What's the Point?

We've all heard students complain, "What's the point? Why do I need to know this?" Heck, we've all been students in our youth, most likely complaining about the same issues. I'm a teacher now, and I can say it's definitely frustrating having the very purpose of one's own craft questioned by a student, but I'd be lying if I pretended I didn't do this same sort of griping when I was a student. See, I'm not a math person. I've always loved the social studies (so it's been easy for me to find purpose in studying history, government, geography, and the like), but I've never enjoyed math. Looking back, I don't think I was ever particularly bad at math, I just never liked doing it. I never saw the point in it. Sure, I'd use basic arithmetic every day, but when would I ever need to use the Quadratic Formula, or Logarithms, or Trigonometry? Outside of standardized tests (the Praxis, GRE, ACT/SAT, etc.), I've never used anything more advanced than basic algebra or geometry in real life. All of my frustrations with math could be boiled down to me not being able to see the relevance or application of what I was learning. And we're fooling ourselves to think that our students aren't having these same frustrations.

Lost in all the discussion about education reform and effective teaching techniques and the value of assessment and on and on is perhaps the most fundamental question: What is the purpose of school?

What's the point? What do we want students to get out of 12-16 years spent in some form of school? [And by "we" I mean society as a whole, the entire educational system]

Are we preparing students for something? Do we take a utilitarian approach where school and learning are simply the means to an end? You go to elementary school to prepare you for junior high which will prepare you for high school so you can get into a good college and then find a good job where you make a lot of money and are able to achieve "success" (whatever that is, anyway).

There are many who feel that school should serve as preparation for more important things later in life. That the purpose of school is to provide specific skills to land a student that prestigious job. That all schools are in a similar way vocational schools. In fact, this is the factory school model that has been inherent in America since the dawn of public schools (of course, that's a whole 'nother topic).

It seems that there are many in the business world who feel that it is the job of schools to provide their companies with employees who have the specific skills to fit into the workplace. They blame schools for turning out a poor product as the reason for higher unemployment rates among recent college graduates.

But how callous must we be to equate people -- human beings -- with products; to equate schools with factories? I certainly refuse to believe that the job of of the school is churn out future laborers. In fact, recent studies indicate that, despite the assumptions in the above paragraph, students are actually overqualified for the jobs available to them. (Here and here). Additionally, most of the jobs we are supposedly preparing students for don't even exist yet!

So if the purpose of school isn't to prepare the future workforce, then what is it? Should it be to educate good citizens? Citizenship education is one of the traditional pillars of the social studies. In fact, often this discipline is justified as being important because it promotes values of quality citizenship. However, to me this explanation is little different than the business-vocational purpose of schools; it is steeped in assumptions of obedience and preserving he status quo. Perhaps more importantly, it follows the same means-to-an-end motif as the previous explanation.

Well no wonder kids learn to hate school! (Speaking in broad generalizations here.)

These imply school as something to be endured, something to be suffered through, something to be gotten out of. If school is simply a means to an end, then there is no point in continuing with Math if I'm not going to pursue a mathematics-based career. Or Social Studies. Or Science. Or English. Or Art or Music or P.E. or...you get the point. This logic is the equivalent of telling kids, "eat your vegetables now because you'll have to eat them when you're an adult," as opposed to the more effective, "eat your vegetables now because it's the healthy thing to do!"

No, education is a much more intrinsic than extrinsic value. I'm trying to avoid cliches and educational buzzwords, but the purpose of school really should be to instill values of lifelong learning in our students. Learning for life, not because it gives you some reward later in life, but because, quite simply, it is good for you. We are educators, not trainers; therefore, we ought to believe in education as a lifelong pursuit. We believe in learning, we believe in knowledge -- in both the consumption and creation of knowledge. We believe in education as a noble lifestyle. We believe in education as more than one job or career or country can contain.

An enlightened lifestyle -- that is the purpose of school.

The next logical question is: How do we communicate this value to our students? That, too, is a topic for another post. Let me know if anyone figures it out perfectly.

(P.S., from the math-hater in me, here's an interesting article that touches on some of these same issues of the relevance of what we're teaching.)

Expectations

One of the most frequent refrains we hear from school reformers, from school administrators, and from school teachers themselves is that educators need to have high expectations for their students. The logic goes that students will only achieve at a high level if they are held to the highest of expectations. Accordingly, any classroom you can find will have some measure of academic, behavioral, and emotional expectations embedded in day-today practice. While I do agree that educators must hold high expectations for their students, I am beginning to discover that this position might be incomplete.

It is incomplete because it assumes a teacher-centered philosophy instead of a student-centered one. In our educations programs, we newbie teachers are drilled and drilled to provide a classicly Dewey-inspried, "student-centered" classroom. However, in practice (and through our education instruction), this "student-centered" model is not actually student-centered. It is teacher-centered.

When we talk about true student-centric classrooms, we are implying that students have a certain level of autonomy and authority for their own learning. A teacher-centric classroom, then, is one in which the sole authority and autonomy rests with the teacher.

When it comes to expectations, the goal of holding students to higher expectations is entirely teacher-centered. It wrests any authority from the students and places it in the hands of the teacher. It is the teacher saying to the students what is expected. A student-centered classroom, on the other hand, would focus on the teacher working with the students to set classroom and individual expectations.

School culture is generally one of top-down authority, with students at the bottom. Learning is done to students as opposed to with students. No wonder so many students don't learn.

Perhaps the biggest mistake we can make as educators is to forget what it is like to be a student. We've all been students. We've all had certain classess we loved and certain classes we hated. The former were the ones where we felt empowered in our learning. The latter were those that left us powerless. So why do we follow these same authoritarian procedures when we take over a class?

We should always be striving to place ourselves in our students' shoes. So when it comes to expectations, we have not only ours for the class, but we also have our students' expectations. Working with students to compromise these expectations creates a true student-centered atmosphere.

Here, then, is a short clip I ran across on reddit that covers the expectations students have for their education:

Speaking of historical perceptions with that last post, here is another interesting blog post that I ran across via Twitter today. While it addresses a different historical topic, it does a very good job of exploring how we should approach historical "truths."

Mythbusters School Edition: Cinco de Mayo

Cinco de Mayo is quickly becoming another St. Patrick's Day. Increasingly, every May 5th, everyone is a little bit Mexican.

But like any popular holiday, our perception of Cinco de Mayo is rife with egregious myths. This fact alone leads to a particularly interesting, if often overlooked, question (especially in the social studies): how should teachers address common myths and misconceptions in the classroom? Curriculum, textbooks, and even tests present students with half-truths on many occasions. Should we go along with these falsehoods? Should we devote time to debunking them? Should we let students investigate and formulate their own interpretations? Why are we teaching "wrong" history? Who even decides what history is "right" and what is "wrong"?

I can't even pretend to be enough of an expert to begin to fully answer some of these questions; however, I do believe that these are questions not being asked often enough. I am of the mind that we should involve students as much as possible in formulating their own worldviews. Of course, I'm also enough of a nerd that I love debunking common misconceptions; in honor of that, here are a few busted myths about Cinco de Mayo.

Cinco de Mayo is not Mexico's Independence Day. No, that would be September 16 (1810). Cinco de Mayo, rather, is a commemoration of the defeat of French forces at the Battle of Puebla in 1862. It marks the time period of the French Restoration, when Napoleon III drove President Benito Juarez out of office and installed Maximilian I as puppet-emperor of Mexico in 1864. The holiday, then, commemorates a mostly symbolic victory; Mexico won the battle, but eventually lost the war. This Restoration regime lasted only until 1867, when Napoleon III withdrew from Mexico and President Juarez re-established a legitimate government.

Cinco de Mayo is not an Hispanic holiday. Rather, it is a holiday specific to Mexico and even more specific to the State of Puebla. This is not an holiday for the whole Hispanic diaspora; it is specific to Mexico.

Cinco de Mayo is not a huge holiday in Mexico. It's actually probably more widely celebrated in the U.S. than it is in Mexico. In fact, in Mexico, the day is not even designated as a federal holiday. While in Puebla there are military parades and recreations of the event, for most of Mexico today is just a regular day.

And so, to end on a bit lighter (if slightly immature) note, I present to you this pie chart about our perceptions of Cinco de Mayo. (Because who doesn't like pie charts?)

(Source consulted: Cinco de Mayo - The History Channel. http://www.history.com/topics/cinco-de-mayo)

Welcome to the Blog!

Greetings fellow Internet surfers! My name is Tommy Kauffmann, and I will be your guide on this grand adventure we call learning.

I started this blog for a few different reasons:

1) I want to start building my Personal Learning Network. So far I've been using Twitter and reddit to follow other educators; now I am branching out into the blogosphere. (Shameless plug: follow me on Twitter, @kauffmannt. I don't tweet often, but I do follow a number a excellent educators.)

2) As I've been reading about various educational issues on these social networks, while also experiencing the classroom - I just finished up a stint as a student-teacher - I am looking to contribute my own thoughts and philosophies on education.

3) As I build my PLN, I am looking to contribute to the body of knowledge on education. The Internet was designed for sharing knowledge, after all, and that is exactly the purpose of this blog.

The content of this blog will essentially range over two broad categories. On the one hand, it will serve as a place for me to comment on my educational philosophy with regards to current events in the education world. This category is pretty wide in scope, and my goal is to share my thoughts and opinions on educational practices.

On the other hand, this blog will also be place for me to share resources and teaching techniques specific to my content area, the Social Studies. So far, my experience has been limited, having only one semester of student-teaching and two semesters of classroom observations. Limited classroom experience aside, I would like this blog to serve as a central place for me to house different pedagogical techniques. And maybe, if people actually read this, it could also serve as a place to bounce different ideas around.

It is my philosophy that education - and learning - should be both informative and fun. Often it seems that we focus extensively on the former and leave out the latter. Hopefully this will be place that brings those two qualities together.

And with that, let me just say willkommen, bienvenida, and happy blogging!