Lotto, a scientist, and his 12-year-old co-presenter, O’Toole (with whom he was published in a scientific journal), pushed this idea of uncertainty, equating it with the concept of play. Uncertainty is play, a time and space for experimentation, discovering something for its own sake.
Play, in this model, is its own reward. When you add rules to play, Lotto went on to say, you have a game. And a game, from the perspective of science, is simply an experiment. The foundation of scientific discovery.
In many ways, Bennett Day School’s evolution is comparable. A single person took a single question and built a team who then, through inquiry and play, discovered the layers beneath that single uncertainty.
We have asked many questions: What schools are available? What approaches to education lead to the highest levels of learning, understanding, innovation and leadership? Are schools thinking about innovation and leadership? Should they be? What if a school could be built around these questions? What if a school could be built around the idea that children’s questions were the essential questions?
By asking these questions we paved paths for discovery. We began finding answers, uncovering and testing various ideas and possibilities. We began building a new model for teaching and learning.
We are, right now, working to answer these questions and constantly uncovering new and complex ideas that push us to create a truly unique approach to school life. We are building off of the powerful and effective history of true progressive education, and we are seeking out effective modern trends and ideas.
At Bennett Day School, we’re not afraid to embrace new ideas any more than we’re afraid to embrace those ideas and approaches that have a long history of effectiveness. What we fear, more than anything, is complacency.
As we build our school from the ground up, both literally and figuratively, we are committed to challenging ourselves as educators, as learners, and as members of a local and global community. We strive to ask and answer questions and welcome you to join us in this profound intellectual, social, and academic play.
The Dali Lama recently said, “We have to think and see how we can fundamentally change our education system so that we can train people to develop warm-heartedness early on in order to create a healthier society. … We need to encourage an understanding that inner peace comes from relying on human values like, love, compassion, tolerance and honesty, and that peace in the world relies on individuals finding inner peace.”
Do we want to train children? No, not exactly, and I don’t think that’s the implication in what the Dali Lama said. But I think what we’re doing at Bennett Day School is in many ways an answer to his appeal for more compassionate and meaningful work in school; we are creating a school environment that acknowledges and honors the child’s voice, that recognizes the child as an individual and a member of a classroom, school, and home community.
We are building a school that nurtures curiosity and discovery, but also a powerful sense of social connection and drive to participate in community life, locally and globally.