Two Roads - Stan Hartzler

Jenny and Selena are the best of friends going into kindergarten, until circumstances require that they move to live in separate school districts with their respective grandmothers.

What then happens illustrates the power of good schools using good learning principles versus poor schools using customary practices and the importance of a grandmother firmly grounded in the Word and love for her new ward.

Two Roads is a response to weak, weepy teacher parables plentifully supplied to new teachers, future teachers, and in-service teachers, distracting these and other education leaders from sound practices and the serious mission of good schools.

Two Roads follows Jenny and Selena from kindergarten through high school, in school classrooms, and during summer activity. Ancillary themes include

importance of new friendships,

influence of music on culture and childhood development,

involvement with the natural world,

properly nurtured curiosity,

respect for community and authority,

involvement in organized recreational activity,

sober living, and

reverent, prayerful, and happy family closure at each day's end.

Effective school leadership is seen as strong but personable and ultimately satisfying.

Positive principles of learning include the critical issues of attention, recall, productive adventure, well-structured discovery, development of schemas, and common sense. Properly done, learning and growth are seen as joyful, exciting, and funny.

The reader is warned not to take Jenny and Selena too much to heart. The worst of teacher parables also tug at the soul. The best of teacher parables make good classrooms better.