Being Thankful for Your Child's School

With the advent of Thanksgiving, taking a closer look at what's good about a child's school can be both heartening and illuminating. As parents, we're often too busy to pay much attention to the particulars of our kids' schools unless something goes wrong. But spending a few minutes reviewing the positive aspects of your child's educational experience can help balance any misgivings you've had and foster a more realistic assessment of a school's merits.

Just as no school is "perfect," every school has at least some things that are working well. Maybe it's a caring teacher, an innovative curriculum, or a large outdoor space. Try to go over all the different parts of your child's day-to-day life at school and see which ones are making—or even exceeding—the grade.

As an example, my own child's current school has terrific teachers, exceptionally thoughtful and intelligent administrators, wonderful courses and extracurricular activities, great indoor and outdoor facilities, an interesting and diverse student body, and a very active, involved parent community. Obviously being thankful for a school like this is easy.

But my child's previous school, which fell short in certain areas, also had numerous things to recommend it, including some great teachers, unusually innovative district-sponsored programs, a safe campus, and many parent-funded supplemental classes and activities. Though as parents we often focused on things that weren't working well, had we taken the time to list all the positives, our feelings about—and engagement with—the school would likely have been different.

So tomorrow, as we all sit around the Thanksgiving table counting our blessings, let's not forget about our children's schools. Each one has something to offer and something we as parents should be grateful for.