Globalization, Global Citizenship, and International Schools

Globalization is not new – though the current form is probably the most well-documented and researched. Tilly (2004) talks about the three forms of globalization – migration of population; spread of ideas, techniques and forms of organization; and increased coordination of activities at a world scale. Throughout history, people have always felt the “grass was greener” somewhere else, from the first humans who left Africa to find more verdant lands to the post-WWII flight from Eastern Europe to escape crushing memories and destruction. Each time, the immigrants brought with them their traditions, culture and way of life and, even when pressured to conform, the two (or more) cultures melded – or as Bhabha (1994) would say, created hybridization. Throughout the middle ages, kingdoms and fiefdoms fought each other and gained power through mutual alliances. In Cleopatra's time, she formed an alliance with Julius Caesar in order to promote Egypt's place in the Roman Empire. Within the last 60 years, the United States has become a world power - meaning that the ideas, fads, fashions, commerce and businesses of the US were replicated, extended, and adopted by other people and countries.

As a backlash to the “Americanization” of the world, new forms of organization are becoming the ruling class of the world – World Bank, European Union, and the World Trade Organization,and the International Monetary Fund. The increased coordination of activities at a world scale is what is new with this current incarnation of globalization. In the past, the conqueror would determine how activities were organized with in the empire – and generally the conquered would be forced to adopt most of the conqueror's ways. The Roman Empire built extensive roads in order to better administrate their lands. The Islamic Empire was united through religion. The British Empire dominated through colonization and conversion. However, today, the coordination is through economic means, and is not confined to a single country or government. Multi-national companies and international cooperatives are determining the day-to-day activities of a major chunk of the world. According to Newsweek, the top ten global companies are Wal-Mart Stores,Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, Toyota Motor, Chevron, ING Group, Total, General Motors, and ConocoPhillips. The world power is whoever controls “power” - most of the top 10 companies control gas and oil. Although OPEC still controls the land where most oil is found, these international companies are improving technologies to get more oil from other fields and produce alternative forms of energy. On a more personal level, Appiah (2008) believes that globalization is not only having access to knowledge of the lives and ways of other people, but also, having the power to affect other people.

McKenzie (2004) gives a checklist for a global citizen, which includes: global appreciation, supports sustainable living and development, being epistemologically nomadic, multilingual, multicultural, being prepared to stand up for others who are very different or far away, be empathetic, and radically challenge those ideas that seem unquestionable or inevitable.

Globalization and Education

World culture theory, as developed by John Meyer, Francisco Ramirez, John Boli and colleagues, argues that the culture of schooling is converging toward a single global model, based on evidence of broad similarities among schooling systems across nations, including common ideals, institutional forms and practices, organizational features, curricula and instructional methods. For many American international schools, much of the unwritten curriculum is an enculturation of American values and educational priorities. The school has to educate both parents and students how to “do school” the American way, which includes projects, group work, disagreeing with the teacher and others and supporting opinion. Often schools give workshops and handouts about homework, reading practices and bullying. By doing this, the school feels it is preparing students to fit into American universities and international universities. But, is that creating global citizens? In actuality, like the Romans did as they conquered other peoples, the schools are creating citizens that could fit into American society. And yet, the local community and culture, along with the tertiary school culture (made up of locals, third country nationals, and Americans), had a strong influence on how American education is interpreted in that context. As Lee and LiPuma (2002) said, “these interpretive communities determine lines of interpretation, found institutions, and set boundaries based principally on their own internal dynamic.”

Bauman (1998) cites Dunlap's principle of the company belonging to the shareholders, not the workers or locality. This is true in a lot of schools, yet more evident in American international schools – especially in the schools where the student population is overwhelmingly foreign as opposed to local. Generally, the school board is elected of and by the parents. This board sets policy, approves hiring, budget etc. Often, the parents will only be in-country for 2-5 years, so their agendas are short term - “what's best for my kid.” It is difficult to get long-term programs and ideas to move forward, because the student body and faculty turn over every 2-5 years. There can be a sense of “freedom from the duty to contribute to daily life and the perpetuation of the community”(p. 9) along with “no need to engage, if avoidance will do.” (p.11) Often American or third country national students will not become involved in local sports or hang out with neighborhood kids because the students knew they would move away eventually. With a high turnover rate for foreign hire teachers, many outreach programs that are started, such as visits to a local orphanage and offering professional development to local teachers, ended as soon as sponsoring teacher leaves.

Within a country, an international school often has unique ties to the local government. Often, the government has to sanction the formation of an international school, which for developing countries, means creating and passing new laws. Implicitly, this means the ruling body agrees with the fundamentals of having foreigners educating the youth in the country. Which, conversely, indicates that the local educational system could not handle the demands of the foreigners in the local schools. By creating separate schools, the nomadic foreigners are insulated from the context of local society, which does, (in many cases) create resentment. In some schools, students are bussed directly to the school, with only a few students, who speak the local language, taking public buses. However, these students may cover up or take off their uniforms because they would be harassed by local students about being “Preppies” or the rich kids who go to the school that anyone can buy their way into. The American international schools are generally better funded, are able to import supplies and materials easily, sometimes get special treatment from the government (taxes, educational requirements etc), can hire more educated faculty and the students come from a higher socioeconomic class than the local population.

To combat this resentment and to create “globally aware citizens,” many American international school require community service projects for the students, which, in theory, gives back to the local community. However, at times, it creates a greater sense of superiority in students and faculty, rather than empathy. As Bauman (1998) says, “Globalization divides as much as it unites; it divides as it unites.” (p. 2) When shopping for gifts for the poorer local kids, some students would buy inferior gifts than if buying for their own friends, assuming that since the local kids had little, any gift would be appreciated.

But what does it mean to educate for global citizenship? Appiah (2008) states that there are three ideals for global citizenship: 1) No single world government 2) Caring for the fate of all fellow citizens 3) Engagement in real conversation between people. He looks back to the Greek sense of education which was to shape the citizen for their common, communal life. However, now, that community is not just the polis, or city/local area. It has expanded to include a global common life – the cosmos. So, schools should be educating for cosmopolitanism – “universality plus difference” (p. 92) which recognizes the fallibility of knowledge and the right for each person to live their own life, as long as that way only effects his/her own fate, even if someone else thinks that way is wrong. Which means, that as a global citizen, a person should spend more time listening and learning from other people, rather than imposing their own will or pointing out their differences. Becoming a global citizen, in Ebbeck's view (2008), should be more about gaining a future-oriented perspective, one that envisions not only a personal future, but a world future with less violence and more tolerance, which is sometimes called a “peace curriculum.” Mckenzie (2004) echoes Ebbeck's concern about the extreme violence in the world, but he believes that the primary purpose of schools should be builders of community – one that cooperates, not confronts; builds interdependence, teamwork and patience. And, through the strength of the school's community, promote community outside the school grounds.

Examples of Global Citizenship Education

Often, the job of teaching “global citizenship” is put on the social studies teachers and curriculum, rather than being infused into the core beliefs of the school. However, even within that context, there are obstacles to effective global citizenship pedagogy. First, there is no single definition of global citizenship education. It is often subsumed under other frameworks, such as multicultural education or even economic education. Even when it is placed within citizenship education, there are significant differences in the requirements of local verse global citizenship. Finally, many people fear that a focus on global citizenship undermines local citizenship (Rapaport, 2008).

Global Learning is a specific pedagogical approach in which learners of different cultures use technologies to improve their global perspective through contact and cooperation with people of other cultures (Gibson, Rimmington, & Landwehr-Brown, 2008). In this model, the instructor creates a set of necessary conditions: 1) Cultural contrasts between participants (ideally in different countries) 2) Modern communication technologies such as Internet and web-based communication applications 3) Substantive and authentic goal 4) Designed to require teamwork. Once these conditions are met, the learners must use a range of attributes/dispositions and processes/skills which may need to be explicitly taught. By engaging with others, especially with those who may be different, on a project with a mutual goal, learners come to understand how interconnected and interdependent the world is, in spite of cultural diversity. However, more influential, the authors found, was the fact that the instructor also becomes more globally conscious through the contacts made in the design of the project.

In Singapore, Lim (2008) documents a unique fusing of content area knowledge and multi-user virtual environments to create a role playing game in which the player must work together with other players, to solve social, ecological and cultural problems reminiscent of current problems. Through “quests” players must define the problem, research possible solutions using examples from other cultures, and design a policy paper describing their solution. The underlying design of the game supports student agency, tolerance and diversity, while at the same time, removing the barriers between school and non-school knowledges. In replicating the global issues currently being faced, and engaging the students as citizens, they realistically practiced the skills needed for responsible adult global citizenship.

References

Appiah, K. (2008, April). Education for global citizenship. Yearbook of the national society for the study of education. 107(1), pp. 83-99.

Bhabha, H. (1994). The location of culture. New York: Routledge.

Bauman, Z. (1998). Globalization: The human consequences. Cambridge, Polity.

Ebbeck, M. (2006). The challenges of global citizenship: Some issues for policy and practice in early childhood education. Childhood Education, 82(6). p. 353-357.

Gibson, K.L., Rimmington, G.M., & Landwehr-Brown, M. (2008). Developing global awareness and responsible world citizenship with global learning. Roeper Review, 30(1). p. 11-23.

Lee, B. & LiPuma, E. (2002) Cultures of circulation: The imaginations of modernity. Public Culture 14(1): 191-213.

Lim, C. P., (2007). Global citizenship education, school curriculum and games: Learning mathematics, English and science as a global citizen. Computers & Education, 51. p.1073–1093.

McKenzie, M. (2004). Sense of community and the emerging global citizen. Independent School, 63 (3), p. 10-16

Newsweek. (2008, July 21). Global 500. Fortune magazine. Retrieved December 26, 2008 from http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/global500/2008/full_list/

Rapoport, A. (2008). A forgotten concept: Global citizenship education and state social studies standards. Journal of Social Studies Research 33(1), p. 75-93.

Radical Possibilities - Jean Anyon

You know when you have a small shard of fiberglass in your finger and it only hurts when you move it a certain way – but then you keep moving it to see where it is and then it really hurts? That's how I felt reading this book. Many of the issues Jean Anyon (2005) brings up have been issues I've railed about before, but when looking at the complexities of bureaucracy, it always seemed impossible to change – poverty, transportation, incarceration etc. However, what I really appreciated in Anyon was she also gives hope – through the analysis of past social movements and the expectation of future collaboration, there seems to be, as she titles it – possibilities!

For most of my teenage years, I remember always hearing about the food shortages in Africa. Then as an adult, I found out that it wasn't so much a lack of food, but a lack of secure, transparent distribution of food, water and supplies that caused such terrible famine. This was caused, in many cases, by the countries' own governments, though sometimes by civil war. It was so frustrating to know that food etc. was available yet wasting away or resold for profit, rather than benefiting the people it was intended for. Currently, the food crisis has been prompted by large corporate farms and the desire for cash crops over food production. Again, governmental policy has allowed this to happen. So, why talk about food as compared to this book? Well, it seems to parallel a lot of what Anyon talks about – few problems are like waffles, with neat little squares, cordoned off from one another. Most problems are like a bowl of spaghetti – intertwined and messy.

Communism seems the way to go – to simplify all the problems of Western society. With a democratic, classless, stateless society with common ownership and control of the means of production and property in general, no religious fervor to divide people and no recognition of race to segregate. But wait, hasn't that been tried and failed? Why? “Communism . . . these alternate beliefs systems [to capitalism] flew in the face of human nature. Of even common sense. Anyone who has ever tried to share pizza with roommates knows that Communism cannot ever work. If Lenin and Marx had just shared an apartment, perhaps a hundred million lives might have been spared and put to productive use...” (Suarez, 2009, p. 289). So, if a truly classless society isn't a reality, what is?

In the 1993 movie Dave, Kevin Kline plays an ordinary man, Dave, who looks a lot like the American president. When the president has a stroke, Dave is asked to fill in for the president for a few days in order for the Chief of Staff to continue to hold power. However, this ordinary man begins to make changes, which drastically improve the lives of ordinary people, rather than just the rich. He diplomatically, forces the various departments to balance the budget while refunding public service projects and pushes through an employment program. However, the corrupt actions of the real president are revealed, and Dave, takes the blame stating:

“And while we're setting the record straight, I'd also like to apologize to the American people. I forgot that I was hired to do a job for you and that it was just a temp job at that. I forgot that I had two hundred and fifty million people who were paying me to make their lives a little better and I didn't live up to my part of the bargain. See, there are certain things you should expect from a President. I ought to care more about you than I do about me... I ought to care more about what's right than I do about what's popular...I ought to be willing to give this whole thing up for something I believe in...”

This, I think, gets to the core of why Communism and social reform has had a difficult time making positive changes for the whole of society. Too many people, including me, are more concerned about the immediate welfare of themselves and their own family, to look beyond and see the need to extend their caring to others. Anyon gives numerous statistics of how the wealthy have continued to protect their wealth, while the poor have continued to get poorer.

I know there is a mythology of the good ol' days, yet there was tremendous value in the need to depend on neighbors to share their thrashing machine, combine or other equipment. Neighbors and towns had to trust and work together to survive. Now, each household buys its own snowblower or lawnmower because no one trusts others to treat the equipment right or bring it back. I think Anyon (2005) has a good point that any social movement must start locally, with building connections and trust between the people involved before it can make connections to larger organizations. And this trust and connection building takes time and effort. In our mobile world of constant change, it is difficult to envision the future and commit to a plan.

How can teachers create a new social order? Although I totally agree that Anyon's multi-pronged approach is the only way to radically alter the way schooling and society runs, I think teachers can begin with building trusting, caring, and, dare I say, loving, relationships with their students and foster the same type of relationships between students, staff, parents and the local community. As Jackie DeShannon sang in 1968:

Think of your fellow man

Lend him a helping hand

Put a little love in your heart

You see it's getting late, so please don't hesitate

Put a little love in your heart

And the world...

Will be a better place

And the world will be a better place for you...

And me

References

Anyon, Jean. (2005). Radical possibilities: Public policy, urban education, and a new social movement. New York: Routledge.

DeShannon, J., Holiday, J. & Myers, R. (1968). Put a little love in your heart. Put a Little Love in Your Heart. MCA Records.

Reitman, I. (Director). (1993). Dave. [Motion Picture].Warner Bros. Pictures.

Suarez, D. (2009). Daemon. Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Should schools support class mobility? Can there be a classless society?

The first fact Bourdieu (1986) claims is that people's cultural practices are linked to, first, their level of education and secondarily, to their social origin. As Dr. Seuss (1978) said, “The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” So, in theory, the more education a person has, the more aware he/she will be about what legitimate culture is, how to legitimately respond to it, and how to find/get it. However, if Bourdieu is correct, a person's social origin will also influence their desire for the knowledge of or attitude toward legitimate culture. So, a working class person, by virtue of their habitus will reject legitimate culture and a middle class person will either revere it or pretend they know more then they actually do (pretentiousness).

In my reading, I get the feeling that Bourdieu thinks that working class rejects legitimate culture, because they assume they will never be accepted into the upper/dominant class, so why bother. The middle class is conflicted – they want to be accepted, but don't have the money to do it. Assuming that access to upper class/dominant class, is the goal of people's lives (which I'm not sure about, but seems to be), then there should be a way to climb the cultural/social/economic ladder. (I find it difficult to truly separate the three.)

This being the case, what is the role of school? If the school teaches legitimate culture (which it mostly does), it would be in an attempt to give access to legitimate culture through education, for those who don't come with the legitimate cultural capital. However, in doing so, the school illegitimates the student's cultural experience. (Would this be cultural debt?) Now, according to Bourdieu, a student from a working class background may very well reject legitimate culture – having a taste for necessity rather than luxury. So, should the school be working more to “develop a taste” for legitimate culture and then the knowledge – and in doing so, does the student have to reject their family's taste? To continue, it would seem that the middle class would embrace this form of education, because they have the aspiration to become upper class. Since there is already a reverence or pretentiousness for legitimate culture, the education should be fairly easy. As for the upper class – well, they attend the private upper class school which is teaching legitimate culture anyway. Overall, this does seem to explain the current state of schooling.

So, what is the alternative? Should schools legitimize other forms of knowledge - which is a phrase I hear often, but don't exactly understand what it means. If, for example, mariachi music is a cultural practice in most of the students' backgrounds, should this become part of the school's curriculum? If so, what does it leave out? If students are using mariachi music to learn other things, ie parts of speech, it is really legitimizing the cultural practice? If learning all about mariachi music – the people, history etc. leaves out learning about classical music, a legitimate cultural practice, is it a service or disservice to the students? Can knowledge of mariachi help them succeed?

I can think of a few examples of something similar being enacted in schools. The ebonics debate in schools – the idea that teachers should use and support the use of African-American vernacular English, (AAVE). Some people believe it is the home language of students, and that teacher knowledge and use supports their learning of standard English. Which, in a similar debate, also supports Spanish bilingual education. However, the opposition believes that by supporting the use of non-standard English in the school, the students will not become proficient in standard English, which will limit their access to other opportunities. When I taught in Brazil, at an international school, the majority of students were Portuguese speakers. At the middle and high school level, we were constantly asking them to use English in the classroom because it was easier for them to converse in Portuguese, understandably. However, as a consequence, by not using and struggling with the English academic language, they did not become proficient with it, and their Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) scores were low, which limited their opportunities to apply for prestigious colleges and universities. In trying to “force” them to speak English, rather than valuing their home language, I've been accused of being a colonial power – which has been applied to my broader choice of working within international school settings.

Is it possible to have a classless society? Is is possible to have a classless school in a classist society? Since our society is formed around notions of class and learning how to maneuver (through education) in a higher class than which one was born in allows a person to earn more power, prestige and money – is education, which supports a white, middle class mentality a bad thing? Should schools be shooting for teaching upper class mentality?

In looking at science fiction and fantasy stories, the only way to achieve classlessness is to take things away from people. In “"Harrison Bergeron" by Kurt Vonnegut, people are made to look and perform at the lowest possible level by attaching “handicaps” to limit their physical appearance or abilities. Athletic people receive heavy weights, beautiful people wear ugly masks, smart people receive electric shocks to interrupt their thinking. Yet, still, there is a rule class of the people who determine the “handicaps.” In The Giver by Lois Lowry, people are assigned jobs, marriage partners, children and housing by a central authority. They are taught to be polite and unquestioning and even have the ability to see color taken way – all in the name of sameness. In the The Twilight Zone episode “Number 12 Looks Just Like You” (1964) when people reach adulthood, they are encouraged /pressured into choose a new body form from the dozen or so approved, beautiful bodies, which means no one is more beautiful or ugly than another. In Wall-E, all of the “work” of daily life is taken away from humans and given to robots – even walking. As a result, humans become fat, lazy and ignorant. All of these images of a classless society are pretty grim.

So, what is the alternative? If there is no working class, how will “dirty” jobs get done? Without monetary and prestige awards, who will choose to devote themselves to long hours of study and practice to become a doctor?

References

Bourdieu, P. (1986). Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste, trans. Richard Nice. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

Seuss, (1978). I Can Read with My Eyes Shut! Random House Children's Books.

Hollywood's View of Teachers: Teachers (1984)

Comedy has to be based on truth.  You take the truth and you put a little curlicue at the end. ~ Sid Caesar

Like any good comedy, the humor in the movie Teachers (Russo & Hiller, 1984) is based on some truth, with some exaggeration. The stereotypical portraits of teacher-types - the lackadaisical, the authoritarian, the crazy (literally and figurative), and the incompetent – can be seen in most large schools, which is what makes them so funny. Yet, the message of the film, that in an urban school, education is reduced to “ get as many through with what we've got,” is quite serious.

Although slightly exaggerated, I've met teachers who could be the origin of the movie's stereotypical teachers. Mr. Stiles, also known as Ditto because of the massive amounts of worksheets he copies, has a clockwork-like atmosphere in which the students are trained to preform to the bell, without teacher interference. In my first year of teaching, the social studies teacher, who had been teaching for twenty years, made a point to tell me that he had made enough purple ditto copies to last until he retired. It seems he didn't like the new-fangled xerox machines and planned ahead. He showed me his lesson plan book, which was planned out from the first day of school and looked remarkably like the year before. “Students look forward to this unit every year,” he explained when showing me the geography unit based on planning a family trip. Even though the students generally liked him, there was little incorporation of student interest and experience and he was on a strict schedule – snow days were a great interference. This is the type of teacher who values the content over the students, and probably looks at teaching as just a job, not a professional calling. Ayers (2004) believes that teaching is an ethical practice. Ditto's version of the classroom removes any ethical decision – just a factory model of input/output. Many students do well in this classroom because it is predictable and routine, yet, there is little room for creativity and critical thinking. Lamentably, this is what many schools apply to student populations who are considered at-risk. Kylene Beers, a teacher and current president of the National Council of Teachers of English, reported on one urban school she visited. The principal reminded teachers and students that they were supposed to stay in their seats and do their work:

• He stared at me and, with no hint of a smile, not even a grin, explained, “Some kids—those out there heading to class right this minute so they aren’t late” he said, nodding toward the bus lot now filled with kids streaming into school, “learn best with rules. Rules and structure. We give it to them.” And then he walked away. He didn’t say it unkindly, that comment about “those” kids. With reflection, I realized he said it with sincerity, perhaps concern, and certainly with conviction. Somehow along the way, he had concluded that those kids, those kids whose lives are lived in the gaps—the poverty gap, the health care gap, the nutrition gap, to name but a few. . . those kids will do better if we just require that they stay in their seats. Those kids just need some structure. And we do them a service, a good service, by giving it to them.(Foster & Nosol, 2008, p. x)

When most children play school, this is the image they strive for and the quiet, dutiful stuffed-animals fulfill the role of passive students happily. However, in the twenty-first century, real students are messy bodies of hopes, fears and insecurities with great potential that shouldn't be limited by drill-&-kill activities. Eventually, Ditto has a heart-attack and each class period runs like a well-oiled machine. His body is not discovered until the end of the day. If only the rosy-image of the silent classroom could die as easily.

Returning to the film, Carl Rosenberg is a well-meaning but inept teacher who can't control his classroom and has his desk stolen as a joke. Unfortunately, I've had and met too many teachers who fit this description. My fourth grade teacher would regularly give us “the talk” which was a guilt-trip wrapped in her tears and would inspire good behavior for a few hours. In eighth grade, my math teacher had a short-temper and it became a class challenge to make her walk out on the class. As a teacher, I heard a music teacher shout, “Shut up!” at the top of his lungs frequently to attempt to get students' attention, which was quite disruptive to me since my classroom was right next door. This type of teacher is also immortalized in the children's book, Miss Nelson Is Missing! in which the nice teacher, Miss Nelson, resorts to becoming Miss Viola Swamp, a mean and ugly teacher, in order to get the children to behave (Allard, 1985). The basic message to the movie-goer, the student in the classroom and the reader is that nice teachers can't control a classroom. The myth of “don't smile until Christmas” has been repeated to many new teachers since before my aunt began her teaching career in the early 1940s. How terribly disheartening for the prospective teacher!

In the movie, the most engaging teacher was Herbert Gower, a mental patient who is mistakenly hired as a substitute. He uses role-playing, costuming and drama to help students “see” history. Unfortunately, he is found out and taken away by men in white suits. Regrettably, I have not personally seen this type of teacher in any school I've been in, but I've used the Teachers' Curriculum Institute's History Alive program, which incorporates many of these ideas. I've asked my students to form a tableau of scenes from history or literature and take the perspective of the person/character they are portraying. Sometimes, I read or see news pieces about teachers like this, usually couched in terms like “outstanding.” I would agree, that getting student attention is an important part of teaching, yet what a teacher can do with it then is the grunt-work of teaching. Anyone can tap dance for five minutes. Activity based learning, for the sake of the theme (teddy bears) or activity (salt dough maps) is meaningless without solid content, critical thinking, and continuous assessment. It is the marathon dancer who wins the prize.

The protagonist of the film, Alex Jurel, is a burnt-out social studies teacher with a idealist past. The system – too many kids, too many problems, too many administrative demands, and too little support – has turned him into a teacher with frequent absences, few lesson plans, and little enthusiasm for his job. The students like him, because he is the most “real” person in the school, and, I would guess, an easy grader. RateMyTeacher.com was built for students to find teachers like this – the ones who will give the A without much work. The teachers I've known like this tend to be very personable – bringing their passions (sports, music, movies) into the classroom, but without much thought about content or pedagogy. One social studies teacher I taught with had CNN running all the time in his classroom, claiming “current event” studies. His tests were easy, reading was done in class, there was no homework, and most of the grade was based on class discussion. Students generally liked him, and like in the movie, the students in trouble gravitated toward him when needing help, which also got him into trouble. On the positive side, when school was over, he left it at school – which is something more dedicated teachers could learn from. On the negative side, I've also seen this type of teacher get too friendly with students and become drinking buddies or sexual partners. At the end of the film, Alex Jural finds a cause he thinks is worth fighting for – his job. However, he redefines his role as an advocate for the troubled students.

Early in the film, Alex Jural hangs out with a former teacher, now vice-principal, Roger Rubell. They lament to each other how the kids don't care, the system is overwhelmed and they aren't paid enough. When Jural shows signs of trying to change the system, Rubell says, “Your job is to get them through school and keep them out of trouble.” (Russo & Hiller, 1984) The pessimistic message of the movie is that in an urban school, there are no individuals, no great aspirations, just the basic skills and babysitting. Even though the end of the film is seemingly optimistic, Jural finds inspiration again in teaching, in anticipating the next possible actions, it really isn't. His fiery lecture to the board of education would most likely lead to suspension, then a lengthy mediation, and possible trial – none allowing him to teach. His involvement in taking a minor to an abortion clinic could result in other charges. Ultimately, nothing in the school would change. 

That, I think, is the more subtle message. Urban schools have grown in size and problems, but because of the student population, lack of parent support, and inner-city location, nothing can be done. In the end, it is a fairly depressing conclusion, one that isn't necessarily true. However, the counterpoint doesn't make good cinema.

References

Allard, H. (1985). Miss Nelson is missing! Sandpiper.

Ayers, W. (2004). Teaching the personal and the political: Essays on hope and justice. Teachers College Press.

Foster, H. & Nosol, M. (2008). America’s unseen kids: Teaching English/Language Arts in today’s forgotten high schools. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Russo, A. (Producer), & Hiller, A. (Director). (1984). Teachers [Motion picture]. United States: MGM/UA Entertainment Company.

Class, Codes and Control Vol. 3 ~ Basil Bernstein

Whole language vs. Phonics. Teacher-centered vs. Student-centered instruction. Uniforms vs. No dress code. Back to basics vs. Project based instruction. When Counts (1932) proposed the idea that teachers could be the foundation of major social change, he didn't really address the conflicting pedagogical debates that have been major battlegrounds in the last half-century. Teachers are expected to identify themselves within a certain “camp” in these debates, and the real victim are the students, especially those of low socioeconomic status. As Bernstein, says, “Conflicting pedagogies have their origins within the fraction of the middle class and so an unreflecting institutionalizing of either pedagogy will not be to the advantage of the lower working class.” (1975, p. 19) I experienced this at one of my schools, when we attempted to update the curriculum guides. Between six teachers, we couldn't even agree on the basic language of categorizing English/Language Arts instruction, so no progress was made on the revisions. Therefore, the next year, a curriculum coordinator was hired and standards and benchmarks were “borrowed” from other districts and imposed on us and our students. What should have been a congenial, reflective conversation between professionals, turned into a dictate from administration. In the end, very little changed within instruction, as teachers continued to do what they always did, the curriculum guides were made “pretty” for accreditation, and the victims were the students.

Basing his observations in the 1970s in the UK, Bernstein seemed very optimistic when he pronounced that, in his view, schools were moving toward a more integrated type of curriculum in which students and teachers had more control over the type, timing, and form of instruction. However, I disagree, viewing the current movement, both in the US and UK. Sure, in some schools, or some classrooms, this may be happening, but on the whole, with NCLB the US is moving to almost a national, standardized curriculum, and the UK already has it with explicit Key Stages. At one of my schools, we had student teachers from the UK who were stymied by our lack of “curriculum guides” which would spell out what, how and how long to teach subjects. The idea of “lesson planning” was so foreign to them, much less the idea of being able to choose topics, materials, and methodology. When I first began teaching middle school English, the curriculum guide specified what books to use and how many days to spend on each topic – which corresponded to the 180 days allotted (not allowing for assemblies, snow days and other interruptions). My mentor teacher happily handed me the grammar book, vocabulary book (don't write in it, have the students copy out the answers), literature anthology, and spelling book. The goal was to keep the kids in their desks, occupied and under control. When I look at Berstein's model of “Types of involvement in the role of pupil” (1975, p. 44) as applied to teachers, I think I fell into another category. I did not accept the means of the instrumental, nor did I accept the means of the expressive order – but I did accept the ends of both, as was officially stated in the handbook.

Thus, I made it my goal to rebel/reform. I asked for real novels to read and instituted writer's workshop. The school was moving to a more “middle school model” which Bernstein would define as “integrated curricula,” and I guess I was the vanguard. I switched classes with the science teacher for a unit. Spearheaded an interdisciplinary week in which all content areas teachers sat together the plan the curriculum, materials, and activities of the week and all teachers taught something that was not their specialty. The students, previously in tracked classes, were assembled into heterogeneous small groups to complete research of their own choosing. Although I think I made in-roads in changing the “that's the way we've always done it” mindset, I was not there long enough to see it to its full fruition.

Unfortunately, as I am supervising student teachers, I seem to see more of the traditional, “collection type” of curriculum being fostered, especially in schools where the majority of students are of low socioeconomic status. Bernstein (1975) states that the task of the school is to get students to a position where the family accepts and supports the means and ends of the school and the student becomes fully involved in the school. I would guess that many of the parents were either detached or estranged during their schooling, which would promote the same, or alienation in their own children. I've heard several responses to this, such as the one cited by teachers interviewed by Kylene Beers:

Those kids, well, they live in such turmoil at home that we provide structure, quiet, orderliness, here at school . . . . Students here need to get the basics; we don’t have much time with them when you look at all they need to learn, so we must drill the basics into them. They do better with strong discipline . . . . Some kids can handle the higher-level thinking discussions you might see in other schools, but not the kids here; the kids here haven’t had anyone show them how to act and so we do. We demand they sit still and answer questions and they learn how to do that. (Foster & Nosol, 2008, p. x)

I've actually had teachers say to me, “Well, if the kid doesn't want to do his work, what can I do about it? I have 20 other students who want to learn, so if he want to put his head down on the desk, I'll let him, at least he isn't disruptive.” Or, “None of these kids complete their homework. I can't lower my standards, so they get zeros. If they were motivated, they'd get the work in, I give them more than enough time to do it in class.” From my experience, too many teachers were the fully committed students when they went to school, and can't wrap their minds around the idea that a student might be detached, estranged or alienated by the school. And, there isn't enough pre-service attention to how to work with kids that don't fit into the current system of education. In fact, some teachers express relief at having a “problem child” truant, as it is easier to conduct the rest of the class. (Which, although it seems I am pointing fingers – as the old adage says, “When you point your finger at someone, three fingers are pointing back at you.” I'm as guilty as any other teacher.)

However, Berstein (1975) does give some hope:

In pluralistic societies like ours, where there are many and conflicting images of conduct, character and manner, and where technological change is rapid the school system is subject to many pressures. These pressures are translated to the pupil in terms of the character of his role involvement. The external pressures of the society as a whole are crystallized out and felt and experienced by the child in terms of each of these five roles he moves towards. The school system need not necessarily be a passive mediator or, at worst, an amplifier for these general social pressures. (p. 49)

If the school does not need to be a mediator, nor an amplifier of societal pressures, what then can it be and should it be? Returning to Counts, what is the new social order in which the teachers should be uniting to form? Is it possible to have a truly classless society in the modern era? And should schools be the catalyst?

References

Bernstein, B.(1975). Class, codes and control, vol 3. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.

Counts, GS (1932). Dare the school build a new social order. New York: John Day.

Foster, H. & Nosol, M. (2008). America’s unseen kids: Teaching English/Language Arts in today’s forgotten high schools. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Imperial Colonialism through Literature and Schools for Everyone

In a small way, I sympathized with McCarthy's (2005) experience of Anglo-American Culture War through “imposed canonical literature . . . imperial symbolic” (p. 9) Several years ago, I taught at an international in which most of my students were from European countries. Within my tenure there, the school moved from a mostly American curriculum to mostly British. It seems the reason was budgetary – it was cheaper getting supplies from Britain than from the US. So, we instituted The International General Certificate of Secondary Education (IGCSE) program, which is an international qualification test/curriculum, developed by University of Cambridge International Examinations and is equivalent to Britain's GCSE.

As an American teacher, I was a bit uncomfortable with the narrowness of the novels, poetry and drama selected for study. Although the list is revised each year, and this current incarnation does include famous American authors such as Harper Lee, Lorraine Hansberry , the nod to non-British authors is just in passing, through Chinua Achebe and Anita Desai, and certainly nothing contemporary. To score well on the IGCSE test (5 essay questions in about 3 ½ hours) one must be able to read and interpret for literal meaning, context and deeper themes in the literature. These tests are than sent to Cambridge to be scored. As McCarthy said, “Power as exercised in culture takes devious routes.” (p. 8) As I look back at that experience now, I realize that the IGCSE is just another form of British colonization. Cambridge, “one of the world's premier universities” is dictating curriculum to hundreds of schools around the world, and mostly in the name of “getting ahead.” According to the Cambridge International Examinations (CIE) website, “CIE qualifications are recognised [sic] throughout the world. At CIE we are committed to ensuring that university admission offices, colleges, employers and professional bodies around the world understand the value of CIE qualifications.” (www.cie.org.uk/qualifications/recognition )

I had one American student resist this imposition, by writing nonsense sentences on the test rather than attempting it. As I read Lee (2005), I recognized many of the issues she addresses in local schools - minority students resisting the values of a middle-class education through passivity, absenteeism, or blatant rebellion. But, I wonder how schools can use “the opportunity to (re)construct definitions of America and Americans to reflect the diversity of the United States” (p. 144). This means much more than multicultural education and having African-American month. Although countries outside of the US have definite ideas of what makes an American an American (overweight, rude, naive) , this conversation has not been had within the US. I think that the view of the US as a melting pot has changed to be a patchwork quilt, with each group (racial, gendered, political) taking its own square and defending it – THIS is what it means to be an American! Again, as Lee (2005) said, “In an increasingly diverse society, it is imperative that schools teach all students that there are multiple ways of being American” (p. 144).

However, here is my dilemma, how do we create schools that work for everyone? This phrase is bantered around, meaning different things in different contexts. For some, it means provide technical education programs; but I mean it as an educational system that will genuinely allow everyone to discover their true potential and then be able to achieve it. Another problem, as worded by Tabachnick and Bloch (1995), “there is difficulty determining which features of “culture” are significant and should be changed in school” (p. 205) And, if something is changed to support a few, would this change not impact a few others, maybe negatively?

"The task is not so much to see what no one yet has seen, but to think what nobody has yet thought about that which everyone sees" - Arthur Schopenhauer (1818) – German philosopher

References

Lee, S. J. (2005). Learning about race, learning about America. In L. Weis & M. Fine (Eds.), Beyond silenced voices: Class, race, and gender in United States schools (Rev. ed, pp. 133-146). Albany: State University of New York Press.

McCarthy, C. (2005) English Rustic in Black Skin: post-colonial education, cultural hybridity and racial identity in the new century. Policy Futures in Education, 3, 4 413-422.

Tabachnick, BR, & Bloch, MN (1995). Learning in and out of school: Critical perspectives on the theory of cultural compatibility. In BB Swadener & S. Lubeck (Eds.). Children and families “at promise:”Deconstructing the discourse of risk. Albany: State University of New York Press

Education and Power – Michael Apple

According to Apple (1995), the process of education is both a reflection and producer of the dominant culture, in which the goal is to sort and select people in order to maintain the current system of unequal distribution of power in the society. Looking at education through this lens makes me almost embarrassed to be a part of it. Since the school is an arm of the state, that would make me a complicit lackey of state sponsored indoctrination and segregation. As I was reading, I was reminded of The Simpson's episode in which Homer becomes a member of the Stonecutters and finds that this secret society is responsible for controlling everything from the British pound to the Oscars. If education is so totally controlled and controlling, what's the point of trying to change anything – the “secret society” will just make sure it doesn't happen?

Throughout Apple's (1995) book, practices that I have engaged in came to mind which illustrate the market-driven aspects of education. I have purchased and used “school to work” materials in order to make school seem “relevant” to students who are not “college bound”. In making this statement, there are so many embedded assumptions that I've never examined. Why must I prepare students for the work world? Who determines what skills are needed and relevant? How did the student become a “not college bound” kid? How did I determine that I needed to choose materials to help them on this path? Another time, I assigned an interview and report in which students selected a person working in a job they hoped to get eventually and find out what types of literacy was required. Again, in an effort to make English class “relevant” I turned to the world of work, essentially saying, “This is what school is preparing you for.” Again, I was unconsciously a lackey for the state.

So, I am led to ask, is there any school system that does not support the government/culture in which it operates? Is there really a “better” way of doing school? As Counts (1932) determined, all schools indoctrinate or “influence” their students. He suggests that as educators, we need to be more aware of what influence we are expending. One way to do that is to look at how the students are resisting our influence – which points to areas of conflict between the expectations of the dominant culture and the needs of the minority culture. But then, what do we do with this knowledge? Can school truly serve the needs of everyone? And should it try?

Although the actors within the educational system, both students and teachers, have supposed agency and the ability to resist, during this reading, I didn't feel very hopeful. Even the length of chapter 6 indicates this – at only 12 pages, it recognizes that “neither vision nor strategy is possible, on a mass basis, unless the cynicism about social change that now pervades American politics and culture can be overcome” (Peter Dreier, as cited by Apple, 1995, p. 157). This would entail not only reforming the educational system, but taking on the working world – to encourage and education people and companies to institute truly democratic policies. As was stated early in the book, we don't need democratic schools (which most schools profess to be, yet are actually autocratic) but rather centers of democratic engineering – where the democratic process (rule by and for the people) is the goal. It is clear that in America capitalism has overcome the ideals of democracy, and this is where the transformation must start. But, there is the question of the chicken or the egg? Does the transformation begin in the school to affect the culture, or in the culture to affect the school?

References

Apple, M. W. (1995) Education and Power, 2nd edn.New York, Routledge.

Counts, G. (1932). Dare the school build a new social order? New York: Arno Press & The New York Times.

Position on Literacy

What is literacy? The basic definition is reading and writing and a hundred years ago that would have been true. However, literacy has changed in the 21st century. To be successful in the modern world, a literate person needs to do more – they need to evaluate, interpret, analyze, synthesize, and respond – not just to words – but numbers, images, video and graphics, and in a variety of contexts. In addition, the amount of information available increases exponential every year. There is no longer a single expert, but a community of experts. Knowledge is no longer something to be attained, but instead, found to be used in practical purposes. A silent classroom indicates teacher control and rote learning, but the job world demands active, independent and collaborative participants who can manipulate information and communicate it clearly. With a changing definition of literacy, classroom instruction need to adapt to reflect the new demands of literacy.

Reading and writing are social events. Teachers need to create opportunities for students to actively interact with text and each other.

Piaget believed that when individuals cooperate, socio-cognitive conflict occurs that creates cognitive disequilibrium, which prompts new perspective-taking and advances cognitive development. Vygotsky showed that social interaction plays a fundamental role in the process of cognitive development through the teaching of a More Knowledgeable Other (MKO), often an adult, and learning occurs when the task is within the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). To extend the idea of Vygotsky's more knowledgeable other, Blatchford et al. (2003) feel that, “pupil-pupil or ‘peer’ relations, as developmental psychology has shown (Pellegrini & Blatchford, 2000), can be an inherently motivating context for action and learning. In contrast to adult child relations, they are more horizontally organized and power is more likely to be evenly shared.” (p. 159) In addition, peers understand each other more directly, which may help them achieve intersubjectivity,which, according to Vygotsky, is the shared understanding of something. 
 

Conversation is an important part of learning. Students need opportunities to discuss what they are learning. One example of this is Literature Circles. Harvey Daniels(1994) pioneered the use of Literature Circles in his book of the same name. Small groups of students read the same text and each student receives a specific role, such as Discussion Director, Passage Picker, Word Wizard, Connector, and Summarizer. When the students get together to discuss the text, each student presents their role and encourages discussion from the rest of the group. Students end up discussing the same ideas that the teacher would assign as questions, though since it is student generated, they feel more ownership for the work. Eventually, students are weaned off of the roles to more book club-like conversations. Through conversation, students are able to gain different perspectives of the text and each other.

Writing and reading are about making meaning from and with text in relation to personal and cultural goals and experiences. The goal of the literacy teacher is to help students clearly communicate their ideas and understand the ideas of others.

Gallagher (2003) gives nine reasons for reading, and none of them have to do with standardized tests or isolated phonic skills. Reading is: emotionally and intellectually rewarding, builds vocabulary, makes you a better writer, makes you smarter, prepares you for the world of work, financially rewarding, opens the doors to college and beyond, arms you against oppression and is hard reading is a good challenge. In the past, the illiterate person was one who physically could not sign their name or read a document. In the future, an illiterate person will be one who can, but chooses not to read or write.

In order to be literate, people need to be able to teach themselves. Not the old version of literacy of just reading, writing, and arithmetic. The new forms of literacy includes evaluation and research skills plus understanding graphics and video. Students will be doing most of their reading online, so they will need to know how to evaluation the bias and information presented on the pages. They'll need to know how to backtrack on a webpage to find the author or organization of the webpage. Our current model of education assumes there is an authority with the correct information – often a writer, teacher, professor, researcher, or encyclopedia. However, that is no longer true. Although books continue to be published, much of the information that students encounter comes from the internet and anyone can put up a website.

What does it mean to be a reader in the 21st century? It isn't just reading the text, but also finding information, decoding text, images and multimedia, critically evaluate the information and organize the information. Mitchell Kapor, a computer engineer and developer of Lotus, said, “Getting information off the Internet is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant.” People can make and share websites and bookmarks. They are also using arrogators that automatically find information based on a personalized list of topics. To be a skilled reader, a student must be able to wade through reams of information to find the specific information needed and apply it to a new situation.

Writing will always be an important skill, however the genre of writing is changing. Blogging, wikis, emailing, and other forms of writing are emerging. Communication is becoming more multimedia and not just text. The successful pieces of information are those that get the reader's attention. Therefore schools need to be teaching students how to work with images and video with the images, text, and music working together to create powerful messages.

Graphic organizers can help students not only take better notes from their reading or to organize their writing, but they also organize those notes, present information in an orderly manner, and structure their thinking process. The general definition of graphic organizers is “a visual representation of knowledge that structures information by arranging important aspects of a concept or topic into a pattern using a label (Bromley, et al. p. 6).” Graphic organizers can be used before studying a topic to activate prior knowledge. During a study of a topic, students can use graphic organizers to order their notes, compare characteristics, find relationships, or learn new vocabulary. After studying a topic, graphic organizers can also help students demonstrate their learning. The same graphic organizer format can be used before, during and after studying a topic with just only a slight change in the focus.

Reading and writing are both cognitive processes with several recursive stages. 
 

In the past, teachers would assign an essay and expect the students to intuitively know how to get a finished product. During the 1970s, writing was seen as a process and teachers were encouraged to treat it as such, with pre-writing, drafting, revision, editing and publishing as a linear progression. However, professional writers see the process as a more nebulous operation, which changes based on the type of writing, subject, and even personal events. Although it is important to teach students different forms of pre-writing and planning and how to revise and edit, teachers need to recognize that the process is different for each student and possibly, for each writing task. Tony Romano (2005), teacher and author of several books, believes that language has tremendous power: writing describes the world, argues for what we believe, frames our thinking, and changes how we think. Believing that you can fill the empty page takes faith and fearlessness. The choice of words determine how we think about things. All writing is creative – even forming an argument and describing a chemistry lab. The creativity is in the choice and arrangement of words. Language is the mother, not the handmaiden of thought. Schools need to help students understand the power of language and develop fearlessness in using it.

Being able to accurately decode text is only the first step in truly being able to read. The reading process is quite similar to the writing process and requires actively engagement of the mind. The reader plans to read through setting a purpose, previewing the text and activating their prior knowledge and then begins to read. While reading, the reader visualizes, questions, tests hypotheses, and makes connections to the content of the text. During and after reading, the reader gets confirmation of his/her ideas and then may share ideas and responses with other people. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Tis the good reader that makes the book good.”

Reading and writing are intimately entwined – one informs the other. Francine Prose, an American writer with over a dozen novels, a half-dozen non-fiction book and three collections of short stories, wrote a book Reading Like a Writer. “Like most, maybe all, writers, I learned to write by writing and, by example, from books.” (2006, p. 2) Writing during reading helps the reader become more cognizant of their own understanding of the text and their connections to it. After reading, writing helps cement the story in the reader's mind. For many writers, reading good literature helps them find solutions to their own writing struggles.

Speaking, listening and collaboration are essential aspects of literacy and must be modeled, taught and practiced.

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills was formed in 2002 by leading technology businesses such as: AOL Time Warner Foundation, Apple Computer, Inc., Cable in the Classroom, Cisco Systems, Inc., Dell Computer Corporation, Microsoft Corporation, along with the US Department of Education and National Education Association. Since that time they have added over three dozen large companies, businesses and educational organizations. The goal of the group is to “serve as a catalyst to position 21st century skills at the center of US K-12 education by building collaborative partnerships among education, business, community and government leaders” and it has “developed a unified, collective vision for 21st century learning that can be used to strengthen American education.” Within this context, the Partnership has identified communication and collaboration as part of the “skills, knowledge and expertise students should master to succeed in work and life in the 21st century.” This is defined as:

• Articulating thoughts and ideas clearly and effectively through speaking and writing.
• Demonstrating ability to work effectively with diverse teams.
• Exercising flexibility and willingness to be helpful in making necessary compromises to accomplish a common goal.
• Assuming shared responsibility for collaborative work (Partnership, 2004)

Often speaking and listening get cursory attention in the curriculum and are lumped in with giving presentations and read alouds, but good speaking and active listening takes skill and practice. Coming into the classroom, students are primed and pumped to talk, but are not often aware of how they present themselves and view listening as a passive activity. Students need to have the opportunity to present themselves in a variety of situations – large and small group, form and informal, different genres of speeches, and including the teaching of techniques of body awareness and voice projection. It is estimated that people retain only 25-50% of what they hear, which means most people lose 50-75% of the content of any conversation – which would include classroom discussion and lecture. Learning active listening skills will have an impact on students' personal life, scholarly pursuits and career achievement.

Conclusion

"Our doctors don't treat patients using 19th-century medicines, and our teachers shouldn't educate students using 19th-century learning models...Today's students need to demonstrate knowledge of core subjects such as reading, math, and science—but they also must learn additional skills, including critical thinking, decision making, problem solving and communication, and the ability to adapt to a changing world." (The Partnership for 21st Century Skills, 2004) 

Ian Jukes (2000), author of Windows on the Future : Education in the Age of Technology and NetSavvy : Building Information Literacy in the Classroom, stresses the need to reform teaching and learning to reflect the profound changes happening in society. He describes seven exponential trends and how these trends effect culture and education. He believes that 21st century learners need to be effective problem solvers and information fluent. A successful problem solver: 1) Defines a problem 2) Designs a solution 3) Does the task with the appropriate tools 4) Debriefs to see if the solution corrected the problem. A fluent information user: 1) Asks the right questions 2) Accesses the data 3) Analyzes the information 4) Applies what has been learned 5) Assesses both the process and the product.

Recognizing these social, cultural and informational changes, the modern classroom MUST adapt to give students the skills and attitudes which will be demanded in their future. It is estimated that the current generation of workers will change careers ( not just jobs) at least a dozen times. That means that the traditional goal of education – filling minds with content – is truly irrelevant. Schools need to teach and encourage students to be thinkers, planners, researchers, visionaries, and their own teachers.

References

Blatchford, P., Kutnick, P., Baines, E., and Galton, M. (2003) Toward a social pedagogy of classroom group work. In Blatchford, P., and Kutnick, P. (Eds.) Special Edition of International Journal of Educational Research, 39, 153-172.

Bromley, K., Irwin-Devitis, L., and Modlo, M. (1999). 50 graphic organizers for reading, writing, and more. New York: Scholastic Professional Books.

Daniels, H. (1994). Literature circles: Voice and choice in the student-centered classroom. Stenhouse Publishers.

Jukes, I. & McCain, T. (2000). Windows on the future : Education in the age of technology. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Partnership for 21^st Century Skills. (2004). Retrieved November 15, 2008, from: http://www.21stcenturyskills.org/

Prose, F. (2006). Reading like a writer: A guide for people who love books and for those who want to write them. New York: Harper Collins.

Romano, T. (2005, November). Middle school mosaic presentation. National Council of Teachers of English Convention 2005. Pittsburgh, PA.

Hollywood, Education and Globalization

In the 1999 film The Matrix, the main characters have ports in the back of their heads in which information can be downloaded. Within seconds, they can access information like jujitsu fighting or flying a helicopter. Yet in this world in which anything is possible and everything is learn-able, the characters are still seeking “The One” who will set them free and they use a Oracle to find it. In many ways, this describes our current educational system. We continue to try and download information into kids, but we are looking for “The One Way” which will make education fair, equitable and accessible to all.

I've been pondering the idea of paideia for quite some time, though I may not have called it that. As a novice teacher, I was concerned about the content I was teaching. My assigned mentor was very traditional – with grammar, vocabulary, literature, and spelling all scheduled out each week. Yet I knew there should be more. I stumbled on Harvard's Project Zero and the idea of Teaching for Understanding, which, in brief, “ says that understanding a topic of study is a matter of being able to perform in a variety of thought-demanding ways with the topic, for instance to: explain, muster evidence, find examples, generalize, apply concepts, analogize, represent in a new way, and so on.” (Perkins, 1993). While attending the 2002 Project Zero Summer institute, I heard a lecture by Howard Gardner based on his work on The Disciplined Mind:What All Students Should Understand. He proposed that schools are dehumanizing education through the focus on standards and teaching. Instead, study should focus on the ideas of truth, beauty and goodness. When I returned to my classroom, I began planning backwards – What major understandings did I want my students to demonstrate at the end of a unit? Then, more importantly, how would these understandings make them better people? At a time that affective education was antithetic, I was embracing it.

“Paideia - In ancient Greek, the word paideia (παιδεία) means "education" or "instruction." Paideia was the process of educating humans into their true form, the real and genuine human nature. Since self-government was important to the Greeks, paideia, combined with ethos (habits), made a man good and made him capable as a citizen or a king. This education was not about learning a trade or an art—which the Greeks called banausos, and which were considered mechanical tasks unworthy of a learned citizen—but was about training for liberty (freedom) and nobility (the beautiful).” (Paideia, 2008)

When I look at Hollywood, the directors have already embraced this trend. Dead Poets Society (1989) encouraged students to "suck the marrow out of life" and throw away the institutional format of reading poetry. Dangerous Minds (1995), Freedom Writers (2007) and The Ron Clark Story (2006) showed that students need to see meaning and purpose to their education – but also, part of education should be about becoming fully human – empathetic, creative and purposeful. 
 

According to Vavrus, education in Tanzania is moving toward social constructivism in order to foster a more democratic society. She quotes Richard Tabulawa who states that too often classrooms in Third World countries are authoritarian, which does not support development of democracies. Yet in her research, Vavrus found a disconnect between what the system says it values and what it actually values. The skill and drill form of instruction dominates because skill in isolation is the focus of test. When pre-service teachers were confronted with the idea of student centered teaching, they mostly rejected it on the basis of “What's going to be tested?” This argument is not unfamiliar in the United States. As wonderful as the student-centered, constructivist, humanistic paideia idea of theorists and thinkers sound, the reality is that teachers/schools are being judged by the test performance of their students. Until the system goals match the system's evaluation method, there will be this struggle.

Hollywood even understands this disconnect. In the 2006 release Accepted, the main character, Bartleby is rejected for every college, although his grades were good. To forestall disappointing his parents, he creates a fictional, South Harmon Institute of Technology. However, when his parents actually want to see the campus, he is forced to really create a school from an old building. With the help of his friends, they fix up the building, create a website, and enlist the help of a burn-out drifter to be the director. When “opening day” arrives, they find themselves with hundreds of students (all rejected from other schools) at the door. Although it is a comedy, the important part of the story is how the curriculum is developed. The students write on a large board what skills and ideas they have and what skills and ideas they would like to have. On the board they find their own teachers and classes and learn from each other. In the end, the school receives a provisional license to try their experiment in education. 
 

If Hollywood is articulating our society's desire for change, and making money off of it too, why aren't we listening?

References

“Paideia.” (2008, November 2). In Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved November 13, 2008 from

Perkins, D (1993, Fall). “Teaching for Understanding,” American Educator: The Professional Journal of the American Federation of Teachers; v17 n3, pp. 8,28-35.

Vavrus, F., The cultural politics of constructivist pedagogies: Teacher education reform in the United
Republic of Tanzania. Int. J. Educ. Dev. (2008), doi:10.1016/j.ijedudev.2008.05.002