Ken Robinson talks about changing our education paradigm. Count me as one who believes in expanding our idea of how to teach, and what to teach. If you ever found your education experience to be dull and enervating, rather than stimulating; or if you object to “drill and kill”; or high-stakes testing; or an education absent humane values … do take a look.
If you’re talking about education, you’re talking about a lot more than just imparting the qualifications for a person to land a remunerative job. You’re talking about what it means to be human.
And creativity, after all, often turns out to be pretty lucrative.
Discuss
4 Comments. Leave a comment below.Time to face some truths about "education."
Thanks for posting, Charley. This is one of the best analyses of the education morass which I have ever seen or heard. It should be required viewing for all so-called school administrators.
There's lots
to recommend here. The Factory Model extends to the union, and the management of schools, not merely the arrangement of rooms similar to the arrangement of cells in a prison. The unions are factory-model precisely because schools are factory model. People who want to change the unions without changing the schools are bound to fail. Let’s say that again: You can’t change unions, and make them do management activities like evaluation and discipline successfully without changing the school, it’s arrangement, its power centers and its use of human resources.
If you want professional teachers, you must professionalize education.
Excellent video
I couldn’t agree more. and Pablophil’s bringing the unions into it is absolutely appropriate. I just had a very negative experience during a school meeting about my son and how a union contract is actually guiding what resources I can have to support my child. I realize now that the problem is as much teaching to the contract as it is teaching to the test.
This video hightlights how outdated and ineffectual our current system is. Will it change? Probably not. There is not enough real desire to make this work for the kids. All changes made seem to put priority on budgets and teacher’s contracts. Once those needs are met, there is no room for what’s best for the kids.
I strongly
doubt the assertion that the contract affects student treatment. Unless you want professionals to work for nothing, that is. I’ve seen just about all Massachusetts contracts…a few AFT contracts I have not seen…and there is little possibility in the assessment above.
Quite frankly, school department policy has MUCH more effect on student treatment and outcomes. I have been saying for YEARS that a teacher’s working conditions are a student’s learning conditions.
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