Readings for 9/29/16

I am still trying to wrap my head around the Social Efficiency Ideology, but had a few questions that have stuck with me:

• I feel like this is a regular question on our blog, but who decides what should be taught in school? In the SE ideology, if schooling is a way to train young people in the skills they need for adulthood, who decides what that adulthood looks like? In mathematics, ideally would a child stop learning new concepts at around grade 5 and proceed to spend their time in secondary school further automatizing their skills? What does the affordability and proliferation of calculators do to this? Similar questions could be made of grammar or spelling and word processors.
• It seems to me that the SE Ideology should be very accommodating of vocational training, after all what better way to meeting the goal of providing young people the things they need to be successful as adults than to give them a vocation? Similarly, what value do the arts hold to SE followers?
• The idea of a programmed curriculum sets forth the notion that learning is a controlled and sequenced set of learning experiences that provide students a behavior to learn. My knee-jerk question is: do these experiences include environmental concerns or are they somehow more prepackaged than that?
• There is a line in the Schiro text, pg 69, that made me wonder if the SE Ideology sees all children as progressing or even developing at the same rate: "Thus, education of a 6-year-old is to prepare for that of the 7-year-old, the education of the 7-year-old for that of the 8-year-old, and so on until maturity is reached." A secondary question that arises from this same sentence has to do with the length of schooling. This sentence seems to imply that schooling is completed "when maturity is reached". Is this 18 years of age? Maturity of skills sufficient to be an adult? This also leaves me with questions of the warehousing of students, but I don't think they will be productive to our conversation (as they are likely too value laden to be beneficial to this discussion)

There's a good number of questions in those four bullets! Hopefully that'll give our discussion a good kickstart.

Readings for 9/22/16

Scholar Academic ideology.  I'm trying really hard not to ask - do you agree or disagree? :-)

As I was reading, I thought of these questions, and I'm curious to know how you would respond to them - and also what questions you had!

• On page 25, Schiro writes, "In assuming that there is a loose equivalence between the world of the intellect, the world of knowledge, and the academic disciplines, Scholar Academics also accept the belief that the contents of these three areas are identical."  That seems to be quite a leap in logic.  Does this seem to be rooted in a positivist view of the world, do you think?  Why or why not?
• If knowledge is separated into these autonomous disciplines, how are there not infinitely many of them?  Couldn't everything be thought of as its own discipline?
• How would schools be organized under this ideology?  
• Describing the cycle of education in the SA ideology, Schiro says, "it involves dropping out of the discipline when one can no longer function as a constructive member of the discipline" (p 30).  Who decides what is "constructive?"  Then later, on page 37, "...all children were to have equal access to an excellent education."  Are these statements contradictory?
• On page 47, it is stated that, "Although Scholar Academics profess an interest in the writings on learning theory produced by philosophers and social scientists, they tend to ignore such writings..." Then why be interested in them at all?
• This outlook on learning theory seems to be contradictory to the idea that "all students" should receive education in the academic disciplines.  If we're ignoring how students best learn and focusing solely on the "nature of knowledge" in each discipline, aren't we leaving some out on purpose?  Is it because they would be seen as not having a "knack" for that discipline?

I think that's enough to start with :-)

Readings for 9/15/16

So I feel like I might be guilty of "serial posting" the last few weeks; therefore, I'm posting a little early this week in hopes of facilitating a more conversational approach to our blog.  What I thought I would do is post a question of the day that is based upon the readings for the week in order to have more of a discussion through our comment section.  As we continue to read more over the weekend and into next week, hopefully we can shed more light on the questions that come up from the reading.

While reading this week, I've been trying to keep the questions posed in class in the back of my mind:
1. Who should develop curriculum and for what purpose?
2. How should it be developed?

Check the comments for the first question of the day!

Readings for 9/8/16

            The readings this week can be condensed to a conversation as to what democracy is and for whom does education serve in one? Further, is it the goal of education to pass on the cultural values and heritage of society, or to empower the learners to confront and even change such things? Between the two texts, it is clear that, given the right set of beliefs a great many beliefs can be justified.

            “Equality is a core concept of democracy…” (Noddings, 2013, p.26)  The problem, as Noddings goes on to discuss, is one not of should there be equality, but, rather, what constitutes equality. To some, the equality that is incumbent in democracy is one of outcomes. To others it is one of opportunity.

            One thing that stuck with me from the reading comes from Walker & Soltis (2009, p.32), “For children of the working class, the results of this alienation were alienation from the only living, encompassing culture open to them, along with a failure to induct them fully into the high culture.” This really reminds me of one of the things we used to tell each other when I worked at the local community college. “We are trying to train them to live in a different class (meaning SES) than they currently do.” We would say this to each other when a student behaved in a way that was counter to that which is expected (e.g. buying new shoes instead of books with the book stipend or attending for the first few days before disappearing after student grant disbursement). The most heartbreaking examples, and perhaps why this passage struck a chord with me, were always ones of a student dropping out because they didn’t really fit anymore. To their old life they didn’t fit anymore because they voluntarily sought more schooling, which had impacted their worldview. To their prospective new life they still came from their old life. This is how I see the essential problem with trying to create education for all, which I agree is essential for a democracy. How do we create truly transformational experiences, the kind that hold the keys to the American Dream (if such a thing exists), for all students? Not some. Not most. All. What does the (an?) American Dream look like in this case? I for one agree with much of what Noddings (2013) suggests in the chapter Equality, but how do we get there? I look forward to reading more of her book.