Socratic Seminar Ticket

Heidi Hanover
ENG 297
Dr. Mueller
Socratic Forum Entry-Ticket
12 October 2007

1. “The Child and the Curriculum” by John Dewey

• Passage: “Not knowledge or information, but self-realization, is the goal. To possess all the world of knowledge and lose one's own self is as awful a fate in education as in religion. Moreover, subject-matter never can be got into the child from without. Learning is active. It involves reaching out of the mind. It involves organic assimilation starting from within. Literally, we must take our stand with the child and our departure from him. It is he and not the subject-matter which determines both quality and quantity of learning” (Dewey 187).
• Explanation: Dewey appears to believe that instead of looking at what students must learn, we should observe how our students learn. An informal way to understand Dewey's concept is to ask an elementary teacher and a high school teacher what they teach. The elementary teacher will usually say the grade level of the students, while the high school teacher will typically state their content area or subject. I completely agree that most teachers weigh content ability more heavily than individual ability, and as a result am worried about how to reverse this trend.
• Question: How can English teachers help students achieve self-realization without compromising content?

2. “Frames of Mind” by Howard Gardner

• Passage: “Life consists of more than the deployment of particular combinations of intelligence for specific educational purposes. I must also point out that these intelligences are not mutually exclusive of one another. Cultivation of one intelligence does not imply that others cannot be acquired: some individuals (and some cultures) may develop several intelligences to a keen extent, while others may highlight only one or two” (Gardner 365).
• Explanation: I chose this passage because it seems many teachers think students should be able to use multiple intelligences to accomplish tasks. Contrary to this common belief, Gardner explains that each student learns differently and as a result, not all students will gain mastery in a single mode of intelligence. While this may be viewed as common sense, it is important for future teachers to realize that their lessons and methods of teaching will rarely, if ever, reach all of their students.
• Question: Gardner explains how some students can develop several intelligences while others may develop only one or two. In a classroom of mixed ability and intelligences, how can teachers successfully encourage active learning for all the students, regardless of intelligence?

3. “The Danger of Softness” by Peter Elbow

• Passage: “Thus when participants used a term like 'child-centered,' they meant something substantive, concrete, and pragmatic: that learning must connect inward personally and focus outward socially—as opposed to being only organized conceptually...This emphasis on the personal and social connects with one of the dominant premises at the conference: that students learn in different ways and often benefit from different kinds of teaching and learning activities” (Elbow 207).
• Explanation: Although addressing the same topic discussed by Dewey, Gardner, and Freire, Elbow's article demonstrates how substantive the divide is between teachers who focus on content versus teachers who focus on their students. The fact that this argument has not been settled demonstrates positively how education is constantly evolving, yet it also causes concern for the students because it is difficult to succeed when there is such a wide variety of teaching practices to learn and adapt to.
• Question: At the conference, the majority of members viewed those who believed in child-centered teaching as unprofessional and naïve. While this may sometimes be the case, should the theory behind child-centered teaching be abandoned in an effort to focus more on content?

4. “Pedagogy of the Oppressed” by Paulo Freire

• Passage: “The students are not called upon to know, but to memorize the contents narrated by the teacher. Nor do the students practice any act of cognition, since the object towards which that act should be directed is the property of the teacher rather than a medium evoking the critical reflection of both teacher and students. Hence in the name of the 'preservation of culture and knowledge' we have a system which achieves neither true knowledge nor true culture” (Freire 61).
• Explanation: I feel Freire is concerned about the validity of content specific methods of teaching. While I agree that rote memorization is a poor and often unreliable method of teaching, I am confused about how it became such a widely accepted practice. I feel the sparse handouts of content knowledge that teachers provide for students are typically unsatisfying and do little to encourage individual thought and development.
• Question: If Freire is suggesting that students can commit information to memory through active engagement instead of teacher narration, why do the majority of educational facilities support lecture based classrooms?

Overarching Question: In light of the multiple school shootings at the hands of students that have occurred in the past few years, do you feel we should focus on our content area to better equip students with the knowledge to succeed in life, or should we focus on the individual and encourage their role as a member in society?

The article in this week's Inbox called "Written Off?" caught my attention immediately after I read the description. A decline in book reading? Well, ok, so that's kind of a "duh" idea. But the article brought up some issues that made me think. The writer focuses a lot on how they think the world of electronics is taking people, especially children, away from the world of books. At one point it mentions the biggest decline in reading is in the age groups of teens and twenty-somethings. They also place this on the increased use of technology, but I am reluctant to accept that. They mention specifically video gamers, but I know a lot of video gamers who still manage to read a heck of a lot more books than me. And personally, my lack of reading is more stemmed from school work than other "after school" activities.
I agree that students need to learn to appreciate reading at a young age, but teachers and everyone else in society need to stop blaming technology for all of this problem. It is just as much the fault of people who ask for the time of young people that we do not have the time to read for pleasure any more.

Socratic Seminar

Amanda Miller

The Child and the Curriculum (Dewey) Page 201
As a teacher he is not concerned with adding new facts to the science he teaches; in propounding new hypotheses or in verifying then. He is concerned with the subject-matter of the science representing a given stage and phase of the development of experience. His problem is that of inducing a vital and personal experiencing. Hence, what concerns him, as teacher, is the ways in which that subject may become a part of experience; what there is in the child’s present that is usable with reference to it; how such elements are to be used; how his own knowledge of the subject-matter may assist in interpreting the child’s needs and doings, and determine the medium in which the child should be placed in order that his growth may be properly directed.
I thought this was an interesting and well thought out example of how a teacher should be concerned about his/her own teaching, and the students learning. It is very straightforward and it is recognizable as something not only employed teacher, but anyone trying to teach something to another person tries to think about while they are explaining or teaching.
Should it be the job of the teacher and ONLY the teacher to interpret the child’s learning needs?

Pedagogy of the Oppressed (Friere) Page 53
This is the “banking” concept of education, in which the scope of action allowed to the students extends only as far as the receiving, filing, and storing of deposits. They do, it is true, have the opportunity to become collectors and cataloguers of the things they store. But in the last analysis, it is the people themselves who are filed away through lack of creativity, transformation, and knowledge in this (at best) misguided system. For apart from inquiry, apart from the praxis, individuals cannot be truly human. Knowledge emerges only through invention and reinvention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other.
It is a good idea to consider that simply giving the students information is not enough, that it does not really spark their creativity. You have to provide them with a way to experience the learning, not just listen to the information.
Do you think there is a way to stop “banking concept” teaching in our country’s schools?

Page 58
Yet only through communication can human life hold meaning. The teacher’s thinking is authenticated only by the authenticity of the students thinking. The teacher cannot think for her students, nor can she impose her thought on them. Authentic thinking, thinking that is concerned with reality, does not take place in ivory tower isolation, but only in communication. If it is true that thought has meaning only when generated by an action upon the world, the subordination of students to teachers becomes impossible.
You cannot make a student take your way of thinking as the only way, you need to show them your way, and tell them to come up with their own version, or own way of thinking about it. It is again about not stomping out the creativity of the students.
Will it be hard for you to NOT impose your thoughts on your students at times?
Do you feel that you communicate well enough to get students to take ideas from you to create something themselves?

The Education of Intelligences (Gardner) page 336
Finally, in certain societies, there emerges a wholly separate class of teachers and leaders – initially religious, later secular in orientation – whose job it is to teach some, or perhaps even all, the youngsters in the community a given body of knowledge. Sometimes the teacher is expected to have an exemplary moral character; though in secular settings, technical expertise has become a key requirement.
Teaching has not always been a career, though that is often overlooked. And in this career you have not always had to have been certified. This is a very good thing to think about as we go in to our careers.
Have you ever thought about teachers as a “separate class?”
Which do you think is more important in a modern, moral character or technical expertise?

The Danger of Softness (Elbow) page 197
Janet Emig: “What are the conditions that all teacher need?” These mentioned: smaller classes, fewer students, more time, support, workshops, leadership.
I hear about this all the time, all teachers think and talk about these “needs” but it is unlikely that most of us will get them.
If you could absolutely have one of the above “needs,” but no others, which one would you rather have?

Socrates say

Cory Burton
Eng 297
Dr. Mueller
10/12/07

For me, then, the conference ended with an important subtheme—ended by sticking up for a side of the profession that often gets lost in high school and college English deparments: play, storytelling, the personal, amateur, imaginative, affective, and informal. I’m not saying that the profession suffers from too much of what is professional, cognitive, analytic, and pragmatic; there cant be too much of those good things—only too little of the other side. Nothing need be lost, but something need to be gained. (Elbow 205)

This passage illustrates the delicate balance that every teacher and professor has to control in the classroom; the balance between keeping things fun and interesting while maintaining a sense of order and not losing the analytical portion of the class.

Education as the practice of freedom—as opposed to education as the practice of domination—denies that man is abstract, isolated, independent, and unattached to the world; it also denies that the world exists as a reality apart from people. Authentic reflection considers neither abstract man nor the world without people, but people in their relations with the world. In these relations consciousness and world are simultaneous; consciousness neither precedes the world nor follows it. (Friere 62)

This passage, however abstract it may be, plays the same dichotomy card in the education world. Prior to this segment, Freire talks of the struggles of students to relate themselves in the world and with the world. Along these same lines here, he tries to put the classroom on a grand scale while still invoking the challenges.

It may well be that, at least in certain contexts, the ability to read and write encourages a more abstract form of thinking, for one can now define terms with precision, refer back to facts and definitions that were presented some time before, and weigh the logical and persuasive elements of an argument. The capacity to employ various symbolized notations enables one to supplement one’s memory, organize one’s future activities, and communicate at one time with an indefinite number of individuals (the set of all potential readers). (Gardner 359)

This may not apply directly to the student-teacher relationship, but it does have a profound effect on teachers helping kids to understand the concept. The process of reading and writing must be taught as a process to help formulate better thinking processes and enhance even more benefits.

Human nature being what it is, however, it tends to seek its motivation in the agreeable rather than in the disagreeable, in direct pleasure rather than in alternative pain. And so has come up the modern theory and practice of the “interesting,” in the false sense of that term. The material is still left; so far as its own characteristics are concerned, just material externally selected and formulated. (Dewey 205-206)
Students and teachers may both try to take the easy way out. Dewey goes on to say that it is easier to leave the information as it is, but sugar coat it to arouse interest and to make it seem interesting. What should really be done however is to apply it to something the student actually cares about, so they can develop and formulate their own thoughts on the process and think for themselves.

Carrie Douglas' Socratic Seminar Preparation

Carrie Douglas
ENG 297A
Dr. Mueller
Socratic Seminar Preparation
October 12, 2007

Passages:

1. Paulo Freire’s “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education”: "Through dialogue, the teacher-of-students and the students-of-the-teacher cease to exist and a new term emerges: teacher-student with students-teachers. The teacher is no longer merely the-one-who-teaches, but one who is himself taught in dialogue with the students, who in turn while being taught also teach. They become jointly responsible for a process in which all grow." Page 61

I feel that this passage is important to teacher-student relationships as it erases the titles “teacher” and “students” that sustain the distance between all those involved in the classroom experience. These titles merely assist in maintaining “banking education.” I also like the idea that everyone is “jointly responsible” in education. After all, I do not think it should be solely the educator’s job to instill knowledge; students have a role in their knowledge attainment, too. Lastly, I love the concept of a “give-and-take” classroom. With open minds, both “teachers” and “students” can instill knowledge and gather knowledge freely from one another.

2. Paulo Freire’s “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education”: "The students -- no longer docile listeners -- are now critical co-investigators in dialogue with the teacher. The teacher presents the material to the students for their consideration, and re-considers her earlier considerations as the students express their own." Page 62

Personally, my favorite professors are the ones who accept all student opinions as options. The worst, most dull professors are those who present a specific text and preach their interpretation, accepting no others. By being open-minded to student opinions, teachers can not only learn from their students but foster a wonderful relationship with students as well. Students will view their teachers as flexible, approachable human beings, which only makes learning all the better.

3. Howard Gardner’s “The Education of Intelligences”: "Authorities generally agree that, outside of schooled settings, children acquire skills through observation and participation in the contexts in which these skills are customarily invoked. In contrast, in the standard classroom, teachers talk, often presenting material in abstract symbolic form and relying on inanimate media such as books and diagrams in order to convey information. Schooling generally treats subject matter that one cannot readily see or touch, even as those sensory modes of taking in information seem singularly inappropriate for most school tasks." Page 357

This passage explicitly states that most of the material teachers present to students is useless. It is in their “presentation” that teachers go wrong. Kids need stimulation, hands-on experience, not charts conveying figures and facts. The role between teachers and students would be more beneficiary if teachers focused on interactive lessons. Don’t teach a student what a plant needs to grow out of a science textbook; let the student grow the plant himself. Teachers gain admiration from their students when they enable such gratifying educational experiences.

4. John Dewey’s “The Child and the Curriculum”: "Every study or subject thus far has two aspects: one for the scientist as a scientist; the other for the teacher as a teacher. These two aspects are in no sense opposed or conflicting. But neither are they identical." Page 200

This passage interests me as I can directly relate it to teacher-student relationships that I have had part in. Of course I understand that my professors are enchanted with and passionate about their subject matter. I know that they delve into the subject for personal reasons (and not just to prepare for teaching the subject). However, it is most detrimental to my learning experience when professors spend class time not conveying information to the class but basking in their own enjoyment of the subject. Don’t get me wrong, I think it is absolutely necessary for professors to love their subject matter, but they must be just as passionate about teaching their area of expertise as they are about learning it. Otherwise, the teacher-student relationship is lacking, and content is not as effectively communicated.

5. Peter Elbow’s “The Danger of Softness”: "And where the wholistic group was often adversarial in stance, the elementary teachers were not. Though they were straightforward and learned, they nevertheless displayed the highest degree of play, metaphor, imagination, and connection of the cognitive to the imaginative. They were willing to risk the charge of corniness. They didn’t fight or get annoyed, and they weren’t particularly pushy…I don’t know why the members of the elementary section were so good in this respect, but perhaps it’s because their job is to work with creatures who so naturally highlight play, metaphor, corniness, imagination, and the connection of the cognitive with the affective and indeed even with the body." Page 204

The previous sentences truly highlight the effects of a teacher-student relationship. The passage above embodies the life lessons that a group of teachers have learned from their innocent, imaginative children. It’s so refreshing to read of the patience and creativity teachers derive from elementary-aged kids. Teacher-student relationships not only play a role inside the walls of schools, but they can also travel with teachers in their interactions with other adults.

Discussion Questions:

1. As teachers, what are some methods that we can use in our future practices to make our role a less “narrative” one (as Freire says)? In other words, how can we create an interactive English classroom?

2. Freire’s article suggests that he practice of simply “filling” or “depositing” is quite obviously not the best teaching method. However, it has been used as an effective method for “teaching to the test.” How do we then, as teachers, manage the pressures of helping our students to pass standardized tests versus helping them to become learned individuals overall?

3. Many of these articles bring to light the idea of students and teachers becoming “equals.” Might we have a problem with maintaining a stable, chaos-free, disciplined classroom if teachers and students are “equals” (and the teacher doesn’t have ultimate control)?

4. Dewey’s article poses two conflicting view pints about ways to view education. One side deems “personality and character” as more important than “subject-matter,” and the other side does just the opposite. Can we ever teach both areas simultaneously?

5. In Elbow’s article, someone remarks, “I don’t teach English, I teach students.” This statement infuriates some at the Coalition Conference. How might we respond to this controversial statement?

Socratic Seminar

Shawn Berger
ENG297 - Socratic Seminar
October 12, 2007
Dr. Mueller

Passage 1:
“Those who use the banking approach, knowingly or unknowingly (for there are innumerable well-intentioned bank-clerk teachers who do not realize that they are serving only to dehumanize), fail to perceive the the deposits themselves contain contradictions about reality. But, sooner or later, these contradictions may lead formerly passive students to turn against their domestication and the attempt to domesticate reality. They may discover through existential experience that their present way of life is irreconcilable with their vocation to become fully human. They may perceive through their relations with reality that reality is really a process, undergoing constant transformation. If men and women are searchers and their ontological vocation is humanization, sooner or later they may perceive the contradiction in which banking education seeks to maintain them, and then engage themselves in the struggle for liberation.”
-Paulo Freire
Pedagogy of the Oppressed, p.56
Explanation:
Freire reads very philosophically but does not leave me with a blank contradicting after taste. I chose this passage because it is here that he begins to explain that the “bank-clerk” teaching method does not enforce what the teacher hopes to achieve, rather it does the opposite. Instead of domesticating the student, this method forces the student to fight the domestication because it is forcing them to just be another number in a desk rather than to be who they are. This is a very important part because it shows that the banking method is totally flawed and that sooner or later students will realize what is going on and try to break free. The problem is that students should not feel as though they are being over powered when learning and be concerned with how to break away from being dehumanized, they should just feel like they are learning without being distracted by conflicts irrelevant to the actual class.
Passage 2:
“‘Throughout his historical course, Homo sapiens has been a “status seeker”; and the way he has had to follow, by compulsion, has been education. Furthermore he has always had to rely on those superior to him in knowing and social status to enable him to raise his own status....instructing the young in the tribal ways is as natural as breathing; [adults] have a vital interest in the children they teach, and they often seem to have even a broader interest in the tribal existence as a whole.’”
-Jules Henry
Howard Gardner’s The Education of Intelligences, p332
Explanation:
This quote stood out to me because in a way it is countering Freire’s stand. Henry is viewing people not as individuals but as a whole; Homo sapiens. He is also regarding teachers as “superior” to students. At the same time this passage does not counter Freire’s because it is saying that the teacher, in this tribal sense, not only has a deep interest in the individual he or she is teaching, but with their existence and interactions as well.
Passage 3:
After explaining the malpractice sect of teachers...
“Not so, says the other sect. The child is the starting-point, the center, and the end. His development, his growth, is the ideal. It alone furnishes the standard. To the growth of the child all studies are subservient; they are instruments valued as they serve the needs of growth. Personality, character, is more than subject-matter. Not knowledge or information, but self -realization, is the goal. To possess all the world of knowledge and lose one’s own self is as awful a fate in education as in religion. Moreover, subject-matter never can be got into the child from without. Learning is active. It involves reaching out of the mind. It involves organic assimilation starting from within. Literally, we must take our stand with the child and our departure from him. It is he and not the subject-matter which determines both quality and quantity of learning.”
-John Dewey
The Child and the Curriculum, p187
Explanation:
Dewey’s point of view is clear and undoubtably correct. Without the student, teaching is nothing. Teaching is not meant to force students to memorize and playback it is meant to serve the child’s growth and development. Learning is part of personality character development. I especially like the line “To possess all the world of knowledge and lose one’s own self is as awful as a fate in education as in religion”. Dewey is saying “What is the point of being smart if you are not well rounded as a person. He also makes the point that learning involves reaching out of the mind. It is not just something in a text book, it is an experience.
Passage 4:
“What I needed in college was not, or at least not just, to bore into my own experience, which, however rich, was nevertheless parochial. What I needed was not self but society...I realized in short that my experience as a student needed to be enlarged by secondary-source knowledge.”
-Bob Denham
The Flight from Complexity, p.196
Explanation:
This quote is relevant to the other passages I chose because it is also about learning that comes from outside the teacher and student. Learning won’t be taken solely from the teacher, it will come from films, photographs, experiences, etc., and most importantly the ones who are around you at any given time. When conversing with others not only do you have your own experiences, views, and ideas to learn from but you also have all of theirs.
Discussion Questions:
1. Why aren’t teacher’s using the “bank-clerk” method corrected?
2. Why do most class room structures make the student out as a number who is not to step out of line?
3. Is it possible for students to run a classroom without a teacher? Not just without a teacher present but without a teacher at all?
4. If students of a class do not have an average that would be considered suit shouldn’t the teacher be to blame? And if found at fault fair measures should be taken, tenured or not.
5. A teacher who is arrogant and pompous obviously distracts students from the importance of the actual class and creates hostility. He or she most likely enjoys this. It is not fair that he or she can not be told of this without stirring up confrontations. How can one get around this? How can his superiors be notified but feel as though it is a significant problem, not just a complaint?

One in five students a minority

In this Sioux Falls public school more than 20 percent of its students are of a racial minority; 1 in 5 students. The school is pleased with this number in comparison to its 5.6% of racial minority in 1991. It is believed by the school and the community that this minority is necessary to provide the students with well rounded learning and keep the class room balanced. "It's good for all people to be aware of other cultures and experience different ways of looking at life" said a local woman. But is she in turn saying that the only way to learn about other cultures is by being in a class with Black, Asian, Indian, and Mexican students? I'm all for natural diversity but it seems as though this school, as well as others, are boosting there diversity for the sake of how it looks and sounds. And just because it looks and sounds well does not mean it is beneficial. If these new students cannot speak English or come to the class with no prior education does that not take away from how the local students learn (not white students, local students)?
Not only is the school trying to boost their student minority but it is also trying to boost its teacher minority. "The district continues its struggle to find teachers of minority races. It has 16 such teachers now, up from 11 last year. But that still leaves the teaching ranks at 1 percent diverse against a district goal of 10 percent by 2010." If the district already has a goal, they will strive to meet these numbers. That seems like affirmative action. Teachers should be hired based on their knowledge and qualification for the job not their skin color. Just because the teacher with the "x" nationality is different from the more common teacher with the "y" nationality he or she should not get the job unless he or she is better qualified.
Again, I am all for "natural" diversity. Natural in the sense that a family moved to the town and their children now are going to that school. I am not for this recruitment of minorities to make a school look better or seem better. I also do not agree with hiring a teacher just because he or she would make the staff look more diverse. If a predominantly Indian fire department hired a Mexican just because they wanted to have a Mexican on the team, but that Mexican knew nothing of firefighting and in turn some one died would it be fair? That is somewhat of an exaggeration, no one will die (hopefully) from a bad teacher, but this is the point I am stressing. Be diverse, be cultured, be well rounded, but not at others expense.