Paul K. Dayton

"I went to a one room school with 8 grades and a teacher with a low tolerance to children who did not keep up, and I learned nothing until I was about 10 when I finally learned to read. I now know I am dyslexic, but most of my life I blamed my struggles on the bad education I got in that primary school. When my children ran into the traditional school system, my wife rebelled and forced the school to offer an alternative class, but then sent my kids to a really alternative school way out in the country in which the kids (1st and 2nd grades) ran free with no obvious traditional teaching. Experienced with my own early failings and life long learning struggles, I was bitterly opposed, a position I now realize was utterly wrong. All kids want to learn, and that alternative teacher was a real genius because she sensed when each kid was ready and taught them at their own pace. When they went back into the traditional system, they were very successful and so far as I know all of them graduated from college and most have considerable graduate education and are very happy in their lives. This contrasts with the kids in the traditional schools where the slow learners (usually little boys) are left behind, and by the time they are in middle school, have given up and many (maybe most?) of the ones I know did not go to college and do not seem very happy with their lives. My kids are so damned lucky that my wife had the wisdom to give them an early education outdoors where they were encouraged to learn at their own pace."

by Gage H. Dayton and Anaika E. Dayton

Observations in nature: the keystone to understanding natural systems

Marine Ecology: 32 (2011). 266–267. 2011.