Eleanor Duckworth

Hello everyone, my name is Eleanor Duckworth. I was born in 1935 in Montreal, Canada to my wonderful parents Jack and Muriel Duckworth. Growing up with these two role models helped lead me in the right direction from the start. My parents were Canadian peace workers and social community activists. With their help I was able to find my way through life. I am currently a Professor of Education at Harvard Graduate School of Education but also enjoyed my time as an elementary school teacher, student at the Universite' de Geneva, as well being a student, colleague, leading translator and interpreter of Jean Paiget. I have also written books including "The having of wonder ideas."
It was while I was working with Paiget that I gained insights into the nature and development of understanding and intelligence in his clinical research method. This led me to develop my "clinical exploration" method. This method can be broken down as follows:

1. Curriculum development: the teacher plans how to engage the students' minds in exploring subject matter.
2. Pedagogy: the teacher encourages the student to express their thoughts as they work to explore the subject matter.
3. The teacher becomes a researcher to explore the student's thoughts and ideas. The teacher then helps to open a variety of paths for exploration, provide any surprises, and help them realize any other viewpoints that could be hiding.
4. The teacher's goal is to keep the student thinking and talking about the subject matter but also help them move beyond the first thought that the student had.

With this method I became convinced that students must construct their own knowledge and find new meanings on their own; if teachers continue to just tell students what they need to know it does not serve enough purpose to keep them interested and learning. Teachers who just "tell" are not opening up the door to exploration and new experiences.

I firmly believe that students need to explore their topic while the teacher acts as a researcher and facilitator. How do you feel about students exploring topics and expressing their thoughts while doing so? Is this something you feel could easily be implemented for every subject/topic or does it only fit into certain subject matter such as Science?

Jean Jacques Rousseau (Sophie)

Hello again!  As previously mentioned, I am a character in a novel written by Jean Jacques Rousseau.  My purpose is the expression of Rousseau's opinions on the education of females.  The education of a female should be different from that of a male because the two are different.  Women should learn many things, but their studies must be restricted to what is useful.  Girls should be taught the duties they will hold as women, which include being pleasing to men, being useful to men, and, to raise males when they are young as well as take care of them when they are grown.  Additional duties are advising men, consoling men, and making their lives pleasant and sweet.  All of the previously mentioned duties should be taught to females starting in their childhood.

 

Playing with dolls provides great training, and therefore should be encouraged.  One day a girl will become her own doll, so to speak.  Motivation for girls' earliest lessons is receiving favors.  That is, allowing girls the things they enjoy and want as long as they are suitable.  For example, most little girls gladly learn sewing.  They take pleasure in believing that this talent will one day serve them for their own adornment.  Valuable lessons in accordance with this interest are cutting material, embroidery, and lace-making.  Another related lesson is drawing.  However, drawing should focus on leaves, fruit, flowers, and draperies.  Girls should not be taught to read until they are able to see the use of it.  Arithmetic should probably come prior to reading because it's utility is evident; it will be useful for account keeping.

 

Educators should always justify tasks they set forth for little girls.  Girls must be kept busy because idleness and insubordination are two very dangerous faults.  They should be accustomed to annoyances early on because they will have to submit to the annoyances of proper decorum for their entire life.  Girls should be taught to control themselves.  Educators should prevent young girls from getting bored with their tasks and infatuated with their amusements.  However, given the choice, there would be no teachers.  Children could then learn on their own what they are already willing to learn.  Furthermore, girls are too full of curiosity not to learn on their own when given the opportunity to do so.

 

An ideal learning environment would be a convent or a boarding school as they have plain food and ample opportunities for activities, races, and games in the open air.  Females can obtain the necessary sound constitution via pleasant, moderate, and healthy exercise. The body is born before the soul, so the first lesson in this area should be nurturing the body.  That is, girls need to be taught grace.

 

My questions are as follows:

1. How do others feel about males and females receiving different educations? 

2. Are children, particularly girls, equipped and motivated to learn on their own?

3. Should the studies of our young people be restricted to only what is useful?

Friedrich Froebel

I am Friedrich Froebel, a German educationalist, best known as the originator of the "kindergarten system". I had a very difficult childhood. My mother died when I was a baby and my father, who was a pastor, remarried. My parents were self involved and didn't nurture me as a child. Even though I had an unhappy childhood, I grew up with a love for nature and with a strong Christian faith which was my central thinking as an educationalist. I sought to encourage unity in all things.
I feel that the purpose of education is to encourage and guide man, thinking and perceiving being in such a way that he becomes a pure and perfect representation of the divine inner law through his own personal choice. Education must show him the ways and meanings of attaining that goal.
I believe that humans are essentially productive and creative and fulfillment comes through developing these with God and the world. I created an educational environment that involved practical work and the direct use of materials. I feel that when people engage with the world, understanding will unfold. The Kindergarten system that I developed has an emphasis on play and use of gifts (play materials) and occupations (activities). I even became known around the world as Froebel Gifts. The Froebel gifts have been widely imitated and adapted by many educators and toy makers. I was convinced that the kindergarten's primary focus should be on play- the process by which I believe children express their innermost thoughts, needs, and desires. I realized that at the time, my emphasis on play contrasted with the traditional view prevalent during the nineteenth century that play, a form of idleness and disorder, was an unworthy element of human life.
Some of the special materials or gifts that I develop include shaped wooden bricks, balls, tiles, sticks and rings, blocks and various materials for drawing, embroidering, paper cutting, weaving or braiding, paper folding, modeling, and interlacing. These materials are used in almost every Kindergarten classroom today. I also developed a series of recommended activities (occupations) and movement activities. Some of the occupations included paper, pencils, wood, sand, clay, and straw. The kindergarten activities included games, songs, and stories that I designed to assist in sensory and physical development and socialization. My original concern was teaching young children through educational games in the family. But in my later years, I became linked with a demand for the provision of special centers for the care and development of children outside of the home. These activities/games not only nourish the inner activity drive, but they also teach the use of the child's immediate environment as means for play and occupations, and as educational aids. These activities/games that have developed are educative and developing for the person who plays with the child, which then influences a genuine bond between them both.

How do you feel about using play as instructional activities in the classroom?

Johann Herbart

Johann Herbart :

My pedagogy emphasizes the connection between individual development and how it contributes to society. I think in order for people to fulfill their true purpose, they need to become productive citizens. Every child is born with certain potential. Only formalized, rigorous, education can develop that potential and lead to moral and intellectual development.

I have noticed that basal readers are becoming very popular in classrooms. These are too predictable and boring. Teachers need to appeal to students' interests instead. The use of literature and historical stories would be much more enjoyable and effective.
My followers designed a five-step teaching method based on my work and ideals. It is as follows:

1. Prepare the pupils to be ready for the new lesson.
2. Present the new lesson.
3. Associate the new lesson with ideas studied earlier.
4. Use examples to illustrate the lesson's major points.
5. Test pupils to ensure they had learned the new lesson.

Do you agree with my thoughts about basal readers? Should literature and historical stories be used in place of them? Also, what do you think of my five-step teaching method? Are they still being used in schools today?

William Ayers

As I mentioned in my introduction I was a weatherman during the Vietnam War. I went underground for awhile, but resurfaced in 1980. Before my days as a Weatherman I was a teacher and school director. I hoped that my students would become activists too. After I resurfaced in 1980 I obtained a master's degree in early childhood education from the Bank Street College of Education in New York and a doctorate in education from Columbia University. During the Obama campaign there was a small controversy over him knowing me. I live not far from his home in Hyde Park.

I now teach at the University of Illinois at Chicago educating future teachers. My work is not focused on policy work, nor on administration. Instead, I consulting, lecturing, writing, and training teachers. When I do this I speak as a classroom teacher, not as a university professor.

I have been involved in reform efforts in the Chicago Public Schools since the 1990s. In 1995 I was able to secure a grant for $49.2 million to fund reform efforts. I used the money for teacher training and support.

My research interests include teaching for social justice, urban educational reform, narrative and interpretive research, children in trouble with the law, and related issues. I believe in progressive education and some people have called me a radical. I do not see myself that way. I was attacked in David Horowitz's book, The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America.

Schools exist throughout all of our society. I see schools as a sort of microcosm of the greater society. I think it is sometimes difficult for people to see this within our own society. But looking outside of our country I use the example of the apartheid in South Africa. Schools for white children have about 15 students per classroom and the classroom is equipped with the highest forms of technology. A school for black children would have a class of 85 children with no equipment. Schools are supposed to prepare children for the future and the latter school is preparing children for low-paying labor jobs. The same is true of schools in our country.

This country supposedly promises a free and common education to all of its citizens. However, I do not believe this is the case. Some forms of policy, such as zero tolerance undermines the democratic system. Zero tolerance is a policy one would see in an authoritarian society, not a democratic one. The classroom should involve a justice system. I also believe that standardization is anti-democratic. It requires all children to be the same and does not allow them to chose what they want to learn.

In the classroom I believe that teachers should advocate for a commitment to free inquiry, questioning, and participation from their students. Teachers should not lecture or drill their students. I do not believe in the new practice of "accountability" because suppresses flexibility, experimentation, democracy. I also believe that students learn better in "small learning" communities. Students should turn out to be active, engaged citizens.

What do you feel is the biggest issue in our school system today and how would you advocate to change/fix it?

Deborah Meier

Hello

My name is Deborah Meier and it is hard to believe I have spent four decades involved in public education. I have worked in public education as a teacher, principal, writer and public advocate. I have been noted to be the founder of the small schools movement and founded a number of public elementary and secondary schools in New York and Boston that serve predominantly low-income African American and Latino students.

Currently I serve as principal emeritus of Mission Hill School in Boston, co-chair of the Coalition for Essential Schools, and am a senior scholar at NYU’s Steinhardt School of Education. I received the MacArthur Genius Award in 1987 for a few of my books which includes, The Power of Their Ideas, In Schools We Trust and Many Children Left Behind.

Recently I was interviewed by Amy Goodman at "Democracy Now", in response to the education policy of President Obama and Arne Duncan, the Education Secretary,speaking before the House Education and Labor Committee Wednesday, May 21, 2009.

This is part of my response;

I think it’s missing the heart of what’s the problem and looking at this from the eyes of—there’s a wonderful book called Seeing Like a State, which I urge people to read, because there’s a way of looking at what’s wrong with schools that I think the business eye sees, which is different than the teacher, child and parent eye, what’s wrong with our schools. And so, to look for the answer increasingly in distant from where the action takes place, the cutting out of teachers’, parents’ and children’s voices in making decisions about schools, as we escalate the penalties if they don’t meet test scores. The incredible obsession with test scores, particularly in two particular areas, that hardly define what it means to be a well-educated person.

For my complete interview please click on my link http://www.democracynow.org/2009/5/21/stream

Reggio Emilia Approach

Our approach to education is based on a variety of principles. The first principle is an emergent curriculum. An emergent curriculum is one that builds upon the interests of children. In our schools topics of study are created from the talks a teacher has with children, through community and family events and was wells as the known interests of children such as dinosaurs, transportation, etc. Teachers work as a team to create and formulate hypotheses about the directions of the project, the materials needed and possible parent and community support and involvement.
The next principle is project work. Projects are in-depth studies of concepts, ideas and interests that arise within the classroom. These projects may last one week or could continue throughout the school year. It is through these projects that teachers help children make decisions about the direction of study, the ways the class will research the topic, how they will represent and demonstrate the topic.
The third principle is collaboration. Students work in collaborative groups. This is considered valuable and necessary to advance their cognitive development. In our approach we collaborate with families and the community in order to form a team to support the learning of the child.
The fourth principle is teachers as researchers. A teacher’s role is somewhat complex compared to that of a teacher in a traditional learning environment. The teacher is seen as a researcher. Teachers listen, observe and document children’s work and the growth of community in their classroom. They provoke, co-construct and stimulate thinking in collaborative groups.
The fifth principle is documentation. Our teachers document their students learning through a process that is very similar to a portfolio approach. This is a very important tool in the learning process for children, teachers and parents. In our class, you would see a teacher taking lots of pictures to document students learning. Documentation is not only used for assessment but for advocacy.
The final principle is the environment and considered the “third teacher”. The set up of our classrooms differ from a traditional classroom. Our classes are very warm and inviting. Teachers organize space for small and large group projects. Documentation of children’s work, plants and collections that children have made from former projects are displayed both at the children’s and adult’s eye level.
Our approach to education is quite different from the traditional early childhood approach. If you walk into our classrooms it may seem we are only playing but, we use this as a way to build a child’s learning. Teachers are guides that create their instruction based on children’s interests rather than instructors who teach a set curriculum. Do you feel our teachers can be effective educators? The community and parents play a very vital role in our approach. What are your thoughts on community and parent involvement in a child’s education?

Horace Mann

Hello everyone! My name is Horace Mann. I was born in Massachusetts on May 4, 1796 and served in both the House of Representatives (6 years) and Senate (7 years) over my lifetime.
I attended Brown University and graduated at the top of my class in 1819, continuing to become educated as a librarian and tutor of Latin and Greek, and studying law for just a short period of time. Though I did not initially intend to be so involved in educational reform, a paid position in legislation allowed me to train teachers at conventions, found and edit The Common School Journal , and sent out annual reports about the progress in the schools. This journal and these reports are still regarded as "among the best expositions, if, indeed, they are not the very best ones, of the practical benefits of a common school education both to the individual and to the state" (Hinsdale).

In my journal, I wrote about controversial issues that were targeted at the schools and the problems within the schools. Specifically, I addressed the following: "(1) the public should no longer remain ignorant and free, (2) that such education should be paid for, controlled, and sustained by an interested public; (3) that this education will be best provided in schools that embrace children of all diversities; (4) that this education must be non-sectarian; (5) that this education must be taught by the spirit, methods, and discipline of a free society; and (6) that education should be provided by well-trained, professional teachers." Essentially, I wanted to fight for more effective, better equipped schools, better pay for teachers, wider curriculum and extended time in education (until 16 years old). I was so convincing that legislators often changed and adapted policies within the school based on my recommendations. This made me realize how much influence I could really have on the world. Though there were several people that did not agree with my ideas, I continued to alert the public about what I believed was the best education in America at the time. Ironically, I was quite influential on the school system, but never actually taught in the schools (only at the university level).

After my time in legislation and reform, I was president at Antioch College, teaching several courses. My legacy lives on there, as well as several other colleges around the nation that have dedicated parts of campus in my name. I am well known in today's world as "the Father of American Education" based on my influential work. I died in 1859 at the age of 63.
A fun fact about me is that my brother in law is the great writer Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Something to think about…
I brought up controversial issues such as separation of church and state and other public policy that were not well received by some. However, I was still very influential in changing the way the public school policy was implemented. Do you think my ideas would have been influential if I were a female? Furthermore, why do you think I was able to have so much influence even though I was never actually an educator in the school system?

Maria Montessori

Hello everyone.  I am Maria Montessori.  As I told you in my introduction, I became involved in education in the late 19^th century and continued my work into the 20^th century. I believe that education of all children should involve three components: the child as learner, the prepared environment, and the trained adult (teacher).

 I strongly believe that learning should not be forced.  Learning is something that humans do naturally.  As such, learning does not need to be externally motivated.  Too often, I see educators force learning and use motivators such as grades and rewards.  This goes against what is natural for all children, as they will learn on their own given the correct environment.  I believe "that education is not something which the teacher does, but that it is a natural process which develops spontaneously in the human being. It is not acquired by listening to words but of experiences in which the child acts on his environment." 

Environment certainly is key and should be carefully prepared.  Classrooms must be organized and ideally contain my recommended materials that encourage hands-on learning.  Teachers may also consider outside spaces as potential learning environments.  Gardens are one of my favorites as they provide many learning opportunities for young children.  A properly prepared environment contains a plethora of carefully considered materials, organized in a careful manner. 

When children are in school, they should be divided by age.  Age groups are best constructed with developmental level in mind.  I believe that children pass through various stages of development.  When considering young and early elementary school aged children, ages 3 to 6 should be grouped together and age groups of three year spans should follow.  Children benefit from interaction with diverse peers.  Ages 3 to 6 are especially important because children of this age range have very absorbent minds – they are taking in an incredible amount and are learning at an amazing rate. 

A Montessori classroom may not resemble that to which you are accustomed.  In one of my classrooms, the child is very active and the teacher may appear more passive than one might expect.  My approach emphasizes a child's freedom and self-direction and motivation in learning.  Many hours may be devoted to allowing self-directed activity.   Importantly, my approach balances this freedom with discipline, as my classrooms are certainly not out of control.  To the contrary, my classrooms are clam and organized.  While children are allowed to choose their activities from the available and carefully selected materials, they learn to use all materials appropriately and to put things back where they belong.  Children are not allowed to disrupt others.  This rule is especially important because I believe that it is very important for children to be allowed to be absorbed in their activity.  When children become absorbed in this manner, their mental and physical energies come together in a process that I call normalization.  Concentration is the key to normalization.

In my classrooms, teachers function as guides.  In a typical lesson, the teacher would introduce an object and its intended use, explain how to care for the object, and then retreat so as to allow the child to learn and explore uninterrupted.  Such learning often takes place on a one-on-one basis, or may take place in small groups.  For young children, objects in the classroom may relate to practical life activities and experiences, such as that which relates to hygiene.  To learn something such as a mathematical concept, concrete materials are introduced that allow the child to explore abstract concepts.

I would like to know what you think of my approach to the education of children.  Do you agree that children are naturally self-motivated and that learning should take place without many external motivators?  Do you agree with my approach to teacher involvement – that teachers should act as guides and take a less active role than the student?  I look forward to hearing your opinions and responses.

-Maria Montessori