ECS 210
How to be a "good student"7/14/2020 In today's education, teachers are to follow the curriculum and hit every indicator. A teachers job is to "fill the glass with certain things" which is stated by Kumashiro in Against common sense. This means that teachers jobs are just to teach the curriculum and students should be learning only about what schools teach.
Being a good student means that they follow the directions of the teacher, they come into the school year with little knowledge but leave at the end with every indicator from the curriculum learnt, they sit quietly and do their work, they listen attentively, they have good communication skills, they only speak when directed to and most importantly they learn how schools want them to learn. This is how common sense affects what makes a good student, teachers love to have control over the classroom as this looks good to society and the school. Having control over the classroom allows the students to learn the desired learning outcomes, well that's what we are led to believe but some students learn in ways that aren't seen as following the direction of the teacher. As a teacher we need to have an understanding that students learn in different ways and have different societal factors that affect students learning. I know from my experience working at a daycare, it can be frustrating when students don't do exactly what they are told, but everyone learns differently and we need to respect that. Take a deep breath and remember when you were learning things for the first time, maybe recently or in younger years. Let students learn in whatever way they please, as long as the student is learning is it really that important how they are learning. The students who are privileged by the definition of a good student in terms of common sense, will be the ones who succeed throughout their education and then into later areas of their lives. They will get a good job because they had the support needed around their learning. The students who are privileged by this are the ones who learn how society views a student should learn, an eager student who asks questions when instructed to and follows the directions of the teacher. These are many different students, but in Canada I would say the majority are white Canadian citizens who grew up in Canada, because they grew up following the common sense of Canada. This doesn't have to be white students though, because as long as a student follows these guidelines they are considered a good student in the eyes of society. A "good" student is shaped by historical factors because common sense may change after certain historical factors or even just after years. Our ideas change as we grow about the world and everything included in the world, this means that our common sense will change. Right now our common sense is oppressive but if we keep learning and educating others we can work to fix our common sense, and evolve the definition of a 'good student'.
2 Comments
Katia Hildebrandt
7/26/2020 11:13:39 pm
Meagan - it's interesting that you write that teachers love to have control over their classrooms. I wonder if it's less that teachers love this, and more that the product model of curriculum necessitates this type of learning environment, and also that teachers feel pressure to conform to society's understanding of the good student, even if they would prefer to do things differently in their classrooms. However, I think this perceived need for control in the classroom tells us how deeply the commonsense is ingrained in our minds!
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Hi Meagan,
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