Entry # 7: "The anti-hands-on
faction is quite large"
A teacher was having trouble with a science class and I was asked to come
and see if I could share any ideas that might help. I was a little nervous
about going to the high school, uncertain of how much help I could give.
My worries were misplaced. The problem wasn't one of secondary curriculum,
it was more a matter of philosophy and method.
The class meets after lunch and it sounds like they're more than a little
active. In fact, it sounds like they're teenagers, and they're bored. However,
the teacher's perspective is that she cannot teach them, and certainly can't
conduct labs, until the kids learn to behave.
I gently suggested that organizing more active classes might help channel
their energy, and that the few who really might not be ready to behave could
be given pencil and paper assignments. I said I would tell them that they
could join the class as soon as they were ready to cooperate.
I asked if the teacher had a lab up his sleave that would really excite
the kids. I had always used a crowd pleaser in the beginning of the year
to get my kids hooked, and I shared that experience with him.
Unfortunately, he hadn't any ideas that he thought would "wow"
the kids, but he did share his views with me. He told me how he'd been "dumbing
down" all his work for this "slow" group. He went on to say
that "the reason for using hands-on methods was to engage the slow
learners."
Now, I was really worried. How should I respond? If I got on my high horse
and let the indignation I was feeling flow freely, I probably wouldn't get
back in the room again...hmmm.
I decided I wanted to try and work this through so I just started suggesting
possible labs. I invited the teacher to my office to get stuff and he responded
favorably. However, he decided to come late next week. Not good.
I'm going to go back and drop some stuff off tomorrow, but I don't know
if it will make any difference. I think I'm going to ask if I can come observe
and maybe co-teach or model a lab. I'm afraid his self-fulfilling prophecy
will play itself out if he tries to switch to hands-on without being convinced
of its value.
Hands-on approaches and "slow" learners
I've been thinking about this attitude that hands-on approaches are for
babies or "slow" learners. Where's this narrow thinking coming
from? Is it rooted in my generation's experience as children, when counting
on your fingers, or pointing at words, could get your knuckles rapped?
It seems to me that we've all been had. This inflated view of abstract thinking
as the only really higher order kind, has effectively reinforced the hegemony
of those who espouse this style and view.
It's all rather self-serving and arbitrary. Despite tons of evidence that
says some of our most brilliant and productive artists and leaders had trouble
in school, we continue to hold up the most narrow ways of knowing as the
goal -- the mark -- that we must all be measured against.
Despite scholarship that documents the "other ways of knowing"
which are more characteristic of females and members of those outside the
majority culture, we continue to define "other" as "less
than."
I always thought really learning something meant being able to connect it
to other experiences and information which I had. I thought "knowing"
was all about making metaphors.
As a kid, I was lucky to be fairly good at the rote learning expected of
me at school, but more importantly, I was blessed with a family that encouraged
my often weird and wacky imaginings and musings at home. If I hadn't been
encouraged -- if instead of listening to me, my folks had scolded me --
I don't know who I'd be today.
Maybe I'd be one of those adults who feels hopeless and helpless. The kind
of adults that our factory model schools used to be so good at churning
out.
I'm glad our kids don't conform so readily today. I'm glad they push back
when the teaching isn't worthy of their attention. But pushing back, without
a sense of what it is you're pushing for, isn't going to turn the tide.
A resource-rich model
Along those lines, I just read about some kids who were designing bird feeders
that photographed birds, building ultralight aircraft, programming their
own video games, and more. I learned about them in an article about a Constructionist
Learning Lab in a correctional facility for youth.
The concept for the multiage lab came from a professor at MIT named Seymour
Papert. Dr. Papert had been asked to create a model of what future classrooms
might look like. Papert based his plan on Piaget's theories. He extended
those ideas "by proposing that the best way a learner will construct
their own knowledge is through the deliberate act of constructing something
shareable." ( Stager, Curriculum
Administrator, Oct. 2000)
Can this resource rich model be dismissed simply as an accommodation for
"slow" learners? It seems more like the classroom of my dreams.
On the math front this week, I've been listening to one of my team members
as she experiences similar anti-hands-on attitudes toward the use of a new,
manipulative-rich math program in a number of our schools.
Some teachers are balking at the thought of learning new ways to teach math.
Everyone agrees that the old ways aren't particularly effective, but that
agreement doesn't automatically lead to a willingness to change their teaching,
especially if the changes involve lots of manipulatives.
So, what's the connection between this model and the use of manipulatives
in a math classroom, or hands-on labs in science? I think they all represent
an effort to help kids, all kids, make meaning, as opposed to getting kids
to conform and absorb, disjointed bits and pieces of curriculum.
Do we really want the critical thinkers that everybody talks about? Our
practice would seem to say we don't.
I'm feeling pretty wound up about these differences and I hope I don't wear
out my welcome in this other person's classroom. I'm going to try and make
a dent in this teacher's wrongheaded attitude both toward these kids and
authentic teaching. If this teacher were the only one, or if he was in the
minority, I wouldn't be quite as concerned, but the anti-hands-on faction
is quite large. Wish me luck!
[Editor's note: Deb is co-moderator of the
new MiddleWeb listserve.]
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