From: Jose Anguiano
Email: anguiano@cats.ucsc.edu
Course: Psychology 100K
College: UCSC
Instructor: Eugene Matusov
ClassWeb: http://ematusov.com/psych100K
ChildrenObservations: No
Date: 22 May 1997
Time: 03:16:18
Remote Name: mingong-mac-12.ucsc.edu
What is learning? Where and how does it happen? How can it be improved? What types of things should we teach our children? These can be very involved questions to which may only have subjectively biased answers. To ask anyone to answer these questions definitively, would be expecting too much.
I hear, and I forget; I see, and I remember; I do, and I understand.
(This is an old saying attributed to the philosopher Confucius).
The focus of this paper is to explore a few different ideas on teaching and learning, and to attempt to come to some approximate resolution as to how we can go about educating all kids. The main emphasis here is on the difference between two radically different teaching approaches: “traditional” schooling contrasted to holistic teaching. I strongly believe that we can educate all children regardless of class, race, gender or other “man-made”, synthetic, artificial ideas. I believe that all children can learn from a genuinely loving and caring person. In this paper I propose the concept of EQ, to me this term of EQ simply is another way of saying the word love. Love can mean many things, but for the purposes of this paper I define it as: trying your best, exercising extreme patience, being disciplined, staying positive, and sharing and giving of yourself to others. To me a teacher must feel love, should give love to her students, and love himself. This type of loving person should be the only kind trusted to teach, influence, and guide our children whether they be: black, yellow, red, or white.
I will rely heavily on Ralph Peterson’s ideas on “traditional” education. He makes very profound observations and summarizes key points in an optimal manner. Therefore, I will include many of his quotes throughout the remainder of this paper. I think that these thoughts could not be articulated much better or more eloquently. Peterson makes several distinctions between the two educational ideologies, the dominate “traditional” approach contrasted a the more humanistic method of instruction or the holistic method. He list several differences between both approaches. I will only briefly touch on one:
According to Peterson is a variable considered by traditional teachers where “cognition (is) emphasized”. (Peterson, 1992: 8) What I will call IQ based, and revolving around: cognition, memory, recognition, and rationalizing exercises. IQ being “mind”.
Characteristics of the holistic method, again according to Peterson are where “social, emotional, and cognition are important.” (Peterson, 1992: 8) What I will claim as including both IQ and EQ. EQ being “body”. So that Holistic education would incorporate both mind and body, a more connected, cohesive, interrelated whole.
Peterson makes several distinctions between the above two concepts, here he is criticizing “traditional” teaching for its narrow view:
Unfortunately, strict traditional teaching has neglected a very important dimension of the way our minds work. People are meaning makers; we seek order and draw on images and feelings as well as thoughts. Our minds are not built to be only logical; intuition and the arts are also ways of knowing. (Peterson, 1992: 5)
Peterson goes on to describe some of these other ways of knowing,
All people are dependent upon tactic knowing, emotional knowing, intuitive knowing, body knowing, and not merely rational knowing. Teaching that is intended to enhance the intellect is strengthened by recognizing this, not weakened. (Peterson, 1992: 139)
Peterson then describes the benefit of holistic teaching, more a stinging criticism of the “usual” way we have gone about educating:
Holistic teaching is an alternative to teaching that makes a “mind” project of students, fragmenting learning and separating the head and the heart. It is an alternative to studying content chopped into basic skills and assembled for delivery to passive minds. In traditional education talk is about skills, sub-skills, and skill mastery, never heart, trust, faith, belief, and feeling. Students are . . judged for mastery and remedied as prescribed. (Peterson, 1992: 137)
It is evident that Ralph Peterson is not a fan of the past practices of instruction. He laments an educational system that has failed many of our youth to be failing. He prefers the more positive alternative holistic of teaching. He advises educators to move towards this more well rounded, collaborative, community model type of classroom. He also calls for teachers to focus more on doing than on simply reading, for teachers not to overlook the knowledge and contributions students already possess, and which they may be able to share (this know-how) through social activities with other students:
We stick to the books, restricting what happens in the classroom to the curriculum (this) tells students that their lived experiences do not count . . . This narrow focus denies the importance of caring and the contributions social relationships can make to learning. (Peterson, 1992: 48)
Although Peterson’s attacks on our currently dominate philosophy towards schooling are very powerful, one of the strongest attacks on our educational system, came from two inner city gang organizations criticizing the quality of education received by the children in Los Angeles. They wrote an article with a list of several demands after the “Rodney King Riot”. It was a cooperative plan between the “Bloods and Crips” previously two major rivals. It states, “with traditional teaching methods we may become encumbered by years of conforming education and bureaucratic regimentation.” (July 1992)
I interpret this quote to mean that some people are tired of receiving an education whose sole goal, it seems, is to socialize and to control; an education that imposes its hegemonic cultural values and standards on others. Maybe what these people want is an education that is more personal and less cluttered by paperwork, rules and regulations. Perhaps an education that is sincerely diverse, culturally competent, and that stimulates and engages youth no matter how severe their conditions of poverty and oppression. A more holistic approach to education would perhaps appeal to many who are turned off by “the same old story”, a story they may not be able to relate to.
Peterson also provides us with his opinion about what schooling should be:
In education it is ever so easy to focus on what it is a student does not know. What counts, however, is what the student does know, for you cannot build on what is not there . . Describing students by labeling them “culturally disadvantaged” or “children at risk” amounts to judging others by what it is they don’t have, don’t know, and don’t do. And who is to set the standards and do the judging? Whose culture is the correct culture? (Peterson, 1992: 82)
I continue to ask questions as well: Why should we accept the European notion of intelligence? On a grander scale, what is intelligence? Is it intelligent to build bombs? Is it exploiting the earth for its “natural resources” and human beings for their labor? Is it committing acts genocide, holocaust, and massacres; which has lead to colonization, imperialism, and neo-colonialism? Is it intelligent to establish an academy of hate that propagates a cycle of hate (i.e. scientific racism, “survival of the fittest”, “culture of poverty”, and distrust of the “dangerous classes”)?
If sociobiology, (the “impulses of sex and aggression”) the passing of our genes to future generations is so important to us, continued life through our children, then does it not make more sense to live forever, for thousands or millions of years instead of just 100 or 300 hundred more years? Finally, is it “intelligent”, responsible, or noble to impose our ideas, culture, language, and egocentric worldview on people from different languages, cultures, ideas, and points of view? Should our socioeconomic wants restrict others of their knowledge of self, livelihood, or other basic human needs? Does being “intelligent” entitle one to rob, cheat, and steal from whom ever we please, and then to cover up, hide, rationalize and justify doing all this?
To get back to the issue of IQ. and EQ. As I mentioned previously, I would characterize “traditional” schooling as solely concerned with IQ, whereas holistic schooling incorporates both IQ and EQ. I would call for a more balanced theory on teaching. An approach that also incorporates caring and loving, on life skills, as well as technical skills needed for employment. Russell describes one possible motives for continuing to focus on IQ and not on teaching EQ:
" . . . it may cost a heck of a lot more money (also time, energy, effort, and skill) to assess someone’s EQ rather than using a machine-score test to measure IQ, but if we don’t, then we are saying that a test score is more important to us than who a child is as a human being. That means an immense loss in terms of human potential because we’ve defined success too narrowly." (Russell, 1995: ?)
These criticisms call for instruction that moves away from simplistic memorization strategies. They call for more practical skills as part of learning. Learning life skills for example, such as emotional intelligence. EQ is such things as being able to assess behavior of others, being aware of our environment, being in tune with our own feelings, and being able to get along well with others. The consensus seems to be to create a more harmonious method of teaching and learning; here students are motivated to learn, and teachers seek to fulfill their students interests. Says Daniel Goleman on the rational for emotional intelligence:
. . . the good news about childhood is that its a wonderful palette to work with. It may look like its been painted on, but you can keep painting and eventually children can learn healthier emotional responses. The literature on resilient children, those who have grown up in the worst circumstances and yet thrived, shows that what made the difference wasn’t the terrible circumstances of their chaotic home life, but the fact that one caring adult got involved in their lives and helped them out. (O’Neil, September 1996)
I believe we can educate all children regardless of their “differences”. In our quest to reach higher levels of consciousness (utopia, “heaven on earth”), we are going to need to make fundamental changes in terms of how we treat and think about “others”. Teachers should have their top goal to help develop young healthy minds. The definition of an educator should be somebody who loves and cares for children. I would like to conclude by asking, what is keeping us from practicing the ideal? Once again I will depend on Ralph Peterson who provides us with another strong argument to consider:
We were, in the same sense as goslings and ducklings, “imprinted.” It is no wonder that teachers have a hard time and that parents and policy makers find it difficult to support change. We belong to schooling traditions more than they belong to us. Even when we become convinced that traditional ways don’t always work, change is difficult, in part because traditional practices and materials are supported by policies and procedures that mandate their use. Developers of commercial materials have lobbied to make sure it works that way. . . Education is big-money business, . . it’s a political business too. (Peterson, 1992: 8; emphasis mine J.A.)
References
“Bloods and Crips: plan to rebuild Los Angeles”, Z magazine, July 1992.
“On Emotional Intelligence; A conversation with Daniel Goleman”, Educational Leadership, Volume 54, September 1996.
Peterson, R., “Life in a Crowded Place: Making a Learning Community”, Heineman, Portsmouth, NH, 1992.
Russell, G., “What’s your EQ”, Time, October 2, 1995.