Sorry that I haven't followed this thread to know who said what when but...
>Instead, try to expand their view of education... (Ricker)
I put a little twist on the original question when I asked my students last
night. First I asked them - informally, and not as a paper-pencil test -
what the purpose of a college education was, and received the usual
responses dominated by utilitarian views. Then, however, I asked them what
they thought teachers want students to think the purpose of an education is
for. At first there were a couple of joking replies (salary, job security -
that is, our salaries as teachers...), but with little apparent effort they
came up with the answers that most of us like to hear: curiosity, learning,
self-improvement, and so on.
Offhand I don't know what this means except to say that many students
already CAN entertain an "expanded view" of education, even if it's not
habit. Of course, it's possible that some of them never thought about
education from the teacher's point of view until the moment of being asked
(it was an intro-level class), but still they didn't have to try hard to
figure it out. (It's also possible that some heard the answers of others
prior to giving their own responses, but again - they didn't have to think
long about which of the above was the correct answer.)
I guess one of the questions then is: If students know the types of
attitudes that teachers prefer students to have in the classroom, why don't
they exhibit these? Why can they afford to discount the teachers'
expectations of student attitudes towards education? (Okay, that last one
was assumptive, but it appears that this is taking place.)
And I'll also guess that one of the answers is that the corporate world
that plays such a central role in our culture and society has a helluva
greater influence on them than we do.
The only solution I can imagine - other than appeasement - is to work on
something that will help convince some of them at least that our attitude
towards education (i.e., finding it valuable to take the time to understand
"sensory preconditioning, Osgood's surface, or whatever" - Roig) is more
valuable to the corporate world than is their mostly immediate-utilitarian
attitude. Of course, this assumes that our attitude IS valuable to the
corporate world (and not just to the republic or their family lives or the
communities they live in or this entire remote tiny solar system and so on).
--> Mike O.
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Michael S. Ofsowitz
University of Maryland - European Division
http://faculty.ed.umuc.edu/~mofsowit
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