Today, Andrea and I stopped by a second hand book sale in support of a
non-profit organization. In 20 minutes or so, we had picked out about
10 books. As I got to the end of the last table, I spotted “Escape from
Childhood” in white letters on a black background. Then I noted the
author was John Holt. It was hardcover and we were running on a tight
budget so I put back 2 of the others I had selected. After getting
home, I checked for it on Amazon and found that every edition of it was
out of print.
Earlier this year, Chris did a great job of writing a chapter by
chapter synopsis of John Taylor Gatto’s Underground History of American
Education. I plan on doing the same thing here.
“In our times people seem to define truth more and more as
a result of some sort of ‘scientific’ experiment, with things weighted and measured and arranged in neat columns of figures.” (P.12)
Isn’t that pretty much what public school is about today? It certainly
was when I went to school. Months of work were reduced to either
letters or numbers accompanied by comments which re-enforced the
designation.
“We are not likely to find out from such ‘experiments’ how we should and can live together. As for the future, most of those who talk and write about it do so as if it already existed and as if we were inexorably carried toward it… This of course is not true. The future does not exist. It has not been made. It is made only as we make it. The question we should be asking ourselves is what sort of future
do we want.” (P. 12)
The future is really what school is all about. In how many defenses of
compulsory schooling are things like society and/or more directly the
child’s future used as the main argument for it? What sort of future is
made both for the children and ourselves by confining them throughout
their development years? Is the toll of the present on children going
to leave anything to make the future we want even possible?
At what point will the absurdity in the logic of coercion producing
freedom, regurgitation producing critical thinking, and narrowly
defined curriculum producing wisdom begin to seep into the minds of
those trying so desperately hard to shape our future? Do most of us
really believe it is worth tossing nearly everything we have today in
hopes of a better tomorrow? Because I don’t. If that is the case for
most, then perhaps it is time to turn back and go in the opposite
direction.
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