Re: emotional bonds/education

Robert Bahruth (rbahruth who-is-at claven.idbsu.edu)
Fri, 13 Feb 1998 10:20:34 +0100

Peter, I'm not sure we disagree either. What I feel is important is that
teaching include consideration of the affective domain of the learner. Too
often I find teachers in classrooms who pride themselves on their content
area expertise, yet the learning of their students is minimal because the
pedagogy only considers the cognitive domain. I know f far too many
students who leave classrooms with the attitude that they never want to
think about or read about the subject again. And this is just as likely a
comment from an A student as it is from one who does poorly. The prime
example for me is foreign language teaching, although I feel it would be
justifiable for math, science, linguistics, or most any discipline. I feel
many students walk away self-diagnosed poor language learners and certainly
the majority remain monolingual despite the rigor of the language program.

With the coaching metaphor, it is precisely the competitive dimension that
concerns me, at least in public education of content areas and languages.
I think one of the best ways to create deep structural changes would be to
get rid of grades. This is why we've had 100 years of school reform and
nothing has changed at all. I think we make cosmetic changes but the deep
structure remains untouched. Have you read Frank Smiths's essay, How
Education Backed the Wrong Horse"? It is in a book entitled Joining the
Literacy Club by Heinemann. He argues that we would have done better to
align education with the science of anthropology rather than psychology way
back in the late 1800's. It is a compeling argument that almost carries
over into the quantitative/qualitative discussions of educational research.

Thanks for your comments. I hadn't considered the symbolism of the Penn
State uniforms before. roberto