Not to worry, this is not another reference to Lindblom's essay. In a class discussion this morning with students taking ID309 Probs of War & Peace, we revisited the study mentioned Tuesday showing that 45% of college students make no measurable progress in analytic reasoning, critical thinking, or written communication during their first two years of college and the percentage declines only to 36% for four-year students. Interestingly, after class one of the students shared an insight based on the reading that had nothing to do with the College Learning Assessment research, but yet did--in a way. The reading was on WWII, particularly the non-aggression pact between Hitler and Stalin, signed in August, 1939, only to be broken in the Spring of 1941 by the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, Operation Barbarossa. That the invasion had to be postponed five weeks due to circumstances beyond Hitler's control meant that the German troops were defeated before they reached Moscow by the Russian winter, an intervention by Mother Nature that probably spelled the difference between victory and defeat for the Third Reich in the larger war. The question we were addressing concerned the popular support Hitler enjoyed by the German people. They were not idiots, yet they empowered and followed a mad man in perpetrating unprecedented evil upon humanity in pursuit of an insane ideal of global dominion.
The author's suggestion was borrowed from Erik Erickson, who saw Hitler as the internalized version of the rebellious male child in the prototypically authoritarian German family dominated by a stern and emotionally-challenged patriarch: submissive to those in authority, hostile and dismissive to those without power. Hitler offered an object of identification that gave the German youth, especially the males, a way of escaping the guilt-ridden pattern of complying with the domineering father figure while feeling self-loathing for doing so. By identifying with Hitler and his over-the-top challenge to existing patterns of authority, German boys could feel a sense of power and "autonomy" by, in effect, relegating their conscience and thus their guilt to the Fuhrer. The student after class wanted to share his appreciation of the Milgram experiments on obedience, which showed -- before they were canceled by the APA as constituting a violation of ethical research guidelines -- that German subjects were more apt to go all the way in obeying commands from an authority figure to administer severe punishment (high voltage shocks) to other subjects who failed to perform a memory task adequately.
This prompted my recollection of a discussion of the Milgram experiments as demonstrating the difference between the effects of two states of mind: the first, the so-called state of "autonomy," the other referred to as the state of "agency." In the latter, officers in the death camps served as examples: "I was just following orders. The decision to villify and execute Jews was not mine, but the Fuhrer's." The former state, autonomy, is one in which we recognize that our choices are no one's but ours: we refuse to follow orders just because a person in a position of authority issues them. We consider, on our own, the consequences of our choices and their ethical grounds. We are captains of our own ship, masters of our own fate. Americans are rightly proud of the emphasis given to this state of mind in our culture. But here, finally, is my question: Does our educational system now -- particularly our system of higher education -- serve to suffocate this state of mind? Are students so accustomed to "following orders" that they find themselves mindlessly going through the motions rather than actively asserting that part of their character that we know of as the "autonomous" state of mind? If so, could this be an enemy of this class, or the opportunity this class provides for defining the content of the major portion of the capstone? How do we find out? And what actions are in order if the enemy diagnosis is on point?
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I believe the current education system in this country is so focused on tracking progress in students through tests at the primary and secondary levels that by the time students get to college they are so accustomed to mechanically memorizing loads of information without retaining much that it just becomes natural to process facts and dispose of them after the test.
ReplyDeleteThis concept is not very useful when it comes to the big picture of education as analytical thought development is hindered while trying to make education more efficient.
Standardized test create this right or wrong environment where students feel there is only one answer to a question, which is true for a math problem, but this carries over into other subjects like the humanities, and kills conversation.
Students are so afraid they are going to say something wrong, that they don't want to put themselves or their thoughts out there because the education system they are the product of emphasizes that there is only one correct answer. By the time students get to college they just assume that whatever the professor says is the way it is and even if afforded the opportunity to offer their input, most would take the chance to either keep quiet, or blindly agree with the professor because they know nothing else.
Students want professors to tell them what to do because they want the sturcture that comes with having a specific course syllabus to stick to instead taking advantage in a course like capstone to determine what they learn. It is the safer way to go, because they don't have to take ownership in the class or responsibility for the material, just do the work and get the grade.
The education system has to do a better job balancing the instruction of concrete information and the promotion of creativity. It is hard to measure creativity, which can sometimes force it to take the back seat in education because test scores have become so important when measuring teachers' abilities and students' progress and ultimately determining funding for schools that students feel the need to spend more time memorizing and less time theorizing.
I use this a lot, but education has to be a want to, and right now it is a have to for far too many students. Time spent conversing with others is much more engaging than time spent blazing through facts. Conversation should lead to a want to attitude about education, which will lead to better test scores, but more importantly, better thinkers and that is something students can use for the rest of their lives.
I believe one of the causes of a lack of anayltical thought among college students is because there is too much emphasis on tracking teacher and student performance at the primary and secondary levels that students naturally assume answers are either right or wrong with little room for much thought in between through standardized testing.
ReplyDeleteWhen students get to college and professors allow them the freedom to have some say in the class, they act like the children of overbearing parents who never let them make decisions on their own and have no idea what do, as they expect someone to always tell them what to do and just react accordingly.
Instead of jamming a bunch of information into students heads, primary and secondary education needs to do a better job of promoting a creative environment where students are encouraged to theorize and not just memorize.
Students need to be encouraged to take a more proactive approach to their education and not just wait for the education to come to them. Too many students are perfectly fine writing down as many notes as they can and not say a word in class because they are conditioned that they need to know as much as they can and what they have to say is not nearly as important.
Educators at all levels need to emphasize the importance of students taking ownership in their education. Education needs to be a want to, but unfortunately because of the importance placed on testing, school and learning is more of a have to for students, which hinders analytical thought.
By allowing students to have a say in their education, educators are helping school become something students want to do which will lead to more engaged students, increasing overall knowledge on a subject and analytical thought at the same time.
I don't mean to intrude into this private conversation, but not long ago Abhay and I were talking about some of these very issues and he directed me to this post. (Professor Thomas then invited me to comment.)
ReplyDeleteI have three kids in elementary school in Iowa City, and I have been continually amazed at how much effort the school puts into teaching the kids to be quiet and obedient, and how little effort is directed toward encouraging them to show initiative, to be skeptical toward received ideas, to develop their own moral compasses, and just to ask good questions. If you want your kids to be quiet and obedient little worker bees who won't rock the boat, these are the schools for you.
I don't mean to single out Iowa City. My sense is that this is the trend everywhere. Schools have probably always overemphasized obedience and passivity, but No Child Left Behind seems almost purposely designed to aggravate that tendency. Maximizing standardized test scores means, in effect, minimizing any effort directed at untestable qualities -- some of which, in my opinion, are far more important than one's ability to, say, divide by fractions.
Anyway, I just wanted to chime in to testify in support of Prof. Thomas's suggestion that students might be "so accustomed to 'following orders' that they find themselves mindlessly going through the motions rather than actively asserting that part of their character that we know of as the 'autonomous' state of mind." That result would certainly be consistent with what I am seeing in our elementary schools.
I would add that I couldn't agree more with everything that Joe Muldoon has said above. The idea that real education has to be a "want to" rather than a "have to" seems like only common sense, yet couldn't be further from the motivating assumptions of virtually all educational policy today.
Sorry to ramble on. Anyone who wants to read more ranting of this kind can find it at my blog, which I started solely for the purpose of venting about this issue (and with little hope of achieving anything else). Virtually all the posts relate to this topic, though this one, this one, this one, this one, and this one are particularly relevant.