"schools become burdened with non-educational functions and, in the process, forget what education is." Goodlad
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"[Charles Rusch] discovered that a complex, urban environment can be extraordinarily educative and that (cont) http://tl.gd/69hc8i
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"I am equally convinced that society, individuals, and the schools would benefit immensely if a vast (cont) http://tl.gd/69hd4t
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I think in many ways, schools have done it to themselves. In convincing the populous that education is the solution to society's problems, a populous that equates education with schooling will blame the school when things in society do not measure up to expectations.
"prime yardstick for appraising a school, then, is the percentage of it's time and resources it spends on what is truly educative."Goodlad
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"If we suddenly were to find ourselves without schools, here in the United States, our school-less culture (cont) http://tl.gd/69hgq1
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I love this place where Goodlad takes us in the book. Imagine a school-less culture and what would that culture invent as a vehicle for education. I love this proposition both as a thought experiment and as a way of thinking about school reform.
"Schools currently perform least well those educational functions that the rest of our society also attends to poorly." Goodlad
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"If we were suddenly to find ourselves without schools, the rest of society would be tuned up quite readily (cont) http://tl.gd/69hief
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"Most studies conclude that teachers don't use instructional technologies very well; often, they leave it in a closet." Goodlad
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@anderscj tech left in closer; new textbooks left on shelf -- agree on this one. So much to do hard to try different
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"we do not need schools today, in our kind of society, if their sole or even prime task is teaching the basics" Goodlad
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This has been why I have said on a few occasions that if we continue down the path we are on of narrowing the curriculum and objectifying all who have anything to do with schooling, that I would start advocating against sending kids there. I have not given up hope that the pendulum will swing back the other direction though.
"Soon, of course, it would become apparent that manipulating numbers and mastering the mechanics of reading (cont) http://tl.gd/69hmij
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I am going to repeat this quote in it's entirety because it is the one that stuck with me most the first time I read Goodlad:
"Soon, of course, it would become apparent that manipulating numbers and mastering the mechanics of reading would not challenge our young for long. The human being requires complexity. And so we would have to think about how the rest of the 'day in custody' would be spent. Would we re-create the schools we have?"
"Education is the only profession I know that consistently places its most highly prepared personnel (cont) http://tl.gd/69hp8v
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@anderscj disagree w/Goodlad medicine, sales, law enforcement, more--all move best away from essence of organization's key actions
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"To what degree are some students deprived of the richest opportunities for personal growth and (cont) http://tl.gd/69v47m
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Also, how many of our kids are placed on a slow track because they were not sufficiently motivated by mainstream prescriptive learning to demonstrate that they need to be placed on a fast track?
"most of those practices serving to differentiate academic students from students who must settle for (cont) http://tl.gd/69v5kc
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I think this is an important point. It sounds a lot like Freire too. That in placing some students on a college track and others on school-to-work track we deny both necessary learning opportunities.
"It is my view that much individualization in learning has gone in precisely the wrong direction. Most (cont) http://tl.gd/69vac7
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How do we take back differentiated instruction? How do we allow differentiated instruction to mean more than just different ways of being shown the same thing? When are we going to say it is not only OK but expected that different kids learn different things?
"We often state that children and youth should learn how to learn, but relatively little of what goes on in s (cont) http://tl.gd/69vcbs
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"schools must guide each student beyond personally comfortable ways of learning into all those alternatives (cont) http://tl.gd/69vdam
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"persons with rich personal resources, living full lives, actually have difficulty scheduling time for (cont) http://tl.gd/69vfn9
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"if schools go on into the twenty-first century and do nothing more than refine in practice the rhetoric of (cont) http://tl.gd/69viie
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"I firmly believe that learning occurs best in a laboratory setting where the teacher also is involved in (cont) http://tl.gd/69vl8l
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"I would endorse the concept of each student having an allocation of vouchers to secure the out-of-school (cont) http://tl.gd/69vn5m
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"To give up on the common school now would place in doubt the possibility of achieving for all of our (cont) http://tl.gd/69vrl6
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"We are all accountable for the conditions of our schools. This is no time for us to become either (cont) http://tl.gd/69vtl0
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