[Xmca-l] Re: MCA Issue 3 article for discussion Re-started

[mike cole]

Sure Larry - its possible to imagine things starting totally bottom up and
seeking to retain horizontality. I believe that the Scandanavian playworlds
group operates in that manner. A sort of "epidemiology" of practices
approach.

I assume that at its best, it is this sort of local initiative that the
charter schools movement is supposed to be about. "Its best" appears
swamped by ideological concerns that are part of the problem, not part of
the solution, methinks.

mike

PS-- I have cut off the long tail trailing this thread.

On Mon, Dec 5, 2016 at 11:18 AM, <lpscholar2@gmail.com> wrote:

> Mike,
> Is it possible to reverse the order of your question and to imagine this
> 40 year old teacher who as a member of a particular public school is
> presented with an already existing model of organized schooling [along the
> lines of the Finnish nursing model].  The school personnel then have the
> option to also follow this model where the teachers have no hierarchical
> leadership.  This would mean the teachers together must take the curriculum
> [their object in the same way the nurses take as their object a mandate to
> offer community health care] and decide how to teach fractions. No
> guarantee that the non-hierarchically organized school would not continue
> teaching fractions the same old way, but they as teachers would be able to
> decide to teach in an alternative way. For example they could decide to ask
> Molly Shea to give inservice to their learning collaborative [and have the
> freedom to decide this on their own. This recognizes the state as still
> supplying the funding as distributing the curriculum, [fractions] but I can
> imagine the question being generated why teaching fractions to our school
> community is not working as intended.
> The key shift in organizational structure of community health at the
> neighbourhood level began in one model instance. No other neighbourhood
> health team was compelled to enact this non-hierarchical model, but they
> had the option to follow this model. What is significant is that this model
> has become the dominant taken for granted way of offering community health
> care and each patient now sees only two nurses.
>
> So... the premise that I am starting from is that the state grants the
> possibility for a school to elect to operate in this way. That 40 year old
> teacher would have elected to be a member of this alternative structure,
> opening the possibility [the not yet but could be] potential of a true
> learning collaborative that decides how to implement the curriculum.
> At this point a huge leap of imagination, but we do have a living example
> in the re-organization of one country’s community health teams
>
> Sent from Mail for Windows 10
>
> From: mike cole
> Sent: December 4, 2016 1:11 PM
> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> Cc: Noah Finkelstein
> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: MCA Issue 3 article for discussion Re-started
>
> Thanks for forwarding the paper and the additional comments, Molly.
> The more concrete examples we have to work with, including their
> pre-histories and later fates, the better for understanding how to connect
> our theories with concrete instantiations. Working simultaneously at
> different "levels" of the sociopoliticalculturaleconomic system in which
> our model activities are embedded seems an inescapable methodological
> requirement. A tall order. Noah Finkelstein's work appears to be taking on
> that tall task.
>
> Larry -- How would you imagine the Finnish nursing care model would be
> reconfigured if the object of activity were learning to divide fractions
> and the participants were a bunch of 9-10 year olds and a forty year old
> teacher in a classroom where the seats are bolted down and keeping order is
> THE over-riding requirement?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> mike
>
> On Sun, Dec 4, 2016 at 12:26 PM, molly shea <mvshea@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Hi Mike,
> > Thanks for the email. I think the Margaret and Carrie's paper did a great
> > job of defining and describing the fall out of neoliberal schooling
> > conditions. The study found "so-called “high-achieving” students
> > learning-to-the-tests (i.e., to make high grades) and struggling to
> > maintain “good student” identities based in compliant behavior and
> mundane
> > activities." The mundane activities is the part that seems so pernicious.
> > You can almost image being in the interviews with some of the brightest
> > women and men asking "why are we here? what is the point?". The wonder of
> > math and science become narrowly focused on future oriented achievement
> and
> > future oriented identities that suggest someday this stuff won't be so
> > mundane.
> >
> > However I think some alternative sites of learning math and science
> sustain
> > themselves on 1) a better understanding of the history and the people
> that
> > constructed and construct the discipline; 2) a better sense of wonderment
> > (Heidegger) about the possibilities to be surprised, confused, and
> curious
> > about how and why the world has become the multiple things that it is or
> > seems to be; and 3) institutional support that can see a shared value
> with
> > these alternative paths. Your Fifth Dimension is an example of taking up
> a
> > kind of ambiguity and curiosity and unsettled ideas (Medin and Bang
> discuss
> > this in detail on their own terms). Carrie and Margaret's paper does a
> nice
> > job of describing the absence of that wonderment or curiosity. Something
> > they suggest the institutionalized neoliberal education for working class
> > kids has all but left behind for a march towards progress through test
> > scores and the improvements of economic security for those who possess
> > merit in the schooling system. Private schools seem to be a refuge for
> the
> > wealthy. Susan Jurow and I discuss how those who want to institutionalize
> > alternatives must consider the reorganizing of scales to consider how
> other
> > forms of becoming can emerge--forms that work towards equity. I am not
> sure
> > there are many answers in this quick email, but it is something I am very
> > interested in understanding and would love to hear other's thoughts.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Molly
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>