I want to teach at a school like Stephen describes!
I suspect that’s where we’d all like to teach. In class on Thursday, Stephen talked about a school where people could explore when they’re ready, and (like Freire says in Ch. 9 of the Foundations book) problem-solve, and not fail. It sounds wonderful.
It reminds me of a Montessori school, in which students explore and discover. A Montessori school rents part of a wing of our church. On Sunday mornings when we walk through the unoccupied wing to get to a meeting room at the end of the hall, the adults are sincerely envious of all the really cool play/learning stations for the children. Couldn’t someone build something like this where grown-ups and kids beyond the primary grades could learn through play and discovery? (Please? I want to play!)
I don’t know if any of you ever had the chance to experience the hands-on section of the Inventor's Hall of Fame, which had been in Akron. It was like a giant science Montessori school for both youth and adults, where people could play with principles of science, like light, sound, magnetism, gravity, etc. It was so much fun! I hope it's still similar now that it's moved to North Canton. Playing with science was a fascinating and exciting adventure. Isn’t that what learning should be like? (That’s why I can’t understand why our school always scores lowest on the Science OGT. Science fits that problem-solving model better than any field.)
If schools could be full of readiness and exploration, then no child would ever be left behind—in a real sense—instead of the maddening aspects of NCLB that impose massive testing and massive pressure.
Like everything else, it all boils down to money, doesn’t it? If people are rich enough to have private tutoring, they can have the opportunity to explore when they’re ready and discover; their education can unfold before their very eyes.
When I talked about failure lists and bending over backwards to try to help kids and give them encouragement and every opportunity, I was talking about life in a school system that’s the product of an economic reality. If your family isn’t rich enough, then you attend public school, which aims toward the middle majority of the bell-shaped curve. A’s are earned by some who are eager, determined, or advanced. F’s are earned by those who can’t or won’t do the work.
(Can’t or won’t. I just had an insight into the distinction--that I never give up on those who find the work hard. But in the case of those who stonewall and refuse to do the work, sometimes I can convince them to crawl back from the edge, but not always. Those few kids that end up on my failure list are the ones who, like in Saar's model, exercise free will as an agent and choose to resist past the end of the semester. Those who reject my help usually have very serious issues in their lives; I usually can't make a dent in these giant problems, but I want to help wherever I can. However in the end, after my coaxing and urging, the student, like a sports figure, is still a free agent.)
The reality is that in public school, classes need to be run in a similar fashion. Imagine if the kids in 1st period took an end-of-unit test and the grade was permanent, but students in 2nd period were allowed to take and re-take and re-take versions of the test until they were ready and had learned it all. Parents of the 1st period kids would be up an arms, rightfully so. I’ve always felt it was better to let students keep striving until they’ve learned it all, but there are limitations in a school system. I have to grade the way the system dictates and also prepare the students for high stakes testing. But I’d rather teach at a school like Stephen envisioned.
Part of the Inventor's Hall of Fame activity seems to have morphed into a camp. Here is some parent/camper feedback from the Camp Invention website:
- “Finally something he enjoys more than video games!”
- “My daughter really felt a sense of pride in her accomplishments at Camp Invention.”
- “He told me each night that it was hard to go to sleep because he was excited about the next day.”
- “Their science vocabulary has exploded! From the day when we heard about the laws of physics to yesterday’s molecule rearrangements, they were fully engaged. Thank you.”
- “You know why I love going to this camp so much? Because if you make a mistake, they say, ‘that’s okay,’ and let you fix it.”
Doesn’t it sound fun? Isn’t that the way you’d like to teach?
| "Camp Invention Home." Camp Invention: A Program of Invent Now. Invent Now, Inc., 2011. Web. 9 July 2011. <http://www.invent.org/ camp/default.aspx>. |
Anthology of Critical Readings. Ed. Bruce A. Marlowe and Alan S.
Canestrari. 2nd ed. Los Angeles: Sage, 2010. 91-103. Print.
Saar, M. "Understanding Genealogy: History, Power, and the Self." Journal of the
Philosophy of History 2.3 (2008): 295-314. Print.
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