Re: The school game
Richard Long (rlong@DAEMEN.EDU)
Tue, 13 Aug 1996 09:09:32 -0400
I think, too, ERic, we're pretty much close to agreement about this freedom
vs. control thing in the classroom, and I suppose it's the hypebole that
sometimes irks me and I feel as if I need to defend my sense of being a
teacher, yet it's also this sense of hyperbole and how it portrays the
student as a victim that sometimes just doesn't seem to ring accurate
anymore. It's as if nothing in education has changed in the last 30 years
and as if all of us who have moved into the universities during that time
have learned nothing of the historical moment. That we have become that
which we detested. The authority. And as we beat ourselves for this we in
turn, quite naturally, praise students who thwart, trick, beat the system,
and the ability to do those things becomes signs of creativity. Perhaps
they are, but they are also ways to avoid what's requested. If we promote
thwarting as an indicator of learning,a generation of thwarters, well, I'm
not sure what will have been learned.
Richard Long