> "The critics have come closer to the answer by suggesting that this > style of teaching persists because it gives teachers power. With power > comes security: the security of controlling the classroom agenda, of > avoiding serious challenges to one's authority, of evading the > embarrassment of getting lost in territory where one does not know the way > home. Teachers are unlikely to relinquish such power even in the face of > students who hunger for another way to learn.
I don't think it's the teachers who decide this. It's the people who design the curriculum. From the experience of my daughter, who has just finished high school, the only options the teachers have is whether to be nice or mean to their students. She's had both kinds, but has somehow managed to find her way through the system. Ed Weick > > From http://www.newsscan.com/ > > WORTH THINKING ABOUT: WHY DO TEACHING METHODS CHANGE SO SLOWLY? > Wondering, "How can we account for the persistence of a mode of > teaching that has so many critics, so many obvious faults?" author Parker > J. Palmer explains: > "Some say that lecturing, assigning readings, and giving tests is > simply the easiest way to teach, and that teachers (like everyone else) > will take the line of least resistance. Others argue that mass education > has forced this method upon us: how else do you teach a class of two > hundred except with managerial techniques? Still others blame educational > economics, pointing out that our underfunded schools are unable to buy the > time or staff necessary for more personal and interactive modes of teaching > and learning. > "All of these explanations are factual and reasonable, but nothing in > history would ever have changed if facts and reasons could not be overcome. > Laziness, conceptions of efficiency, and budgets are not forced upon us by > cosmic superpowers. They are all matters of choice, and we always have the > freedom to choose otherwise. Why do we not choose otherwise? Why does this > pedagogy persist? > "The critics have come closer to the answer by suggesting that this > style of teaching persists because it gives teachers power. With power > comes security: the security of controlling the classroom agenda, of > avoiding serious challenges to one's authority, of evading the > embarrassment of getting lost in territory where one does not know the way > home. Teachers are unlikely to relinquish such power even in the face of > students who hunger for another way to learn. > "But that is only half the story. Students themselves cling to the > conventional pedagogy because it gives them security, too, a fact well > known by teachers who have tried more participatory modes of teaching. When > a teacher tries to share the power, to give students more responsibility > for their own education, students get skittish and cynical. They complain > that the teacher is not earning his or her pay, and they subvert the > experiment by noncooperation. Many students prefer to have their learning > boxed and tied, and when they are invited into a more creative role they > flee in fear. > "The conventional pedagogy persists because it conveys a view of > reality that simplifies our lives. By this view, we and our world become > objects to be lined up, counted, organized and owned, rather than a > community of selves and spirits related to each other in a complex web of > accountability called 'truth.' The conventional pedagogy pretends to give > us mastery over the world, relieving us of the need for mutual > vulnerability that the new epistemologies, and truth itself, imply." > *** > See http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060664517/newsscancom/ref=nosim > for "To Know as We Are Known" by Parker J. Palmer -- or look for it in > your favorite library. (We donate all revenue from our book recommendations > to adult literacy programs.) > > > _______________________________________________ > Futurework mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
