Several years ago I was given the name the Miracle Worker…of Parenting and Education. This was because I have learned to harness the Power of Respect and to put it to work in everything I do, in every action I take, in every choice I make.
I use it to help bring out the best in every child or teen I have worked with, interacted with or lived with. Now I am dedicated to helping as many people as are interested to be able to work ‘miracles. of their own. (for more see first comment)
kvryce
This page didn’t let me leave what I intended…So I’ll add the rest a comment.
Several years ago I was given the name the Miracle Worker…of Parenting and Education. This was because I have learned to harness the Power of Respect and to put it to work in everything I do, in every action I take, in every choice I make.
I use it to help bring out the best in every child or teen I have worked with, interacted with or lived with. Now I am dedicated to helping as many people as are interested to be able to work ‘miracles. of their own.
In 1973 my ex-husband and I started the first version of The Children’s House, a Montessori pre-school. This was the beginning of manifesting a dream that began to form three years previously.
Four years before this, in 1969, I ended up in India, spending about one year traveling with my ex-husband. In order to stay an extended time in India, without renewing your visa every three months, many travelers enrolled in schools.
I met another girl traveler who had studied with the Montessori Training Course. After several discussions, my ex-husband and I decided that we would enroll in the Montessori training. That way we could get a year’s visa.
We had to leave the country to apply. We decided to go to Nepal. We applied to the training course and for a one year visa. Then we waited enjoying living in Katmandu and hiking in the Himalayas. After three months all our paperwork came through.
Then we headed for India. The Montessori course was being given in Hyderabad in South India. Although the course had already started, the first night we attended, we were hooked.
The trainer was Mr. A.M. Joosten, a dynamic, fascinating, captivating lecturer. The information he was sharing and his style of sharing was so compelling that we rarely missed a class, no matter what.
He had been training students in India in the Montessori Method since Dr. Montessori called him from Holland to take over what she had begun in India during WWII.
Because she was Italian, she was under house arrest as an enemy alien. However, she was allowed to continue to train students.
I graduated in the top few students in my class. Although I had already completed my B.A. in Anthropology, and enjoyed my studies of culture, I did not know what kind of work to do. Montessori training gave my something I enjoyed that I could do for a living.
Although I got my B.A. in Anthropology, it was during the Montessori Course that I learned the important function of childhood. Here I learned that the child is the father, or mother, of the man, or woman.
It is the child that creates the adult and is given many special powers to accomplish this task. This is the work of childhood, work worthy of great respect.
We were asked to stay on the next year as assistants to the course. We helped with everything except lecturing. We assisted in the practical classes, graded papers, tests, and sat as examiners for the final examination. On our own we formed study groups with the interested students to give them one-on-one attention.
After following the Course to Ahmedabad in northwest India, we decided that it was time to return to the United States to start our own Montessori school. In 1973 we ended up in the mountains of Northern California where the community invited us to start our pre-school. We started in the town of Garberville in the manse of the Presbyterian Church. After two years there, we moved the school to a house in the redwoods.
During this time we decided to incorporate. This process evolved into a non-profit community service organization, of which the Children’s House was a part.
By this time our first child was already two-years-old. She had been a part of Children’s House since she was born. We even hired an assistant to help us care for our daughter, Shanti. The children loved to have her there.
Once the organization, Beginnings’ Incorporated, was formed, a local subdivider donated the land. Children’s House moved into the trailer on the land. A fence was built and we continued.
Soon after this, a friend sent us a notice that the State of California was looking to fund programs such as ours. Unfortunately, the due date of the application was two weeks away. My ex-husband said that there wasn’t enough time to get that together.
I decided that I was going to try. With the help of the current President of the Board of Beginnings who had written grants before, I did it. I sent it in. Our program was funded. That funding continues to this day.
I remained as head teacher in Children’s House for 15 years. During this time we had two more children, a son and then a daughter.
During this time we had a visitor from India. He visited Children’s House. He had formed a large community service organization and wanted to have his schools made into schools like Children’s House. He invited me to do this work.
As I was considering doing this, including several of trips to India, I realized that before I did this, I needed to share what I learned about being respectful to children with the community that helped me learn, practice and begin to master this valuable lesson.
My determination to do this was fueled by a young boy at the elementary branch of Beginnings, which the students had named Skyfish. One day this boy was out on the play structure and was talking with me. He was telling me about things that went on at home. At one point he said, with frustration and despair in his voice, “They treat me like a slave!”
I had had the same awareness of the position of children in relation to adults in much of this world. I knew I had to write this down and how and why to remedy it with respect.
I began writing what turned into Friendly Families and the Power of Respect. This eventually became Parenting for the New Millennium. It is now taking ebook forms. The first is Teens and the Power of Respect. The second is Parenting with the Power of Respect.
This need to tell others of the importance of respect took on a life of its own and took over my life also. I gave workshops and classes, spoke on the radio, wrote for a local magazine and newspaper. I have taught adults, teens and children how to use the Power of Respect. They can see for themselves its benefits. I once received a spontaneous standing ovation from a classroom of elementary children.
Now I have noticed that on the Internet, of all the groups of people, those who receive the least help are the troubled teenagers and their parents. I am offering my help here as my first venture into the Internet.