Boredom. Gatto talks about boredom being everywhere in his world. He goes on to say that indeed even the school teachers were every bit as bored as the students. But then who is to blame for the boredom if we blame them and they blame us. He tells the story of how he was "cured of boredom" A story in which his grandfather told him his boredom was his own fault with no one else to blame. "Do we really need school?" he clarifies that he means the forced schooling, not education. He goes on to question this structure he says : Is this "twelve year deadly routine" really necessary? His answer pretty much connects to boredom, he says, "Well schooled kids have a low threshold for boredom" Also "urge them to to take on serious matter."
I thought Gatto's idea's were interesting. He was in no way saying no to education , but he wasn't saying that the way it is right now is probably the best. What he means by that is the whole structure of what we learn and the amount of time we spend. I guess we can say that he is kinda against it. His idea of schooling and boredom go hand in hand. Boredom comes from not enjoying the way schooling works. Not enjoying the structure that we are forced to go through for a long period of time. So, in order to stop being bored we must figure out a way to enjoy the education, to actually want to learn. I agree with this thought. Wouldn't school be that much better if everyday we are walking in and knew that what we were gonna learn was going to be enjoyable? But then again, is that all it takes? "curing" boredom?
Delpit-
Here we are introduced to Distar lessons. Pretty much it is a way of teaching that focuses on "higher education level critical thinking skill." She goes on to talk about how this way of teaching only helps people who know these skills to exhibit the skills, and those who don't end up "needing remedial instruction." Her idea is that students must be taught the codes necessary to "participate fully in the American life." She goes on to say that the appropriate education for poor children should be consulted with adults from their own culture. She proposes five aspects of power , that is a complex theme.
I don't agree with the whole Distar lesson. I think its a way to make students who "aren't " for any reason able to prior learn these schools feel as though they aren't to the level of others. Its sorta a way to discriminate the "bad" students from the "good." I'm not sure the way its done is the best. Then again we need to keep in mind the fact that maybe some of these students are in need of extra help, or are not yet to the level of others for a and b reasons. Going into the codes she believes necessary , who knows what the codes truly should be? What if her ideas of these skills and codes don't work for everyone , just a certain amount of students. How do we know that, that way is truly, genuinely the right way to start ones education.
Mr.Fanning-
Liberal arts schools was one of the topics Mr. Fanning came in and started taking about. He went over what some people have said and thought about liberal arts schools and what his own opinion is. He also talked about the way schools are resembling the structure of S.OF. , even though "we've being doing it that way for years." Fanning also told s what he believed a perfect education was...¨constantly learning, throught out your whole life, and meeting class goals that are set, BUT having your own goals in mind and meeting those as well.¨ He stated that before school was a way to get ahead , now we have this mentality of we HAVE to go, so we do.
I though what Mr. Fanning had said about what a perfect education is was interesting.
The fact of learning your whole life is sorta intimidating, but when we think about it we learn any way, almost everyday we learn something new. Also the ides of setting our own goals and meeting them is something very important, and that we should and need to do. Its a way of knowing and figuring out what we are capable of and keep going from there. Over all Fannings ideas were things i haave heard before but i can tell he really believes in.
Freire-
*I am not done with this post as you can see, i will be finishing up by tonight , i just wanted to post some work to show that i have been working on it*
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