The Amish Children of Charm, Ohio

When I taught special education in Ashland, Ohio in 1973, I enjoyed visiting the nearby Amish village of Charm (Population 53). A group of Amish children, ages 6 through 15, attended a one-room schoolhouse there. Their teacher never attended high school, the humdrum rote learning of the 3 “R’s” was still drilled into each student’s head, no administration or support staff were present, and the small playground out back offered bare earth and one makeshift seesaw- a splintered slab of barn siding balanced on a wooden crate.

Modern curriculum specialists would have gone ballistic over their weather-beaten, outdated textbooks. The teacher skulked behind a nearby public elementary school and retrieved an Amish buggy-full of them from the trash bin.

Despite the lack of an up-to-date school library, the antiquated educational hardware and archaic teaching methods, the Amish children of Charm walked away from their required eight years of schooling with lessons about life which contemporary schools find difficult to ingrain in the minds of their students.

The Amish children of Charm learned the advantages of interdependence, of working together for the benefit of the whole. Despite differences in intelligence and learning abilities among the kids, there was only one inflexible curriculum for each grade level.

The teacher ignored individual differences and encouraged teamwork. Students of the same age helped one another, smarter kids worked with slower ones and older kids tutored younger ones. Their goal was to get through the curriculum… together!

The Amish children of Charm found out quickly who they were and where they fit into the scheme of things. They never had to wait long for their self-esteem to ripen nor did they need to dig deep to unearth their self-identities. The dominant and befuddling mixed value messages from the larger American society surrounding them never permeated the brick and mortar walls of their dingy one-room schoolhouse.

They felt a strong emotional bond between home and school. The 3 “R’s” and mutual respect learned at school were pruned so only relevant skills needed to manage the farm and to live in harmony were taught. Likewise, the Amish family constantly reinforced these academic and social skills at home.

The Amish children of Charm never heard the phrase, “Do your own thing”. Believing “I’m number one” was an alien concept to them. They discovered how to balance their personal desires with social cohesiveness. The kids sensed when competition began to intrude upon cooperation, and sought “Win-Win” not “Win-Lose” solutions to conflicts. They learned it’s better to win an agreement…than an argument.

The Amish children of Charm learned in an easygoing manner a profound lesson about life, one in which a competitive, hi-stress and hi-tech America finds difficult to implant into the minds of its youth. They learned, not by formal instruction, but incidentally through day-to-day living, how to live in harmony… and how to be happy.

Today, when I drive to Charm with my wife to enjoy a nice Amish-cooked meal at the Charm Family Restaurant, old memories surface of that one-room schoolhouse. I ask myself, “Is there something the Amish schools can teach us?”