Reflecting upon the readings we have discussed thus far, Gatto’s article where he talks about his opinion in which he believes our education system is crippling our kids, was a stance that I agree with for the most part. His opinion of encouraging the best qualities out of our students youthfulness, such as helping them use their natural qualities of curiosity, intrigue and their sense of adventure and adapt into our schooling system contrary to what is in place now . His suggestion of offering more flexibility and being able find the natural path of insight for each individual student wouldn’t just help our students become more fully rounded adults but also help them become more integrated in our society with the education they received.
I was really struck by his opposition of Ingles’ 6 functions, especially the selective function in which it discusses how the school systems application to “the favored races.” Where students are sorted into certain branches creating an inferiority, which then translated into the jobs they have options for, and is a fundamental force in what drives our economy. Instead of using alternative methods in helping the students who are tagged unfit find their niche, in learning things that are crucial to their respective personalities and ideas. But instead these students become neglected and tainted with poor grades, that doesn’t help advance who they are as people but instead giving them a leftover role of our socio-economic structure which only benefits those that weren’t subjected from the very beginning of their education as well as other external factors.
Personally, I agree with a lot of Gatto’s points because it highlights the main issues with our education system. When I was in Middle school, most teachers taught class in a traditional textbook format, but in one class, all of the assignments where open ended and designed to create an environment where critical thought and reflective discussion where more important and overshadowed the sorting functions of grades and tests. As I look back on my time in that class I see that I learned a lot more valuable information not only about the material but as well as myself , opposed to the more the traditionally taught classes that where much more frequent in my k-12 public school life.
Chris L.
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I really liked Gatto's essay as well. When I was in school I had a lot of textbook classes but in high school I had one teacher that taught a very open ended class. She let us pick our topics and let us run with them. The class was small and because of that nobody had any problem with doing a speech, we were talking about what we were interested in talking about. A lot of my friends in class are still friends with the teacher to this day. Also everybody aced that class, passed it with flying colors.
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