I'm not going to agree or disagree with elements of the post, but I want
to take a few elements to comment on. I spent a decent part of my career
in education, doing research, training teachers, part of an ed. journal
board, etc. This doesn't make me an expert, but may give me a different
perspective.
On 6 Aug 96 at 6:09, Marion Brady wrote:
> The educational establishment is long on high-sounding
> objectives
> (e.g. "Students are being prepared for useful, satisfying work," for
> "democratic citizenship," to "solve social problems," to "actualize
> themselves," etc.) but even if these were acceptable statements of
> the overarching purpose of education--which in my opinion they're
> not--it's a real stretch to connect what's happening on a daily
> basis in most classrooms to them.
What you cited are not objectives in any educational sense, as commonly
defined. I would agree with your statement, though and suggest that a) the
objectives (sic) that you cite mean nothing whatsoever, due to an
inability to translate them into something concrete, or even to reach
consensus on their meaning.
> What really shapes and drives
> what's going on in today's classrooms is what went on yesterday.
> And what went on yesterday is "explained" by what went on the day,
> the month, the year, the decade, the generation before.
> We teach what we were taught because we think it's
> important. But
> we think it's important primarily because it's what we were taught.
I think this is true. When I was supervising practice teaching at the high
school level, it got to be pretty clear that student teachers were
teaching as they were taught, with some variations thrown in.
> Round and round we go, victims of institutionalization. The
> purpose of education is to expand our understanding of reality.
That is YOUR purpose, and is certainly not shared by a majority, or large
number of teachers, parents or students. I make this point because unless
we understand the complexities of the educational system, with it's
seemingly endless stream of stakeholders, interest groups, etc, we are
lost. There are literally hundreds of statements of the type you
espouse...none agreed upon by any significant segment of the stakeholders.
> We're going nowhere. In fact, on balance, I'd say we were
> currently slipping backwards. I'm not a basher of education. I
> sincerely believe that the schools are, on balance, doing a better
> job of doing what they've always done than they've ever done before
Even this issue is hotly debated, with no consensus on even what MEASURES
would be useful in evaluating whether things are better, worse, or the
same.
> We're in crisis. We need (excuse the overworked phrase) a
> paradigm shift, need to understand that biology, chemistry, math,
> sociology, history and all the other comfortably familiar fields of
> study are not only mere means to an end, but poor ones at
> that--ignoring vast and important areas of knowledge, failing to
> show the systemic nature of reality, placing students in passive
> roles, making it difficult or impossible to trace the kinds of
> relationships by means of which knowledge expands . . . (I could go
> on and on, and have elsewhere).
I think it would be interesting to hear your views on how change can be
enacted, and what it would look like from, the student's point of view.
> We have a lousy curriculum. It's always been a lousy
> curriculum.
I would wonder how you have come to that conclusion. I certainly don't
know how I would come to that conclusion, or it's opposite.
> EVERY SOCIETY HAS A MODEL OF REALITY--A BODY OF KNOWLEDGE
> AND A
> WAY OF ORGANIZING THAT KNOWLEDGE. IF THIS KNOWLEDGE AND ITS
> ORGANIZING SCHEME ARE MADE EXPLICIT AND FORMALIZED, IT WILL
> CONSTITUTE EACH SOCIETY'S OPTIMUM DESIGN FOR GENERAL STUDY.
If one assumes that a SOCIETY is homogeneous and holds a SINGLE body of
knowledge as important, then this makes sense. However, what seems to be
missing is an understanding that this is clearly not the case. Each
PERSON in the society has a model of reality--society as a whole does not
hold a single unitary one. Even if it did, one could not define it.
This sounds wonderful, and I think as a philisophical statement, it has a
ring of truth to it. But education doesn't take place in a philosophy
class...it takes place in classrooms, with real people, all different.
This is WHAT has changed...our society has moved to a level of diversity
that makes a school system impotent, because there is NO consensus on
anything educational...and since there is no shared reality, systems are
pushed and pulled, as you have indicated.
... by a university press, followed it with articles
> in a half dozen or so respected journals, wrote a course of study
> operationalizing it that most middle school students can handle with
> no difficulty, and the idea has yet to "register" with the
> educational establishment. (That paradigm thing, you know.)
I think you might consider that it is wrong...it assumes a reality that
doesn't exist in society. And that is why it isn't embraced...some people
will agree, some will disagree, some will not care, and each category will
have different reasons for their stands.
And for every action, some people will fight to defeat it.
> I'd like to convince them (you?) of the possibility that a little
> judicious moving and shaking of the educational establishment--or at
> least your local representatives of it--have the potential for
> increasing by several orders of magnitude the quality of the images
> of and assumptions about reality your kids will carry with them
> through life. --
It isn't at all clear what you are suggesting...it's all very vague
sounding to me, personally. But, for every person that moves to encourage
education to do what you ask (whatever that might be), there will be
stakeholders, with both good and bad reasons, who will recoil at it.
Without understanding this, one cannot understand why educational systems
do not change well.
(OK, I did agree and disagree) guffaw.
Robert Bacal, CEO, Institute For Cooperative Communication
dbt359@freenet.mb.ca, Located in Winnipeg,Canada.
*For articles on management, change, training,communication, etc,
visit our home page at: http://www.winnipeg.freenet.mb.ca/~dbt359
--"Robert Bacal" <dbt359@freenet.mb.ca>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>