Parents are naturally deeply invested in the education of their children, since a child’s education may unlock his or her future. When a child is old enough to start attending school, or when a family moves to a new community or city, the parents in the family will look for age-appropriate schools for their children and consider their options carefully. A nursery school, or a preschool, is a fine choice for a three to five year old child. Meanwhile, progressive schools cover most of a child’s education all the way through their senior year of high school, and progressive schools and private schools may offer some advantages that regular public schools do not. Why might parents consider sending their children to these progressive schools or private high schools?
Sending Your Child to Preschool
Unlike a K-12 education, going to preschool is not mandatory for American children but it may offer some key advantages to any young child who attends them. This option is popular among many parents today, and more of them are sending their young children to preschool today than they did around 1990. The concept of preprimary schools dates all the way back to the 1700s, when parents needed care for their children while those parents were at work or out of the home. Today, the United States is home to many preschools and day care centers, some of them being private ones. By the year 2021, there may be as many as 856,238 different preschools and day care centers in the United States, and as of 2016, an estimated total of 8.76 million children across the United States were enrolled in pre-primary school.
Parents may search for private nursery schools or a private preschool when they search online. This search may include the family’s hometown or ZIP code to find something local, and a list of nearby schools will appear. The parents may disregard schools considered too far away or those who aren’t enrolling new students, and check out the rest. The child may come along too during these visits, and get a feel for the school and its staff. If a child feels comfortable and welcome there, then that school may be a fine candidate for that child’s education. The parents, meanwhile, will check the teachers’ credentials and experience, and find out how much funding that school gets. This may be done for a number of schools until the parents find one whose admission prices, staff expertise, and the child’s own opinion align just right. Going to preschool often helps children learn social skills and gross motor skills, and, put simply, learn how to learn. This may give them a head start during their mandatory education.
Other Schools
Older children may have local schools scouted out for them, and they may come along with their parents and provide articulated input on what they would like in a school. Older students may want particular programs, groups, or features in a middle or high school such as a sports team, a cheerleader squad, a marching band or music program, art programs, or even a debate team. Parents may look for schools online and visit them with their children in person, and this may be done for all sorts of schools. Public schools are the most common, being federally owned, run, and funded. However, parents may choose a different sort of school for their children.
Private schools are privately funded and run, hence the name, and tend to have high quality teachers and counselors on staff. These schools tend to have fewer problems among their students than public schools, and most private high school graduates tend to go on to college. This is a strong option for parents who can afford the tuition of sending their children to these schools.
Progressive schools are another educational model. They do not assign tests or homework in the traditional sense, nor do they give letter grades. Instead, they offer a rigorous but free-form curriculum, where students can freely learn and create projects as they like. Teachers report to parents on the students’ progress not with report cards, but with detailed and individualized descriptions and summaries of each student’s progress. Different progressive schools may value different academic areas more than others.