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Poem: Mummy Slept Late and Daddy Fixed Breakfast, by John Ciardi 

If you liked this Ciardi poem, you may enjoy his book on poetry, How Does a Poem Mean. 

Statement of the Whole: How does a teacher balance careful planning with wise use of the rabbit trail?  If you over plan you stand to be very frustrated, but the same can be said for under-planning.  What is the balance?  Jason and Steve run with a quote from Jack London down the path of Goldilocks to find the size of planning that fits the classroom just right. 

Quote from Jack London’s The Road to start our episdoe: 

“[The railroad tramp] has learned the futility of telic endeavor, and knows the delight of drifting along with the whimsicalities of Chance.”

Jack London, The Road

Steve first discovered this term and its counterpart, paratelic, in psychology class.  It is prominent in a modern view called Reversal Theory, which has as a major idea the notion that modern man is too consumed with goals and plans, and should play more.  “The two states in the first pair are called “Telic” (or “Serious”) and “Paratelic” (or “Playful”) and refer to whether one is motivated by achievement and future goals, or the enjoyment of process in the moment.” (Wikipedia article on Reversal Theory) 

One helpful work referenced in this episode, which is getting its own episode, is Joseph Pieper’s Leisure: The Basis of Culture. 

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Poem:  “The Naming of Cats” by T.S. Eliot, if you like, here Eliot reads it himself

Statement of the Whole: Jerome Bruner said, “Any subject can be taught effectively in some intellectually honest form to any child at any stage of development.”  Is this true?  If it is, how does this work?  Anything or just some things?  Steve and Jason have fun discussing this statement for half an hour.

1. The stated position — Jerome Bruner: “Any subject can be taught effectively in some intellectually honest form to any child at any stage of development.” (Rose, p. 142)
2. What it is arguing against: Modern Overly Air Tight Developmental Theory
   1. Are certain subjects only appropriate at certain ages?
   2. Or can, as Bruner states, any child learn anything?
   3. Many today believe strongly in “age appropriate” learning, but don’t we hide behind the “developmentally ready” words because what is really happening is that we have not yet developed our own minds as teachers to be able to give a clear simple straightforward “even a little kid can get it” explanation of whatever we are thinking about. 
   4. Simple is not the same as dumb; often it is indicative of much hard and deep thinking that resulted in a clarity unknown to the novice.
   5. The key here is the phrase, “intellectually honest form”
      1. We must, as teachers, reduce the temptation to “dumb down” an idea. 
      2. When we do this, it short circuits the students’ thinking and growth.
      3. While dumbing it down provides for no pain of learning, but there is also no pleasure, no celebration.
3. What it is not arguing
   1. It is not arguing against real maturity – a more mature mind can learn things more deeply
   2. It is not arguing against the need for layer learning – the same item may need revisiting regularly throughout a student’s life – you don’t learn life in one lesson.
4. How does this work?  How do we call students to higher learning from where they are?
   1. Recounting conversations from faculty development/joking around to students, bringing them into a conversation they can’t fully grasp, but can enter only partially into.
   2. Break it down to the characters. Who are they? What are they doing? Limit them to one sentence each.  Simplifying is not dishonest.
   3. Images help. Classic example: Raphael’s School of Athens.
   4. Write out on the chalkboard a thesis as it develops. When you introduce something new, when a student uncovers something good that must be included, add to it, so they see it literally fitting in.
   5. Maybe the same as “d” but consider building what Steve calls “classroom doodles” which are documents started for a given discussion, put up on the monitor, and we thus can build across multiple days a map of our discussion without it getting erased after class.  Often this becomes the “notes” of a humanities class.

Concluding Thought:  Do we justify our pursuit of the “objective” piecemeal, fact-focused teaching and testing not because our student’s age demands it but because we fear the failure of our students?  We “dumb it down so as to not let them fail. Unfortunately, if they can’t fail, they can’t succeed! So don’t do that.

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Reading: “To Be, or Not to Be?” by William Shakespeare

The slowly creaking door episode

Statement of the Whole:  Many discussions and arguments about education seem to come from a place of fear.  Nowhere is this more obvious than with parents.  In this episode, Jason and Steve consider when fear is good, when it is bad, what can be done about it, and how to rise above fear to a place of peace and rest in the classroom.

1. What Should School Produce in its students?
   1. Joy
   2. But there is a lot of fear these days
      1. Grades
      2. Get into college
      3. Relationships
      4. “Succeed”
   3. While there is a fear that leads to wisdom, illegitimate and debilitating fears should be overcome in education
2. How are schools agents of fear?
3. Fear is a very personal thing: each of us should examine ourselves, and if we find fear, we should seek to drive it out of our lives

Closing Thought:  The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.  Be at leisure and know God.