I kind of read the responses (with exception of Gordon's I think) as saying
that the question makes no sense for differrent reasons: How do we know
what a "best" is ( how do we know what a good is, how do we know what
a bad is could also be asked). Doesnt what is good depend on what people
are trying to do? Isnt it all, so to speak, context specific?
It can be anticipated that I would have a lot of sympathy with these
and other questions raised. But I had a paradoxical reaction. For a long
time I have read of the efforts of people on this list to understand
how to organize kids instruction so that, for example, they learn how
to read, how to do arithmetic, how to think critically, etc. That is
certainly what people argue they are trying to do when they get money
for their research.
What is the point of research on classrooms and schools and development
and communities, etc. that we are doing if we have as an apriori
conclusion that we cannot generalize from beyond individual cases?
I think I know how to make the argument for restrictions on generalizibility
and there is a fine tradition that claims there should be none expected.
Is that what people think? Is it irrelevant to understanding educational
processes that 90+ percent of classrooms use recitation scripts with
known answer questions and activity-centered education with the properties
that Gordon is valorizing exist only now and again? Does Ellice's
work showing that kids thought to be able to engage only in Drill and Kill
that is tracking them downward are capable of complex discursively
mediated education amount to no more than a parlor trick, or the imposition
of middle class standards on kids who are going to be tracked down
no matter what?
I do not mean to presuppose a correct answer to this question for myself
or for the group. Its just that so much of the response so far says that
we should not be taking responsibility for the study of the effects
of our interventions or observations of others' interventions that it
makes me wonder what we do take responsibility for.
mike