The World of Education
In my younger years, I used to see the world of education as a better place for everyone, a world in which anyone can "improve" themselves by learning more about themselves and what makes them happy and sad, frustrated and fulfilled. We can learn, after all, to make the world a better place and to make our own little worlds better places as well, and we can be happy in our own little worlds and help others to be happy also.
And of course, that's the ideal--learning so that we can improve things, so that we can make the world a better place for our children than it was for us. But this ideal begs the question: if more people are educated now than ever before, why is our world so incredibly messed up? Why is our planet in worse shape now than it ever has been? Why do so many people still die of starvation when we make enough food to feed more than the world's population? Why are politicians more able now to push through laws based on their own belief systems than they were fifty years ago?
We obviously haven't come very far as human beings. We do some wonderful things, but we also do awful things, and the expansion of our education systems hasn't made the world a much better place for many of us. Is it that we're just hopeless, and even something like education can't redeem us, or is there something more to the question?
Personally, I believe that one of the reasons for which our education systems are failing us is that so many people who know nothing at all about education are constantly meddling in it, trying to make sure that teachers are teaching exactly what these people want them to be teaching, rather than teaching them the subject at hand. And these people are trying to make sure that teachers don't teach the things that they disagree with.
On the other hand, having spent more than thirty years observing my fellow teachers in their classrooms and talking to their students, I also know that another reason for which the systems are failing is that many teachers are extremely bad at what they're doing. Many of them don't know their material well, and many of them have no strategies in place for helping students to learn. They yell at students when they get frustrated, and they belittle them when they get flustered. Many of them don't even treat their students as people, but rather as just students, who all should be learning everything at about the same rate as all the other students.
But I also see another dynamic that I've never seen addressed by anyone, for it's inconceivable to many people: many students simply aren't ready to learn the material that they're expected to learn. We put them into a classroom and assume that just because they're a certain age, they're ready to learn certain material. Because of this myopic and distorted view of young human beings, we set many of them up for failure from the very beginning, putting them in no-win situations that they're not ready to face. Others, of course, are more than ready, and should be learning much more complicated material, but we force them to experience the drudgery of sitting around and "learning" stuff that they're capable of picking up in a couple of minutes.
There's a lot to talk about, and I hope to be talking about as much as I can over the next year or so. Education is very important to me because I've devoted most of my life to it and it's the field in which I'm strongest. But my views are often at odds with administrators who think that a cookie-cutter approach to teaching is most appropriate, and with fellow teachers who don't feel a need to expose their students to rigor or high demands. This conflict makes teaching sometimes a chore, something that I don't enjoy doing because of artificial expectations from others.
And the title of the blog? I think it's self-explanatory in an ironic sort of way--I often wonder this exact question when some of the bullshit gets too deep and stressful, but I continue to teach after many years of frustration. The kids are just too important to me, and I'll keep doing what I can to help them no matter how strongly my hands are tied, or how limited my ability to help them in ways that are truly helpful. It's a legitimate question, and I do think that I can answer it.
And of course, that's the ideal--learning so that we can improve things, so that we can make the world a better place for our children than it was for us. But this ideal begs the question: if more people are educated now than ever before, why is our world so incredibly messed up? Why is our planet in worse shape now than it ever has been? Why do so many people still die of starvation when we make enough food to feed more than the world's population? Why are politicians more able now to push through laws based on their own belief systems than they were fifty years ago?
We obviously haven't come very far as human beings. We do some wonderful things, but we also do awful things, and the expansion of our education systems hasn't made the world a much better place for many of us. Is it that we're just hopeless, and even something like education can't redeem us, or is there something more to the question?
Personally, I believe that one of the reasons for which our education systems are failing us is that so many people who know nothing at all about education are constantly meddling in it, trying to make sure that teachers are teaching exactly what these people want them to be teaching, rather than teaching them the subject at hand. And these people are trying to make sure that teachers don't teach the things that they disagree with.
On the other hand, having spent more than thirty years observing my fellow teachers in their classrooms and talking to their students, I also know that another reason for which the systems are failing is that many teachers are extremely bad at what they're doing. Many of them don't know their material well, and many of them have no strategies in place for helping students to learn. They yell at students when they get frustrated, and they belittle them when they get flustered. Many of them don't even treat their students as people, but rather as just students, who all should be learning everything at about the same rate as all the other students.
But I also see another dynamic that I've never seen addressed by anyone, for it's inconceivable to many people: many students simply aren't ready to learn the material that they're expected to learn. We put them into a classroom and assume that just because they're a certain age, they're ready to learn certain material. Because of this myopic and distorted view of young human beings, we set many of them up for failure from the very beginning, putting them in no-win situations that they're not ready to face. Others, of course, are more than ready, and should be learning much more complicated material, but we force them to experience the drudgery of sitting around and "learning" stuff that they're capable of picking up in a couple of minutes.
There's a lot to talk about, and I hope to be talking about as much as I can over the next year or so. Education is very important to me because I've devoted most of my life to it and it's the field in which I'm strongest. But my views are often at odds with administrators who think that a cookie-cutter approach to teaching is most appropriate, and with fellow teachers who don't feel a need to expose their students to rigor or high demands. This conflict makes teaching sometimes a chore, something that I don't enjoy doing because of artificial expectations from others.
And the title of the blog? I think it's self-explanatory in an ironic sort of way--I often wonder this exact question when some of the bullshit gets too deep and stressful, but I continue to teach after many years of frustration. The kids are just too important to me, and I'll keep doing what I can to help them no matter how strongly my hands are tied, or how limited my ability to help them in ways that are truly helpful. It's a legitimate question, and I do think that I can answer it.
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