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Rigorous

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Where is there a law written that schools can not be both rigorous and nurturing? Why does the answer have to be either or and not both and? Having been in education for over twenty-five years, I know that schools can be both rigorous and nurturing, just as parents can be both strict and nurturing.

I loved my students both as a teacher and as an administrator, but I also held them to a very strict standard both as a teacher and as an administrator. It is the responsibility of all educators everywhere to make sure that students are challenged and that they are loved, respected, and nurtured. Our heavenly Father holds us to a strict standard, but He also loves us and nurtures us with Himself through His written Word and inner leading. We should, in turn, do the same for our students.

Rigorous does not mean cruel. It means challenging. Nurturing does not mean loose or having low expectations. It means the careful, loving upbringing of a child. There is no reason that the two can no co-inhere; the problem is not the children; it is the adults, mostly the parents. Those who do not want the little ones or older ones bothered with homework or deep-thinking projects and/or deep reading. Many parents want the students to have high grades with little or no effort. That desire is not nurturing; it is causing weak students who feel that the world owes them something or everything that their hearts desire. They don't understand the concept that working for something makes it much more valuable because they, for the most part, have never had to work for anything.

I had much rather have a classroom full of students who may not be have super high intellect but who truly have a desire to learn than a room full of very bright students who are lazy and want grades to be given to them. Rigorous or nurturing, NO! Rigorous AND nurturing!

Learn more about this author, Brooke Shea.
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