>... I found the article
>alarming. Here in the U.S., a diatribe against "nature/fun,"
>child-centered, whole-language, constructivist, etc. pedagogies
>invokes a very powerful political right-wing.
since I was not sure of this, just suspected it from my meagre
knowledge of present politics in the US (also, I never heard of
the "whole language" program before I re-entered the x-family
space).
As explained in my comment to Phil's review, I see some symptoms
of the phenomena that Stone posits as pervasive facts of the US
also here in our country, and therefore had reserved my judgement
as to the wrong-headedness in general of that article.
On the other hand, my family tradition on mother's side always
has been "developmental" insofar as "if you don't do it out of
your own insight then it's no use to force you" was the constant
verse sung by my mother, accompanied by the proverb "Man kann ja
nichts erzwingen" (there's no possible way to enforce anything).
This family was a mixture of Austrian architects and engineers,
and Hugenot mothers and housewifes, my grandfather a surgeon.
At age 50+ I must say that I could have made good use of some
clearer cultural constraints as regards ability to do routine
work, to be productive at reproduction tasks at home, to follow
rules even if they are clearly silly from a programmer's viewpoint.
Also, my two sons tell me about the same unfulfilled need in their
childhood (the early seventies)...
"It will haunt us until way into the third generation..."
See?
Arne.