Eric,
Thankyou for clarifying your thinking. There are a number of points I would
like to make. But first - to clarify misunderstandings you seem to have
about me. I am not a teacher in an institution (although I used to be long
ago). However I do now work with such institutions for about a third of my
work. I also invite you not to privilege yourself by making assumptions
about my experience. I have a chronically and profoundly schizophrenic
step-daughter (who is now 32 years old, and who I have known since she was
18 and newly afflicted) whose experience has led me to deep and long term
involvement with the mentally ill on an unpaid basis. Professionally my
organisation has recently been helping to reorganise and reorientate state
provided educational services for the deaf, the blind and the intellectually
disabled here in New Zealand.
(1) If you mean formal educational institutions by 'contrived educational
environments', then I do not agree with you that they do not need to exist.
I suggest that such a proposition is a denial of the precepts of CHAT.
Schools and colleges are a fundamental cultural historical inheritance of,
now, every country on earth. One may or may not agree with you that they are
an inadequate solution to the challenge of mass education, but even if one
accepts your position about them, to suggest that they do not need to exist
and that they could be eliminated in any short time period is, I suggest,
unrealistic. Before they might not exist there would have to first be a
social and political agreement that this should happen, and then a
fundamental reordering of society to accomodate the consequences. Neither of
these are in any immediate - or even distant - prospect. Therefore,
concretely and pragmatically, they must and will continue to exist.
If it is the case that institutional education is inevitably with us for
some time to come - because they are culturally and historically embedded -
then what are we to do for those generations of students who will still
experience them? I accept what you may say in rebuttal - that we risk
legitimating and prolonging bad practices by seeking to optimise their
performance. So you and I are thrust back into the eternal revolutionary
debate. Clearly, then, our world views are irreconcilable. I will continue
to do what I do, and you will continue to be wearied by it. Others will
judge who has best assisted humanity.
(2) I celebrate and affirm your work and the way you do it. That is in no
way connected to my views expressed above, and it in no way leads me to
reassess my own commitments. I am pleased that the mentally ill young adults
you work with had that opportunity. There are few ways in which similar
young adults in NZ could have access to such an experience.
(3) You say that you have never been inspired by any institutional teacher.
That is your experience. I have been so inspired. Furthermore, if I am asked
to name the practical, concrete, skill (beyond basic literacy and numeracy)
I learned in my youth which has contributed most to my working life, my
answer is that it is the disciplne of writing a formal essay. This was
learnt in the abstract and ascended to the concrete. I do not agree with
your statements about concreteness if they are meant to be absolute and
exclusive of other modes.
(4) I believe that there are some teachers and theoreticians who believe
that it is possible to control how individuals come to their own
abstractions. I am not one of them. Nor, as far as I can see, are any of the
teachers who participation the debates in this forum. If your statement
means that you believe that to teach in an institution means that this is a
belief that you must hold, then I disagree with you.
Phillip Capper
WEB Research
PO Box 2855
(Level 9, 142 Featherston Street)
Wellington
New Zealand
Ph: (64) 4 499 8140
Fx: (64) 4 499 8395
-----Original Message-----
From: MnFamilyMan@aol.com [mailto:MnFamilyMan@aol.com]
Sent: Sunday, 22 July 2001 06:33
To: xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
Subject: Re: active learning/teaching at the 7000 level
Phillip,
I will not except 'contrived educational environments' as a given. They
do
not need to exist. I do not teach in that method and would refuse to work
in
a setting that required it of me. I work with mentally ill young adults
in
the real world settings of work, home living, community participation and
recreation. For example I just took 4 of them on an overnight camping
trip.
The reality of being in the woods and having to work as a team is
something a
classroom does not provide no matter how much theorizing one approaches
the
lesson plan with. If your method of instruction is based in similar
reality
contexts then I will not assume you to be an ivory tower academician. I
have
never been inspired by any High School or College teacher, my inspiration
has
come from people I have participated in real world activities with. Boy
Scout leaders, freinds I have gone skiing with, working on houses with my
dad, so on and so on. All learning should begin with concrete activities
and
end with concrete products. The abstraction that takes place between
these
two events is unique to an individual. It is the ivory tower thinkers who
believe they can 'control' how a person comes to that abstraction.
Something to chew on,
Eric
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Aug 01 2001 - 01:01:19 PDT