Peace, Love, and The Woodland School Cooperative

For several years we have been involved with The Woodland School Homeschool Co-op. I cannot say enough good things about the wonder of bringing people together to learn in community. It is messy, it is difficult, it is tiring, and it is a many splendored thing.

My husband and I used to want to move to a communal living farm and hug trees and other people on a daily basis. A homeschool co-op can be kind of like this, minus the farm animals (though in some places, you could keep this aspect as well!)

I know this because we have experimented with communal living in several different ways over our 20 years together and I have experimented with homeschool co-ops for the past 13 years. I have a lot of experience with this "community" thing.

First of all, people are beautiful and complicated.  We all need each other to make good things happen here on earth. Recognizing and appreciating our individual geniuses can be a joyful discovery in a co-op. People are also messy and have a lot of baggage. All people, regardless of creed, nationality, political leanings, religious convictions or whatever have their "stuff", myself included. Not to mention personality types, levels of commitment to the group, ideas about education, ideas about parenting, ideas about everything. Throw in hormonal changes in children, teenagers, and the mom's and you pretty much have a perfect storm. I remember a song that I learned at Koinonia Farm, a communal farm we spent some time at in Georgia. It goes like this:

"Turn the other cheek and surprise the one that hits you, turn, turn, 

Turn the other cheek and surprise the one that hits you, turn, turn, turn.  

First the log and then the speck, first the log, and then the speck." 

This pretty much sums up the best rule of co-op life. Surprise your co-op sisters and brothers with an amazing capacity to turn the other cheek. I have never had anyone hit me at any homeschool co-op (unless, do toddlers count?), but the message of being able to turn away from misunderstanding or anger in the face of something you may take personally is a priceless piece of wisdom for co-op life (or life anywhere).

 

Which brings me to my second gem of wisdom about living in community. Assume positive intent. Always. These are three words that my family lives by. Do this and you may save nations - I am not kidding.

 

These little lessons with big implications are a bigger deal in terms of learning than any lab experiment or group project. We do the group projects and lab experiments, but the entire experience of learning as a community is the experiment. My daughter often says, "The journey is the destination." (I know she didn't make that one up, but she says it a lot.) Part of taking the journey in community is not being threatened by another person's ideas and values. You have to be strong enough in your own thinking to entertain other ideas without having to absorb them as your own or criticize someone else for holding them. This is crucial to a co-op experience that does not just scratch the surface of human relationships. We can all hang out with people just like us. It is boring, but we do it all the time. We tend to surround ourselves with people who think, act, dress, and talk just like we do. But, the gift of living in a true community is to get past that.

 

I know that the group we are in for this coming school year will look different at the end than at the beginning. The group may stay together, some may come and some may go. Some may have life experiences that take them elsewhere and some may love it and some may not. All of that is okay. The coming and the leaving, the loving it and not loving it are a part of the experience.  All of this and the way we react or don't react is an education.  The Woodland School is an experiment in community - a community with boys and girls, grown-ups and children, democrats and republicans (and some who don't know what we are), Christians and Jews, Evolutionists and Creationists, right and left, up and down, and some in the middle. This, my friends, is socialization at its finest. Just don't forget to turn the other cheek and assume positive intent.