In the second book,
ALWAYS MORE JOY, he shows the way to therapy and healing. Schools can be places where children feel comfortable and learn with joy and curiosity. There are teachers who expect nothing from their pupils, they simply trust them to do everything. In the living school, children are touched rather than perfected so that they can understand their world a little better every day. IMMER MEHR FREUDE shows where living schools already exist. Every child has a right to attend them. Now - and not in ten or twenty years' time.
Reading samples
The deadly school is above all an "as if" school.
It takes place in buildings and with curricula that "pretend" children have no body outside of gym class. Then there are school politicians who "pretend" that school reforms imposed from above ever reach the classrooms. There are school inspectors who "act as if" they actually want to solve proven shortcomings, but who, as dear "Hello, everything's fine?" uncles who don't want to mess with anyone; union members who "act as if" they care about the best teachers and who actually prevent head teachers from holding staff appraisals with all their teachers; head teachers who put up with this "as if" it could improve the climate at their school; parents who "act as if" they don't know what their children are capable of. And they all "act as if" they care about the well-being of each individual child. In the classroom, "Easter bunny pedagogy" is a hallmark of the deadly schools: The teacher hides the knowledge from his pupils and they have to search for it "as if" it were Easter eggs. Others have been handing out the same loveless worksheets for years, "as if" their mindless completion could unleash curiosity. It should therefore come as no surprise that students then "pretend" to pay attention and simulate that they have understood something during exams.
The deadly school wants to evade instead of meet, ignore instead of confront, pretend instead of enlighten, it is cold and not warm, it is simply mendacious and this prevents everything.
If we know so well how good schools work, why don't we create them for all children?
We know what a school that is geared towards the individual needs of pupils should look like. Good schools are based on certain principles:
- Pupils are systematically assessed in terms of their strengths and weaknesses and continue to develop. The definition of talent encompasses cognitive, athletic, artistic, emotional and social talents on an equal footing.
- There is a clear code of conduct for pupils and teachers, which is implemented consistently. There are trained specialists for difficult cases.
- The school's time structure and rooms are geared towards the needs of the pupils. Break bells and rigid timetables have been abolished.
- Teachers do not prepare "their" lessons alone, but work in teams to develop the learning experiences for their pupils. Teachers spend the whole day at school and manage their time independently. They have modern workstations and rooms for their team meetings.
- An excellent director who can lead and inspire people. This director has a significant influence on the selection of his teachers and can also part with the completely unsuitable ones.
- The lessons go beyond traditional subjects such as mathematics, languages and science and include learning in projects, art, sport and social experiences.
- Parents are integrated into the school network right from the start, no matter how difficult this may be for some.
- And the most important thing: everyone - the principal, the pupils, the teachers and the parents - see themselves as learners. Learners who are allowed to make mistakes without having to fear sanctions; learners who learn to overcome resistance within themselves and from others; learners who do not count failures and failed attempts, but successes and progress.
If we know so well how good schools work, why don't we create them for all children?
The answer I came up with after countless discussions with those responsible is banal and tragic: they don't want to see the obvious because they are afraid of resistance to the new. They cling to the old against their better judgment. They are not guided by the reformers, but by the obstructionists. In business, there is the saying "It's not the big who eat the small, but the fast who eat the slow". In school, the slow ones rule over the fast ones. And since the slow ones don't move at all at school, standing still becomes the dominant form of movement.
