[Olpc-open] Sorry, what are we teaching? How?

[Edward Cherlin]

On Thu, May 15, 2008 at 5:08 AM, Dave Crossland <dave at lab6.com> wrote:
> Hi Edward!

Hi, and thanks. Your post below has been the most informative so far
for me. I'm going to transfer most of it to the Wiki, if you approve.

However, I think that you are taking too narrow a view of the issues
facing us. Sugar is far more Constructionist than any other software.
It will have many of its intended effects whether or not teachers,
administrators, or government officials know that that is what is
happening. It will have other effects that we do not know about yet.
Gutenberg had no thought of supporting the Renaissance, the
Reformation, the Scientific Revolution, or anything else that followed
from printing. He wanted to print Bibles and other books that had been
written by hand before, in expensive editions for those who were
already buying books, mostly in the Church. Nobody knew that Aldus
Manutius, Martin Luther, and Galileo Galilei were coming, or any of
the others, nor what convulsions their productions would inspire.

But Sugar can have even greater effects as we develop it further,
depending on the ideas that bubble up in these very conversations and
others in our rapidly growing community. In particular, I propose that
we create the Constructionist curriculum for teachers' colleges. Peru
has one, and I would like to see their textbooks and have a community
critique of them. Making, sharing, getting feedback, and improving is
much of the Constructionist program, so let's have at it.

> 2008/5/14 Edward Cherlin <echerlin at gmail.com>:
>>
>> Constructionism means at least two different things.
>>
>> * One is how the learner constructs knowledge and understanding. This
>> is universal, and doesn't depend on a teaching technique. But
>> understanding how people learn suggests how to teach more effectively.
>>
>> * The second is that people learn better by doing and making,
>> particularly collaborative public creation, rather than by theory,
>> lectures, and book learning. But not any of these to the exclusion of
>> the others.
>
> I don't mean to be rude, but I think you are confusing Constructivism,
> which was proposed by Piaget -
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_(learning_theory) - with
> Constructionism, which was proposed by Papert -
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructionism_(learning_theory) :-)

I was trying to simplify the account, on the basis that
Constructionism includes Constructivism as a foundation, and then
applies it particularly to learning on a computer.

> Here's that confusion of Constructivist and Constructionist made very clear:
>
>> my mother studied Piaget in
>> her college days, majoring in Child Development, and often talked
>> about him and other Constructivist pioneers.
>>
>> The Constructionist point of view says
>
> :-)

No, that was a deliberate change of topic, from Piaget and
Constructivism, to Papert's Constructionism.

>> The biggest question is how to deal with the culture clash that
>> Constructionism inherently creates. Conventional education treats a
>> great deal of the dominant culture simply as given, and not to be
>> questioned. Constructionism requires behaviors that are not valued in
>> many cultures, such as speaking up with new ideas, or criticizing
>> received wisdom.
>>
>> What do you think, Sirs?
>
> Quickly:
>
> You are correct to point out the clash between school and education.
> OLPC has failed to challenge Prussian schooling directly, so it should
> fall back to providing laptops and unrestricted internet access and
> let the medium be the message.

We have much more to discuss before we attempt to come to any
conclusions. I and no doubt others would like to hear your suggestions
for putting more Constructionism into the XO, and re-educating
teachers, administrators, an Ministry officials. I have more to make,
when I see that enough of us have some common ground for what we are
trying to talk about.

> In depth:
>
> I think its important to distinguish between education and schooling :-)
>
> Constructionism is synonymous with education, and conventional
> _schooling_ - Prussian schooling, accurately named - inhibits
> education. I'd define education as "teaching the way children learn."
> Prussian schools do not teach the way children learn, and nor are they
> supposed to.
>
> Probably few are familiar with this reference to Prussia, but Prussian
> schooling is central to the history of the thing. John Taylor Gatto
> wrote a brief introduction for Harpers in 2003, online at
> http://www.spinninglobe.net/againstschool.htm and  summarised the 6
> functions of Prussian schooling as explained by Alexander Inglis in
> his 1918 book, "Principles of Secondary Education":
>
> -- 8< --
>    1) The adjustive or adaptive  function. Schools are to establish
> fixed habits of reaction to authority. This, of course, precludes
> critical judgment completely. It also pretty much destroys the idea
> that useful or interesting material should be taught, because you
> can't test for reflexive obedience until you know whether you can make
> kids learn, and do, foolish and boring things.
>
>    2) The integrating function. This might well be called "the
> conformity function," because its intention is to make children as
> alike as possible. People who conform are predictable, and this is of
> great use to those who wish to harness and manipulate a large labor
> force.
>
>    3) The diagnostic and directive function. School is meant to
> determine each student's proper social role. This is done by logging
> evidence mathematically and anecdotally on cumulative records. As in
> "your permanent record." Yes, you do have one.
>
>    4) The differentiating function. Once their social role has been
> "diagnosed," children are to be sorted by role and trained only so far
> as their destination in the social machine merits - and not one step
> further. So much for making kids their personal best.
>
>    5) The selective function. This refers not to human choice at all
> but to Darwin's theory of natural selection as applied to what he
> called "the favored races." In short, the idea is to help things along
> by consciously attempting to improve the breeding stock. Schools are
> meant to tag the unfit - with poor grades, remedial placement, and
> other punishments - clearly enough that their peers will accept them
> as inferior and effectively bar them from the reproductive
> sweepstakes. That's what all those little humiliations from first
> grade onward were intended to do: wash the dirt down the drain.
>
>    6) The propaedeutic function. The societal system implied by these
> rules will require an elite group of caretakers. To that end, a small
> fraction of the kids will quietly be taught how to manage this
> continuing project, how to watch over and control a population
> deliberately dumbed down and declawed in order that government might
> proceed unchallenged and corporations might never want for obedient
> labor.
> -- 8< --
>
> I tracked down this book and have posted scans at
> http://dave.lab6.com/acid/dump/2008/innis/ if you want to check the
> original text.
>
> Gatto has made a full explanation of this in his 300,000 word book,
> "Underground History of American Education," online in full at
> www.johntaylorgatto.com/chapters/
>
>
> So, what can be done about the contradiction between schooling and education?
>
> Sell OLPC to the Prussian school systems was either going to be done
> overtly, only selling to school systems already wanting to throw out
> the Prussian model, or covertly, selling to Prussian schools and
> hoping they woudn't realise what was happening until too late. OLPC
> until a few months ago was taking the former route, and unsuprisingly
> there are only 500,000 kids in such school systems.
>
> Are Negroponte's new plans for OLPC going to uproot Prussian schooling
> covertly, or are they going to reinforce Prussian school methods?
>
> IMO Negroponte has never seriously challenged the principles of
> secondary education that Innis outlines, and the way that the MIT
> Media Lab runs is the same as all other technical universities and the
> same as Prussian universities ran: Serving corporations and state
> first, learners second. Mario Savio knew the deal.
>
> The reason that http://medialabeurope.org/ failed is that the
> corporations that were funding it, and were meant to get early access
> to the innovation being incubated there, realised that any kid with a
> laptop and internet access was capable of the same innovation, and
> there was no point paying Negroponte for doing something that had
> become as common as dirt in the developed world.
>
> I think McLuhan's ideas of media determinism are spot on; I think its
> most important to get kids laptops and internet access, which in
> itself creates a constructionist environment, and worry about the
> details later.
>
> Details like taking a hammer to Prussian schooling and proprietary
> software are not small, but I think if we get 5 million kids laptops
> and internet access without overt constructionism and free software,
> instead of 0.5 million with those things, in 10 years time we'll have
> many more supporters than we do right now to do "right."
>
> I wonder if things would be different if Papert was alive,

Greatly exaggerated, as the saying goes. I hear that he has health
issues at age 80, but he's on some of the mailing lists, and writing
essays that get onto the Wiki from time to time.

> because he
> had succeeded at chipping away at Prussian schooling before, afterall
> - I was taught Logo in my math classes as an 8 year old, 12 year old
> and 15 year old (I'm now a 25 year old British guy.)
>
> But I was given computers with proprietary software (eg, the Logo I
> used was proprietary) and then I was given internet access, and then I
> learned about a free society and free software, and defenestrated my
> computers and am helping my friends do the same. I speak up with new
> ideas and criticize received wisdom.
>
> So I think OLPC has to forget about challenging Prussian schooling and
> give up on overt Constructionism, like it has given up on overt free
> software, and let the medium be the message :-)
>
> --
> Regards,
> Dave

-- 
Edward Cherlin
End Poverty at a Profit by teaching children business
http://www.EarthTreasury.org/
"The best way to predict the future is to invent it."--Alan Kay