"Empowering Education" Shor quotes

"People are naturally curious. They are born learners. Education can either develop or stifle their inclination to ask why and to learn"

I think the author is trying to point out that we can't just tell people that something is true just because. We need to explain why it's true and if we talking about something that has yet to be proven, we need to teach them how to ask the write questions. The author is saying that everyone is born with the ability to learn but when they enter school, a place that should be encouraging learning, some are being left behind because they learn differently and no one is teaching them differently.

"Empowered students make meaning and act from refelction, instead of memorizing facts and values handed to them"

I think the authour is saying that these are the qualities a teacher should be trying to bring out of their students. If "empowered students" are our future leaders then we should be encouraging all students to think critically and ask why. Teachers shouldn't let them accept "just because" as a reason why. This will teach them what questions to ask and expand their knowledge.

"Empowered education, as I define it here, is a critical-democratic pedagogy for self and social change. It is a student-centered program for multicultural democracy in school and society. It approaches individual growth as an active, cooperative, and social process, because the self and society create each other"

The author argues that students today are the future of society. We need to teach them the past and present while also helping them to develop social skills. In order for them to succeed in life, they will need to have the knowledge and ability to ask the right questions while also having the social skills to work with others. Society can change us but we can also change society.

In class I would like to talk about what we as future teachers can do to further this idea. How are we going to develop a student centered education in our classrooms?

Check out this page with the background on Ira Shor with videos of a keynote address he gave.

Oakes- Arguement Post

In "Tracking: Why Schools need to take another route" Jeannie Oakes argues that even though it's difficult to do, tracking needs to be changed. When we seperate students and expect more from the "high ability" students, we not only put the "less abled" students farther behind but also the "average" students are getting penalized. Here is a passage that I think really sums up what she is trying to say needs to change to help equal things out.
"Students who need more time to learn appear to get less; those who have the most difficulty learningseem to have fewer of the best teachers."
And here is a part where she discusses the "average" students...
"Researchers found that the proliferation of classes and special programs for students at the extremes-students with high abilities or with handicaps- had the effect of making students in the middle "unspecial" and guarenteeing that they were taught in quite "unspecial" ways.

I agree with Jeanne Oakes arguement and it reminds me alot of my service learning placement. In the classroom I am in, the students are grouped by reading level but instead of giving the students who need less help more help, they make sure the students struggling with reading get more help and are working now to even things out. I think Oakes would like this and want it to be modified to secondary education in place of the tracking thats going on now.

Here is a newer article that states what Oakes said in 1985.

In class I plan in discussing further how I think the school I volunteer in is heading in the right direction.

Gender in Education

While researching gender differences in education, I came across alot of studies and research talking about the gender gaps in education. As the years go on the gaps seem to get smaller but they are still present. More girls than boys end up going to college and thinking about the classes I have taken here at RIC and even thinking about the ones I took at CCRI, I realized that there have been more females. Here is a link to one of the sites I found discussing the gaps in 2010 and some of the changes.
In class I planned on asking why the gap is getting smaller now? What has changed to make more men choose to go on to higher education?

Another thing that I found interesting was that there are many people who believe that schools should be segregated. Many researchers think that school curriculum is geared towards teaching girls. Here is one site that explains why girls and boys recieve a different education. Reading all this really made me mad because thinking about my classes, I don't think I've ever noticed a teacher who has tried to exclude the boys or set them up for failure and it seems that is what this site wants people to think. Another site I found talks about how boys and girls should recieve seperate educations because boys develop at a different rate than girls. I disagree with this completely. It is true that boys mature slower than girls, however I think it's important to have interaction between boys and girls in school to help expand the learning. Having the different genders in schools offers different perspectives. Click here to read the research on having seperate schooling. This link is actually from 2003. There are newer sites but this is the most informative.