Personal Curriculum Platform

Educational Issues

Before taking this class I had spent little time thinking about the aim of
education and I never thought about how education was formed. Now, when
I look at education through the lens of school as a social construct that was
developed by white, wealthy men, it has given me a new perspective through
which I see education and its aims. The critical issue that I wrestled with is
was what is the best way to teach skills and content to prepare our students
to reconstruct society.
I have been a teacher for very few years, and all I have experienced in
education is No Child Left Behind, standardized testing, and AYP as the
trademark of our nations efforts to improve education and our society. I
have seen aims in education that have been skewed to the point of cheating.
I have seen scripted teaching, rote memorization, and the dulling of interests.
However, within the readings I have found a far different picture of education.
The images painted by Dewey and Noddings reveal more about what the
aims of education should be and have blared our current shortcomings.
These visionaries write about an education that relies heavily on
students interests and individual talents to be strengthened by education. As
opposed to conforming students and dulling interests by focusing on a few
core subjects like English, writing, and math, they both write about critical
thinking and questioning within a variety of subjects. Dewey and Noddings
both discuss the aim of education to be a vehicle for reform. It is through
thoughts and images that I thought about the aim of education for myself.

Aims of education

My aim in education is to help students grow personally and socially
within a diverse community to learn essential skills to be applied for the social
good. I believe school is a place for students to find out who they are,
explore their interests, learn how to express themselves, and critically think
through big issues with guidance and scaffolding. It is equally important for
the student to learn how to work within and care for a community for the
good of society. These aims are not separated but very connected. As a
student grows, and is educated, it is not solely for the betterment of the
individual but also to be used to help society progress.
One of the problems I see with our current education system is in the
effort to standardize school we are conforming students and crushing
individual interests. As Rousseau saysEach individual is born with a distinctive
temperament.We indiscriminately employ children of different bents on the
exercises ; their education destroys the special bent and leaves a dull
uniformity. (Dewey, 1916) I believe we must teach large enough themes that
leave open room for interpretation in creation and a space to explore
individual interests. Through this students will learn at a deeper level and
retain the information at a greater length. It is crucial to foster our students
individual interests as it can grows to great human capacities to help society.
This idea of growing personal strengths for the gain of society as an
aim might strike a cord for a society that is obsessed with self, however this is
a toxic mindset. Walter Parker writes about the term idiot in the original
meaning used to explain the problem with thinking only about individual
gain. To Parker, an idiot is one whose self-centeredness undermines his or
her citizen identityis suicidal in a certain way, definitely self defeating, for the
idiot does not know that privacy and individual autonomy are entirely
dependant on the community. (Parker, 2006) His example is of a mother
who decides to take care of only her children by keeping a clean home.
However, since she has not cared for the cleanliness of the community its
sickness has crept into her own home causing her children to become ill.
When education is not teaching a social mindset I believe we are setting our
students up for failure individually as well as for the society.
Since individuals depend on a community, students should use their
education and skills to help a community progress. Education can be the
vehicle through which social progress can be made. The first skill that should
be practiced in school is the act of deliberation, which is the discussion
aimed at making a decision across these differences about a problem that the
participants face in common. (Parker, 2006) Since school is one of the first
social constructs within community there are multiple perspectives and
personal values. I believe it is the aim of education to guide students
through how to deliberate through these diverse opinions to come to a
synthesis for the common good. Imagine how discussions of politics,
religion, and money might change if we taught our students this skill at a
young age.

Preferred School

With the aim of education to be both for the individuals and societal
good a preferred school for me would be one that that focuses on
community.
This community should be a place where everyone is welcomed and different
opinions are celebrated, shared, heard, and valued. Real life issues like
poverty, friendship, and family should be discussed and critically thought
about by all community to deepen students understand of community and
how it differs for others. It is through this understanding and deeper thinking
that true growth can occur.
The learning environment should be one that engages students in
critical thinking and active learning. It should be collaborative at times, and
should be open for students to incorporate interests. This environment will
be made possible through high expectations. These expectations should be
discussed and formed with the students. They should be clear to the
students and the parents and enforced by the teacher. Teachers should have
procedures for the classroom that are posted and clear and agreed upon by
the class to help the class to run smoothly and efficiently. Students modeling
positive behavior should be acknowledged by the classroom and by the
school.
At Pound Middle School, this can be done by classroom contingencies
to raise awareness of behavior and how it affects the whole class. But
students should also be recognized on an individual basis. Currently at my
building, there are students of the week as well as Cool Crew recognition
where teachers and staff nominate students for positive behavior.

Image of the teacher

There are many roles that a teacher takes on in the duration of a
career. The first role of a teacher in education is to model for students how
to be a caring member in a community. When the teacher models this
behavior it sets the standard for the rest of the class, students feel like the
teacher is working with them rather than against them. It impacts how
students participate in class, how they respond to discipline, and how
students work with each other. Within this role they must also explain the
rules and procedures of the room to create a safe, efficient, and fun
environment.
The teachers role is to guide students to think through experience,
asking essential questions, and providing opportunities to apply their
knowledge. It should be noted that The teacher is not in the school to
impose certain ideas or to form certain habits in the child, but is there as a
member of the community to select the influences which shall affect the child
and to assist him in properly responding to these influences.- (Dewey, 1897)
Imposing ideas leads to conformity without thought while guiding allows
students to feel like they have some control over their learning and allows
room to express and grow individual interests. The teacher should also
guide learning to make connections to the problems of society or the big
ideas.

Nature of the Learner

Although there are variations of how, it can be agreed that students
learn in different ways. Howard Garner refers to it as nine different levels of
intelligence; Bernice Mcarthy divides it into student learning preferences as
well as left and right brain thinking, and Piaget connects intelligence to the
cognitive development of the brain.
I do not subscribe to one line of thought but rather agree that
students learn in different ways based on an array of circumstances. What
can all children learn? Anyone who has taught in the public schools knows
that childrens talents and interests vary enormously. (Noddings, 1997)
Students learning is deeply connected to the overall well being of the child,
this includes social, physical, emotional, and spiritual development of a child.
Although there are varying intelligence, personality, preference and
cognitive development I believe that the nature of the learner can have
commonalities. I believe that learning is strongest as students when they
form connections. Students have the seen the relevance of learning in their
own life. John Dewey explains, I believe that the image is the great
instrument of instruction. What a child gets out of any subject presented to
him is simply the images which he himself forms with regard to it. (Dewey,
1897) The student must form images of how the curriculum relates to them
for the best possible learning.

Image of the Curriculum


My argument against liberal education is not a complaint against
literature, history, physical science, mathematics, or any other subject.
It is an argument, first, against an ideology of control that forces all
students to study particular, narrowly prescribed curriculum devoid of
content they might really care about. Second, it is an argument in
favor of greater respect for a wonderful range of human capacities now
largely ignored by schools (Noddings, 1997)


With endless amounts of concepts to be covered with a multitude of
differing interests, curriculum should be thematically written. With this broad
concept it can be taught in various modalities and across curriculum. The
synthesis of the learning can be chosen by students to allowing them to
explore areas of specific interest to each student. This style of teaching allows
connection to real life.
Within my art curriculum instead of teaching Pop Art and having all of
my students make Andy Warhol styled portraits I teach a thematic unit
regarding the idea of consumption that rose out of World War II. We look at
where our products come from, how consumables are designed for the dump,
how advertising influences what we buy, and then where all of these goods
go when we throw them away. We then have a discussion in groups to
create action plans on how to cut down on consumption. Students then take
the idea of consumption and create a piece of art out of recycled materials.
The curriculum starts with a big idea or theme and then is broken down for
students to understand and then the students take the information and relate
it to their own life first through an action plan and second through a work of
art that allows for choice. The concept of thematic units allows students to
grow in their interest while still learning essential skills like critically thinking,
deliberation, and how to care for the community.

Preferred Pedagogy

I have not been teaching long but within the first day I found that my
students preferred type of learning was to be told the right answer and then
to regurgitate the right answer. They claim they want freedom of thought
but when it is given they are completely stumped. I believe this is because
teachers teach to the test and there is little room for creativity or critical
thought is todays classrooms. I am trying to provide and space for students
to take small steps to see that life is not black and white or right and wrong
and that we must critically examine and deliberate these kinds of issues.
Although I believe all subjects in school should be educating in this
manner, the art room has become the perfect place for this to happen. In
the art room we explore what is art, does art have to be beautiful, does art
have to be made by a human. These questions might not seem important to
the average person, but the skills students learn from discussing, having
different opinions, and even learning to change their own opinion is
invaluable.
I believe these skills to be creative, critical, problem solving thinkers will
benefit them greatly once they move on from my class whether they continue
in art or not, they will apply these skills when the look at a math problem in a
different way, or talk about politics, or have a marriage dispute. I teach the
way I do because I believe it helps them grow personally, socially, and will in
turn benefit society.























Bibliography
Garder, J. (1961) Excellence: Can we be equal and excellent too? In
N.Noddings A Morally Defensible Mission for Schools in the 21
st
Century. in Transforming Public Education: A new Course for
Americas Future, edited by Evan Clinchy, 27-37. New York: Teachers
College Press.

Dewey,J.(1897). My Pedagogic Creed. In E.F. Provenzo, Critical Issues in
Education (pp.2230).Thousand Oaks: Stage Publications Inc. 2006. Print.

Dewey, J (1916). Democracy and Education. In N.Noddings A Morally
Defensible Mission for Schools in the 21
st
Century. in Transforming
Public Education: A new Course for Americas Future, edited by Evan
Clinchy, 27-37. New York: Teachers College Press.

Noddings, N.(1997) A Morally Defensible Mission for Schools in the
21
st
Century. in Transforming Public Education: A new Course for
Americas Future, edited by Evan Clinchy, 27-37. New York: Teachers
College Press.

Parker, Walter. "Teaching Against Idiocy." Phi Delta Kappa International . 86.5
(2005): 344-351. Web. 29 Jun. 2012.