Spoiler alert? Just kidding, not really. I’m near the end of Shame of the Nation, and Kozol shares with us some bits and pieces that suggest that perhaps people are starting to see the ugly truth about the accountability/standardization movement. Keep in mind the book came out five years ago, so we could start looking for more examples that things have perhaps started to shift in a better direction; like Kozol said on p. 258 the movement comes first and litigation, or in some situations policy change, comes after. So despite Obama’s backing of some of the key NCLB rhetoric and principles, maybe things are changing (and at least he sees the importance in expanding Head Start and moving away from punishing underperforming schools). From page 304:
At P.S. 65, there have been changes too. A new principal has been appointed. A new curriculum is now in use. In recent visits to the school, I noted that the hand-held timers and the scripted lesson plans were gone. Writings by children, as the children wrote them, were displayed in corridors and on the classroom walls.
If some have started to realize that buzzword-driven education, saluting and hand gestures in class, and scripted lesson plans are not the way to go, that is an improvement but it doesn’t get us very far with the bigger, harder to solve problems. Segregation is still what drives separate and almost certainly, almost always unequal educational opportunity. Without addressing this we are never more than halfway there. The progressive funding models I mentioned in my first post are one logical way to help address unequal and unjust situations, and this needs to happen far more than it does, but that gets us to what, 75%? A lowly C!
I don’t mean to minimize the importance of better funding and a more real, caring, and meaningful kind of teaching. You can tell that Kozol cares about the teacher/student relationship and the principal/teacher relationship. He also cares about recess, play, carving pumpkins just for fun, and any other way that lets a kid be a kid. Far from taking away from test-drill learning (or any kind of learning), these are things that support learning and child socialization. Coming from the counseling angle, this is crucial to me and I’m glad Kozol takes time to discuss it.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHi, Brian.
ReplyDeleteEven though I did not read, 'Shame of the Nation', I thought about several similar ideas that you commented on because I read
'Savage Inequalites' which I think was written by same author.
The book, 'Savage Inequalites' was written almost 20 years ago. Of course, I think the educational system and circumstances have changed so much since the time when Kozol wrote the book, 'Savage Inequalites'.
I also believe that better funding was also given to the public schools as you said. However, what I thought about when I used to go to public elementary school for my observation hours, was same as what you commented. I also thought that it was not all about the matter of money, but the matter of the teacher/student and the principal/teacher relationship because I observed a teacher that had to follow the instruction or curriculum from the government.
Since, my teacher was busy doing all the tests that were required by the government, I thought it would be impossible to do progressive education in those circumstances. However, if the relationships between teachers, students and principals get better, it will be much more helpful for the teacher to do progressive education.
I also want to add one more thing to my comment which is about the relationship between teachers, principals, students and parents. I think parents are really important since they can support teachers and students by making the enviornment to study in and understanding the curriculum that the teachers are doing.
I think it would be interesting to see, and I wonder if you talked with the other students in your observation class, about the differences from one school to another regarding how much time was spent on testing and more specifically, test preparation. I know that in Wheaton, for example, they don't teach to the test at all, but they do end up teaching the concepts they will be tested on. Does that make sense? So is it really that different? I guess it's more the style and how drilled and set in stone it is at some schools.
ReplyDelete