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Anti intellectualism in American schools

So, what was the point of those videos. Did you watch them?

I was actually looking for a video discussing the trend of anti-intellectualism in America. I thought about this after reading a book called the Reading Deficit which discusses the history of American focus on "real world experience" rather than dusty old books as important in life and the general contempt of the educated elite. I wanted to address this issue in hopes to debunk any suggestion that I was lending in the conservative camp in my blogs. I really am saddened to be discussing political ideas but unfortunately most of what frustrates me in education and what leads me to blog about it are the political issues.

There's definitely a contempt for elitists attitudes and a contempt by the academics for experienced but uneducated people. This trend leaks into the classroom. But school politics are quite different and the perpetuation of anti intellectualism in students is far more youth related than politics.

Engrossed as we are in theory and research, our classes tend to overlook the reality of student politics, of the popular trends of youth thought and the effect of those trends on education. Not having been on the breast of those waves myself in high school I really don't know their origin. I hope to discover this through field work this winter.

Claymation

EDU Blogger post as promised...

This short post is dedicated to the only person who reads my posts. I looked into an EDU blogger sit called EdTech Solutions as I was advised. One post really caught my eye. The first was the idea that writing prompts could be detrimental to student's ability to write. The premise of the article was that writting prompts limits the ability of the students because they don't always have the desire to write about what they would feel like if they were the ruler of the world or one of the other such nonsense that they might be required to respond to. As much as I appreciate that new insight, I felt that the idea wasn't convincing enough to my way of thinking about prompts. It stems from the constructivists idea that students need to want to work to do well. I don't see anything wrong with it and I think that whatever helps students learn to write is great. However, it seems to coddle students by refusing to give them prompts or guidelines for fear that they might not be able to get into the prompt. I think a major need for students is to be able to use their imagination when required to do things they don't like.

The Presidential speech to children...

It's been a great summer. I am going to be discussing an edublogger in more detail in my next post but I want to pause a moment and talk about President Obama's address to the students. I've found a copy of it and I've listed it here:


I must confess I haven't read it in it's entirety, but I've skimmed it and with my awesome skimming skills I have got the jest of the speech. In my own humble opinion I think this has to be the best speech he's given. Why? Well, mostly because it is saying all the things that I wanted him to say and therefore it must be good.

But in all seriousness, the speech does several key things.
1. There's nothing political about it. No veiled discussions of healthcare, no poster making of how to help the president to succeed.
2. The president uses his own experiences to illuminate his point. It's not strict platitudes but relatable.
3. He talks about key people who have made a difference and have shown how they are just like the kids. If you don't necessarily relate to Pres. Obama's experience, you can definitely relate to one of the people's examples.
4. Most importantly he's talking about student responsibility. Yes that's right, student responsibility. He's trying to make students care about their well-being and the school environment, their academics etc. I won't deny that the speech could use some deft Licolnisms-- rhetorical devices to make the oration better-- and yes, I do think there might be some other additions he could have made. But the student responsibility item is so important.

So, even though the speech might not be the best he's made, I haven't listened to them all. (how many has he done?). But the substance you can't beat.

"But at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life – what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you’ve got going on at home – that’s no excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude. That’s no excuse for talking back to your teacher, or cutting class, or dropping out of school. That’s no excuse for not trying.
Where you are right now doesn’t have to determine where you’ll end up. No one’s written your destiny for you. Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future. "

That's got to be my favorite part of the whole speech.

As for the political implications of his speech, I understand those who agree and disagree with the idea. I believe that the new administration, like many new administration is inexperienced with the pragmatism necessary to forward a positive political PR. Here are the problems as I see it:

1. Parents. Pres. Obama and his education officials forgot how important the parents are in the students' life. Caring parents often desire to have autonomy with their children despite what the national opinion of their choices are. Observe how Obama himself had his girls put in private schools while promoting the public schools and supporting measures to remove the voucher program which allowed low income parents to put their children in private schools. He may have changed his mind about the voucher program or has figured out a alternate option to satisfy the teachers' union and the parents. But in relation to this address he needed to realize that his election indicated that a little more than half of America agrees with him and a little less than half does not. Therefore his policies will be objected by that little less than half that does not agree. The brazenness of those who put up that silly agenda of asking the students how they can help Pres. Obama with his objectives or promoting that ridiculous video of celebrities vowing the be "servants to Obama" completely ruined an otherwise completely routine situation and has put conservative parents on the high alert. This is probably a good example for teachers in their own practice to consider the parents and their motivations separate from your own opinions. Even if you think its irrational does not mean that it won't occur. Instead of labeling those who object to you as loony you should understand their objections and consider them. Who would object to the president's speech as written? No one. Why didn't the president simply state that he would post the speech and omit the silly suggested lesson plans? Why not carefully write the lesson plans to be about the student's achievement rather than the president's?
2. The uproar I think also has a big chunk in the local autonomy verse the national autonomy in schools argument. A national figure who addresses all the students in the US and has a suggested lesson plan flies in the face of those who aren't for a nationalized education system. The lesson plans, I believe were a mistake. I mean, consider this: teachers are always pressed for time. Encouraging them to do a unit or a lesson plan on Pres. Obama's speech is asking too much. I can understand the idea of reinforcing the ideas by activities but trending softly and not taking up too much class time is what the administration should have done originally.

Not withstanding, though, the ruckus surrounding his speech is a bit unnecessary.
I remove myself from my soapbox. Please let me know what you think.

Summary of Summer

So, I have written four blogs but not one inspired by an edublogger. What I love about the internet is ability to meet people from all around the world. Through our twittering assignment I was able to connect with a lady from Great Britain who is the head of language. I was able to be linked to her blog and she had a wonderful post on how to manage one's time and schedule when dealing with all sorts of internet items like email, twitter, blog posts, facebook etc. Which was helpful because I have a great fear of facebook and the drama and/or waste of time that program can be. While I was reading her suggestions, I noticed that which each post there was an attached podcast thing. When I clicked it, thinking that I would hear her voice, I found that it was some new podcast service that reads the text assigned to you out loud through a computer generated voice. I was thinking about why she would have that on her blog. I wondered at first if she was making it easier for people who were deaf to connect with what she was saying, however they would be able to read, and if they were blind how could they become connected to her blog?

Well this got me thinking about how the technology class has not addressed students with disabilities such as deafness and blindness who would not necessarily be able to use these resources.

But I finally came to the conclusion that since the computer generated voice was clearer and slower than the average person's voice, I assumed that this was a way to help reinforce English skills for foreign speakers.

Overall, a great deal of things to think about.

Working with diversity in the classroom and teaching controversial topics...

Am I insane when I ask if teaching or maintaining diversity in the classroom can be done without causing rifts and discomfort to other people?

I guess where I come from respect and ethical considerations are universal absolute truths which I feel are necessary for dealing with issues socially. I also have this sneaking feeling that my high school education was probably unique and excuse me if I brag, but really a good experience.

There were some bumps as there are at all schools but I remember being mostly respected for my religion and having principals that immediately addressed issues of concern like harassment and were very easy and fun people to talk to. Though I should qualify that and say that I didn't really have many brushes with authority where I was combative so that might factor in as to why I got along so well with them. But seriously, it was a very good experience and I think I should consider how those schools were run when I look for a job. So here is a list of things I remember them having.

1. A school code of excellence that promoted respect and was integrated into all classroom expectations introduced that the beginning of class.
2. Having debates on topics where the teachers had control over the classroom and students had to carefully word their responses to make sure they weren't offensive.
3. A unspoken policy of being generally neutral. One history teacher made it a game for the students to try to discover what his political views were. With the impute of the class he was able to see if he was presenting a neutral stance. We only found out his political views after we graduated. Many of the students were surprised.
4. Respect and accommodations were given to students for whatever reason without much mumbling from the teachers. Many embraced the opportunity to have students learn and become aware of opposing ideas.

Maybe I'm airbrushing my school but because it was such a positive experience for me and others, and because I am stunned to see a lack of what I would consider professional academic standards of ethics, I think I am painting a clear picture.

The main point that I wish to get across is the idea of academic standard of ethics that I think is a necessity of the practice of education on all levels. It is the policy of conveying and teaching information in a neutral, non-opinionated and respectful way. Points of contention will occur but when the teacher is not stating her opinion or conveying her point of view as fact, there is less of a chance that students will act negatively when discussing contentious issues. Academic standards of ethics also includes a substandard of critical analysis and objective criticism that questions even accepted norms, qualifies opinions or views with factual evidence and attempts to portray a full-fleshed-out opposing opinion. Just like in a good persuasive essay, it should be the job of the teacher to teach students to acknowledge the validity of having an opposing opinion, to know the argument and to systematically using factual evidence and persuasive techniques to demonstrate the holes in the argument.

This purely demonstrates academic standards by which students learn critical thinking by questioning all opinions and creates students who develop a deep understanding of philosophical means of persuasion and professional debate techniques to intelligently, rather than emotionally, address these controversial issues.

On student's social conditions

During our discussion, I brought up the idea that the social aspect is most centrally located in the social interactions between the students. I noticed that in most of the talks about how to change the NCLB and in general about the social well-being of the child, it has always been about trying to get them out of poverty. I understand the reasons for the interest; no one would want students to come to school poor or unhappy because of their home situation. But without the government taking over the entire raising of children, this cannot necessarily be stopped by social programs. I believe in extra help programs for these issues like shelters and free breakfast from the local social science groups to be connected to the school so students can use these resources if need be. However, all students deal with the social aspect within schools and therefore it is important to deal with that issues, especially since the school environment is easier to control than the environment at home. Students deal with drama with friends, fighting, bullying, stalking and romantic drama. All of these effect what a student is doing in class, especially on their ability to pay attention. Students are strongly affected by the interactions with students and sometimes really negative experiences with other students can cause really big problems.

I was told that it is really difficult to get rid of these problems in the classroom, that if a teacher is focusing on that aspect as a teacher it might detract with teaching regular information. I don't believe that is true. If you reinforce the idea that all students are respected in your classes it is relatively easy to keep correcting wrong actions while focusing on the academic aspect of the school. For instance, the teacher could assign people into the groups for small group projects rather than the students themselves to make sure that the students aren't leaving anyone out. Or the teacher could talk about how if students leave someone out or don't agree to work with certain people that the students would be kept after the bell. No kid wants that so everyone would quickly get into groups and to make sure to include everyone. Even if this is an affective way of stopping students from excluding people, it would be better for the students to reason out why this is right and work hard to follow the idea to respect their classmates.

Motivation and detrimental effects of labeling children's achievement levels...

This poem has been one of my favorite poems. Though after reading it I tend to get teary eyed.

It is called "The Average Child" by Mike Buscemi,

I don’t cause teachers trouble;
My grades have been okay.
I listen in my classes.
I’m in school every day.
My teachers think I’m average;
My parents think so too.
I wish I didn’t know that, though;
There’s lots I’d like to do.
I’d like to build a rocket;
I read a book on how.
Or start a stamp collection…
But no use trying now.
’Cause, since I found I’m average,
I’m smart enough you see
To know there’s nothing special
I should expect of me.
I’m part of that majority,
That hump part of the bell,
Who spends his life unnoticed
In an average kind of hell.

post reflecting on class so far

In this post, I am considering the design of the classroom that I drew yesterday in class. I feel that I focused more on classroom management than on technology. I decided to put the students' desk in the shape of a V with a large rolling chair in the middle. I had a overhead, smart board in the front of the class, a mini computer center in the back corner and in another back corner I had the "publishing room" where the technological tools for "publishing" the students' periodicals and projects will be. If, that is, I have to resources to provide that for the students. It could simply be a copier printer and a staple.

I know that this class, being aptly titled, Education and technology in the classroom, will be a bit bias towards putting technology as the center focus in the classroom; thus encouraging teachers to use every kind of updated media possible. However, I am going to pick and chose.

I am not interested in congesting the focus of the classroom with technology especially if I have to strain my mental faculties trying to figure out how it could apply to my classroom. I desire technology to be complimentary to the learning.

As a future English teacher, I aim to focus on how technology can help my students in that area of expertise. I am particularly focused on the subcategories of English, namely literature, vocabulary, grammar, and writing.

For the literature aspect I think I would like to have a program where students can read ebooks where they can practice writing in the text, highlighting key points, noting problematic passages or themes, and noting vocabulary words and sentence style. I am still going to be using books but since most books are not kept by the students, this ebook idea might allow them to really interact with the text and could be another source in case they forget their book at school.

For vocabulary, I was thinking of using the transparencies for the kids to make concept maps for chosen vocab words as a part of their vocab and spelling assessment. Each would do a thorough job on one and present it to the class. Afterwards they would take a simple multiple choice test either using the bubble sheets that are graded by a machine or worked online. (I would want a program that saves their answers so I could view them and make sure the machine did not make any mistakes). After that, I think a program that allows them to practice spelling techniques rather than a workbook might be a nice way to save paper but I don't want that to take up all my time. I also will demand that they take off the spell check on some of their papers so they can learn to check spelling for themselves.

For grammar, I would probably use a smart board and overhead, (as I probably would for most lecture sections) to talk about the parts of speech, again allowing students to make transparencies where they examine a sentence for part of speech, style, syntax, diction etc. I might even assign practice problems through a website that they would have to copy their results and send to me. (Or I could be the teacher connected with the program.)I would also have a large dry erase board and perhaps a small one for each students. I know that dry erase boards aren't really technology but they are fun to use. And allow students to write and erase their answers without using paper and allows me to see their progress.

Finally for the writing section of the course, I would definitely use technology. I would want my students to write their papers on the computer. I would try to use the tract changes to grade the papers, though their might be times where I would ask them to print out their papers to bring to class. I would still do a great deal of writing in class where they have to do writing on paper in preparation of the SAT and AP test and because thinking in this medium is good for students. I would also use a microphone to give verbal feedback. It's really an easy program on my computer but it's a great way to get students to listen and feel individual attention is given to their papers. I might assign my students to listen to podcast of literary importance or online radio programs. I also would want to work with my students on different ways to plan creative or larger essay writing. One way is to talk the ideas out. I might have one assignment where the students are required to record themselves either by tape or CD or through a podcast, talking about their ideas and questions about their paper. ( I would provide guidelines for them, questions and points they'd need to address). I also might show them the program where they can talk through a microphone and the computer writes down the words. Sometimes that can be helpful if a blank paper causes a mental blank.

I am also going to be encouraging my students to read and write articles for journals, magazines, newspapers and other written media. I might have them create a creative blog but what I really want to do is to have a literary magazine and newspaper that is produced by the class at large and printed and distributed to their classmates. I think it serves many purposes. First, students can feel a sense of pride and accomplishment when they get their papers in, doing homework assignments will have more relevance to their lives, they will see the practical application of the things they learn in class and it will encourage them, hopefully, to read literary media on their own.

I know that was a long blog for our first assignment, but I'm really getting inspiration and ideas. Please comment and I applaud you for reading such a long passage.;)

My first post

This is the first post of my new MAC blog.
fun stuff.