Life of Pride
Friday, January 13, 2006
Hooray! Excitement and joy! People are posting to their blogs again. Or, at least, they have posted. This is naturally no guarantee that they will continue to do so, particularly as the PHC semester is about to start in less than a week. Still, I enjoy these occasional windows into the lives of my friends.
Right now I am reading John Holt's 1965 classic, How Children Fail, ostensibly as research for my history project. This is one of the formative works for the school reform movement that began in that decade; later, Mr. Holt gave up entirely on public schools and turned to homeschooling. He is the founding voice of the "unschooling" movement, in which children, all potential geniuses, are directed into the paths that they wish to follow to education. I don't really need to finish this entire book, though, because it speaks very little to the "public opinion" of homeschooling. But it is fascinating, and I cannot stop. A quote on the back cover says that "Holt's empathy for the child's mind is extraordinary." That about sums it up. He observed children in his own classroom and many others, and got into their heads in an uncanny way. This quote made me think:
Not long after the book came out I found myself being driven to a meeting by a professor of electrical engineering in the graduate school of MIT. He said that after reading the book he realized that his graduate students were using on him, and had used for the ten years and more he had been teaching there, all the evasive strategies I described in the book - mumble, guess-and-look, take a wild guess and see what happens, get the teacher to answer his own questions, etc.
But as I later realized, these are the games that all humans play when others are sitting in judgment on them.
Holt describes several classroom situations in which teachers, looking only for the answers they want, totally miss the fact that their pupils do not understand the actual concepts. These students dupe their teachers into complacence so that they will leave them alone. The funny part that I'm analyzing is my own incredulity at the instructors. I've noticed all these behaviors in children I've tutored one-on-one or taught in groups at Civil Air Patrol meetings. They never fooled me. Why not? And why could the teachers not see? My answer is that I have six younger siblings. Further, I remember my own success with similar strategies. I therefore take for granted that children will be trying to pass one off more often than not. Perhaps some teachers do not understand the full limit of what kids are capable of doing. They underestimate their subjects' innate cunning.
I don't know. But this book is an intriguing, easy read. I highly recommend it, if your library has a copy. Mostly, Holt tells stories about individual situations and children.
Right now I am reading John Holt's 1965 classic, How Children Fail, ostensibly as research for my history project. This is one of the formative works for the school reform movement that began in that decade; later, Mr. Holt gave up entirely on public schools and turned to homeschooling. He is the founding voice of the "unschooling" movement, in which children, all potential geniuses, are directed into the paths that they wish to follow to education. I don't really need to finish this entire book, though, because it speaks very little to the "public opinion" of homeschooling. But it is fascinating, and I cannot stop. A quote on the back cover says that "Holt's empathy for the child's mind is extraordinary." That about sums it up. He observed children in his own classroom and many others, and got into their heads in an uncanny way. This quote made me think:
Not long after the book came out I found myself being driven to a meeting by a professor of electrical engineering in the graduate school of MIT. He said that after reading the book he realized that his graduate students were using on him, and had used for the ten years and more he had been teaching there, all the evasive strategies I described in the book - mumble, guess-and-look, take a wild guess and see what happens, get the teacher to answer his own questions, etc.
But as I later realized, these are the games that all humans play when others are sitting in judgment on them.
Holt describes several classroom situations in which teachers, looking only for the answers they want, totally miss the fact that their pupils do not understand the actual concepts. These students dupe their teachers into complacence so that they will leave them alone. The funny part that I'm analyzing is my own incredulity at the instructors. I've noticed all these behaviors in children I've tutored one-on-one or taught in groups at Civil Air Patrol meetings. They never fooled me. Why not? And why could the teachers not see? My answer is that I have six younger siblings. Further, I remember my own success with similar strategies. I therefore take for granted that children will be trying to pass one off more often than not. Perhaps some teachers do not understand the full limit of what kids are capable of doing. They underestimate their subjects' innate cunning.
I don't know. But this book is an intriguing, easy read. I highly recommend it, if your library has a copy. Mostly, Holt tells stories about individual situations and children.
Comments:
From watching professors both as a student and as a TA, I too notice this "duping." However, I think that most teachers realize they are being duped, and sadly, allow themselves to be. The reason is because it is easier than being vulnerable with students. Teachers, especially new/young ones, create a distance between themsevles and students because they lack a sense of confidence in their position of knowledge and institutional authority. I wish more teachers would, like Dr. Hake, leap to the opportunity of being humble before their students and openly vulnerable. There is a way to do this and not let studentns take advantage.
Thanks for you comments btw.
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Thanks for you comments btw.
