,
“Despite the late start, the vast
majority [of Finnish students] arrive with solid reading and math skills. By
age 15, Finnish students outperform all but a few countries on international
assessments.”[iv]
We
live in a society where being first apparently makes you a better person, but
when it comes to our children’s education, waiting a little longer will
ultimately keep our children healthier and smarter.
School Starts Too Early
Children
are also starting the school day earlier; thus, they spend less time at home with
family, and they spend less time in unstructured
play or outdoors.
As children begin their school day earlier, they ultimately spend longer days
at school. Although spending more time in the classroom means more time for
learning, multiple disadvantages exist.
Longer
school days result in attention deficit, fatigue, and lower test scores in
students.[v] Fatigue and sleep issues affect many children, and beginning
school at an earlier time disrupts a child’s sleep schedule. Catherine
Darley, naturopathic physician and sleep expert, explains that 24% of
children have sleep issues including bedtime resistance, night waking,
obstructive sleep apnea, and excessive daytime sleepiness.[vi] We’ve observed
that beginning school at an earlier age doesn’t prove to make children smarter,
and beginning
school at an earlier time isn’t proving to make children any healthier
either.
Disrupted Play
Children
are over-scheduled with activities to prepare them for college and the “real
world” but childhood is the real world, and we are letting children miss out on it.
Perhaps the worst way in which is we removed children from their natural
habitat is by institutionalizing them, instead of allowing them to learn naturally.
In the school system, children only average 30 minutes of recess in a 6-7 hour
day. Running, jumping and moving are essential to learning as learning is
multi-sensory. Play is an instinct and by pushing children into the
education system at such an early age, we thwart this instinct. Dr. Peter
Gray, developmental psychologist and author of Free to
Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More
Self-Reliant, and Better Students For Life, explains in his blog that:
“…it is generally a waste of time, and
often harmful, to teach academic skills to children who have not yet developed
the requisite motivational and intellectual foundations. This explains why
researchers repeatedly find that academic training in preschool and
kindergarten results in worse, not better, performance on academic tests in
later grades.”[vii]
Dr.
Gray reaffirms that pushing our children into the school system too early and
upsetting their natural need to play only disrupts healthy minds and
intellectual growth.
Common Core
Common
core takes away the child’s interests and learning style. Instead of allowing
the teacher to tailor curriculum to the children needs and interests, each
child everywhere is learning the exact same thing at the exact same time. First
and foremost, common
core standards create a lack of diversity. Prescribing the same standards
to all states ignores the fact that some students learn different subjects at
different paces and this ultimately thwarts creative and unique development.
Other
cons include an unguaranteed improvement in testing, a pushed government
program (no acceptance, no money), an untailored program to our children’s
needs, and a straddled middle ground for education.[viii] Being that each child
thinks and
learns differently, forcing a strict standardized program on our child’s
educational development will ultimately inhibit our children from reaching
their full potential.
“Education is not the filling of a pail but
the lighting of a fire.”
~ William Butler Yeats
Overcrowded Classrooms
Classrooms
are more crowded than ever before and is as problematic for the
students and the teachers. Teachers in overcrowded classrooms tend to be more
stressed, overwhelmed, and unorganized. Overcrowded classrooms are challenging
for teachers as it spreads them too thin and does not allow children to receive
tailored attention to their needs. Frontier Academy explains that:
“…if children are not given the
attention they need in the classroom, they may fall behind. This can affect not
only standardized testing scores, but also the child’s own enjoyment of school
and learning, setting them up for failure in the future.”[ix]
Overcrowded
classrooms discourage our children from receiving the best education
possible, and pushing them into the
school system too soon only keeps these issues from being resolved.
No
species thrives when taken from its natural environment. It’s time we rethink
the way we educate our children, and the effects that institutionalization
has on the physical, intellectual and emotional well being of our children. For
me, the way I “got off the grid” was the decision to homeschool.
This decision was not without sacrifice, but the rewards have far outweighed
any inconvenience. I am able to tailor their sleep schedules, social
activities, curriculum, meals and extra curricular activities in a way that
meets the individual needs and interests of my children. If homeschooling is
not an option for your family, then feel empowered to get involved and be
the voice our children need advocating for them in the school system. Our
children, and our world, will be better because of it.
Article
sources:
- [i] Kyung Hee Kim, 2011. The Creativity Crisis: The Decrease in Creative Thinking Scores on the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2011.627805
- [ii] http://www.babycenter.com/0_how-to-tell-if-your-child-is-ready-for-preschool_64544.bc
- [iii] Raymond Moore. The Moore Formula. http://www.moorefoundation.com/article/5/moore-formula
- [iv] Claudio Sanchez, 2014. What The U.S. Can Learn From Finland, Where School Starts At Age 7. http://www.npr.org/2014/03/08/287255411/what-the-u-s-can-learn-from-finland-where-school-starts-at-age-7
- [v] Kristine Tucker, 2016. The Disadvantages of Longer School Days. http://education.seattlepi.com/disadvantages-longer-school-days-1489.html
- [vi] NDNR Editor, 2013. DR CIDS—CHILDREN WITH INSOMNIA AND DISORDERED SLEEP. http://ndnr.com/pediatrics/dr-cids-children-with-insomnia-and-disordered-sleep/
- [vii] Dr. Peter Gray, 2015. How Early Academic Training Retards Intellectual Development. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/freedom-learn/201506/how-early-academic-training-retards-intellectual-development
- [viii] Michael Higham, 2013. 5 Arguments Against Common Core Standards. http://ivn.us/2013/06/13/5-arguments-against-common-core-standards-2/
- [ix] 2014. Do Crowded Classrooms Affect Learning? http://frontiersacademy.org/do-crowded-classrooms-affect-learning/
About
the author:
Razi
Berry became an advocate of natural medicine after it helped her
heal from debilitating chronic disease and infertility when conventional medicine
did not. For more than a decade she has been founder/publisher of the
award-winning journal for doctors, Naturopathic Doctor News & Review.
Razi
enjoys organic cooking, gardening and attempting to grow tropical fruit trees
in the Arizona desert heat where she homeschools her two daughters. You can
find her on the NaturalPath to healthy living, loving and
learning, naturally!
From Wake Up World
@ http://wakeup-world.com/2016/07/14/the-school-system-the-incarceration-of-children/
For more information about education see http://nexusilluminati.blogspot.com/search/label/education
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