Over the years, I have been writing about misconceptions regarding the schooling process. The purpose of these posts is to explain why I disagree with various comments that I have heard people make about schooling. These are meant as personal thoughts rather than conclusive proof, and I will admit that I'm not always the best at explaining my thoughts. Regardless, I have decided that I should be willing to share these posts when I encounter someone online who makes an argument that I have already discussed.
Teachers are very quick to credit themselves for everything their students learn. For example, if you are literate, it must have been thanks to your teachers. The problem with this kind of credit is that being around schools is insufficient to prove how someone learned.
This is not just an issue with our K-12 system. Almae matres like to point to their graduates as proof of the great job they are doing. They conveniently fail to establish that any component of success was because of them.
Of course, this issue of credit doesn't have much meaning if we only look at how the schools praise themselves for the accomplishments and skills of their former students. Education is ultimately the responsibility of the learner. Even if the schools are successful, it is completely irresponsible for them to ignore the role that students play in their own educations.
Getting back to the literacy comment, being in school does not prove that students did not learn through other means. In fact, some teachers credit their profession every time they encounter someone who is literate. This has turned into a cliché, "If you can read this, thank your teacher." Although most people go through our forced schooling system, there are exceptions. It's clear that not all of these exceptions are illiterate. Despite that piece of common sense, teachers won't hesitate to credit themselves for literacy among those who have never been to school.
How about me? Although I went through the schools, it is actually clear that I taught myself how to read and write. The fact that I attended school does not change that. Even so, teachers will be quick to insist that my literacy would not have happened without them.
All of this goes to something that I have been saying for years. There is nothing that can be learned in school that can't be learned elsewhere. Literacy and other sources of teacher pride predate the schools. The idea that teachers insist that they are solely responsible for learning along these lines is absurd. To put it another way, your teachers could not learn on your behalf. You did that. Give yourself at least a little credit.
There is one final thing that I wanted to mention. Teachers have not been entirely consistent in regards to who is responsible for whether or not students learn. I have never heard the argument, "If you can't read this, blame your teachers." Teachers take full credit when learning is successful, but they also pin the entirety of failures on their students. I have been referring to this as selective logic. By that, I mean that what they believe is inconsistent depending on what matches preconceived notions. We should not let them have it both ways. We need to make them provide a consistent answer to, "Who is ultimately responsible for whether or not a student learns?" Unlike them, I have already answered that question.
No comments:
Post a Comment